Moff JER Chapter 13

◄ JER 13 ► ║ ©

13 This is what the Eternal said to me: “Go and get a linen waist-cloth, and wrap it round your waist; do not steep it in water.” 2 So I got a waist-cloth, as the Eternal had told me, and I put it on. 3 A second time the Eternal’s word came to me, saying, 4 “Take that waist-cloth you bought, the waist-cloth round your waist, and go away and hide it at Parah in a crevice of the rock.” 5 So I went and buried it at Parah as the Eternal had ordered me. 6 Many days afterwards the Eternal said to me, “Go to Parah and fetch the waist-cloth which I ordered you to bury there.” 7 So I went to Parah and unearthed the waist-cloth from the place where I had buried it. And the waist-cloth was spoiled, quite useless! 8 Then the word of the Eternal came to me saying, “Hereby the Eternal declares: 9 So will I spoil the pride of Judah and the vast pride of Jerusalem. 10 This evil people, who will not listen to my words, who follow their own stubborn mind and go after foreign gods to serve and worship them—they are to become quite useless, like this waist-cloth. 11 For I meant the whole house of Judah and the whole house of Israel to hold fast to me, says the Eternal, close as a waist-cloth round a man’s waist, to be a people for me, a source of renown, of praise and honour to me; but they would not listen to me. 12 You shall give them this word, straight from the Eternal, the God of Israel: ‘Every jar must be filled with wine.’ If they answer, ‘Do we not know that?’ 13 then you must tell them straight from the Eternal: ‘I will fill all the dwellers in this land, the kings on David’s throne, priests, prophets, all the citizens of Jerusalem, fill them till they are drunk, 14 and dash them one against another, father and son together (so the Eternal declares); I will have no mercy, I will not spare, I will have no pity, till I destroy them.’ ” * * *

Listen—it is the Eternal speaking--

be not too proud to hearken;

do honour to the Eternal, to your God,

before the darkness falls,

before your footsteps stumble

on the twilight hills,

before the gleam you look for turns

to dense, dead gloom.

If you will not listen,

then I must weep in secret for your pride,

mine eyes streaming with tears,

for the Eternal’s flock borne off to exile.

Say to the king, say to the queen-mother,

“Sit low, low down;

for from your heads has dropped

your glorious crown.”

The towns in the south are hemmed in,

none can raise the siege;

Judah is all swept away,

swept into exile.

Jerusalem, lift up your eyes and look,

see who are on you from the north!

Where is the flock entrusted to your charge,

that flock so fair?

What will you say when you feel the sway

of those you trained as allies?

Shall not anguish seize you,

like the throes of a woman in labour?

And if you say to yourself,

“Why ever has this befallen me--

it is for a host of sins

that you are exposed and stripped.

Can a negro change his skin?

Can a leopard change his spots?

As soon can you do right,

so accustomed to do wrong!

I will scatter you like straw,

driven by a desert wind;

such is the lot I deal to you,

your destiny,

because you have forgotten me, says the Eternal,

and relied on what was false.

I will lift your skirt high

and expose you naked,

for your adulteries, your lustful cries,

your vice so foul.

Yes, on the open hills

your lewdness have I seen!

Woe betide you, Jerusalem!

Will you ever be clean?

◄ JER 13 ► ║ ©

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