16 And you, Yirmeyah, don’t pray on behalf of this group of people, and don’t cry out for help, or pray for them, or petition me about them, because I won’t listen to you. 17 Don’t you see what they do in Yehudah’s (Judah’s) cities and in Yerushalem’s (Jerusalem’s) streets? 18 The sons are gathering firewood, and the fathers are kindling the fire, and the women are kneading dough to make cakes for ‘the queen of the heavens’ and pouring out drink offerings for other gods so as to provoke me to anger.[ref] 19 Yahweh declares that it’s not me they’re provoking, but rather it’s themselves that they’re hurting to their own shame. 20 So my master Yahweh, says this: “Listen, my anger and rage will gush out onto this place—onto people and animals, and trees in the countryside and crops in the ground. It will burn and not be extinguished.”

21 Yisrael’s god, Commander-in-chief Yahweh says: “Instead of wasting time burning up your sacrifices, just eat the meat yourselves, 22 because on the day when I brought your ancestors out from Egypt, I didn’t immediately give them orders about burnt offerings and sacrifices. 23 What I told them was, ‘Listen to my voice, and I’ll be your god, and you all will be my people. Follow all the instructions that I’ll give you so that everything will go well for you all.’ 24 But they didn’t turn their heads towards him and listen, and they enacted schemes from the stubbornness of their own evil hearts—going backwards instead of forwards 25 from the day that their ancestors left Egypt even until today. Then I sent my servants the prophets to you all—rising early each day and sending them. 26 However, they didn’t listen to me, and they stiffened their necks and turned their heads—doing even more evil than their ancestors.

27 So pass all these messages on to them, even though they won’t listen to you.

You’ll call to them, but they won’t answer you. 28 Tell them that this is a nation that doesn’t listen to the voice of its god Yahweh, and doesn’t accept discipline.