Open English Translation JER Chapter 22

22 Yahweh told me to go down to Yehudah’s (Judah) palace and proclaim this message: 2 Listen to Yahweh’s message for Yehudah’s king who sits on David’s throne, along with your officials and your people who enter these doorways. 3 Yahweh says that you must administer justice and do what’s right. Rescue anyone who’s been robbed, from their oppressor. Don’t mistreat any foreigner or orphan or widow. Don’t be violent, and don’t shed innocent blood in this place, 4 because if you carefully do those things, then the kings who sit on David’s throne will enter through the gates of this palace riding in chariots or on horses, along with their officials and their people. 5 However, if you take no notice of those instructions, then Yahweh solemnly promises that this palace will become a pile of rubble,[ref] 6 because this is what Yahweh says about the palace of Yehudah’s king:

To me, you’re like the Gilead forests or like Levanon’s summit.

However, I’ll make you into a wilderness—

cities that aren’t inhabited.

7 I’ll appoint destroyers against you—

each warrior with his weapons.

They’ll cut down your choicest cedars

and throw them onto the fire.

8 Then many nations will pass by this city and ask each other why Yahweh has done that to this great city? 9 Someone else will answer that it’s because they abandoned the agreement with their god Yahweh, and bowed down to their gods and served them.

10 Don’t weep for King Yoshiyah (Josiah) who was killed

≈ and don’t mourn because he died.

Instead, weep bitterly for his son, King Yehoahaz who’s about to be exiled

because he won’t return again and see his native land again.

11 Yes, Yahweh says this about Yoshiyah’s son Yehoahaz[fn] who reigned instead of his father, who then left this place. He won’t return there again[ref] 12 because he’ll die in the place where they took him into exile, and he won’t ever see this country again.

13 The king[fn] who built his house by doing what’s not right

≈ and built his upper rooms by unjustly forcing people to work,

→ won’t end well.

He forced the citizens to work without getting paid—

≈ not giving them their wages.

14 He’d decided to build himself a large house with spacious upper rooms,

so he cut out large windows for it, and panelled it with cedar,

and painted it with red ochre.

15 Does having the best cedar make you a better king?

Didn’t your father Yoshiyah (Josiah) eat and drink well?

However, he administered justice and did what was right

→ so things went well for him.

16 He took up the cause of the poor and needy,

→ so things went well for him.

Yahweh declares that that’s what it means to know me,

17 but your desires and motives are only focused on your dishonest gain,

on shedding innocent blood,

and on oppression and practicing extortion.

18 Therefore this is what Yahweh says about Yehoyakim, son of Yehudah’s (Judah) King Yoshiyah (Josiah):[ref]

They won’t mourn for him saying, ‘Oh no, my brother! Oh no, my sister!’

≈ They won’t mourn for him saying, ‘Oh no, my master! Oh no, his splendour!’

19 He’ll be buried just like a donkey would be—

dragged away and thrown somewhere outside Yerushalem’s (Jerusalem) gates.

20 You people of Yehudah (Judah), go up to Levanon and cry out.

Shout in the Bashan region.

Cry out from the Avarim mountains,

because all your ‘lovers’ have been destroyed.

21 I warned you when you were still secure—

you said that you wouldn’t listen.

That’s been your way since your youth,

that you haven’t taken any notice of my instructions.

22 The wind will drive away all your ‘shepherds’,

and your ‘lovers’ will go into captivity.

Then you’ll be ashamed and humiliated because of all your wickedness.

23 You who live in Levanon,

nested there among the cedars,

but how you’ll groan when your labour pains come to you,

like a woman giving birth.

24 Yahweh declares by his life:

Even if you, Yehoyakin,[fn][ref] son of Yehudah’s (Judah) King Yehoyakim, were the signet ring on my right hand, I would tear you off 25 because I’m handing you over to the ones who are wanting to kill you and to those that you’re afraid of—to Babylonian King Nevukadnetsar (Nebuchadnezzar) and his Kasdim (Chaldeans). 26 I’ll hurl you and your mother who bore you, into another land—a country where you’re both foreigners and you’ll both die there. 27 Although they’ll long to return to this land, they’ll never return here.

28 Is this man Yehoyakin a despised, shattered pot—

≈ a jar that no one wants

Why will before hurled out along with his descendants,

and thrown into a country that they’re not familiar with?

29 Land, land, land, Listen to Yahweh’s message.

30 Yahweh says this:

Record this man as being childless—

a man who won’t prosper in his lifetime.

None of his descendants will prosper

to sit on David’s throne

or to rule over Yehudah (Judah) again.