JER C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 C10 C11 C12 C13 C14 C15 C16 C17 C18 C19 C20 C21 C22 C23 C24 C25 C26 C27 C28 C29 C30 C31 C32 C33 C34 C35 C36 C37 C38 C39 C40 C41 C42 C43 C44 C45 C46 C47 C48 C49 C50 C51 C52

ULT JER Chapter 3

◄ JER 3 ► ║ ©

3 Saying, “If a man sends away his wife

and she goes from him and becomes another man’s,

will he return to her again?

Would that land not be greatly polluted?

And you have been a prostitute with many lovers

and would you return to me?

—the declaration of Yahweh.

2 Lift up your eyes to the barren heights and see!

Where have you not been ravished?

By the roads you sat for them,

as an Arab in the wilderness.

And you have polluted the land

with your prostitution and with your evil.

3 So the showers have been withheld

and the late rains have not been;

yet you have the forehead of a prostitute woman;

you refuse to be embarrassed.

4 Have you not from now called to me:[fn]

‘My father! You are a close friend of my youth!

5 Will he guard forever?

Or will he keep watch to eternity?’

Behold, you have spoken, [fn]

but you do the evils as you can!”

6 Then Yahweh said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Do you see what apostate Israel has done? She herself has walked up every high hill and to underneath every leafy tree, and she has been a prostitute there. 7 And I said, ‘After her doing all these, she will return to me,’ but she did not return. Then her treacherous sister Judah saw. 8 So I saw that because of all circumstances where apostate Israel had committed adultery, I had sent her away and had given a scroll of her divorce to her. But her sister Judah, acting treacherously, did not fear, and she went out, and she herself also prostituted. 9 And her prostitution was from thoughtlessness. And she defiled the land, and committed adultery with the stone and the tree. 10 And even in all of this, her treacherous sister Judah has not returned to me with all her heart, but with a lie—the declaration of Yahweh.”

11 Then Yahweh said to me, “Apostate Israel has shown her spirit to be righteous more than Judah acting treacherously! 12 Go and proclaim these words to the north and say,

‘Return, apostate Israel!—the declaration of Yahweh—

I shall not cause my face to fall against you.

Since I am faithful—the declaration of Yahweh—

I shall not keep forever.

13 Only, know your iniquity,

for you have transgressed against Yahweh your God,

and you have spread your ways to strangers

under every leafy tree,

and to my voice you did not listen

—the declaration of Yahweh.

14 Turn back, apostatizing sons!—the declaration of Yahweh—for I myself am your husband, and I shall take you, one from a city and two from a clan, and I shall bring you to Zion! 15 Then I shall give you shepherds according to my heart, and they will shepherd you with knowledge and insight. 16 And it will happen that you will increase and be fruitful in the land in those days—the declaration of Yahweh—they will no longer say, “The Box of the Covenant of Yahweh!” And it will not come up in heart, and they will not remember it. And they will not miss it, and another will not be made.’ 17 In that time they will call to Jerusalem, ‘the throne of Yahweh,’ and all the nations will gather to her—to the name of Yahweh, to Jerusalem. And they will no longer walk after the stubbornness of their evil heart. 18 In those days, the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel. And they will come together from the land of the north to the land that I caused your fathers to inherit.

19 And I myself said,

‘How I would set you among sons

and give to you a pleasant land,

an inheritance of beautiful splendor of nations!’

And I said, ‘You shall call me “my father”.’

and from after me you shall not turn away.

20 But, like a woman dealing treacherously with her companion,

thus you have dealt treacherously against me, house of Israel

—the declaration of Yahweh.”

21 A voice is heard on the bare heights,

weeping pleas of the sons of Israel!

For they have made their ways crooked;

they have forgotten Yahweh their God.

22 “Turn back, apostatizing sons!

I will heal your apostasies!”

“Behold! We come to you,

for you are Yahweh our God!

23 But the lie is from the hills,

a commotion of mountains;

but with Yahweh our God

is the salvation of Israel.

24 Yet from our youth the shame has consumed

the toil of our fathers—

their flock and their cattle,

their sons and their daughters!

25 Let us lie down in our shame,

and let our humiliation cover us,

for against Yahweh our God we have sinned!

Ourselves and our fathers,

from our youth and to this day,

and we have not listened to the voice of Yahweh our God!”

The MT has I have spoken but other manuscripts and modern versions have you called.

The MT has I have spoken but ancient manuscripts and modern versions have you have spoken.