Jeremiah 7:21-8:3; 9:22-9:23

21. יהוה of Armies, the God of Israel says: “Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat meat.

22. For I didn’t speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:

23. But this thing I commanded them, saying, ‘Listen to my voice, and I will be your God, and you shall be my people; and walk in all the way that I command you, that it may be well with you.’

24. But they didn’t listen nor turn their ear, but walked in their own counsels and in the stubbornness of their evil heart, and went backward, and not forward.

25. Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have sent to you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them:

26. Yet they didn’t listen to me, nor inclined their ear, but made their neck stiff: they did worse than their fathers.

27. “You shall speak all these words to them; but they will not listen to you: you shall also call to them; but they will not answer you.

28. You shall tell them, ‘This is the nation that has not listened to יהוה their God’s voice, nor received instruction. Truth has perished, and is cut off from their mouth.’

29. Cut off your hair, and throw it away, and take up a lamentation on the bare heights; for יהוה has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.

30. “For the children of Judah have done that which is evil in my sight,” says יהוה. “They have set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to defile it.

31. They have built the high places of Topheth, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I didn’t command, nor did it come into my mind.

32. Therefore behold, the days come”, says יהוה, “that it shall no more be called Topheth, nor The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of Slaughter; for they shall bury in Topheth, until there is no place to bury.

33. The dead bodies of this people shall be food for the birds of the sky, and for the animals of the earth; and no one shall frighten them away.

34. Then I will cause to cease from the cities of Judah, and from the streets of Jerusalem, the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; for the land shall become a waste.”

Chapter 8

1. “At that time,” says יהוה, “they shall bring out the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of his princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves;

2. And they shall spread them before the sun, and the moon, and all the army of the sky, which they have loved, and which they have served, and after which they have walked, and which they have sought, and which they have worshiped: they shall not be gathered, nor be buried, they shall be for dung on the surface of the earth.

3. Death shall be chosen rather than life by all the residue that remain of this evil family, that remain in all the places where I have driven them,” says יהוה of Armies.

Chapter 9

23. יהוה says, Don’t let the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might, don’t let the rich man glory in his riches;

24. But let him who glories glory in this, that he has understanding, and knows me, that I am יהוה who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, says יהוה.