Israel and Judah have broken my covenant
1The Lord talked to Jeremiah and said to him: 2‘You must listen to what I said when I made a covenant with the Israelites and you must tell it to the people of Judah and the people who live in Jerusalem. 3You must tell them: “The Lord, the God of Israel, says: I will curse everyone who does not listen to what I said when I made a covenant with your forefathers. 4Your forefathers suffered badly in Egypt before I came to save them. I told them: “‘You must listen to Me and do everything that I tell you. Then you will be my people and I will be your God.”’ 5If you listen to Me, I will continue doing what I promised your forefathers. I told them that I would give them a land that had a lot of food, milk and honey and today that is the land that belongs to you.” ’
I, Jeremiah, said: ‘Yes, Lord. Amen.’
6Then the Lord said to me: ‘Go and talk to the people in the towns and cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. You must tell them that I said: “You must listen to Me and do what I said when I made a covenant with your forefathers.
7From the time that I brought your forefathers out of Egypt to this day I kept on saying to you: “‘You must listen to Me.”’ 8But you did not listen to Me, and you did not obey Me. You were stubborn and kept on living wrongly as your sinful hearts told you to do. That is why I made those things happen to you that I had warned you about when I made the covenant with your forefathers. You did not do what I told you to do.” ’
9The Lord also said to me: ‘The people of Judah and the people who live in Jerusalem have decided to serve other gods. 10They are doing the same sins as their forefathers did. Their forefathers did not obey Me. They did not want to do what I told them and they started to serve other gods. The Israelites and the people of Judah have broken the covenant that I made with their forefathers. 11That is why I will punish them. They will suffer and they will call Me and ask Me to help, but I will not listen to them. 12The people of Judah and the people who live in Jerusalem will then call to their gods and ask them to help. They have sacrificed incense-offerings to those gods, but the gods will not be able to save them when they suffer. 13The people of Judah had a lot of gods, as many as the towns and cities they had. There were a lot of altars in Jerusalem, as many as the streets they had. They sacrificed incense-offerings on those altars to the idol, Baal. 14And you, Jeremiah, you must not pray for these people and for this nation. Do not ask Me to help them, because I will not listen when they pray to Me for help, and I will not take away their suffering.
15The people that I love
are doing things that are wrong in my temple.
They can not stop Me. I will punish them.
You sacrifice a lot of meat,
but that will not take away your suffering.
You have done a lot of bad things,
but you must stop celebrating now.’
16Long ago the Lord said you are like
green olive trees with beautiful fruit,
but now He will call the enemies to come.
They will shout and burn the leaves
of the olive tree,
and they will break off the branches.
17The Lord who rules over all planted that olive tree. He gave life to the Israelites. But now He has decided to make them suffer because the Israelites and the people of Judah have done bad things. They sacrificed incense-offerings to Baal, and that is how they made the Lord angry.
Jeremiah's enemies want to kill him
18The Lord told me about the plans that my enemies had, to do something bad against me. 19I was like a young lamb. They wanted to kill me, but I did not know it. They made plans against me and said: ‘Let's cut down this tree with its fruit and take him away from the people who are alive. Let's kill him. No one must remember that he has lived.’
20‘Lord, You who rule over all, You are the righteous Judge, and You know what everyone thinks. You must show me how You punish my enemies, because I have told you what they have done.’
21The Lord said: ‘Jeremiah, the men from the town of Anathoth want to kill you. They said: “You may not be a prophet, and you may not say that the Lord has sent you. If you say that, we will kill you.” ’
22The Lord who rules over all said: ‘Because they have said that, I will punish them. Their young men will die in war, and their sons and daughters will die because they will not have any food to eat. 23Not one of them will stay alive. The people of Anathoth will suffer when I punish them.’
