Jeremiah 9

2O! that I had a remote lodging in the wilderness, that I might leave my people and go away from them!
(J) Because they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men,

3and have bent their tongue like a bow—lying and infidelity prevailed in the land—because they have proceeded from evils to evils, and have not known Me, saith the Lord;

4be upon your guard every man against his neighbour, and in your own brothers place no confidence; for every brother will supplant, and every friend will walk deceitfully;

5each one will treat his friend with contempt. They cannot speak truth; their tongue hath learned to speak lies. They have done injustice, and have not stopped to rectify it.

6There is usury upon usury, deceit upon deceit; they refused to know Me, saith the Lord.

7Therefore thus saith the Lord, Behold I will melt them and try them. What else can I do on account of the wickedness of the daughter of My people?

8Their tongue is a wounding dart: the words of their mouth are deceitful. To his neighbour one speaketh peace; when inwardly he harboureth enmity.

9Shall I not visit for these things, saith the Lord; and on such a nation shall not My soul be avenged?

10Take ye up a lamentation for the mountains, and for the paths of the wilderness, a song of woe; for such is the desolation that there are no men, nor is there a sound of existence heard from birds of the air, nor from cattle. They were confounded. They are fled.

11I will indeed deliver up Jerusalem to captivity and make it a den for jackals; and the cities of Juda an uninhabitable desolation.

12(p) Whoever is a wise man, let him understand this; and let him, who hath a word from the mouth of the Lord, declare to you for what cause the land is destroyed—burned up like a desert, so as not to be travelled.

13Again the Lord said to me: (J) Because they have forsaken My law which I set before them and have not hearkened to My voice;

14but have gone after the pleasures of their own wicked heart, and after the idols which their fathers taught them;

15therefore thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: Behold I will feed them with wormwood, and give them the water of gall to drink.

16And I will scatter them among the nations, which neither they nor their fathers have known, and send a sword after them till they are consumed by it.

17Thus saith the Lord, Call the mourning women and let them come; send for the well instructed and let them utter a plaintive sound

18and take up a mournful lamentation for you: and let your eyes collect tears, and your eyelids gush out water.

19(p) Because a sound of wailing is heard in Sion: “Oh how wretched we are! how greatly confounded because we have left our land, and abandoned our habitations!”

20hear I beseech ye, O women, a word of God! and let your ears receive the words of His mouth: and teach your daughters a song of woe; and every woman, the mournful dirge to her neighbour.

21For death is gone up through your windows: it is come into your land, to destroy infants at home and young men in the streets,

22and the carcasses of the men shall be for a spectacle on the open field throughout your land, like grass after a mower; and there will be none to gather.

24but let him who boasteth boast of this only: that he understandeth and knoweth that I am the Lord, Who exercise mercy and judgment and justice on the earth: that in these things is My delight, saith the Lord.

25Behold days are coming, saith the Lord, when I will visit upon all the uncircumcised their uncircumcision—

26upon Egypt, and upon Idumea, and upon Edom, and upon the Ammonites, and upon the Moabites, and upon all that have their foreheads shaven, namely them who dwell in the wilderness. For all the nations are uncircumcised in flesh, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in their hearts.