6:1  FLEE FOR safety, you children of Benjamin, out of the midst of Jerusalem! And blow the trumpet in Tekoa [a town far south in Judah], and raise a [fire] signal over Beth-haccherem [a town near Jerusalem]! For evil is looking forth with eagerness from the north, and great destruction.

6:2  The comely and delicate one, [Jerusalem] the Daughter of Zion, I will destroy. [To a pasturage, yes, a luxurious pasturage, have I likened her.]

6:3  Shepherds with their flocks shall come against her; they shall pitch their tents round about her; they shall pasture, each one in his place [eating up all her luxurious herbage on every side].

6:4  Prepare yourselves for war against her [they cry]; up, let us attack her at noon! But alas, the day declines, the evening shadows lengthen.

6:5  Arise, let us go by night and destroy her palaces!

6:6  For the Lord of hosts has said, Hew down her trees and cast up a siege mound against Jerusalem. This is the city which must be punished; there is nothing but oppression within her.

6:7  As a fountain wells up {and} casts forth its waters {and} keeps them fresh, so she is [continually] casting forth [fresh] wickedness. Violence and destruction are heard within her; sickness and wounds are continually before Me.

6:8  Be corrected, reformed, instructed, {and} warned, O Jerusalem, lest I be alienated {and} parted from you, lest I make you a desolation, an uninhabited land.

6:9  Thus says the Lord of hosts: They shall thoroughly glean as a vine what is left of Israel; turn back your hand again {and} again [O minister of destruction] into the baskets, like a grape gatherer, {and} strip the tendrils [of the vine].

6:10  To whom shall I [Jeremiah] speak and give warning, that they may hear? Behold, their ears are uncircumcised [never brought into covenant with God or consecrated to His service], and they cannot hear {or} obey. Behold, the word of the Lord has become to them a reproach {and} the object of their scorn; they have no delight in it.

6:11  Therefore I am full of the wrath of the Lord; I am weary of restraining it. I will pour it out on the children in the street and on the gathering of young men together; for even the husband with the wife will be taken, the aged with the very old.

6:12  And their houses will be turned over to others, their fields and their wives together; for I will stretch out My hand against the inhabitants of the land, says the Lord.

6:13  For from the least of them even to the greatest of them, everyone is given to covetousness (to greed for unjust gain); and from the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

6:14  They have healed also the wound of the daughter of My people lightly {and} neglectfully, saying, Peace, peace, when there is no peace.

6:15  Were they brought to shame because they had committed abominations (extremely disgusting and vile things)? No, they were not at all ashamed, nor could they blush [at their idolatry]. Therefore they shall fall among those who fall; at the time that I punish them they shall be overthrown, says the Lord.

6:16  Thus says the Lord: Stand by the roads and look; and ask for the eternal paths, where the good, old way is; then walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls. But they said, We will not walk in it!

6:17  Also I set watchmen over you, saying, Hear {and} obey the sound of the trumpet! But they said, We will not listen {or} obey.

6:18  Therefore hear, O [Gentile] nations, and know, O congregation [of believing ones], what [great things I will do] to them.

6:19  Hear, O earth: behold, I am bringing evil upon this people, the fruit of their thoughts (their schemes and devices) because they have not listened {and} obeyed My words, and as for My law, they have rejected it.

6:20  To what purpose does frankincense come to Me from Sheba [in southwestern Arabia] and the sweet cane from a far country? Your burnt offerings are not acceptable, nor are your sacrifices sweet {or} pleasing to Me.

6:21  Therefore thus says the Lord: Behold, I will lay stumbling blocks before this people. And the fathers and the sons together will stumble against them; the neighbor and his friend will perish.

6:22  Thus says the Lord: Behold, a people is coming from the north country, and a great nation is arousing itself from the ends of the earth.

6:23  They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel (ruthless and inhuman) and have no mercy. Their voice sounds like the roaring sea; they ride on horses, every one set in array as a man for battle against you, O Daughter of Zion!

6:24  We have heard the report of it; our hands become feeble {and} helpless. Anguish has taken hold of us, pangs like that of a woman in childbirth.

6:25  Go not out into the field nor walk on the road, for the enemy is armed with the sword; terror is on every side.

6:26  O daughter of my people [says Jeremiah], gird yourself with sackcloth and wallow in ashes; make mourning as for an only son, a most bitter lamentation, for the destroyer will suddenly come upon us [on prophet and people].

6:27  I [says the Lord] have set you [Jeremiah] as an assayer {and} a prover of ore among My people, that you may know and try their doings and be like a watchtower.

6:28  They are all the worst [kind] of rebels {and} utter and total revolters against God, going about publishing slander. They are [not gold and silver ore, but] bronze and iron; they are all corrupters.

6:29  The bellows blow fiercely, the lead is consumed by the fire; in vain do they continue refining, for the wicked [the dross] are not removed.

6:30  Men will call them reprobate {and} rejected silver [only dross, without good metal], because the Lord has rejected them.