Jeremias 9

1 Oh that my head were waters,

2 Oh that I had in the wilderness

3 "They bend their tongue,

4 "Everyone beware of his neighbor,

5 Friends deceive each other,

6 Your habitation is in the middle of deceit.

7 Therefore Yahweh of Armies says,

8 Their tongue is a deadly arrow.

9 Shouldn’t I punish them for these things?" says Yahweh.

10 I will weep and wail for the mountains,

11 "I will make Jerusalem heaps,

12 Who is wise enough to understand this? Who is he to whom the mouth of Yahweh has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished and burned up like a wilderness, so that no one passes through?

13 Yahweh says, "Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice or walked in my ways,

14 but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart and after the Baals, which their fathers taught them."

15 Therefore Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, says, "Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink.

16 I will scatter them also among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known. I will send the sword after them, until I have consumed them."

17 Yahweh of Armies says,

18 Let them make haste

19 For a voice of wailing is heard out of Zion,

20 Yet hear Yahweh’s word, you women.

21 For death has come up into our windows.

22 Speak, "Yahweh says,

23 Yahweh says,

24 But let him who glories glory in this,

25 "Behold, the days come," says Yahweh, "that I will punish all those who are circumcised only in their flesh:

26 Egypt, Judah, Edom, the children of Ammon, Moab, and all who have the corners of their hair cut off, who dwell in the wilderness, for all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in heart."