The Lord said, “Jerusalem, ¹  I will surely send you away for your own good. I will surely ²  bring the enemy upon you in a time of trouble and distress.

For the Lord God of Israel who rules over all says, ‘Fair Babylon ¹  will be like a threshing floor which has been trampled flat for harvest. The time for her to be cut down and harvested will come very soon.’ ² 

We hoped for good fortune, but nothing good has come of it. We hoped for a time of relief, but instead we experience terror. ¹ 

They are worthless, mere objects to be mocked. ¹  When the time comes to punish them, they will be destroyed.

They are worthless, objects to be ridiculed. When the time comes to punish them, they will be destroyed.

You have brought all this on yourself, Israel, ¹  by deserting the Lord your God when he was leading you along the right path. ² 

You have been the object of Israel’s hopes. You have saved them when they were in trouble. Why have you become like a resident foreigner ¹  in the land? Why have you become like a traveler who only stops in to spend the night?

In those days and at that time I will raise up for them a righteous descendant ¹  of David. “‘He will do what is just and right in the land.

Kill all her soldiers! ¹  Let them be slaughtered! ²  They are doomed, ³  for their day of reckoning ⁴  has come, the time for them to be punished.”

“Listen! I am opposed to you, you proud city,” ¹  says the Lord God who rules over all. ²  “Indeed, ³  your day of reckoning ⁴  has come, the time when I will punish you. ⁵ 

They say to a wooden idol, ¹  ‘You are my father.’ They say to a stone image, ‘You gave birth to me.’ ²  Yes, they have turned away from me instead of turning to me. ³  Yet when they are in trouble, they say, ‘Come and save us!’

But where are the gods you made for yourselves? Let them save you when you are in trouble. The sad fact is that ¹  you have as many gods as you have towns, Judah.

“At that time the people of Judah and Jerusalem ¹  will be told, ‘A scorching wind will sweep down from the hilltops in the desert on ²  my dear people. ³  It will not be a gentle breeze for winnowing the grain and blowing away the chaff. ⁴ 

They do not say to themselves, ¹  “Let us revere the Lord our God. It is he who gives us the autumn rains and the spring rains at the proper time. It is he who assures us of the regular weeks of harvest.” ² 

Even the stork knows when it is time to move on. ¹  The turtledove, swallow, and crane ²  recognize ³  the normal times for their migration. But my people pay no attention to ⁴  what I, the Lord, require of them. ⁵ 

Then those living in the towns of Judah and in Jerusalem will ¹  go and cry out for help to the gods to whom they have been sacrificing. However, those gods will by no means ²  be able to save them when disaster strikes them.

May that man be like the cities ¹  that the Lord destroyed without showing any mercy. May he hear a cry of distress in the morning and a battle cry at noon.

Alas, what a terrible time of trouble it is! ¹  There has never been any like it. It is a time of trouble for the descendants of Jacob, but some of them will be rescued out of it. ² 

At that time I will be the God of all the clans of Israel ¹  and they will be my people. I, the Lord, affirm it!” ² 

“I, Lord, make the following promise: ¹  ‘I have made a covenant with the day ²  and with the night that they will always come at their proper times. Only if you people ³  could break that covenant