Tell them: ‘Hear this, you foolish people who have no understanding, who have eyes but do not discern, who have ears but do not perceive:

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

Rich and poor alike will die in this land. They will not be buried or mourned. People will not cut their bodies or shave off their hair to show their grief for them.

You kept the promise that you swore on oath to their ancestors. You gave them a land flowing with milk and honey.

I will give them a single-minded purpose to live in a way that always shows respect for me. They will want to do that for their own good and the good of the children who descend from them.

They are regarded as ‘rejected silver’ because the Lord rejects them.”

They will be my people, and I will be their God.

The prophets will prove to be full of wind. The Lord has not spoken through them. So, let what they say happen to them.’”

Your wise men will be put to shame. They will be dumbfounded and be brought to judgment. Since they have rejected the word of the Lord, what wisdom do they really have?

Not one of them will survive. I will bring disaster on those men from Anathoth who threatened you. A day of reckoning is coming for them.”

But they will be subject to the Lord their God and to the Davidic ruler whom I will raise up as king over them.

But I will most surely heal the wounds of this city and restore it and its people to health. I will show them abundant peace and security.

I will give them the desire to acknowledge that I am the Lord. I will be their God and they will be my people. For they will wholeheartedly return to me.’

But he left behind in the land of Judah some of the poor people who owned nothing. He gave them fields and vineyards at that time.

Moreover, you will come away from Egypt with your hands covering your faces in sorrow and shame because the Lord will not allow your reliance on them to be successful and you will not gain any help from them.

“Look up at the hilltops and consider this. You have had sex with other gods on every one of them. You waited for those gods like a thief lying in wait in the desert. You defiled the land by your wicked prostitution to other gods.

I will take away their harvests, says the Lord. There will be no grapes on their vines. There will be no figs on their fig trees. Even the leaves on their trees will wither. The crops that I gave them will be taken away.’”

The Lord says, “Yes indeed, I am sending an enemy against you that will be like poisonous snakes which cannot be charmed away. And they will inflict fatal wounds on you.”

For the Lord says, “I will now throw out those who live in this land. I will bring so much trouble on them that they will actually feel it.”

Their widows will become in my sight more numerous than the grains of sand on the seashores. At noontime I will bring a destroyer against the mothers of their young men. I will cause anguish and terror to fall suddenly upon them.