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Better an open rebuke than love that is concealed.

The wounds of a friend are faithful, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful.

An evil man is caught by his own sin, but a righteous one sings and rejoices.

An angry man stirs up dissension, and a hot-tempered man abounds in transgression.

An unjust man is detestable to the righteous, and one whose way is upright is detestable to the wicked.

…the way of an eagle in the sky, the way of a snake on a rock, the way of a ship at sea, and the way of a man with a maiden.

This is the way of an adulteress: She eats and wipes her mouth and says, ‘I have done nothing wrong.’

…an unloved woman who marries, and a maidservant who supplants her mistress.

Better is a poor but wise youth than an old but foolish king who no longer knows how to take a warning.

Wisdom, like an inheritance, is good, and it benefits those who see the sun.

“Behold,” says the Teacher, “I have discovered this by adding one thing to another to find an explanation.

This is an evil in everything that is done under the sun: There is one fate for everyone. Furthermore, the hearts of men are full of evil and madness while they are alive, and afterward they join the dead.

For surely no man knows his time: Like fish caught in a cruel net or birds trapped in a snare, so men are ensnared in an evil time that suddenly falls upon them.

There is an evil I have seen under the sun—an error that proceeds from the ruler:

There is an evil I have seen under the sun—an error that proceeds from the ruler:

Like an apple tree among the trees of the forest is my beloved among the young men. I delight to sit in his shade, and his fruit is sweet to my taste.

Your branches are an orchard of pomegranates with the choicest of fruits, with henna and nard,

For you will become like an oak whose leaves are withered, like a garden without water.

For ten acres of vineyard will yield but a bath of wine, and a homer of seed only an ephah of grain.”

Then the LORD said to me, “Take a large scroll and write on it with an ordinary stylus: Maher-shalal-hash-baz.

Does an axe raise itself above the one who swings it? Does a saw boast over him who saws with it? It would be like a rod waving the one who lifts it, or a staff lifting him who is not wood!

He will clear the forest thickets with an axe, and Lebanon will fall before the Mighty One.

Listen, a tumult on the mountains, like that of a great multitude! Listen, an uproar among the kingdoms, like nations gathered together! The LORD of Hosts is mobilizing an army for war.

Listen, a tumult on the mountains, like that of a great multitude! Listen, an uproar among the kingdoms, like nations gathered together! The LORD of Hosts is mobilizing an army for war.

Joy and gladness are removed from the orchard; no one sings or shouts in the vineyards. No one tramples the grapes in the winepresses; I have put an end to the cheering.

And now the LORD says, “In three years, as a hired worker counts the years, Moab’s splendor will become an object of contempt, with all her many people. And those who are left will be few and feeble.”

Yet gleanings will remain, like an olive tree that has been beaten—two or three berries atop the tree, four or five on its fruitful branches,” declares the LORD, the God of Israel.

In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the center of the land of Egypt, and a pillar to the LORD near her border.

This is the burden against the Desert by the Sea: Like whirlwinds sweeping through the Negev, an invader comes from the desert, from a land of terror.

A dire vision is declared to me: “The traitor still betrays, and the destroyer still destroys. Go up, O Elam! Lay siege, O Media! I will put an end to all her groaning.”

For you said, “We have made a covenant with death; we have fashioned an agreement with Sheol. When the overwhelming scourge passes through it will not touch us, because we have made lies our refuge and falsehood our hiding place.”

And I will constrain Ariel, and there will be mourning and lamentation; she will be like an altar hearth before Me.

But your many foes will be like fine dust, the multitude of the ruthless like blowing chaff. Then suddenly, in an instant,

In a very short time, will not Lebanon become an orchard, and the orchard seem like a forest?

“Woe to the rebellious children,” declares the LORD, “to those who carry out a plan that is not Mine, who form an alliance, but against My will, heaping up sin upon sin.

…this iniquity of yours is like a breach about to fail, a bulge in a high wall, whose collapse will come suddenly—in an instant!

Each will be like a shelter from the wind, a refuge from the storm, like streams of water in a dry land, like the shadow of a great rock in an arid land.

…until the Spirit is poured out upon us from on high. Then the desert will be an orchard, and the orchard will seem like a forest.

Your ropes are slack; they cannot secure the mast or spread the sail. Then an abundance of spoils will be divided, and even the lame will carry off plunder.

Her towers will be overgrown with thorns, her fortresses with thistles and briers. She will become a haunt for jackals, an abode for ostriches.

So this is what the LORD says about the king of Assyria: ‘He will not enter this city or shoot an arrow into it. He will not come before it with a shield or build up a siege ramp against it.

My dwelling has been picked up and removed from me like a shepherd’s tent. I have rolled up my life like a weaver; He cuts me off from the loom; from day until night You make an end of me.

I composed myself until the morning. Like a lion He breaks all my bones; from day until night You make an end of me.

To an idol that a craftsman casts and a metalworker overlays with gold and fits with silver chains?

One lacking such an offering chooses wood that will not rot. He seeks a skilled craftsman to set up an idol that will not topple.

One lacking such an offering chooses wood that will not rot. He seeks a skilled craftsman to set up an idol that will not topple.

Who then is like Me? Let him say so! Let him declare his case before Me, since I established an ancient people. Let him foretell the things to come, and what is to take place.

Who fashions a god or casts an idol which profits him nothing?

The blacksmith takes a tool and labors over the coals; he fashions an idol with hammers and forges it with his strong arms. Yet he grows hungry and loses his strength; he fails to drink water and grows faint.

It serves as fuel for man. He takes some of it to warm himself, and he kindles a fire and bakes his bread. He also fashions it into a god and worships it; he makes an idol and bows down to it.

But Israel will be saved by the LORD with an everlasting salvation; you will not be put to shame or humiliated, to ages everlasting.

Your sons have fainted; they lie at the head of every street, like an antelope in a net. They are full of the wrath of the LORD, the rebuke of your God.

Incline your ear and come to Me; listen, so that your soul may live. I will make with you an everlasting covenant—My loving devotion promised to David.

Instead of the thornbush, the cypress will grow, and instead of the brier, the myrtle will spring up; this will make a name for the LORD, an everlasting sign, never to be destroyed.”

I will give them, in My house and within My walls, a memorial and a name better than that of sons and daughters. I will give them an everlasting name that will not be cut off.

Whereas you have been forsaken and despised, with no one passing through, I will make you an everlasting pride, a joy from age to age.

For I, the LORD, love justice; I hate robbery and iniquity; in My faithfulness I will give them their recompense and make an everlasting covenant with them.

All day long I have held out My hands to an obstinate people who walk in the wrong path, who follow their own imaginations,

Whoever invokes a blessing in the land will do so by the God of truth, and whoever takes an oath in the land will swear by the God of truth. For the former troubles will be forgotten and hidden from My sight.

No longer will a nursing infant live but a few days, or an old man fail to live out his years. For the youth will die at a hundred years, and he who fails to reach a hundred will be considered accursed.

Whoever slaughters an ox is like one who slays a man; whoever sacrifices a lamb is like one who breaks a dog’s neck; whoever presents a grain offering is like one who offers pig’s blood; whoever offers frankincense is like one who blesses an idol. Indeed, they have chosen their own ways and delighted in their abominations.

Whoever slaughters an ox is like one who slays a man; whoever sacrifices a lamb is like one who breaks a dog’s neck; whoever presents a grain offering is like one who offers pig’s blood; whoever offers frankincense is like one who blesses an idol. Indeed, they have chosen their own ways and delighted in their abominations.

Who has heard of such as this? Who has seen such things? Can a country be born in a day or a nation be delivered in an instant? Yet as soon as Zion was in labor, she gave birth to her children.

And they will bring all your brothers from all the nations as a gift to the LORD on horses and chariots and wagons, on mules and camels, to My holy mountain Jerusalem,” says the LORD, “just as the Israelites bring an offering in a clean vessel to the house of the LORD.”

And the word of the LORD came to me, asking, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” “I see a branch of an almond tree,” I replied.

Now behold, this day I have made you like a fortified city, an iron pillar, and bronze walls against the whole land—against the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests, and the people of the land.

Although you wash with lye and use an abundance of soap, the stain of your guilt is still before Me,” declares the Lord GOD.

In those days the house of Judah will walk with the house of Israel, and they will come together from the land of the north to the land that I gave to your fathers as an inheritance.

Disaster after disaster is proclaimed, for the whole land is laid waste. My tents are destroyed in an instant, my curtains in a moment.

Behold, I am bringing a distant nation against you, O house of Israel,” declares the LORD. “It is an established nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language you do not know and whose speech you do not understand.

Behold, I am bringing a distant nation against you, O house of Israel,” declares the LORD. “It is an established nation, an ancient nation, a nation whose language you do not know and whose speech you do not understand.

Do you not fear Me?” declares the LORD. “Do you not tremble before Me, the One who set the sand as the boundary for the sea, an enduring barrier it cannot cross? The waves surge, but they cannot prevail. They roar but cannot cross it.

This is what the LORD says: “Behold, an army is coming from the land of the north; a great nation is stirred up from the ends of the earth.

O daughter of my people, dress yourselves in sackcloth and roll in ashes. Mourn with bitter wailing, as you would for an only son, for suddenly the destroyer will come upon us.

“The sin of Judah is written with an iron stylus, engraved with a diamond point on the tablets of their hearts and on the horns of their altars.

But if you do not listen to Me to keep the Sabbath day holy by not carrying a load while entering the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day, then I will kindle an unquenchable fire in its gates to consume the citadels of Jerusalem.’”

Then some said, “Come, let us make plans against Jeremiah, for the law will never be lost to the priest, nor counsel to the wise, nor an oracle to the prophet. Come, let us denounce him and pay no heed to any of his words.”

I will make this city a desolation and an object of scorn. All who pass by will be appalled and will scoff at all her wounds.

But the LORD is with me like a fearsome warrior. Therefore, my persecutors will stumble and will not prevail. Since they have not succeeded, they will be utterly put to shame, with an everlasting disgrace that will never be forgotten.

May that man be like the cities that the LORD overthrew without compassion. May he hear an outcry in the morning and a battle cry at noon,

And I Myself will fight against you with an outstretched hand and a mighty arm, with anger, fury, and great wrath.

“Among the prophets of Samaria I saw an offensive thing: They prophesied by Baal and led My people Israel astray.

I will make them a horror and an offense to all the kingdoms of the earth, a disgrace and an object of scorn, ridicule, and cursing wherever I have banished them.

I will make them a horror and an offense to all the kingdoms of the earth, a disgrace and an object of scorn, ridicule, and cursing wherever I have banished them.

…behold, I will summon all the families of the north, declares the LORD, and I will send for My servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, whom I will bring against this land, against its residents, and against all the surrounding nations. So I will devote them to destruction and make them an object of horror and contempt, an everlasting desolation.

…behold, I will summon all the families of the north, declares the LORD, and I will send for My servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, whom I will bring against this land, against its residents, and against all the surrounding nations. So I will devote them to destruction and make them an object of horror and contempt, an everlasting desolation.

But when seventy years are complete, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their guilt, declares the LORD, and I will make it an everlasting desolation.

…to make them a ruin, an object of horror and contempt and cursing, as they are to this day—Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, its kings and officials;

…then I will make this house like Shiloh, and I will make this city an object of cursing among all the nations of the earth.’”

I will pursue them with sword and famine and plague. I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth—a curse, a desolation, and an object of scorn and reproach among all the nations to which I banish them.

For they have committed an outrage in Israel by committing adultery with the wives of their neighbors and speaking lies in My name, which I did not command them to do. I am He who knows, and I am a witness, declares the LORD.”

All your lovers have forgotten you; they no longer seek you, for I have struck you as an enemy would, with the discipline of someone cruel, because of your great iniquity and your numerous sins.

But I will restore your health and heal your wounds, declares the LORD, because they call you an outcast, Zion, for whom no one cares.”

The LORD appeared to us in the past, saying: “I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have drawn you with loving devotion.

I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning: ‘You disciplined me severely, like an untrained calf. Restore me, that I may return, for You are the LORD my God.

You brought Your people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs and wonders, with a strong hand and an outstretched arm, and with great terror.

They have built the high places of Baal in the Valley of Ben-hinnom to make their sons and daughters pass through the fire to Molech—something I never commanded them, nor had it ever entered My mind, that they should commit such an abomination and cause Judah to sin.

I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never turn away from doing good to them, and I will put My fear in their hearts, so that they will never turn away from Me.

Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, swore an oath to them and their men, assuring them, “Do not be afraid to serve the Chaldeans. Live in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it will go well with you.

…they all returned from all the places to which they had been banished and came to the land of Judah, to Gedaliah at Mizpah. And they gathered an abundance of wine grapes and summer fruit.