Jeremiah 22, verse 1. Thus says the Lord: “Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and there you shall speak this word, Jeremiah 22, verse 2. and you shall say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O king of Judah, you who sit on the throne of David, you and your house and your people, and those who enter these gates! Jeremiah 22, verse 3. Thus says the Lord: “Bring about judgment and righteousness, and rescue the plundered from the hand of the one who wrongs him. Do not oppress and act ungodly toward the resident alien, the orphan, or the widow. Do not shed innocent blood in this place. Jeremiah 22, verse 4. For if you will indeed perform this word, there shall enter through the gates of this house kings who sit on the throne of David. They shall ride on horses and in chariots—they, their servants, and their people. Jeremiah 22, verse 5. But if you do not perform these words I Myself have sworn,” says the Lord, “this house shall become a desolation.”’” Jeremiah 22, verse 6. For thus says the Lord concerning the house of the king of Judah: “You are Gilead to Me, the head of Lebanon. Yet I will surely make you as a wilderness, and your cities shall not be inhabited. Jeremiah 22, verse 7. I will bring against you a man who destroys with his two-edged ax; and they shall cut down your choice cedars and cast them into the fire. Jeremiah 22, verse 8. Then nations will pass through this city, and each will say to his neighbor, ‘Why has the Lord done so to this great city?’ Jeremiah 22, verse 9. They will answer, ‘Because they forsook the covenant of the Lord their God, and worshiped foreign gods and served them.’” Jeremiah 22, verse 10. Weep not for the dead, neither lament. Weep bitterly for him who goes away, for he shall return no more to see his native land.
A Word to the Sons of Josiah
Jeremiah 22, verse 11. For thus says the Lord concerning Shallum the son of Josiah, who reigned in the place of Josiah his father, who left this place: “He shall not return here anymore, Jeremiah 22, verse 12. but he shall die in the place where I have exiled him. He shall see this land no more. Jeremiah 22, verse 13. “Woe to him who builds his house without righteousness and his rooms upstairs without judgment, who employs his neighbor for nothing and will not give him his pay! Jeremiah 22, verse 14. You built for yourself a well-proportioned house with breezy rooms upstairs, lined with windows, cedar panels, and painted with vermilion. Jeremiah 22, verse 15. Shall you reign, for you provoked Me as did your father Ahaz? They shall not eat and drink. It is better for you to bring about good judgment and righteousness. Jeremiah 22, verse 16. They did not understand and judge the cause of a lowly or poor man. Is this your not knowing Me?” says the Lord. Jeremiah 22, verse 17. “Behold, neither your eyes nor your heart are good for anything except for covetousness and the shedding of innocent blood, and for committing wrongdoing and murder.” Jeremiah 22, verse 18. Therefore thus says the Lord to Jehoiakim the king of Judah, the son of Josiah: “Woe to this man. They shall not mourn for him, saying, ‘Oh brother!’ Neither shall they weep for him, saying, ‘Alas, master!’ Jeremiah 22, verse 19. But he shall be buried with the burial of a donkey, and they will drag him out to be discarded beyond the gates of Jerusalem. Jeremiah 22, verse 20. “Go up to Lebanon and cry out, and lift up your voice in Bashan. Shout to the faraway places of the sea that all your lovers are crushed. Jeremiah 22, verse 21. For I spoke to you concerning your transgression, but you said, ‘I will not hear.’ This has been your way from your youth. You do not hear My voice. Jeremiah 22, verse 22. The wind shall tend all your shepherds, and your lovers shall go into captivity, for then you will be shamed and treated with dishonor because of all your lovers. Jeremiah 22, verse 23. Those who dwell in Lebanon and who make their nest in the cedar trees, you shall groan when pangs come upon you, as those of a woman giving birth.
A Word to Jeconiah
Jeremiah 22, verse 24. “As I live,” says the Lord, “though Jeconiah king of Judah, the son of Jehoiakim, were the signet on My right hand, still I would drag off all of you. Jeremiah 22, verse 25. I will give you into the hands of those who seek your life, into the hands of the Chaldeans, before whose face you are afraid. Jeremiah 22, verse 26. So I will cast all of you, and your mother who bore you, into a country where you were not born. There you shall die. Jeremiah 22, verse 27. But they shall not return to the land they long for in their souls. Jeremiah 22, verse 28. Jeconiah is dishonored like a worthless vessel, for he is cast forth and driven out into a land he did not know. Jeremiah 22, verse 29. “O land, land, hear the word of the Lord: Jeremiah 22, verse 30. ‘Write this man as a banished man, for none at all from his seed shall be raised to sit on the throne of David, or still as a ruler in Judah.’”