[1] Thus said the LORD, "Go, buy a potter's earthen flask, and take some of
the elders of the people and some of the senior priests, [2] and go out to
the valley of the son of Hinnom at the entry of the Potsherd Gate, and
proclaim there the words that I tell you. [3] You shall say, `Hear the word
of the LORD, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the
LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, Behold, I am bringing such evil upon this
place that the ears of every one who hears of it will tingle. [4] Because
the people have forsaken me, and have profaned this place by burning
incense in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the
kings of Judah have known; and because they have filled this place with the
blood of innocents, [5] and have built the high places of Ba'al to burn
their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Ba'al, which I did not command
or decree, nor did it come into my mind; [6] therefore, behold, days are
coming, says the LORD, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or
the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of Slaughter. [7] And in
this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will
cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the
hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food
to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the earth. [8] And I will make
this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at; every one who passes by it
will be horrified and will hiss because of all its disasters. [9] And I
will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and every
one shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress,
with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.' [10]
"Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you,
[11] and shall say to them, `Thus says the LORD of hosts: So will I break
this people and this city, as one breaks a potter's vessel, so that it can
never be mended. Men shall bury in Topheth because there will be no place
else to bury. [12] Thus will I do to this place, says the LORD, and to its
inhabitants, making this city like Topheth. [13] The houses of Jerusalem
and the houses of the kings of Judah--all the houses upon whose roofs
incense has been burned to all the host of heaven, and drink offerings have
been poured out to other gods--shall be defiled like the place of
Topheth.'" [14] Then Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the LORD had sent
him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the LORD's house, and said to
all the people: [15] "Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel,
Behold, I am bringing upon this city and upon all its towns all the evil
that I have pronounced against it, because they have stiffened their neck,
refusing to hear my words."
