Verse 1
Thus said Yahweh: Go down to the house of the king of Judah, and speak there this word,
Verse 2
Say, Hear the word of Yahweh, king of Judah, who sits on the throne of David, you, and your servants, and your people who enter in by these gates.
Verse 3
Thus says Yahweh: Execute justice and righteousness, and deliver him who is robbed out of the hand of the oppressor: and do no wrong, do no violence, to the foreigner, the fatherless, nor the widow; neither shed innocent blood in this place.
Verse 4
For if you do this thing indeed, then shall there enter in by the gates of this house kings sitting on the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, he, and his servants, and his people.
Verse 5
But if you will not hear these words, I swear by myself, says Yahweh, that this house shall become a desolation.
Verse 6
For thus says Yahweh concerning the house of the king of Judah: You are Gilead to me, [and] the head of Lebanon; [yet] surely I will make you a wilderness, [and] cities which are not inhabited.
Verse 7
I will prepare destroyers against you, everyone with his weapons; and they shall cut down your choice cedars, and cast them into the fire.
Verse 8
Many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every man to his neighbor, Why has Yahweh done thus to this great city?
Verse 9
Then they shall answer, Because they forsook the covenant of Yahweh their God, and worshiped other gods, and served them.
Verse 10
Don't weep for the dead, neither bemoan him; but weep bitterly for him who goes away; for he shall return no more, nor see his native country.
Verse 11
For thus says Yahweh touching Shallum the son of Josiah, king of Judah, who reigned instead of Josiah his father, [and] who went forth out of this place: He shall not return there any more.
Verse 12
But in the place where they have led him captive, there shall he die, and he shall see this land no more.
Verse 13
Woe to him who builds his house by unrighteousness, and his rooms by injustice; who uses his neighbor's service without wages, and doesn't give him his hire;
Verse 14
who says, I will build me a wide house and spacious rooms, and cuts him out windows; and it is ceiling with cedar, and painted with vermilion.
Verse 15
Shall you reign, because you strive to excel in cedar? Didn't your father eat and drink, and do justice and righteousness? then it was well with him.
Verse 16
He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Wasn't this to know me? says Yahweh.
Verse 17
But your eyes and your heart are not but for your covetousness, and for shedding innocent blood, and for oppression, and for violence, to do it.
Verse 18
Therefore thus says Yahweh concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah: they shall not lament for him, [saying], Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! They shall not lament for him, [saying] Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!
Verse 19
He shall be buried with the burial of a donkey, drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem.
Verse 20
Go up to Lebanon, and cry; and lift up your voice in Bashan, and cry from Abarim; for all your lovers are destroyed.
Verse 21
I spoke to you in your prosperity; but you said, I will not hear. This has been your way from your youth, that you didn't obey my voice.
Verse 22
The wind shall feed all your shepherds, and your lovers shall go into captivity: surely then you will be ashamed and confounded for all your wickedness.
Verse 23
Inhabitant of Lebanon, who makes your nest in the cedars, how greatly to be pitied you will be when pangs come on you, the pain as of a woman in travail!
Verse 24
As I live, says Yahweh, though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were the signet on my right hand, yet would I pluck you there;
Verse 25
and I will give you into the hand of those who seek your life, and into the hand of them of whom you are afraid, even into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans.
Verse 26
I will cast you out, and your mother who bore you, into another country, where you were not born; and there you will die.
Verse 27
But to the land whereunto their soul longs to return, there shall they not return.
Verse 28
Is this man Coniah a despised broken vessel? is he a vessel in which none delights? why are they cast out, he and his seed, and are cast into the land which they don't know?
Verse 29
O earth, earth, earth, hear the word of Yahweh.
Verse 30
Thus says Yahweh, Write you this man childless, a man who shall not prosper in his days; for no more shall a man of his seed prosper, sitting on the throne of David, and ruling in Judah.