1 ¶ I wish that my head were water, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!

2 I wish I had a place in the desert where travelers stay; so that I might leave my people, and get away from them! for they are all adulterers, a community of treacherous men.

3 For throughout the land they bend their tongues like a bow to send forth lies: but are not valiant for the truth; they proceed from evil to evil, and do not know me, says the LORD.

4 Let everyone beware of his neighbor, and let no one trust his brother: for every brother will surely deceive, and every neighbor will spread slander.

5 Everyone cheats his friend, and no one speaks the truth: they train their tongue to speak lies, and wear themselves out doing wrong.

6 You live in a world of deceit; through deceit they refuse to know me, says the LORD.

7 Therefore the LORD of hosts says, Behold, I will melt them, and refine them; for how else can I deal with the daughter of my people?

8 Their tongues are deadly arrows; that speak deceit: with his mouth one speaks peaceably to his neighbor, but in heart he is laying a trap.

9 Shouldn’t I punish them for this? asks the LORD: shouldn’t I take vengeance on a nation like this?

10 I will cry and weep over the hills, and lament for the pastures of the wilderness, because they have been scorched, and no one passes through them; nor can men hear the sound of cattle; both the beasts and the birds in the sky have fled; and are gone.

11 And I will reduce Jerusalem to rubble, and make it a haven for lizards; and I will make the cities of Judah desolate, without any inhabitants.

12 ¶ Who is the man wise enough to understand this? and who is he to whom the LORD has spoken with his mouth, so that he may explain it, why is the land destroyed and scorched like a desert, that no one crosses?

13 And the LORD said, Because they have forsaken my law which I put before them, and refused to listen to what I said, or follow it;

14 But they follow the imagination of their own heart, and have gone after Baals, as their fathers taught them:

15 Therefore the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel says; Behold, I will feed these people wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.

16 I will also scatter them among the heathen, whom neither they nor their fathers have known: and I will send a sword after them, till I have consumed them.

17 The LORD of hosts says, Consider this, and summon the women who mourn, that they may come; and send for skilled women, that they may come:

18 And let them quickly start wailing over us, so that tears may run down our eyes, and our eyelids flow with water.

19 For the sound of wailing can be heard from Zion, How devastated we are! we are greatly shamed, because we have left the land, because they have torn down our homes.

20 Yet listen to the word of the LORD, O you women, and let your ears receive what he says, and teach your daughters how to wail, and let everyone teach her neighbor a song of death.

21 For death is coming through our windows, and is entering our fortresses, to cut off the children from the streets, and the young men from the squares.

22 Say, The LORD says, Even the dead bodies of men will lie as dung on the open fields, and like handfuls of grain left by the harvester, and no one will gather them.

23 ¶ The LORD says, Do not let the wise man glory in his wisdom, or the mighty man glory in his might, do not let the rich man glory in his riches:

24 But let anyone who glories glory in this, that he knows me and understands, that I am the LORD who shows loving-kindness, judgment, and righteousness, on the earth: for I delight in these things, says the LORD.

25 Behold, the days come, says the LORD, that I will punish all those who are circumcised with the uncircumcised;

26 Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the children of Ammon, and Moab, all who cut the corners of their hair, and live in the desert: for all these nations are uncircumcised, and all in Israel are uncircumcised in the heart.