1   These were the words of the Lord: Go down to the house of the king of Judah and say this: 2   Listen to the words of the Lord, O king of Judah, you who sit on David's throne, you and your courtiers and your people who come in at these gates. 3   These are the words of the Lord: Deal justly and fairly, rescue the victim from his oppressor, do not ill-treat or do violence to the alien, the orphan or the widow, do not shed innocent blood in this place. 4   If you obey, and only if you obey, kings who sit on David's throne shall yet come riding through these gates in chariots and on horses, with their retinue of courtiers and people. 5   But if you do not listen to my words, then by myself I swear, says the Lord, this house shall become a desolate ruin. 6   For these are the words of the Lord about the royal house of Judah:

  Though you are dear to me as Gilead
    or as the heights of Lebanon,
  I swear that I will make you a wilderness,
    a land of unpeopled cities.
   7   I will dedicate an armed host to fight against you,
    a ravening horde;
  they shall cut your choicest cedars down
    and fling them on the fire.

8   Men of many nations shall pass by this city and say to one another, ‘Why has the Lord done this to such a great city?’ 9   The answer will be, ‘Because they forsook their covenant with the Lord their God; they worshipped other gods and served them.’

10   Weep not for the dead nor brood over his loss.
  Weep rather for him who has gone away,
  for he shall never return,
  never again see the land of his birth.

Kings and prophets denounced

11   For these are the words of the Lord concerning Shallum son of Josiah, king of Judah, who succeeded his father on the throne and has gone away: 12   He shall never return; he shall die in the place of his exile and never see this land again.

13   Shame on the man who builds his house by unjust means
  and completes its roof-chambers by fraud,
  making his countrymen work without payment,
  giving them no wage for their labour!
14   Shame on the man who says, ‘I will build a spacious house
    with airy roof-chambers,
set windows in it, panel it with cedar
    and paint it with vermilion’!
   15   If your cedar is more splendid,
    does that prove you a king?
Think of your father: he ate and drank,
dealt justly and fairly; all went well with him.
   16   He dispensed justice to the lowly and poor; ^note
did not this show he knew me? says the Lord.
17   But you have no eyes, no thought for anything but gain,
  set only on the innocent blood you can shed,
  on cruel acts of tyranny.

18   Therefore these are the words of the Lord concerning Jehoiakim son of Josiah, king of Judah:

For him no mourner shall say, ‘Alas, brother, dear brother!’
no one say, ‘Alas, lord and master!’
   19   He shall be buried like a dead ass,
    dragged along and flung out
    beyond the gates of Jerusalem.


   20   Get up into Lebanon and cry aloud,
  make your voice heard in Bashan,
cry aloud from Abarim, for all who befriend you are broken.
   21   I spoke to you in your days of prosperous ease,
    but you said, ‘I will not listen.’
  This is how you behaved since your youth;
    never have you obeyed me.
   22   The wind shall carry away all your friends, ^note
  your lovers shall depart into exile.
  Then you will be put to shame and abashed
    for all your evil deeds. ^note

Kings and prophets denounced
23   You dwellers in Lebanon, who make your nests among the cedars,
  how you will groan when the pains come upon you,
    like the pangs of a woman in labour!

24   By my life, says the Lord, Coniah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, shall be the signet-ring on my right hand no longer. Yes, Coniah, I will pull you off. 25   I will hand you over to those who seek your life, to those you fear, to Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon and to the Chaldaeans. 26   I will fling you headlong, you and the mother who gave you birth, into another land, a land where you were not born; and there shall you both die. 27   They shall never come back to their own land, the land for which they long.

28   This man, Coniah, then, is he a mere puppet, contemptible and broken, only a thing unwanted? Why else are he and his children flung out headlong and hurled into a country they do not know?

29    30   O land, land, land, hear the words of the Lord: These are the words of the Lord: Write this man down as stripped of all honour, one who in his own life shall not prosper, nor shall he leave descendants to sit in prosperity on David's throne or rule again in Judah.

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