1-2 In the fourth year that Jehoiakim was king of Judah, which was
the first year that Nebuchadnezzar was king of Babylonia, the Lord told me to
speak to the people of Judah and Jerusalem. So I told them:
3 For twenty-three years now, ever since the thirteenth year
that Josiah was king, I have been telling you what the Lord has told me. But
you have not listened.
4 The Lord has sent prophets to you time after time, but you
refused to listen. 5 They told you that the Lord had said:
Change your ways! If you stop doing evil, I will let you stay forever in this land that I gave your ancestors. 6 I dont want to harm you. So dont make me angry by worshiping idols and other gods.
7 But you refused to listen to my prophets. So I, the Lord, say that you have made me angry by worshiping idols, and you are the ones who were hurt by what you did. 8 You refused to listen to me, 9 and now I will let you be attacked by nations from the north, and especially by my servant, King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylonia. You and other nearby nations will be destroyed and left in ruins forever. Everyone who sees what has happened will be shocked, but they will still make fun of you. 10 I will put an end to your parties and wedding celebrations; no one will grind grain or be here to light the lamps at night. 11 This country will be as empty as a desert, because I will make all of you the slaves of the king of Babylonia for seventy years.
12 When that time is up, I will punish the king of Babylonia and his people for everything they have done wrong, and I will turn that country into a wasteland forever. 13 My servant Jeremiah has told you what I said I will do to Babylonia and to the other nations, and he wrote it all down in this book. I will do everything I threatened. 14 I will pay back the Babylonians for every wrong they have done. Great kings from many other nations will conquer the Babylonians and force them to be slaves.
15 The Lord God of Israel showed me a vision
in which he said, Jeremiah, here is a cup filled with the
wine of my anger. Take it and make every nation drink some. 16
They will vomit and act crazy, because of the war this cup
of anger will bring to them.
17 I took the cup from the Lords hand,
and I went to the kings of the nations and made each of them drink
some. 18 I started with Jerusalem and the towns of
Judah, and the king and his officials were removed from power
in disgrace. Everyone still makes insulting jokes about them and
uses their names as curse words. 19 The second place
I went was Egypt, where everyone had to drink from the cup, including
the king and his officials, the other government workers, the
rest of the Egyptians, 20 and all the foreigners who
lived in the country.
Next I went to the king of Uz, and then to the four kings of Philistia,
who ruled from Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and what was left of Ashdod.
21 Then I went to the kings of Edom, Moab,
Ammon, 22 and to the kings of Tyre, Sidon, and their
colonies across the sea. 23-24 After this, I went to
the kings of Dedan, Tema, Buz, the tribes of the Arabian Desert,
25 Zimri, Elam, Media, 26 and
the countries in the north, both near and far.
I went to all the countries on earth, one after another, and finally
to Babylonia.
27 The Lord had said to tell each king, The
Lord All-Powerful, the God of Israel, commands you to drink from
this cup that is full of the wine of his anger. It will make you
so drunk that you will vomit. And when the Lord sends war against
the nations, you will be completely defeated.
28 The Lord told me that if any of them refused
to drink from the cup, I must tell them that he had said, I,
the Lord All-Powerful, command you to drink. 29 Starting
with my own city of Jerusalem, everyone on earth will suffer from
war. So there is no way I will let you escape unharmed.
30 The Lord told me to say:
From my sacred temple
I will roar like
thunder,
while I trample my people
and everyone else
as though they
were grapes.
31 My voice will be heard
everywhere on
earth,
accusing nations of their crimes
and sentencing the guilty
to death.
32 The Lord All-Powerful says:
You can see disaster spreading
from far across
the earth,
from nation to nation
like a horrible
storm.
33 When it strikes, I will kill so many people
that their bodies will cover the ground like manure. No one will
be left to bury them or to mourn.
34 The Lords people are his flock,
and you leaders
were the shepherds.
But now its your turn
to be butchered
like sheep.
Youll shatter like fine pottery
dropped on the
floor.
So roll on the ground,
crying and mourning.
35 You have nowhere to run,
nowhere to hide.
*36 Listen to the cries
of the shepherds,
37 as the Lords burning anger
turns peaceful meadows
into barren deserts.
38 The Lord has abandoned
his people
like
a lion leaving its den.