91 If only my head was a stream of waters and my eyes fountains of weeping, so that I might go on weeping day and night for the dead of the daughter of my people! 2 If only I had in the waste land a night's resting-place for travellers, so that I might go away, far from my people! for they are all untrue, a band of false men. 3 Their tongues are bent like a bow to send out false words: they have become strong in the land, but not for good faith: they go on from evil to evil, and they have no knowledge of me, says the Lord. 4 Let everyone keep watch on his neighbour, and put no faith in any brother: for every brother will certainly be tricking his brother, and every neighbour will go about saying evil. 5 Everyone will make sport of his neighbour with deceit, not saying what is true: their tongues have been trained to say false words; they are twisted, hating to come back. 6 There is wrong on wrong, deceit on deceit; they have given up the knowledge of me, says the Lord. 7 So the Lord of armies has said, See, I will make them soft in the fire and put them to the test; this I will do because of their evil-doing. 8 His tongue is an arrow causing death; the words of his mouth are deceit: he says words of peace to his neighbour, but in his heart he is waiting secretly for him. 9 Am I not to send punishment for these things? says the Lord: will not my soul take payment from such a nation as this? 10 Give yourselves to weeping, crying out in sorrow for the mountains; and for the fields of the waste land send up a song of grief, because they are burned up, so that no one goes through; there is no sound of cattle; the bird of the heavens and the beast are in flight and are gone. 11 And I will make Jerusalem a mass of broken stones, the living-place of jackals; and I will make the towns of Judah a waste, with no man living there.
12 Who is the wise man able to see this? who is he to whom the word of the Lord has come, so that he may make it clear? why is the land given to destruction and burned up like a waste place, so that no one goes through? 13 And the Lord said, Because they have given up my law which I put before them, giving no attention to my voice and not being guided by it; 14 But they have been walking in the pride of their hearts, going after the Baals, as their fathers gave them teaching. 15 So the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said, I will give them, even this people, bitter plants for food and bitter water for drink. 16 And I will send them wandering among the nations, among people strange to them and to their fathers: and I will send the sword after them till I have put an end to them. 17 This is what the Lord of armies has said: Take thought and send for the weeping women, so that they may come; and send for the wise women, so that they may come: 18 Let them quickly make cries of sorrow for us, so that drops may be flowing from our eyes till they are streaming with water. 19 For a sound of weeping goes up from Zion, a cry, How has destruction come on us? we are overcome with shame because we have gone away from our land; he has sent us out from our house. 20 But even now, give ear to the word of the Lord, O you women; let your ears be open to the word of his mouth, training your daughters to give cries of sorrow, everyone teaching her neighbour a song of grief. 21 For death has come up into our windows, forcing its way into our great houses; cutting off the children in the streets and the young men in the wide places. 22 The bodies of men will be falling like waste on the open fields, and like grain dropped by the grain-cutter, and no one will take them up.
23 This is the word of the Lord: Let not the wise man take pride in his wisdom, or the strong man in his strength, or the man of wealth in his wealth: 24 But if any man has pride, let it be in this, that he has the wisdom to have knowledge of me, that I am the Lord, working mercy, giving true decisions, and doing righteousness in the earth: for in these things I have delight, says the Lord. 25 See, the day is coming, says the Lord, when I will send punishment on all those who have circumcision in the flesh; 26 On Egypt and on Judah and on Edom and on the children of Ammon and on Moab and on all who have the ends of their hair cut, who are living in the waste land: for all these nations and all the people of Israel are without circumcision in their hearts.
101 Give ear to the word which the Lord says to you, O people of Israel: 2 This is what the Lord has said: Do not go in the way of the nations; have no fear of the signs of heaven, for the nations go in fear of them. 3 For that which is feared by the people is foolish: it is the work of the hands of the workman; for a tree is cut down by him out of the woods with his axe. 4 They make it beautiful with silver and gold; they make it strong with nails and hammers, so that it may not be moved. 5 It is like a pillar in a garden of plants, and has no voice: it has to be lifted, for it has no power of walking. Have no fear of it; for it has no power of doing evil and it is not able to do any good. 6 There is no one like you, O Lord; you are great and your name is great in power. 7 Who would not have fear of you, O King of the nations? for it is your right: for among all the wise men of the nations, and in all their kingdoms, there is no one like you. 8 But they are together like beasts and foolish: the teaching of false gods is wood. 9 Silver hammered into plates is sent from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz, the work of the expert workman and of the hands of the gold-worker; blue and purple is their clothing, all the work of expert men. 10 But the Lord is the true God; he is the living God and an eternal king: when he is angry, the earth is shaking with fear, and the nations give way before his wrath. 11 This is what you are to say to them: The gods who have not made the heavens and the earth will be cut off from the earth and from under the heavens. 12 He has made the earth by his power, he has made the world strong in its place by his wisdom, and by his wise design the heavens have been stretched out. 13 At the sound of his voice there is a massing of waters in the heavens, and he makes the mists go up from the ends of the earth; he makes the thunder-flames for the rain, and sends out the wind from his store-houses. 14 Then every man becomes like a beast without knowledge; every gold-worker is put to shame by the image he has made: for his metal image is deceit, and there is no breath in them. 15 They are nothing, a work of error: in the time of their punishment, destruction will overtake them. 16 The heritage of Jacob is not like these; for the maker of all things is his heritage: the Lord of armies is his name.
17 Get your goods together and go out of the land, O you who are shut up in the walled town. 18 For the Lord has said, I will send the people in flight like a stone from the land at this time, troubling them so that they will be conscious of it. 19 Sorrow is mine for I am wounded! my wound may not be made well; and I said, Cruel is my disease, I may not be free from it. 20 My tent is pulled down and all my cords are broken: my children have gone from me, and they are not: no longer is there anyone to give help in stretching out my tent and hanging up my curtains. 21 For the keepers of the sheep have become like beasts, not looking to the Lord for directions: so they have not done wisely and all their flocks have been put to flight. 22 News is going about, see, it is coming, a great shaking is coming from the north country, so that the towns of Judah may be made waste and become the living-place of jackals. 23 O Lord, I am conscious that a man's way is not in himself: man has no power of guiding his steps. 24 O Lord, put me right, but with wise purpose; not in your wrath, or you will make me small. 25 Let your wrath be let loose on the nations which have no knowledge of you, and on the families who give no worship to your name: for they have made a meal of Jacob, truly they have made a meal of him and put an end to him and made his fields a waste.
111 The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, 2 Give ear to the words of this agreement, and say to the men of Judah and to the people of Jerusalem, 3 The Lord, the God of Israel, has said, Let that man be cursed who does not give ear to the words of this agreement, 4 To the order which I gave your fathers on the day when I took them out of the land of Egypt, out of the oven of iron, saying, Give ear to my voice, and do all the orders I have given you: so you will be my people, and I will be your God: 5 So that I may give effect to the oath which I made to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey as at this day. And I said in answer, So be it, O Lord. 6 And the Lord said to me, Give out these words in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, Give ear to the words of this agreement and do them. 7 For I gave certain witness to your fathers on the day when I took them up out of the land of Egypt, and even to this day, getting up early and witnessing and saying, Give ear to my voice. 8 But they gave no attention and did not give ear, but they went on, every man in the pride of his evil heart: so I sent on them all the curses in this agreement, which I gave them orders to keep, but they did not. 9 And the Lord said to me, There is an evil design at work among the men of Judah and the people of Jerusalem. 10 They are turned back to the sins of their fathers, who would not give ear to my words; they have gone after other gods and become their servants: the people of Israel and the people of Judah have not kept the agreement which I made with their fathers.
11 So the Lord has said, I will send evil on them, which they will not be able to get away from; and they will send up a cry for help to me, but I will not give ear to them. 12 Then the towns of Judah and the people of Jerusalem will go crying for help to the gods to whom they have been burning perfumes: but they will give them no salvation in the time of their trouble. 13 For the number of your gods is as the number of your towns, O Judah; and for every street in Jerusalem you have put up altars to the Baal for burning perfumes to the Baal. 14 And as for you, make no prayers for this people, send up no cry or prayer for them: for I will not give ear to their cry in the time of their trouble. 15 About Judah. What have you to do in my house? is it your thought that oaths and holy flesh will get you out of your trouble? will you make yourself safe in this way? 16 You had been named by the Lord, A branching olive-tree, fair with beautiful fruit: with the noise of a great rushing he has put it on fire and its branches are broken. 17 For the Lord of armies, by whom you were planted, has given his decision for evil against you, because of the evil which the people of Israel and the people of Judah have done, In moving me to wrath by offering perfumes to the Baal.
18 And the Lord gave me knowledge of it and I saw it: then you made clear to me their doings. 19 But I was like a gentle lamb taken to be put to death; I had no thought that they were designing evil against me, saying, Come and let us make trouble his food, cutting him off from the land of the living, so that there may be no more memory of his name. 20 But, O Lord of armies, judging in righteousness, testing the thoughts and the heart, let me see your punishment come on them: for I have put my cause before you. 21 So this is what the Lord of armies has said about the men of Anathoth who have made designs against your life, saying, You are not to be a prophet in the name of the Lord, or death will overtake you by our hands: 22 So the Lord of armies has said, See, I will send punishment on them: the young men will be put to the sword; their sons and their daughters will come to death through need of food: 23 Not one of them will keep his life, for I will send evil on the men of Anathoth in the year of their punishment.
61 Let all who are servants under the yoke give all honour to their masters, so that no evil may be said against the name of God and his teaching. 2 And let those whose masters are of the faith have respect for them because they are brothers, working for them the more readily, because those who take part in the good work are of the faith and are dear. Give orders and teaching about these things.
3 If any man gives different teaching, not in agreement with the true words of our Lord Jesus Christ, and with the teaching which is in agreement with true religion, 4 He has an over-high opinion of himself; being without knowledge, having only an unhealthy love of questionings and wars of words, from which come envy, fighting, cruel words, evil thoughts, 5 Bitter talk of men who, being evil in mind and dead to what is true, take the faith to be a way of making profit.
6 But true faith, with peace of mind, is of great profit: 7 For we came into the world with nothing, and we are not able to take anything out; 8 But if we have food and a roof over us, let that be enough. 9 But those who have a desire for wealth are falling into danger, and are taken as in a net by a number of foolish and damaging desires, through which men are overtaken by death and destruction. 10 For the love of money is a root of all evil: and some whose hearts were fixed on it have been turned away from the faith, and been wounded with unnumbered sorrows.
11 But you, O man of God, keep yourself from these things, and go after righteousness, religion, faith, love, a quiet mind, gentle behaviour. 12 Be fighting the good fight of the faith; take for yourself the life eternal, for which you were marked out, and of which you gave witness in the eyes of all.
13 I give you orders before God, the giver of life, and Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate gave witness to the faith, 14 To keep the word untouched by evil, clear from all shame, till the revelation of our Lord Jesus Christ: 15 Which at the right time he will make clear, who is the eternal and only Ruler, King of kings, and Lord of lords; 16 Who only has life for ever, living in light to which no man may come near; whom no man has seen or is able to see: to whom be honour and power for ever. So be it. 17 Give orders to those who have money and goods in this life, not to be lifted up in their minds, or to put their hope in the uncertain chances of wealth, but in God who gives us in full measure all things for our use; 18 And to do good, having wealth in good works, being quick to give, taking part with one another; 19 Making ready for themselves a safe place for the time to come, so that the true life may be theirs. 20 O Timothy, take good care of that which is given to you, turning away from the wrong and foolish talk and arguments of that knowledge which is falsely so named; 21 Through which some, who gave their minds to it, have been turned away from the faith. Grace be with you.
