Jeremiah 19

¹Thus says the Lord

²And go out to the Valley of the Son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the Potsherd Gate; and proclaim there the words that I will tell you,

³and say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord

⁴“Because they have forsaken Me and made this an alien place, because they have burned incense in it to other gods whom neither they, their fathers, nor the kings of Judah have known, and have filled this place with the blood of the innocents

⁵(they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind),

⁶therefore behold, the days are coming,” says the Lord

⁷And I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place, and I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies and by the hands of those who seek their lives; their corpses I will give as meat for the birds of the heaven and for the beasts of the earth.

⁸I will make this city desolate and a hissing; everyone who passes by it will be astonished and hiss because of all its plagues.

⁹And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and everyone shall eat the flesh of his friend in the siege and in the desperation with which their enemies and those who seek their lives shall drive them to despair.” ’

¹⁰“Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you,

¹¹and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord

¹²Thus I will do to this place,” says the Lord

¹³And the houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah shall be defiled like the place of Tophet, because of all the houses on whose roofs they have burned incense to all the host of heaven, and poured out drink offerings to other gods.” ’ ”

¹⁴Then Jeremiah came from Tophet, where the Lord

¹⁵“Thus says the Lord