Jeremiah 2:8

For what is the hope of the godless, when he is cut off, when God takes away his life?

Therefore my people go into captivity for lack of knowledge. Their honorable men are famished, and their multitudes are parched with thirst.

For your obedience has become known to all. I rejoice therefore over you. But I desire to have you wise in that which is good, but innocent in that which is evil.

Brothers, don’t be children in thoughts, yet in malice be babies, but in thoughts be mature.

For we are not as so many, peddling the word of God. But as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God, we speak in Christ.

‘Hear this now, foolish people without understanding, who have eyes, and don’t see, who have ears, and don’t hear:

“But God said to him, ‘You foolish one, tonight your soul is required of you. The things which you have prepared—whose will they be?’

Give diligence to present yourself approved by God, a workman who doesn’t need to be ashamed, properly handling the Word of Truth.

“Woe to the shepherds who destroy and scatter the sheep of my pasture!” says Yahweh.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you devour widows’ houses, and as a pretense you make long prayers. Therefore you will receive greater condemnation.

For what does it profit a man if he gains the whole world, and loses or forfeits his own self?

They said therefore to him, “Where is your Father?” Jesus answered, “You know neither me nor my Father. If you knew me, you would know my Father also.”

There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks after God.

According as it is written, “God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, to this very day.”

For they are a nation void of counsel. There is no understanding in them.

At the time of the evening offering, Elijah the prophet came near, and said, “Yahweh, the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel, and that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your word.

It isn’t good to have zeal without knowledge, nor being hasty with one’s feet and missing the way.

Their deeds won’t allow them to turn to their God; for the spirit of prostitution is within them, and they don’t know Yahweh.

Woe to those who devise iniquity and work evil on their beds! When the morning is light, they practice it, because it is in the power of their hand.

If your right eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out and throw it away from you. For it is more profitable for you that one of your members should perish, than for your whole body to be cast into Gehenna.

“But Abraham said, ‘Son, remember that you, in your lifetime, received your good things, and Lazarus, in the same way, bad things. But here he is now comforted, and you are in anguish.

You are of your father, the devil, and you want to do the desires of your father. He was a murderer from the beginning, and doesn’t stand in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaks a lie, he speaks on his own; for he is a liar, and the father of lies.

and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, four-footed animals, and creeping things.

Therefore don’t be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is.

For our exhortation is not of error, nor of uncleanness, nor in deception.

We traveled from Horeb and went through all that great and terrible wilderness which you saw, by the way to the hill country of the Amorites, as Yahweh our God commanded us; and we came to Kadesh Barnea.

He found him in a desert land, in the waste howling wilderness. He surrounded him. He cared for him. He kept him as the apple of his eye.

After all that generation were gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who didn’t know Yahweh, nor the work which he had done for Israel.

For I have told him that I will judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knew, because his sons brought a curse on themselves, and he didn’t restrain them.

He said, “I have been very jealous for Yahweh, the God of Armies; for the children of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.”

Now for a long time Israel was without the true God, without a teaching priest, and without law.

Wine is a mocker and beer is a brawler. Whoever is led astray by them is not wise.

The ox knows his owner, and the donkey his master’s crib; but Israel doesn’t know. My people don’t consider.”

For you have forgotten the God of your salvation, and have not remembered the rock of your strength. Therefore you plant pleasant plants, and set out foreign seedlings.

When its boughs are withered, they will be broken off. The women will come and set them on fire, for they are a people of no understanding. Therefore he who made them will not have compassion on them, and he who formed them will show them no favor.

and have cast their gods into the fire; for they were no gods, but the work of men’s hands, wood and stone; therefore they have destroyed them.

Haven’t you known? Haven’t you heard? The everlasting God, Yahweh, the Creator of the ends of the earth, doesn’t faint. He isn’t weary. His understanding is unsearchable.

Your first father sinned, and your teachers have transgressed against me.

They don’t know, neither do they consider: for he has shut their eyes, that they can’t see; and their hearts, that they can’t understand.

They are vanity, a work of delusion. In the time of their visitation they will perish.

Can the Ethiopian change his skin, or the leopard his spots? Then may you also do good, who are accustomed to do evil.

Should a man make to himself gods which yet are no gods?”

“I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria. They prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.

It is because of the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests, That have shed the blood of the just in the middle of her.

They have seen falsehood and lying divination, who say, ‘Yahweh says;’ but Yahweh has not sent them. They have made men to hope that the word would be confirmed.

For Israel has forgotten his Maker and built palaces; and Judah has multiplied fortified cities; but I will send a fire on his cities, and it will devour its fortresses.”

“Indeed they don’t know to do right,” says Yahweh, “Who hoard plunder and loot in their palaces.”

Those who regard lying vanities forsake their own mercy.

If a man walking in a spirit of falsehood lies: “I will prophesy to you of wine and of strong drink;” he would be the prophet of this people.

“What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?

For the priest’s lips should keep knowledge, and they should seek the law at his mouth; for he is the messenger of Yahweh of Armies.

But they will do all these things to you for my name’s sake, because they don’t know him who sent me.

Righteous Father, the world hasn’t known you, but I knew you; and these knew that you sent me.

Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,

Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting;

Knowing therefore the fear of the Lord, we persuade men, but we are revealed to God, and I hope that we are revealed also in your consciences.

See how great a love the Father has given to us, that we should be called children of God! For this cause the world doesn’t know us, because it didn’t know him.

That prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death, because he has spoken rebellion against Yahweh your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt and redeemed you out of the house of bondage, to draw you aside out of the way which Yahweh your God commanded you to walk in. So you shall remove the evil from among you.

Then I said, “Surely these are poor. They are foolish; for they don’t know the Yahweh’s way, nor the law of their God.

The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?

But they are together brutish and foolish, instructed by idols! It is just wood.

For the shepherds have become brutish, and have not inquired of Yahweh. Therefore they have not prospered, and all their flocks have scattered.

Her priests have done violence to my law, and have profaned my holy things. They have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they caused men to discern between the unclean and the clean, and have hidden their eyes from my Sabbaths. So I am profaned among them.

“Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel. Prophesy, and tell them, even the shepherds, ‘The Lord Yahweh says: “Woe to the shepherds of Israel who feed themselves! Shouldn’t the shepherds feed the sheep?

Hear Yahweh’s word, you children of Israel; for Yahweh has a charge against the inhabitants of the land: “Indeed there is no truth, nor goodness, nor knowledge of God in the land.

According to their pasture, so were they filled; they were filled, and their heart was exalted. Therefore they have forgotten me.

Your prophets have seen false and foolish visions for you. They have not uncovered your iniquity, to reverse your captivity, but have seen for you false revelations and causes of banishment.

They will do these things because they have not known the Father, nor me.

But we have renounced the hidden things of shame, not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully, but by the manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God.

You are to teach the children of Israel all the statutes which Yahweh has spoken to them by Moses.”

But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in my name, which I have not commanded him to speak, or who speaks in the name of other gods, that same prophet shall die.”

They shall teach Jacob your ordinances, and Israel your law. They shall put incense before you, and whole burnt offering on your altar.

Now the sons of Eli were wicked men. They didn’t know Yahweh.

Don’t turn away to go after vain things which can’t profit or deliver, for they are vain.

Then Elijah said to the people, “I, even I only, am left as a prophet of Yahweh; but Baal’s prophets are four hundred fifty men.

When midday was past, they prophesied until the time of the evening offering; but there was no voice, no answer, and nobody paid attention.

Elijah said to them, “Seize the prophets of Baal! Don’t let one of them escape!” They seized them; and Elijah brought them down to the brook Kishon, and killed them there.

He sings before men, and says, ‘I have sinned, and perverted that which was right, and it didn’t profit me.

I have more understanding than all my teachers, for your testimonies are my meditation.

This also is a grievous evil, that in all points as he came, so shall he go. And what profit does he have who labors for the wind?

They also reel with wine, and stagger with strong drink. The priest and the prophet reel with strong drink. They are swallowed up by wine. They stagger with strong drink. They err in vision. They stumble in judgment.

For Yahweh has poured out on you a spirit of deep sleep, and has closed your eyes, the prophets; and he has covered your heads, the seers.

They shall all be ashamed because of a people that can’t profit them, that are not a help nor profit, but a shame, and also a reproach.”

They didn’t say, ‘Where is Yahweh who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought and of the shadow of death, through a land that no one passed through, and where no man lived?’

Has a nation changed its gods, which really are no gods? But my people have changed their glory for that which doesn’t profit.

“For my people are foolish. They don’t know me. They are foolish children, and they have no understanding. They are skillful in doing evil, but they don’t know how to do good.”

“For from their least even to their greatest, everyone is given to covetousness. From the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.

Behold, you trust in lying words that can’t profit.

but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart and after the Baals, which their fathers taught them.”

Many shepherds have destroyed my vineyard. They have trodden my portion under foot. They have made my pleasant portion a desolate wilderness.

If I go out into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! If I enter into the city, then, behold, those who are sick with famine! For both the prophet and the priest go about in the land, and have no knowledge.’ ”

then you shall tell them, ‘Because your fathers have forsaken me,’ says Yahweh, ‘and have walked after other gods, have served them, have worshiped them, have forsaken me, and have not kept my law.

Yahweh, my strength, and my stronghold, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the nations will come to you from the ends of the earth, and will say, “Our fathers have inherited nothing but lies, vanity and things in which there is no profit.

Then they said, “Come! Let’s devise plans against Jeremiah; for the law won’t perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let’s strike him with the tongue, and let’s not give heed to any of his words.”

The wind will feed all your shepherds, and your lovers will go into captivity. Surely then you will be ashamed and confounded for all your wickedness.

My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, that you may be no priest to me. Because you have forgotten your God’s law, I will also forget your children.

For what will it profit a man, if he gains the whole world, and forfeits his life? Or what will a man give in exchange for his life?

Woe to you lawyers! For you took away the key of knowledge. You didn’t enter in yourselves, and those who were entering in, you hindered.”

You have not known him, but I know him. If I said, ‘I don’t know him,’ I would be like you, a liar. But I know him and keep his word.

Remind them of these things, charging them in the sight of the Lord, that they don’t argue about words, to no profit, to the subverting of those who hear.