Jeremiah 22:13-30 ▼

13 “Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, and his upper rooms without justice, who makes his countrymen serve without pay, and fails to pay their wages,

14 who says, ‘I will build myself a great palace, with spacious upper rooms.’ So he cuts windows in it, panels it with cedar, and paints it with vermilion.

15 Does it make you a king to excel in cedar? Did not your father have food and drink? He administered justice and righteousness, and so it went well with him.

16 He took up the cause of the poor and needy, and so it went well with him. Is this not what it means to know Me?” declares the LORD.

17 “But your eyes and heart are set on nothing except your own dishonest gain, on shedding innocent blood, on practicing extortion and oppression.”

18 Therefore this is what the LORD says concerning Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah: “They will not mourn for him: ‘Alas, my brother! Alas, my sister!’ They will not mourn for him: ‘Alas, my master! Alas, his splendor!’

19 He will be buried like a donkey, dragged away and thrown outside the gates of Jerusalem.

20 Go up to Lebanon and cry out; raise your voice in Bashan; cry out from Abarim, for all your lovers have been crushed.

21 I warned you when you were secure. You said, ‘I will not listen.’ This has been your way from youth, that you have not obeyed My voice.

22 The wind will drive away all your shepherds, and your lovers will go into captivity. Then you will be ashamed and humiliated because of all your wickedness.

23 O inhabitant of Lebanon, nestled in the cedars, how you will groan when pangs of anguish come upon you, agony like a woman in labor.”

24 “As surely as I live,” declares the LORD, “even if you, Coniah son of Jehoiakim king of Judah, were a signet ring on My right hand, I would pull you off.

25 In fact, I will hand you over to those you dread, who want to take your life—to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and to the Chaldeans.

26 I will hurl you and the mother who gave you birth into another land, where neither of you were born—and there you both will die.

27 You will never return to the land for which you long.”

28 Is this man Coniah a despised and shattered pot, a jar that no one wants? Why are he and his descendants hurled out and cast into a land they do not know?

29 O land, land, land, hear the word of the LORD!

30 This is what the LORD says: “Enroll this man as childless, a man who will not prosper in his lifetime. None of his descendants will prosper to sit on the throne of David or to rule again in Judah.”