Jeremiah 22:13-30 ▼

13 Woe for the one who builds his palace through unrighteousness, his upstairs rooms through injustice, who makes his neighbor serve without pay and will not give him his wages,

14 who says, “I will build myself a massive palace, with spacious upstairs rooms.” He will cut windows in it, and it will be paneled with cedar and painted bright red.

15 Are you a king because you excel in cedar? Didn’t your father eat and drink and administer justice and righteousness? Then it went well with him.

16 He took up the case of the poor and needy; then it went well. Is this not what it means to know me? This is the LORD’s declaration.

17 But you have eyes and a heart for nothing except your own dishonest profit, shedding innocent blood and committing 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, saying, “Woe, my brother! ” or “Woe, my sister! ” They will not mourn for him, saying, “Woe, lord! Woe, his majesty! ”

19 He will be buried like a donkey, dragged off and thrown outside Jerusalem’s gates.

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 spoke to you when you were secure. You said, “I will not listen.” This has been your way since youth; indeed, you have never listened to me.

22 The wind will take charge of all your shepherds, and your lovers will go into captivity. Then you will be ashamed and humiliated because of all your evil.

23 You residents of Lebanon, nestled among the cedars, how you will groan when pains come on you, agony like a woman in labor.

24 “As I live”—this is the LORD’s declaration—“though you, Coniah son of Jehoiakim, the king of Judah, were a signet ring on my right hand, I would tear you from it.

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

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

27 They will never return to the land they long to return to.”

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

29 Earth, earth, earth, hear the word of the LORD!

30 This is what the LORD says: Record this man as childless, a man who will not be successful in his lifetime. None of his descendants will succeed in sitting on the throne of David or ruling again in Judah.