Jeremiah 3 - "The Temple Sermon" (7:1-15)

(14) Heal me, O LORD, and let me be healed;
Save me, and let me be saved;
For You are my glory. (15) See, they say to me:
“Where is the prediction of the LORD?
Let it come to pass!” (16) But I have not evaded
Being a shepherd in your service,^-g
Nor have I longed for the fatal day.
You know the utterances of my lips,
They were ever before You.

(1) Heal us, Adonai, and we will be healed, deliver us and we will be delivered; for You are our praise. Grant a complete healing to all our affliction

(4) because You are the Almighty, King, Who is a faithful and merciful Healer. Blessed are You, Adonai, Healer of the sick of His people Israel.

(1) At the beginning of the reign of King Jehoiakim son of Josiah of Judah, this word came from the LORD:

(2) “Thus said the LORD: Stand in the court of the House of the LORD, and speak to [the men of] all the towns of Judah, who are coming to worship in the House of the LORD, all the words which I command you to speak to them. Do not omit anything. (3) Perhaps they will listen and turn back, each from his evil way, that I may renounce the punishment I am planning to bring upon them for their wicked acts.

Opening

(1) The word which came to Jeremiah from the LORD: (2) Stand at the gate of the House of the LORD, and there proclaim this word: Hear the word of the LORD, all you of Judah who enter these gates to worship the LORD!

Part One (3) Thus said the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Mend your ways and your actions, and I will let you dwell^-a in this place. (4) Don’t put your trust in illusions and say, “The Temple of the LORD, the Temple of the LORD, the Temple of the LORD are these [buildings].” (5) No, if you really mend your ways and your actions; if you execute justice between one man and another; (6) if you do not oppress the stranger, the orphan, and the widow; if you do not shed the blood of the innocent in this place; if you do not follow other gods, to your own hurt— (7) then only will I let you dwell^-a in this place, in the land that I gave to your fathers for all time.

Part Two (8) See, you are relying on illusions that are of no avail. (9) Will you steal and murder and commit adultery and swear falsely, and sacrifice to Baal, and follow other gods whom you have not experienced, (10) and then come and stand before Me in this House which bears My name and say, “We are safe”?—[Safe] to do all these abhorrent things! (11) Do you consider this House, which bears My name, to be a den of thieves? As for Me, I have been watching—declares the LORD.

​​​​​​​Part Three (12) Just go to My place at Shiloh, where I had established My name formerly, and see what I did to it because of the wickedness of My people Israel. (13) And now, because you do all these things—declares the LORD—and though I spoke to you persistently, you would not listen; and though I called to you, you would not respond— (14) therefore I will do to the House which bears My name, on which you rely, and to the place which I gave you and your fathers, just what I did to Shiloh. (15) And I will cast you out of My presence as I cast out your brothers, the whole brood of Ephraim.

(1) In the year that King Uzziah died, I beheld my Lord seated on a high and lofty throne; and the skirts of His robe filled the Temple. (2) Seraphs stood in attendance on Him. Each of them had six wings: with two he covered his face, with two he covered his legs, and with two he would fly.
(3) And one would call to the other,
“Holy, holy, holy!
The LORD of Hosts!
His presence fills all the earth!”

(28) Is this man Coniah
A wretched broken pot,
A vessel no one wants?
Why are he and his offspring hurled out,
And cast away in a land they knew not? (29) O land, land, land,
Hear the word of the LORD! (30) Thus said the LORD:
Record this man as without succession,
One who shall never be found acceptable;
For no man of his offspring shall be accepted
To sit on the throne of David
And to rule again in Judah.

(13) For from the smallest to the greatest,
They are all greedy for gain;
Priest and prophet alike,
They all act falsely. (14) They offer healing offhand
For the wounds of My people,
Saying, “All is well, all is well,”
When nothing is well / shalom, shalom, ve'ein shalom.

(1) The whole community of the Israelite people assembled at Shiloh, and set up the Tent of Meeting there. The land was now under their control;

(14) Assuredly, I swear concerning the house of Eli that the iniquity of the house of Eli will never be expiated by sacrifice or offering.”

(58) They vexed Him with their high places;
they incensed Him with their idols. (59) God heard it and was enraged;
He utterly rejected Israel. (60) He forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh,
the tent He had set among men. (61) He let His might [the Ark] go into captivity,
His glory into the hands of the foe. (62) He gave His people over to the sword;
He was enraged at His very own. (63) Fire consumed their young men,
and their maidens remained unwed. (64) Their priests fell by the sword,
and their widows could not weep.
(65) The Lord awoke as from sleep,
like a warrior shaking off wine. (66) He beat back His foes,
dealing them lasting disgrace. (67) He rejected the clan of Joseph;
He did not choose the tribe of Ephraim.

(26) To the priest Abiathar, the king [=Solomon] said, “Go to your estate at Anathoth! You deserve to die, but I shall not put you to death at this time, because you carried the Ark of my Lord GOD before my father David and because you shared all the hardships that my father endured.” (27) So Solomon dismissed Abiathar from his office of priest of the LORD—thus fulfilling what the LORD had spoken at Shiloh regarding the house of Eli [referring to I Samuel 3:14].

(16) Then the officials and all the people said to the priests and prophets, “This man does not deserve the death penalty, for he spoke to us in the name of the LORD our God.”

(17) And some of the elders of the land arose and said to the entire assemblage of the people, (18) “Micah the Morashtite, who prophesied in the days of King Hezekiah of Judah, said to all the people of Judah: ‘Thus said the LORD of Hosts:
Zion shall be plowed as a field,
Jerusalem shall become heaps of ruins
And the Temple Mount a shrine in the woods.’ (19) “Did King Hezekiah of Judah, and all Judah, put him to death? Did he not rather fear the LORD and implore the LORD, so that the LORD renounced the punishment He had decreed against them? We are about to do great injury to ourselves!”