This wicked people, that will not hear my words and that walk in the perverseness of their heart and have gone after strange gods to serve them and to adore them: and they shall be as this girdle which is fit for no use.
My people have been silent, because they had no knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will reject thee, that thou shalt not do the office of priesthood to me: and thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I also will forget thy children.
For I heard the reproaches of many, and terror on every side: Persecute him, and, let us persecute him: from all the men that were my familiars and continued at my side: if by any means he may be deceived and we may prevail against him and be revenged on him.
And I was as a meek lamb that is carried to be a victim: and I knew not that they had devised counsels against me, saying: Let us put wood on his bread and cut him off from the land of the living, and let his name be remembered no more.
And they said: Come, and let us invent devices against Jeremias, for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let us strike him with the tongue, and let us give no heed to all his words.
They are returned to the former iniquities of their fathers who refused to hear my words: so these likewise have gone after strange gods, to serve them. The house of Israel and the house of Juda have made void my covenant which I made with their fathers.
If the Lord shall wash away the filth of the daughters of Sion, and shall wash away the blood of Jerusalem out of the midst thereof, by the spirit of judgment and by the spirit of burning.
How shall I deal with thee, O Ephraim, shall I protect thee, O Israel? how shall I make thee as Adama, shall I set thee as Seboim? my heart is turned within me, my repentance is stirred up.
And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined: and I will try them as gold is tried. They shall call on my name, and I will hear them. I will say: Thou art my people: and they shall say: The Lord is my God.