1Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people! 2Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging-place of wayfaring men, that I might leave my people, and go from them! For they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men. 3And they bend their tongue--their bow--for falsehood, and they have grown strong in the land, but not for truth. For they proceed from evil to evil, and they do not know me, says LORD. 4Take ye heed each one of his neighbor, and trust ye not in any brother, for every brother will utterly supplant, and every neighbor will go about with slanders. 5And they will deceive each one his neighbor, and will not speak the truth. They have taught their tongue to speak lies. They weary themselves to commit iniquity. 6Thy habitation is in the midst of deceit. Through deceit they refuse to know me, says LORD. 7Therefore thus says LORD of hosts: Behold, I will melt them, and try them, for how [else] should I do, because of the daughter of my people? 8Their tongue is a deadly arrow; it speaks deceit. He speaks peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, but in his heart he lays wait for him. 9Shall I not visit them for these things? says LORD. Shall not my soul be avenged on such a nation as this? 10For the mountains I will take up a weeping and wailing, and for the pastures of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none passes through, nor can men hear the voice of the cattle. Both the birds of the 11And I will make Jerusalem heaps, a dwelling-place of jackals. And I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant. 12Who is the wise man, who may understand this, and he to whom the mouth of LORD has spoken, that he may declare it? Why has the land perished and burned up like a wilderness, so that none passes through? 13And LORD says, Because they have forsaken my law which I set before them, and have not obeyed my voice, nor walked in it, 14but have walked after the stubbornness of their own heart, and after the Baalim, which their fathers taught them. 15Therefore thus says LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink. 16I will scatter them also among the nations, whom neither they nor their fathers have known. And I will send the sword after them, till I have consumed them. 17Thus says LORD of hosts, Consider ye, and call for the mourning women, that they may come, and send for the skilful women, that they may come. 18And let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters. 19For a voice of wailing is heard out of Zion, How we are ruined! We are greatly confounded, because we have forsaken the land, because they have cast down our dwellings. 20Yet hear the word of LORD, O ye women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth, and teach your daughters wailing, and each one her neighbor lamentation. 21For death has come up into our windows. It has entered into our palaces, to cut off the sons from outside, the young men from the streets. 22Speak, Thus says LORD: The dead bodies of men shall fall as dung upon the open field, and as the handful after the harvestman, and none shall gather. 23Thus says LORD: Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, nor let the mighty man glory in his might. Let not the rich man glory in his riches, 24but let him who boasts boast in this, that he has understanding, and knows me, that I am LORD who exercises loving kindness, justice, and righteousness, in the earth. For in these things I delight, says LORD. 25Behold, the days come, says LORD, that I will punish all those who are circumcised in [their] uncircumcision: 26Egypt, and Judah, and Edom, and the sons of Ammon, and Moab, and all who have the corners [of their hair] cut off, who dwell in the wilderness. For all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in