And so, what I did to Shiloh I will do to this Temple of mine, in which you trust. Here in this place that I gave to your ancestors and you, I will do the same thing that I did to Shiloh.

He burned down the Temple, the palace, and the houses of all the important people in Jerusalem,

He burned down the Temple and the city, with all its palaces and its wealth, and broke down the city wall.

They smashed all the wooden panels with their axes and sledge hammers.

They wanted to crush us completely; they burned down every holy place in the land.

O God, the heathen have invaded your land. They have desecrated your holy Temple and left Jerusalem in ruins.

Your sacred cities are like a desert; Jerusalem is a deserted ruin,

and our Temple, the sacred and beautiful place where our ancestors praised you, has been destroyed by fire. All the places we loved are in ruins.

The Lord rejected his altar and deserted his holy Temple; He allowed the enemy to tear down its walls. They shouted in victory where once we had worshiped in joy.

Once they were proud of their beautiful jewels, but they used them to make disgusting idols. That is why the LORD has made their wealth repulsive to them.

I will not interfere when my treasured Temple is profaned, when robbers break into it and defile it.

to give you Israelites this message: You are proud of the strength of the Temple. You like to look at it and to visit it, but the LORD is going to profane it. And the younger members of your families who are left in Jerusalem will be killed in war.

And so, because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field, Jerusalem will become a pile of ruins, and the Temple hill will become a forest.

Open your doors, Lebanon, so that fire can burn down your cedar trees!

"Yes," he said, "you may well look at all these. I tell you this: not a single stone here will be left in its place; every one of them will be thrown down."

Then they brought in some men to tell lies about him. "This man," they said, "is always talking against our sacred Temple and the Law of Moses.

We heard him say that this Jesus of Nazareth will tear down the Temple and change all the customs which have come down to us from Moses!"

Doomed is the one who says, "I will build myself a mansion with spacious rooms upstairs." So he puts windows in his house, panels it with cedar, and paints it red.

I will give the order, and they will return to this city. They will attack it, capture it, and burn it down. I will make the towns of Judah like a desert where no one lives. I, the LORD, have spoken."

Then the Babylonians will come back, attack the city, capture it, and burn it down.

Even if you defeat the whole Babylonian army, so that only wounded men are left, lying in their tents, they would still get up and burn this city to the ground."

Then I added, "All your women and children will be taken out to the Babylonians, and you yourself will not escape from them. You will be taken prisoner by the king of Babylonia, and this city will be burned to the ground."

Meanwhile, the Babylonians burned down the royal palace and the houses of the people and tore down the walls of Jerusalem.

Finally Nebuzaradan, the commanding officer, took away as prisoners to Babylonia the people who were left in the city, together with those who had deserted to him.

On the tenth day of the tenth month of the ninth year of our exile, the LORD spoke to me.

Tell my rebellious people this parable that I, the Sovereign LORD, have for them: Set the pot on the fire and fill it up with water.

Use the meat of the finest sheep; pile the wood under the pot. Let the water boil; boil the bones and the meat."

There was murder in the city, but the blood was not spilled on the ground where the dust could hide it; it was spilled on a bare rock.

This is what the Sovereign LORD is saying: "The city of murderers is doomed! I myself will pile up the firewood.

Now set the empty bronze pot on the coals and let it get red-hot. Then the pot will be ritually pure again after the corrosion is burned off,

Jerusalem, your immoral actions have defiled you. Although I tried to purify you, you remained defiled. You will not be pure again until you have felt the full force of my anger.

So I will send fire upon Judah and burn down the fortresses of Jerusalem."

The LORD says, "These people fill their mansions with things taken by crime and violence. They don't even know how to be honest.

And so an enemy will surround their land, destroy their defenses, and plunder their mansions."

When the LORD gives the command, houses large and small will be smashed to pieces.