The In-Dept Study of the Bible
Jeremiah 31
1 “At that time,” says Yahweh, “I will be
the God of all the families of Israel, and
they will be my people.”
2 Yahweh says, “The people who survive
the sword found favor in the wilderness;
even Israel, when I went to cause him to
rest.”
3 Yahweh appeared of old to me, saying,
“Yes, I have loved you with an everlasting
love. Therefore I have drawn you with
loving kindness.
4 I will build you again,
and you will be built, O virgin ofIsrael.
You will again be adorned with your tambourines,
and will go out in the dances of those
who make merry.
5 Again you will plant vineyards on the
mountains of Samaria. The planters will plant,
and will enjoy its fruit.
6 For there will be a day that the watchmen
on the hills of Ephraim cry, ‘Arise!
Let’s go up to Zion to Yahweh
our God.
7 For Yahweh says, “Sing with gladness for Jacob,
and shout for the chief of the nations.
Publish, praise, and say, ‘Yahweh, save your people,
the remnant of Israel!’
8 Behold, I will bring them from the north
country, and gather them from the uttermost
parts of the earth, along with the blind
and the lame, the woman with child and her who
travails with child together.
They will return as a great company.
9 They will come with weeping.
I will lead them with petitions.
I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters,
in a straight way in which they won’t
stumble; for I am a father to Israel.
Ephraim is my firstborn.
10 “Hear Yahweh’s word, you nations,
and declare it in the distant islands.
Say, ‘He who scattered Israel will gather him,
and keep him, as a shepherd does his
flock.
11 For Yahweh has ransomed Jacob,
and redeemed him from the hand of
him who was stronger than he.
12 They will come and sing in the height of
Zion, and will flow to the goodness of Yahweh,
to the grain, to the new wine, to the oil,
and to the young ofthe flock and ofthe
herd. Their soul will be as a watered garden.
They will not sorrow any more at all.
13 Then the virgin will rejoice in the dance,
the young men and the old together;
for I will turn their mourning into joy,
and will comfort them, and make
them rejoice from their sorrow.
14 I will satiate the soul of the priests with
fatness, and my people will be satisfied with
my goodness,” says Yahweh.
15 Yahweh says: “A voice is heard in Ramah,
lamentation and bitter weeping,
Rachel weeping for her children.
She refuses to be comforted for her
children, because they are no more.”
16 Yahweh says: “Refrain your
voice from weeping, and your eyes
from tears, for your work will
be rewarded,” says Yahweh. “They
will come again from the land of
the enemy.
17 There is hope for your latter end,” says
Yahweh. “Your children will come againto their
own territory.
18 “I have surely heard Ephraim grieving
thus, ‘You have chastised me,
and I was chastised, as an untrained
calf. Turn me, and I will be turned,
for you are Yahweh my God.
19 Surely after that I was turned.
I repented. After that I was instructed.
I struck my thigh. I was ashamed, yes,
even confounded, because I bore
the reproach of my youth.
20 Is Ephraim my dear son?
Is he a darling child?
For as often as I speak against him,
I still earnestly remember him.
Therefore my heart yearns for him.
I will surely have mercy on him,” says
Yahweh.
21 “Set up road signs. Make guideposts.
Set your heart toward the highway,
even the way by which you went.
Turn again, virgin of Israel.
Turn again to these your cities.
22 How long will you go here and there,
you backsliding daughter?
For Yahweh has created a new thing in the
earth: a woman will encompass a man.”
23 Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel,
says: “Yet again they will use this speech in
the land of Judah and in its cities, when I
reverse their captivity: ‘Yahweh bless you,
habitation of righteousness, mountain of
holiness.’
24 Judah and all its cities will dwell
therein together, the farmers, and those
who go about with flocks.
25 For I have satiated the weary soul, and
I have replenished every sorrowful soul.”
26 On this I awakened, and saw; and my
sleep was sweet to me.
27 “Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh,
“that I will sow the house of Israel and the
house of Judah with the seed of man and
with the seed of animal.
28 It will happen that, like as I have
watched over them to pluck up and to
break down and to overthrow and to
destroy and to afflict, so I will watch over
them to build and to plant,” says Yahweh.
29 “In those days they will say no more,
The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and
the children’s teeth are set on edge.’
30 But everyone will die for his own
iniquity. Every man who eats the sour grapes,
his teeth will be set on edge.
31 “Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh,
“that I will make a new covenant with
the house of Israel, and with the house of
Judah,
32 not according to the covenant that I
made with their fathers in the day that I
took them by the hand to bring them out of
the land of Egypt, which covenant of mine
they broke, although I was a husband to
them,” says Yahweh.
33 “But this is the covenant that I will
make with the house of Israel after those
days,” says Yahweh: “I will put my law in their inward parts,
and I will write it in their heart. I will be their God,
and they shall be my people.
34 They will no longer each teach his neighbor,
and every man teach his brother, saying,
‘Know Yahweh;’ for they will all know me,
from their least to their greatest,” says
Yahweh, “for I will forgive their iniquity,
and I will remember their sin no more.”
35 Yahweh, who gives the sun for a light by
day, and the ordinances ofthe moon and of
the stars for a light by night,
who stirs up the sea, so that its waves
roar Yahweh of Armies is his name, says:
36 “If these ordinances depart from before
me,” says Yahweh, “then the offspring
of Israel also will cease from being
a nation before me forever.”
37 Yahweh says: “If heaven above can be
measured, and the foundations of the earth
searched out beneath, then I will also
cast off all the offspring of Israelfor
all that they have done, says Yahweh.
38 “Behold, the days come,” says Yahweh,
“that the city will be built to Yahweh from
the tower of Hananel to the gate of the
corner.
39 The measuring line will go out further
straight onward to the hill Gareb, and will
turn toward Goah.
40 The whole valley of the dead bodies
and of the ashes, and all the fields to the
brook Kidron, to the corner of the horse
gate toward the east, will be holy to Yahweh.
It will not be plucked up or thrown
down any more forever.”