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Updated Bible Version
Jeremiah 31
1 At that time, says Yahweh, I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall be my people.2 Thus says Yahweh, The people that were left of 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 with loving-kindness I have drawn you.4 Again I will build you, and you shall be built, O virgin of Israel: again you shall be adorned with your tabrets, and shall go forth in the dances of those that make merry.5 Again you shall plant vineyards on the mountains of Samaria; the planters shall plant, and shall enjoy [the fruit thereof].6 For there shall be a day, that the watchmen on the hills of Ephraim shall cry, Arise, and let us go up to Zion to Yahweh our God.7 For thus says Yahweh, Sing with gladness for Jacob, and shout for the chief of the nations: publish, praise, and say, O Yahweh, save your people, the remnant of Israel.8 Look, I will bring them from the north country, and gather them from the uttermost parts of the earth, [and] with them the blind and the lame, the pregnant woman and her that travails with child together: a great company they shall return here.9 They shall come with weeping; and with supplications I will lead them: I will cause them to walk by rivers of waters, in a straight way wherein they shall not stumble; for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first-born.
10 Hear the word of Yahweh, O you nations, and declare it in the isles far off; and say, He that 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 that was stronger than he.12 And they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow to the goodness of Yahweh, to the grain, and to the new wine, and to the oil, and to the sons of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow anymore at all.13 Then shall the virgin rejoice in the dance, and 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 And I will satiate the soul of the priests with fatness, and my people shall be satisfied with my goodness, says Yahweh.15 Thus says Yahweh: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping, Rachel weeping for her sons; she refuses to be comforted for her sons, because they are not.16 Thus says Yahweh: Refrain your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears; for your work shall be rewarded, says Yahweh; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy.17 And there is hope for your latter end, says Yahweh; and [your] sons shall come again to their own border.
18 I have surely heard Ephraim bemoaning himself [thus], You have chastised me, and I was chastised, as a calf unaccustomed [to the yoke]: turn me, and I shall be turned; for you are Yahweh my God.19 Surely after that I was turned, I repented; and after I was instructed, I smote on 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 earnestly remember him still: therefore my insides yearn for him; I will surely have mercy on him, says Yahweh.21 Set up waymarks, make guide-posts; set your heart toward the highway, even the way by which you went: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these cities of yours.22 How long will you go here and there, O you backsliding daughter? for Yahweh has created a new thing in the earth: a woman shall encompass an [able-bodied] man.23 Thus says Yahweh of hosts, the God of Israel, Yet again they shall use this speech in the land of Judah and in the cities thereof, when I shall bring again their captivity: Yahweh bless you, O habitation of righteousness, O mountain of holiness.24 And Judah and all the cities thereof shall dwell therein together, the husbandmen, and [those who] go about with flocks.25 For I have satiated the weary soul, and every sorrowful soul I have replenished.26 On this I awakened, and looked; and my sleep was sweet to me.
27 Look, 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 beast.28 And it shall come to pass that, like 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 shall say no more, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the sons are set on edge.30 But every one shall die for his own iniquity: any among man that eats the sour grapes, his teeth shall be set on edge.31 Look, 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 in their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people:34 and they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know Yahweh; for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest of them, says Yahweh: for I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more.
35 Thus says Yahweh, who gives the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, who stirs up the sea, so that the waves thereof roar; Yahweh of hosts is his name:36 If these ordinances depart from before me, says Yahweh, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me forever.37 Thus says Yahweh: If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, then I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done, says Yahweh.38 Look, the days come, says Yahweh, that the city shall be built to Yahweh from the tower of Hananel to the gate of the corner.39 And the measuring line shall go out further straight onward to the hill Gareb, and shall turn about to Goah.40 And 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, shall be holy to Yahweh; it shall not be plucked up, nor thrown down anymore forever.
Updated Bible Version
Scripture quotations are from the UPDV® Updated Bible Version 1.9, Copyright © 2003-4 by Updated Publishers. Used by permission. All Rights Reserved.