Jeremiah 19 in plain modern English. New Ground English Translation.

This is what Yahweh said: "Go buy a clay flask from a potter, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the senior priests with you.

Then go out to the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate, and announce there the words I'm about to tell you.

Say: 'Listen to the word of Yahweh, kings of Judah and people living in Jerusalem. This is what Yahweh, Commander of Angel Armies, the God of Israel, says: I'm about to bring a disaster on this place so terrible that the ears of anyone who hears about it will ring.

Because they have abandoned me and turned this place into something unrecognizable. They've burned offerings here to other gods that neither they, nor their ancestors, nor the kings of Judah ever knew. And they have filled this place with the blood of innocent people.

They have built shrines to Baal where they burn their own children alive as offerings to Baal — something I never commanded, never spoke about, and never even imagined.

So watch out — the days are coming, declares Yahweh, when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.

I will shatter the plans of Judah and Jerusalem in this very place. I will make them fall by the sword right in front of their enemies, killed by people who want them dead. And I will hand over their corpses as food for the birds and wild animals.

I will turn this city into a horror show and a target for mockery. Everyone who passes by will be shocked and will hiss at the sight of all its wounds.

I will make them eat the flesh of their own sons and daughters, and they will eat each other's flesh during the siege and in the desperate straits their enemies impose on them — the ones who want them dead.

Then smash the flask right in front of the men who went with you,

and tell them, 'This is what Yahweh, Commander of Angel Armies, says: I will smash this people and this city just like someone smashes a potter's vessel so completely that it can never be put back together again. And they will bury their dead in Topheth because there will be no room left anywhere else to bury them.'

This is what I will do to this place and the people who live here, declares Yahweh. I will make this city like Topheth.

The houses of Jerusalem and the palaces of the kings of Judah will become contaminated — just like the place of Topheth — every house where people burned incense on their rooftops to the stars and poured out drink offerings to other gods.

Then Jeremiah came back from Topheth, where Yahweh had sent him to prophesy, and he went and stood in the courtyard of Yahweh's house and said to all the people:

"This is what Yahweh, Commander of Angel Armies, the God of Israel, says: I am about to bring down on this city and on all its surrounding towns every disaster I have pronounced against it, because they have become completely stubborn and refused to listen to what I've said."