17 Thus saith the Lord of hosts, Take heed, and call for [a]the mourning women, that they may come, and send for skillful women, that they may come,

18 And let them make haste, and let them take up a lamentation for us, that our eyes may cast out tears, and our eyelids gush out of water.

19 For a lamentable noise is heard out of Zion, How are we destroyed, and utterly confounded, for we have forsaken the land, and our dwellings [b]have cast us out.

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Footnotes

  1. Jeremiah 9:17 Seeing you cannot lament your own sins, call for those foolish women, whom of a superstition you have to lament for the dead, that they by their feigned tears may provoke you to some sorrow.
  2. Jeremiah 9:19 As though they were weary of us, because of our iniquities, Lev. 18:28 and 20:22.

17 This is what the Lord Almighty says:

“Consider now! Call for the wailing women(A) to come;
    send for the most skillful of them.
18 Let them come quickly
    and wail over us
till our eyes overflow with tears
    and water streams from our eyelids.(B)
19 The sound of wailing is heard from Zion:
    ‘How ruined(C) we are!
    How great is our shame!
We must leave our land
    because our houses are in ruins.’”

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