20:1 Jeremiah was heard prophesying these things by the priest Pashhur, son of Immer, chief officer in the house of the LORD.
20:2 So he had the prophet scourged and placed in the stocks at the upper Gate of Benjamin in the house of the LORD.
20:3 The next morning, after Pashhur had released Jeremiah from the stocks, the prophet said to him: Instead of Pashhur, the LORD will name you "Terror on every side."
20:4 For thus says the LORD: Indeed, I will deliver you to terror, you and all your friends. Your own eyes shall see them fall by the sword of their enemies. All Judah I will deliver to the king of Babylon, who shall take them captive to Babylon or slay them with the sword.
20:5 All the wealth of this city, all it has toiled for and holds dear, all the treasures of the kings of Judah, I will give as plunder into the hands of their foes, who shall seize it and carry it away to Babylon.
20:6 You Pashhur, and all the members of your household shall go into exile. To Babylon you shall go, you and all your friends; there you shall die and be buried, because you have prophesied lies to them.
20:7 You duped me, O LORD, and I let myself be duped; you were too strong for me, and you triumphed. All the day I am an object of laughter; everyone mocks me.
20:8 Whenever I speak, I must cry out, violence and outrage is my message; The word of the LORD has brought me derision and reproach all the day.
20:9 I say to myself, I will not mention him, I will speak in his name no more. But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart, imprisoned in my bones; I grow weary holding it in, I cannot endure it.
20:10 Yes, I hear the whisperings of many: "Terror on every side! Denounce! let us denounce him!" All those who were my friends are on the watch for any misstep of mine. "Perhaps he will be trapped; then we can prevail, and take our vengeance on him."
20:11 But the LORD is with me, like a mighty champion: my persecutors will stumble, they will not triumph. In their failure they will be put to utter shame, to lasting, unforgettable confusion.
20:12 O LORD of hosts, you who test the just, who probe mind and heart, Let me witness the vengeance you take on them, for to you I have entrusted my cause.
20:13 Sing to the LORD, praise the LORD, For he has rescued the life of the poor from the power of the wicked!
20:14 Cursed be the day on which I was born! May the day my mother gave me birth never be blessed!
20:15 Cursed be the man who brought the news to my father, saying, "A child, a son, has been born to you!" filling him with great joy.
20:16 Let that man be like the cities which the LORD relentlessly overthrew; Let him hear war cries in the morning, battle alarms at noonday,
20:17 because he did not dispatch me in the womb! Then my mother would have been my grave, her womb confining me forever.Why did I come forth from the womb, to see sorrow and pain, to end my days in shame?