Listen, you women, to the words of the Lord; open your ears to what he has to say. Teach your daughters to wail; teach one another how to lament.
Parallel translations
- WEB Yet hear Yahweh’s word, you women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth. Teach your daughters wailing, and everyone her neighbor lamentation.
- KJV Yet hear the word of the LORD, O ye women, and let your ear receive the word of his mouth, and teach your daughters wailing, and every one her neighbour lamentation.
- BSB Now, O women, hear the word of the LORD. Open your ears to the word of His mouth. Teach your daughters to wail, and one another to lament.
- NKJV Yet hear the word of the Lord, O women, And let your ear receive the word of His mouth; Teach your daughters wailing, And everyone her neighbor a lamentation.
- NASB Now hear the word of the Lord, you women, And let your ears receive the word of His mouth; Teach your daughters wailing, And have every woman teach her neighbor a song of mourning.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God tells the women to teach their daughters and neighbors how to wail. The coming grief will be so widespread that lament must be passed on.
Overview
Yahweh instructs the women to receive His word and train others in lamentation. The need to teach mourning to the next generation reveals how pervasive and lasting the calamity will be. The verse soberly portrays a nation steeped in grief, while implicitly calling the people to hear God's word even now and turn before the wailing comes.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 6
- Luke 23:27–30A great multitude of the people followed him, including women who also mourned and lamented him.
- Isa 32:9–13Rise up, you women who are at ease! Hear my voice! You careless daughters, give ear to my speech!
- Job 22:22Please receive instruction from his mouth, and lay up his words in your heart.
- Isa 3:16Moreover Yahweh said, “Because the daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with outstretched necks and flirting eyes, walking to trip as they go, jingling ornaments on their feet;
- Jer 9:17–18Yahweh of Armies says, “Consider, and call for the mourning women, that they may come; and send for the skillful women, that they may come.
- Isa 3:4I will give boys to be their princes, and children shall rule over them.
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Christ at the center
Against the failure of false shepherds Jeremiah promises the Righteous Branch, 'The LORD our righteousness,' and the new covenant written on the heart and sealed in the blood of Christ.
How Jeremiah 9:20 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.