_Because that they forsook Me, and made this place strange_--alienated it from Iahvah by consecrating it to "strange gods"; or as the Targum and Syriac, "polluted" it--_and burnt incense therein to other gods, whom neither they nor their fathers knew_ (xvi. 13); _and the kings of Judah did fill this place with blood of innocents_ (so the LXX. "Nor the kings of Judah" gives a poor sense; they are included in the preceding phrase), _and built the bamoth Baal_ (High-places of Baal; a proper name, Josh. xiii. 17), _to burn their sons in the fire_, [_as burnt-offerings to the Baal_: LXX. omits, and it is wanting, vii. 31, xxxii. 35. It may be a gloss, but is probably genuine, as there are slight variations in each passage], _which I commanded not_, [_nor spake_: LXX. omits], _neither came it into My mind: therefore, behold days are coming, saith Iahvah, when this place will no more be called the Tophet and valley of ben Hinnom but the Valley_ _of Slaughter!_ [_and in Tophet shall they bury, so that there be_--remain--_no room to bury!_ This clause, preserved at the end of ver. 11, but omitted there by the LXX., probably belongs here: see vii. 42]. _And I will pour out_ (ver. 1; Isa. xix. 3) _the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place_--that is, I will _empty_ the land of all wisdom and resourcefulness, as one empties a bottle of its water, so that the heads of the state shall be powerless to devise any effectual scheme of defence in the face of calamity (cf. xiii. 13)--_and I will cause them to fall by the sword "before their enemies"_ (Deut. xxviii. 25), _and by the hand of them that seek their life; and I will make "their carcases food unto the birds of the air and the beasts of the earth"_ (Deut. xxviii. 26; chap. vii. 33, xvi. 4). _And I will set this city "for an astonishment"_ (Deut. xxviii. 37) _and a hissing_ (xviii. 16); _every one that passeth by her shall be astonished and hiss at all her "strokes"_ (xlix. 17, l. 13) or "_plagues_" (Deut. xxviii. 59). _And I will cause them to "eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters," and each the flesh of his fellow shall they eat--"in the stress and the straitness wherewith their enemies" and they that seek their life "shall straiten them."_ It will be seen from the references that the Deuteronomic colouring of these closing threats (vv. 7-9) is very strong, the last verse being practically a quotation (Deut. xxviii. 53). The effect of the whole oracle would thus be to suggest that the terrible sanctions of the sacred Law would not remain inoperative; but that the shameless violation of the solemn covenant under Josiah, by which the nation undertook to observe the code of Deuteronomy, would soon be visited with the retributive calamities so vividly foreshadowed in that book.