6. For this is what the Lord says about the palace of the king of Judah: “Though you are like Gilead to me, like the summit of Lebanon, I will surely make you like a wasteland, like towns not inhabited.
7. I will send destroyers against you, each man with his weapons, and they will cut up your fine cedar beams and throw them into the fire.
8. “People from many nations will pass by this city and will ask one another, ‘Why has the Lord done such a thing to this great city?’
9. And the answer will be: ‘Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God and have worshiped and served other gods.’ ”
10. Do not weep for the dead king or mourn his loss; rather, weep bitterly for him who is exiled, because he will never return nor see his native land again.
11. For this is what the Lord says about Shallum son of Josiah, who succeeded his father as king of Judah but has gone from this place: “He will never return.
12. He will die in the place where they have led him captive; he will not see this land again.”
13. “Woe to him who builds his palace by unrighteousness, his upper rooms by injustice, making his own people work for nothing, not paying them for their labor.