Sefer Yirmiyahu (Jeremiah) is the book of the prophecies of Yirmiyahu ben Chilkiyahu, of the kohanim of Anatot (north of Jerusalem), and one of the books of the Neviim Acharonim (the Later Prophets). The word of Hashem comes to him from the thirteenth year of King Yoshiyahu, through the reigns of Yehoyakim (Jehoiakim) and Tzidkiyahu (Zedekiah), until Yerushalayim (Jerusalem) goes into exile (1:1–3). He goes on prophesying after the exile. (The Gemara, Bava Batra 15a, says that Yirmiyahu wrote his own book, Sefer Melachim and Eicha.)
Hashem calls Yirmiyahu while he is young and appoints him a navi (prophet) to the nations. An almond branch and a boiling pot tipped from the north are signs that Hashem will carry out His word and that disaster will come from the north. Yirmiyahu rebukes Yehudah (Judah) for leaving Hashem, the source of living water. At the gate of the Beit HaMikdash (the Holy Temple) he warns that the building will not protect people who steal, murder and serve other gods. He is beaten and put in the stocks, and the men of his own town plot to kill him, yet Hashem's word burns in him like fire and he cannot hold it in.
He tells the kings of Yehudah to submit to Bavel (Babylon) and foretells seventy years of its rule. The false navi Chananyah ben Azur breaks the wooden yoke Yirmiyahu wears as a sign, and dies that same year. He writes to the exiles in Bavel to build houses there and seek the city's welfare. Then come words of comfort (30–33). The exiles will return, Rachel weeping for her children is told that they will come back, and Hashem will make a new covenant with Bnei Yisrael (the children of Israel). During the siege Yirmiyahu buys a field in Anatot as a sign that fields will again be bought in the land.
King Yehoyakim burns the scroll of his prophecies, and Yirmiyahu dictates it again to Baruch ben Neriyah, his scribe. Under King Tzidkiyahu he is imprisoned and lowered into a pit, and Eved-Melech the Kushi pulls him out. Yerushalayim falls to Nevuchadnetzar (Nebuchadnezzar). After Gedalyah ben Achikam, the governor of those left behind, is murdered, the remnant flees to Mitzrayim (Egypt) against Yirmiyahu's warning and serves idols there. Perakim 46–51 are prophecies against the nations, and the words of Yirmiyahu end at 51:64. Perek 52 tells the fall of Yerushalayim once more.
Sefer Yirmiyahu has fifty-two perakim, and nine haftarot come from it. They include the haftarot of Parshat Matot and Masei, two of the three haftarot of rebuke before Tisha B'Av, and the haftarah of Tisha B'Av morning. The others are the haftarot of Parshat Bo, Mishpatim, Tzav, Behar and Bechukotai, and of the second day of Rosh Hashana.