The Anselm Project

Chapter 29

¹ And these are the words of the book that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the remainder of the elders of the exile and to the priests and to the prophets and to all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon. ² after the going-out of Jehoiachin the king and the queen-mother and the eunuchs, the chiefs of Judah and Jerusalem and the artisan and the smith from Jerusalem ³ By the hand of Eleasah son of Shaphan and Gemariah son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon to Babylon, saying: ⁴ Thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I have exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon. ⁵ Build houses and dwell in them, and plant gardens and eat their fruit. ⁶ Take wives and father sons and daughters, and take wives for your sons and give your daughters to men so that they bear sons and daughters, and multiply there and do not diminish. ⁷ And seek the peace of the city where I have exiled you, and pray for it to the LORD, for in its peace you will have peace. ⁸ For thus says the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets who are in your midst deceive you and your diviners, and do not listen to your dreams which you are dreaming. ⁹ For they are prophesying to you falsely in my name; I did not send them, says the LORD. ¹⁰ For thus says the LORD: After Babylon has fulfilled seventy years, I will attend to you and I will establish over you my good words to return you to this place. ¹¹ For I know the thoughts that I have thought concerning you, says the LORD, thoughts of peace and not calamity, to give you a future and a hope. ¹² And you will call to me, and you will come and pray to me, and I will hear you. ¹³ And you will seek me and you will find me, for if you seek me with all your heart. ¹⁴ And I will be found by you, says the LORD, and I will restore your fortunes and I will gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have banished you there, says the LORD, and I will bring you back to the place from where I exiled you there. ¹⁵ For you said, "The LORD has raised up prophets for us in Babylon." ¹⁶ For thus says the LORD to the king sitting on the throne of David and to all the people living in this city, your brothers who did not go out with you in the exile. ¹⁷ Thus says the LORD of Hosts: "Behold, I am sending against them the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, and I will give them as figs of the Gates that are not eaten because of badness." ¹⁸ And I will pursue them with the sword, with famine, and with pestilence, and I will give them as a terror to all the kingdoms of the earth, as a curse and as a name and as a whistling and as a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them. ¹⁹ in place of which they did not listen to the words, utterance of the LORD, which I sent to them with my servant the prophets, rising early and sending, and you did not listen, utterance of the LORD. ²⁰ And you, hear the word of the LORD, all the exiles whom I have sent from Jerusalem to Babylon. ²¹ Thus says the LORD of Hosts, God of Israel, to Ahab son of Koliah and to Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, the ones prophesying to you in my name a lie: Here I am giving them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babel, and I will strike them before your eyes. ²² And he will take from them a curse for all the exiles of Judah who are in Babylon, saying, "May the LORD make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab, whom the king of Babylon roasted in fire." ²³ Because they have done folly in Israel and have committed adultery with the wives of their companions and have spoken a word in my name—a lie which I did not command them—and I am the one who knows and witnesses, utterance of the LORD.