Baruch and the Jews in Babylon

1 These are the words of the book which Baruch the son of Nera′iah, son of Mahse′iah, son of Zedeki′ah, son of Hasadi′ah, son of Hilki′ah, wrote in Babylon, ² in the fifth year, on the seventh day of the month, at the time when the Chalde′ans took Jerusalem and burned it with fire. ³ And Baruch read the words of this book in the hearing of Jeconi′ah the son of Jehoi′akim, king of Judah, and in the hearing of all the people who came to hear the book, ⁴ and in the hearing of the mighty men and the princes, and in the hearing of the elders, and in the hearing of all the people, small and great, all who dwelt in Babylon by the river Sud.

⁵ Then they wept, and fasted, and prayed before the Lord; ⁶ and they collected money, each giving what he could; ⁷ and they sent it to Jerusalem to Jehoi′akim the high priest,^[a] the son of Hilki′ah, son of Shallum, and to the priests, and to all the people who were present with him in Jerusalem. ⁸ At the same time, on the tenth day of Sivan, Baruch^[b] took the vessels of the house of the Lord, which had been carried away from the temple, to return them to the land of Judah—the silver vessels which Zedeki′ah the son of Josi′ah, king of Judah, had made, ⁹ after Nebuchadnez′zar king of Babylon had carried away from Jerusalem Jeconi′ah and the princes and the prisoners and the mighty men and the people of the land, and brought them to Babylon.

A Letter to Jerusalem

¹⁰ And they said: “Herewith we send you money; so buy with the money burnt offerings and sin offerings and incense, and prepare a cereal offering, and offer them upon the altar of the Lord our God; ¹¹ and pray for the life of Nebuchadnez′zar king of Babylon, and for the life of Belshaz′zar his son, that their days on earth may be like the days of heaven. ¹² And the Lord will give us strength, and he will give light to our eyes, and we shall live under the protection^[c] of Nebuchadnez′zar king of Babylon, and under the protection^[d] of Belshaz′zar his son, and we shall serve them many days and find favor in their sight. ¹³ And pray for us to the Lord our God, for we have sinned against the Lord our God, and to this day the anger of the Lord and his wrath have not turned away from us. ¹⁴ And you shall read this book which we are sending you, to make your confession in the house of the Lord on the days of the feasts and at appointed seasons.

Confession of Sins

¹⁵ “And you shall say: ‘Righteousness belongs to the Lord our God, but confusion of face, as at this day, to us, to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, ¹⁶ and to our kings and our princes and our priests and our prophets and our fathers, ¹⁷ because we have sinned before the Lord, ¹⁸ and have disobeyed him, and have not heeded the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in the statutes of the Lord which he set before us. ¹⁹ From the day when the Lord brought our fathers out of the land of Egypt until today, we have been disobedient to the Lord our God, and we have been negligent, in not heeding his voice. ²⁰ So to this day there have clung to us the calamities and the curse which the Lord declared through Moses his servant at the time when he brought our fathers out of the land of Egypt to give to us a land flowing with milk and honey. ²¹ We did not heed the voice of the Lord our God in all the words of the prophets whom he sent to us, but we each followed the intent of his own wicked heart by serving other gods and doing what is evil in the sight of the Lord our God.

2 “‘So the Lord confirmed his word, which he spoke against us, and against our judges who judged Israel, and against our kings and against our princes and against the men of Israel and Judah. ² Under the whole heaven there has not been done the like of what he has done in Jerusalem, in accordance with what is written in the law of Moses, ³ that we should eat, one the flesh of his son and another the flesh of his daughter. ⁴ And he gave them into subjection to all the kingdoms around us, to be a reproach and a desolation among all the surrounding peoples, where the Lord has scattered them. ⁵ They were brought low and not raised up, because we sinned against the Lord our God, in not heeding his voice.

⁶ “‘Righteousness belongs to the Lord our God, but confusion of face to us and our fathers, as at this day. ⁷ All those calamities with which the Lord threatened us have come upon us. ⁸ Yet we have not entreated the favor of the Lord by turning away, each of us, from the thoughts of his wicked heart. ⁹ And the Lord has kept the calamities ready, and the Lord has brought them upon us, for the Lord is righteous in all his works which he has commanded us to do. ¹⁰ Yet we have not obeyed his voice, to walk in the statutes of the Lord which he set before us.

Prayer for Deliverance

¹¹ “‘And now, O Lord God of Israel, who didst bring thy people out of the land of Egypt with a mighty hand and with signs and wonders and with great power and outstretched arm, and hast made thee a name, as at this day, ¹² we have sinned, we have been ungodly, we have done wrong, O Lord our God, against all thy ordinances. ¹³ Let thy anger turn away from us, for we are left, few in number, among the nations where thou hast scattered us. ¹⁴ Hear, O Lord, our prayer and our supplication, and for thy own sake deliver us, and grant us favor in the sight of those who have carried us into exile; ¹⁵ that all the earth may know that thou art the Lord our God, for Israel and his descendants are called by thy name. ¹⁶ O Lord, look down from thy holy habitation, and consider us. Incline thy ear, O Lord, and hear; ¹⁷ open thy eyes, O Lord, and see; for the dead who are in Hades, whose spirit has been taken from their bodies, will not ascribe glory or justice to the Lord, ¹⁸ but the person that is greatly distressed,^[e] that goes about bent over and feeble, and the eyes that are failing, and the person that hungers, will ascribe to thee glory and righteousness, O Lord. ¹⁹ For it is not because of any righteous deeds of our fathers or our kings that we bring before thee our prayer for mercy, O Lord our God. ²⁰ For thou hast sent thy anger and thy wrath upon us, as thou didst declare by thy servants the prophets, saying: ²¹ “Thus says the Lord: Bend your shoulders and serve the king of Babylon, and you will remain in the land which I gave to your fathers. ²² But if you will not obey the voice of the Lord and will not serve the king of Babylon, ²³ I will make to cease from the cities of Judah and from the region about Jerusalem the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, and the whole land will be a desolation without inhabitants.”

²⁴ “‘But we did not obey thy voice, to serve the king of Babylon; and thou hast confirmed thy words, which thou didst speak by thy servants the prophets, that the bones of our kings and the bones of our fathers would be brought out of their graves;^{[f] 25} and behold, they have been cast out to the heat of day and the frost of night. They perished in great misery, by famine and sword and pestilence. ²⁶ And the house which is called by thy name thou hast made as it is today, because of the wickedness of the house of Israel and the house of Judah.

God’s Promise Recalled

²⁷ “‘Yet thou hast dealt with us, O Lord our God, in all thy kindness and in all thy great compassion, ²⁸ as thou didst speak by thy servant Moses on the day when thou didst command him to write thy law in the presence of the people of Israel, saying, ²⁹ “If you will not obey my voice, this very great multitude will surely turn into a small number among the nations, where I will scatter them. ³⁰ For I know that they will not obey me, for they are a stiff-necked people. But in the land of their exile they will come to themselves, ³¹ and they will know that I am the Lord their God. I will give them a heart that obeys and ears that hear; ³² and they will praise me in the land of their exile, and will remember my name, ³³ and will turn from their stubbornness and their wicked deeds; for they will remember the ways of their fathers, who sinned before the Lord. ³⁴ I will bring them again into the land which I swore to give to their fathers, to Abraham and to Isaac and to Jacob, and they will rule over it; and I will increase them, and they will not be diminished. ³⁵ I will make an everlasting covenant with them to be their God and they shall be my people; and I will never again remove my people Israel from the land which I have given them.”

Some Extreme Forms of Evil

The Evil of a Wicked Woman

Jesus the True Vine

15 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. ² Every branch of mine that bears no fruit, he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit. ³ You are already made clean by the word which I have spoken to you. ⁴ Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. ⁵ I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. ⁶ If a man does not abide in me, he is cast forth as a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire and burned. ⁷ If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done for you. ⁸ By this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit, and so prove to be my disciples. ⁹ As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love. ¹⁰ If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. ¹¹ These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full.

¹² “This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. ¹³ Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. ¹⁴ You are my friends if you do what I command you. ¹⁵ No longer do I call you servants,^[a] for the servant^[b] does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. ¹⁶ You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide; so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. ¹⁷ This I command you, to love one another.

The World’s Hatred

¹⁸ “If the world hates you, know that it has hated me before it hated you.^{[c] 19} If you were of the world, the world would love its own; but because you are not of the world, but I chose you out of the world, therefore the world hates you. ²⁰ Remember the word that I said to you, ‘A servant^[d] is not greater than his master.’ If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; if they kept my word, they will keep yours also. ²¹ But all this they will do to you on my account, because they do not know him who sent me. ²² If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not have sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. ²³ He who hates me hates my Father also. ²⁴ If I had not done among them the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they have seen and hated both me and my Father. ²⁵ It is to fulfil the word that is written in their law, ‘They hated me without a cause.’ ²⁶ But when the Counselor comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness to me; ²⁷ and you also are witnesses, because you have been with me from the beginning.