¹² And a letter came to him from Elijah the prophet, saying, “Thus says the Lord, the God of David your father, ^(A)‘Because you have not walked in the ways of Jehoshaphat your father, or ^(B)in the ways of Asa king of Judah,

³ The Lord was with Jehoshaphat, because he walked in the earlier ways of his father David. He did not seek the Baals, ⁴ but sought the God of his father and walked in his commandments, ^(A)and not according to the practices of Israel.

^2 [a] And Asa did what was good and right in the eyes of the Lord his God. ³ He took away the foreign altars ^(A)and the high places and broke down ^(B)the pillars and cut down the ^(C)Asherim ⁴ and commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their fathers, and to keep the law and the commandment. ⁵ He also took out of all the cities of Judah ^(D)the high places and the ^(E)incense altars. And the kingdom had rest under him.

Elijah Taken to Heaven

2 Now when the Lord was about to ^(A)take Elijah up to heaven by a whirlwind, Elijah and ^(B)Elisha were on their way from ^(C)Gilgal.

²⁵ And this is the writing that was inscribed: Mene, Mene, Tekel, and Parsin. ²⁶ This is the interpretation of the matter: Mene, God has numbered^[a] the days of your kingdom and brought it to an end; ²⁷ Tekel, ^(A)you have been weighed^[b] in the balances and found wanting; ²⁸ Peres, your kingdom is divided and given to ^(B)the Medes and ^(C)Persians.”^[c]

²⁹ Then ^(D)Belshazzar gave the command, and Daniel ^(E)was clothed with purple, a chain of gold was put around his neck, and a proclamation was made about him, that he should be the third ruler in the kingdom.

^5 (A)Immediately ^(B)the fingers of a human hand appeared and wrote on the plaster of the wall of the king's palace, opposite the lampstand. And the king saw ^(C)the hand as it wrote.

²⁸ “Take another scroll and write on it all the former words that were in the first scroll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah has burned. ²⁹ And concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah you shall say, ‘Thus says the Lord, You have burned this scroll, saying, ^(A)“Why have you written in it that the king of Babylon will certainly come and destroy this land, and will cut off from it man and beast?” ³⁰ Therefore thus says the Lord concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah: ^(B)He shall have none ^(C)to sit on the throne of David, ^(D)and his dead body shall be cast out to the heat by day and the frost by night. ^31 (E)And I will punish him and his offspring and his servants for their iniquity. I will bring upon them and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem and upon the people of Judah all the disaster that I have pronounced against them, but they would not hear.’”

³² Then Jeremiah took another scroll and gave it to ^(F)Baruch the scribe, the son of Neriah, who ^(G)wrote on it at the dictation of Jeremiah all the words of the scroll that Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire. And many similar words were added to them.

²³ As Jehudi read three or four columns, the king would cut them off with a knife and throw them into the fire in the fire pot, until the entire scroll was consumed in the fire that was in the fire pot.

² “Take ^(A)a scroll and ^(B)write on it all the words that I have spoken to you against Israel and ^(C)Judah ^(D)and all the nations, ^(E)from the day I spoke to you, from the days of Josiah until today.