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

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

^2 [a]Asa did what was good and right in the sight of the Lord his God. ³ He took away the foreign altars and the high places, broke down the pillars, cut down the sacred poles,^{[b](A) 4} and commanded Judah to seek the Lord, the God of their ancestors, and to keep the law and the commandment. ⁵ He also removed from all the cities of Judah the high places and the incense altars. And the kingdom was quiet under him.^(B)

Elijah Ascends to Heaven

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

²⁵ And this is the writing that was inscribed: mene,^[a] tekel, and parsin. ²⁶ This is the interpretation of the matter: mene: God has numbered the days of^[b] your kingdom and brought it to an end;^{(A) 27} tekel: you have been weighed on the scales and found wanting;^{(B) 28} peres:^[c] your kingdom is divided and given to the Medes and Persians.”

²⁹ Then Belshazzar gave the command, and Daniel was clothed in purple, a chain of gold was put around his neck, and a proclamation was made concerning him that he should rank third in the kingdom.

The Writing on the Wall

⁵ Immediately the fingers of a human hand appeared and began writing on the plaster of the wall of the royal palace, next to the lampstand. The king was watching the hand as it wrote.^(A)

²⁸ Take another scroll and write on it all the former words that were in the first scroll, which King Jehoiakim of Judah has burned.^{(A) 29} And concerning King Jehoiakim of Judah you shall say: Thus says the Lord, You have burned this scroll, saying, “Why have you written in it that the king of Babylon will certainly come and destroy this land and will cut off from it human beings and animals?”^{(B) 30} Therefore thus says the Lord concerning King Jehoiakim of Judah: He shall have no one to sit upon the throne of David, and his dead body shall be cast out to the heat by day and the frost by night.^{(C) 31} And I will punish him and his offspring and his servants for their iniquity; I will bring on them and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem and on the people of Judah all the disasters with which I have threatened them, but they would not listen.^(D)

³² Then Jeremiah took another scroll and gave it to the secretary Baruch son of Neriah, who wrote on it at Jeremiah’s dictation all the words of the scroll that King Jehoiakim of Judah had burned in the fire, and many similar words were added to them.

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

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