¹² Then the king commanded Hilkiah the priest, ^(A)Ahikam the son of Shaphan, ^[a](B)Achbor the son of Micaiah, Shaphan the scribe, and Asaiah the king’s servant, saying, ¹³ “Go, inquire of the Lord for me and for the people and all Judah concerning the words of this book that has been found, for ^(C)the wrath of the Lord that burns against us is great, because our fathers did not listen to the words of this book, to act in accordance with everything that is written regarding us.”

Huldah Predicts

¹⁴ So Hilkiah the priest, Ahikam, Achbor, Shaphan, and Asaiah went to Huldah the prophetess, the wife of Shallum the son of ^[b](D)Tikvah, the son of Harhas, keeper of the wardrobe (and she lived in Jerusalem in the ^(E)Second Quarter); and they spoke to her.

¹⁴ they even sent word and ^(A)took Jeremiah out of the courtyard of the guardhouse and entrusted him to ^(B)Gedaliah, the son of ^(C)Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, to take him home. So he stayed among the people.

⁵ As ^[a]Jeremiah was still not going back, ^[b]he said, “Go on back then to ^(A)Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, whom the king of Babylon has ^(B)appointed over the cities of Judah, and stay with him among the people; or else go anywhere it seems right for you to go.” So the captain of the bodyguard gave him a ^(C)ration and a ^(D)gift, and let him go. ⁶ Then Jeremiah went to ^(E)Mizpah to ^(F)Gedaliah the son of Ahikam and stayed with him among the people who were left in the land.

^7 (G)Now all the commanders of the forces that were in the field, they and their men, heard that the king of Babylon had appointed Gedaliah the son of Ahikam over the land, and that he had put him in charge of the men, women, and ^[c]children, those of the ^(H)poorest of the land who had not been exiled to Babylon.