¹⁵ Mortal, your kinsfolk, your own kin, your fellow exiles,^[a] the whole house of Israel, all of them, are those of whom the inhabitants of Jerusalem have said, “Stay far from the Lord; to us this land is given for a possession.”^(A)

²⁴ Mortal, the inhabitants of these waste places in the land of Israel keep saying, “Abraham was only one man, yet he got possession of the land, but we are many; the land is surely given us to possess.”^(A)

² They will put you out of the synagogues. Indeed, an hour is coming when those who kill you will think that by doing so they are offering worship to God.^(A)

The Good and the Bad Figs

24 The Lord showed me two baskets of figs placed before the temple of the Lord. This was after King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon had taken into exile from Jerusalem King Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim of Judah, together with the officials of Judah, the artisans, and the smiths, and had brought them to Babylon.^{(A) 2} One basket had very good figs, like first-ripe figs, but the other basket had very bad figs, so bad that they could not be eaten.^{(B) 3} And the Lord said to me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I said, “Figs—the good figs very good and the bad figs very bad, so bad that they cannot be eaten.”^(C)

⁴ Then the word of the Lord came to me: ⁵ Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: Like these good figs, so I will regard as good the exiles from Judah whom I have sent away from this place to the land of the Chaldeans.

The Lord Vindicates Zion