^17 (A)Pharaoh with his mighty army and great company will not help him in war, ^(B)when mounds are cast up and siege walls built to cut off many lives.

⁷ “Thus says the Lord, God of Israel: Thus shall you say to the king of Judah who ^(A)sent you to me to inquire of me, ‘Behold, ^(B)Pharaoh's army that came to help you is about to ^(C)return to Egypt, to its own land.

⁶ Then all the inhabitants of Egypt ^(A)shall know that I am the Lord.

“Because you^[a] have been ^(B)a staff of reed to the house of Israel, ^7 (C)when they grasped you with the hand, you broke and tore all their shoulders; and when they leaned on you, you broke and made all their loins to shake.^[b]

^2 (A)And put siegeworks against it, ^(B)and build a siege wall against it, ^(C)and cast up a mound against it. Set camps also against it, ^(D)and plant battering rams against it all around.

^6 (A)Behold, you are trusting in Egypt, that broken reed of a staff, which will pierce the hand of any man who leans on it. Such is Pharaoh king of Egypt to all who trust in him.

^5 (A)The army of Pharaoh had come out of Egypt. And when ^(B)the Chaldeans who were besieging Jerusalem heard news about them, ^(C)they withdrew from Jerusalem.

^4 (A)And in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, on the tenth day of the month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came with all his army against Jerusalem, and laid siege to it. And they built siegeworks all around it.

⁵ They are coming in ^(A)to fight against the Chaldeans and to fill them^[a] with the dead bodies of men whom I shall strike down ^(B)in my anger and my wrath, ^(C)for I have hidden my face from this city because of all their evil.