But they answered, “We will drink no wine, for (A)Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, commanded us, ‘You shall not drink wine, neither you nor your sons forever. You shall not build a house; you shall not sow seed; you shall not plant or have a vineyard; but you shall live in tents all your days, (B)that you may live many days in the land where you sojourn.’ We have obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, in all that he commanded us, to drink no wine all our days, ourselves, our wives, our sons, or our daughters, and not to build houses to dwell in. We have no vineyard or field or seed, 10 but we have lived in tents and have obeyed and done all that Jonadab our father commanded us. 11 But (C)when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against the land, we said, ‘Come, and let us go to Jerusalem for fear of (D)the army of the Chaldeans and (E)the army of the Syrians.’ (F)So we are living in Jerusalem.”

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But they replied, “We do not drink wine, because our forefather Jehonadab[a](A) son of Rekab gave us this command: ‘Neither you nor your descendants must ever drink wine.(B) Also you must never build houses, sow seed or plant vineyards; you must never have any of these things, but must always live in tents.(C) Then you will live a long time in the land(D) where you are nomads.’ We have obeyed everything our forefather(E) Jehonadab son of Rekab commanded us. Neither we nor our wives nor our sons and daughters have ever drunk wine or built houses to live in or had vineyards, fields or crops.(F) 10 We have lived in tents and have fully obeyed everything our forefather Jehonadab commanded us. 11 But when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon invaded(G) this land, we said, ‘Come, we must go to Jerusalem(H) to escape the Babylonian[b] and Aramean armies.’ So we have remained in Jerusalem.”

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Footnotes

  1. Jeremiah 35:6 Hebrew Jonadab, a variant of Jehonadab; here and often in this chapter
  2. Jeremiah 35:11 Or Chaldean