Jeremiah Buys a Field During the Siege

32 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the tenth year of King Zedekiah of Judah, which was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadrezzar. ² At that time the army of the king of Babylon was besieging Jerusalem, and the prophet Jeremiah was confined in the court of the guard that was in the palace of the king of Judah,^{(A) 3} where King Zedekiah of Judah had confined him. Zedekiah had said, “Why do you prophesy and say: Thus says the Lord: I am going to give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall take it;^{(B) 4} King Zedekiah of Judah shall not escape out of the hands of the Chaldeans but shall surely be given into the hands of the king of Babylon and shall speak with him face to face and see him eye to eye,^{(C) 5} and he shall take Zedekiah to Babylon, and there he shall remain until I attend to him, says the Lord; though you fight against the Chaldeans, you shall not succeed?”^(D)

³⁰ For the people of Israel and the people of Judah have done nothing but evil in my sight from their youth; the people of Israel have done nothing but provoke me to anger by the work of their hands, says the Lord.^{(A) 31} This city has aroused my anger and wrath, from the day it was built until this day, so that I will remove it from my sight^{(B) 32} because of all the evil of the people of Israel and the people of Judah that they did to provoke me to anger—they, their kings and their officials, their priests and their prophets, the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem.^{(C) 33} They have turned their backs to me, not their faces; though I have taught them persistently, they would not listen and accept correction.^(D)