The Rechabites Commended

35 The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the days of King Jehoiakim son of Josiah of Judah:^{(A) 2} Go to the house of the Rechabites, and speak with them, and bring them to the house of the Lord, into one of the chambers; then offer them wine to drink.^{(B) 3} So I took Jaazaniah son of Jeremiah son of Habazziniah and his brothers and all his sons and the whole house of the Rechabites. ⁴ I brought them to the house of the Lord into the chamber of the sons of Hanan son of Igdaliah, the man of God, which was near the chamber of the officials, above the chamber of Maaseiah son of Shallum, keeper of the threshold.^{(C) 5} Then I set before the Rechabites pitchers full of wine and cups, and I said to them, “Have some wine.”^{(D) 6} But they answered, “We will drink no wine, for our ancestor Jonadab son of Rechab commanded us, ‘You shall never drink wine, neither you nor your children,^{(E) 7} nor shall you ever build a house or sow seed, nor shall you plant a vineyard or even own one, but you shall live in tents all your days, that you may live many days in the land where you reside.’^{(F) 8} We have obeyed the charge of our ancestor Jonadab son of Rechab in all that he commanded us, to drink no wine all our days, ourselves, our wives, our sons, or our daughters,^{(G) 9} and not to build houses to live in. We have no vineyard or field or seed, ¹⁰ but we have lived in tents and have obeyed and done all that our ancestor Jonadab commanded us. ¹¹ But when King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon came up against the land, we said, ‘Come, and let us go to Jerusalem for fear of the army of the Chaldeans and the army of the Arameans.’ That is why we are living in Jerusalem.”^(H)