God’s Sign to the People in Egypt

⁸ Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah at Tahpanhes: ⁹ “Pick up some large stones and set them in the mortar of the brick pavement that is at the opening of Pharaoh’s palace at Tahpanhes. Do this in the sight of the Judean men ¹⁰ and tell them: This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: I will send for My servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and I will place his throne on these stones that I have embedded, and he will pitch his pavilion over them. ¹¹ He will come and strike down the land of Egypt^(A)—those destined for death, to death; those destined for captivity, to captivity; and those destined for the sword,^(B) to the sword. ¹² I^[a] will kindle a fire in the temples of Egypt’s gods,^(C) and he will burn them and take them prisoner. He will clean the land of Egypt as a shepherd picks lice off^[b] his garment,^(D) and he will leave there unscathed. ¹³ He will smash the sacred pillars of the sun temple^[c][d] in the land of Egypt and burn down the temples of the Egyptian gods.”