²¹ The Benjamites came out of Gibeah and cut down twenty-two thousand Israelites^(A) on the battlefield that day.

²⁵ This time, when the Benjamites came out from Gibeah to oppose them, they cut down another eighteen thousand Israelites,^(A) all of them armed with swords.

Jeremiah’s Complaint

A Common Destiny for All

9 So I reflected on all this and concluded that the righteous and the wise and what they do are in God’s hands, but no one knows whether love or hate awaits them.^{(A) 2} All share a common destiny—the righteous and the wicked, the good and the bad,^[a] the clean and the unclean, those who offer sacrifices and those who do not.

³ This is the evil in everything that happens under the sun: The same destiny overtakes all.^(C) The hearts of people, moreover, are full of evil and there is madness in their hearts while they live,^(D) and afterward they join the dead.^(E)

¹⁰ And now you intend to make the men and women of Judah and Jerusalem your slaves.^(A) But aren’t you also guilty of sins against the Lord your God?