The Example of the Rechabites

35 This is the message that came to Jeremiah from the Lord during the reign^[a] of Josiah’s son Jehoiakim, king of Judah: ² “Go to the house of the Rechabites and speak to them. Bring them into the Lord’s Temple, to one of the offices, and offer them wine to drink.” ³ So I took Jeremiah’s son Jaazaniah (a descendant of Habazziniah), his brothers, all his sons, and the whole family of the Rechabites. ⁴ I brought them to the Lord’s Temple to the office of the descendants of Igdaliah’s son Hanan, the man of God, which was next to the office of the officials, and which was above the office of Shallum’s son Maaseiah, the keeper of the threshold.

⁵ I put containers full of wine and cups in front of the members of the Rechabite clan^[b] and told them, “Drink the wine!”

⁶ But they said, “We won’t drink wine, because our ancestor, Rechab’s son Jonadab commanded us: ‘You and your descendants are never to drink wine! ⁷ You aren’t to build houses, you aren’t to sow seeds, and you aren’t to plant vineyards, or own them. Instead, you are to live in tents all your lives,^[c] so you will enjoy a long life in the land where you reside.’^{[d] 8} We have obeyed everything that our ancestor, Rechab’s son Jonadab, commanded us. So we, our wives, our sons, and our daughters have drunk no wine all our lives,^{[e] 9} and have built no houses to live in. We don’t have vineyards, fields, or seed. ¹⁰ We have lived in tents. We have obeyed and have done everything that our ancestor Jonadab commanded us. ¹¹ Now when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against the land, we said, ‘Come on! Let’s go to Jerusalem because of the army of the Chaldeans and the army of Aram. And now we’re living in Jerusalem.’”