Beginning

The Rechabites

35 This is the word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord in the days of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah: ² “Go to the house of the Rechabites and speak to them. Then bring them to one of the rooms of the house of the Lord, and give them wine to drink.” ³ So I took Jaazaniah the son of Jeremiah, son of Habazziniah, and his brothers and all his sons, and all those of the Rechabite family. ⁴ And I brought them into the house of the Lord, into the room of the sons of Hanan, the son of Igdaliah, the man of God. This room was near the room of the leaders and above the room of Maaseiah the son of Shallum, the doorkeeper. ⁵ Then I set jars full of wine and some cups in front of the men of the Rechabite family. And I said to them, “Drink wine.” ⁶ But they said, “We will not drink wine. For Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, told us, ‘You and your sons must never drink wine. ⁷ You must never build a house. You must never plant seeds. And you must never plant a grape-field or own one. But you must always live in tents. Then you will live many days in the land where you have come to.’ ⁸ We have obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son of Rechab, our father, in all that he told us. We, our wives, our sons, and our daughters, never drink wine. ⁹ We have never built houses to live in, and we do not have grape-fields or fields or seeds to plant. ¹⁰ We have only lived in tents. We have obeyed, and have done all that our father Jonadab told us. ¹¹ But when Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up against the land, we said, ‘Come and let us go to Jerusalem to get away from the armies of the Chaldeans and the Syrians.’ So we are living in Jerusalem.”

¹² Then the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, saying, ¹³ “This is what the Lord of All, the God of Israel, says: ‘Go and say to the men of Judah and the people of Jerusalem, “Will you not learn by listening to My words?” says the Lord. ¹⁴ “The words of Jonadab the son of Rechab, telling his sons not to drink wine, are obeyed. They do not drink wine to this day, for they have obeyed their father. But I have spoken to you again and again, yet you have not listened to Me. ¹⁵ And again and again I have sent you all My servants who spoke for Me, saying, ‘Everyone turn now from your sinful way, and do what I tell you to do. Do not go after other gods to worship them. Then you will live in the land I have given to you and to your fathers before you. But you have not turned your ear to listen to Me. ¹⁶ The sons of Jonadab, the son of Rechab, have obeyed what their father told them, but these people have not listened to Me.’”’ ¹⁷ So the Lord, the God of All, the God of Israel, says, ‘I am bringing on Judah and on all the people of Jerusalem all the trouble I have said would come upon them. For I spoke to them but they did not listen. I have called them but they did not answer.’”

¹⁸ Then Jeremiah said to those of the Rechabite family, “This is what the Lord of All, the God of Israel, says: ‘You have obeyed everything that Jonadab your father told you to do. ¹⁹ And so the Lord of All, the God of Israel, says, “Jonadab the son of Rechab will never be without a man to stand before Me.”’”

Baruch Reads the Book in the House of God

36 In the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, this word came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, ² “Take a book and write in it all the words which I have said to you about Israel, Judah, and all the nations. Write all I have said since the day I first spoke to you, from the days of Josiah until today. ³ It may be that the house of Judah will hear all the trouble I am planning to bring on them, so that everyone will turn from his sinful way. Then I will forgive their wrong-doing and their sin.”

⁴ So Jeremiah called Baruch, the son of Neriah. And Baruch wrote in the book all the words which Jeremiah told him that the Lord had said to him. ⁵ Then Jeremiah said to Baruch, “I am shut up here and cannot go into the house of the Lord. ⁶ So you go to the Lord’s house on the special day of no food, and read to the people the words of the Lord which you have written down as I told them to you. And also read them to all the people of Judah who come from their cities. ⁷ It may be that their prayer will come before the Lord, and everyone will turn from his sinful way. For the punishment that the Lord said would come to these people because of His anger is very bad.” ⁸ Baruch the son of Neriah did all that Jeremiah the man of God told him. He read from the book the words of the Lord in the Lord’s house.

⁹ In the ninth month of the fifth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, all the people in Jerusalem and all those from the cities of Judah set apart to the Lord a day when they would not eat. ¹⁰ Then Baruch read from the book the words of Jeremiah to all the people in the house of the Lord, in the room of Gemariah the son of Shaphan the writer, in the upper place by the New Gate of the Lord’s house.

The Book Is Read to the Leaders

¹¹ When Micaiah the son of Gemariah, the son of Shaphan, had heard all the words of the Lord from the book, ¹² he went down to the king’s house, into the writer’s room. And he saw that all the leaders were sitting there. There was Elishama the writer, and Delaiah the son of Shemaiah, and Elnathan the son of Achbor, and Gemariah the son of Shaphan, and Zedekiah the son of Hananiah, and all the other leaders. ¹³ And Micaiah told them all that he had heard Baruch read to the people from the book. ¹⁴ Then all the leaders sent Jehudi the son of Nethaniah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Cushi, to Baruch, saying, “Take the book you have read to the people, and come.” So Baruch the son of Neriah took the book in his hand and went to them. ¹⁵ They told him, “Sit down and read it to us.” So Baruch read it to them. ¹⁶ When they had heard all the words, they turned in fear to one another and said to Baruch, “For sure we will tell all these words to the king.” ¹⁷ And they asked Baruch, “Tell us, how did you write all this? Did Jeremiah tell it to you?” ¹⁸ Baruch said to them, “He told me all these words, and I wrote them down in the book.” ¹⁹ Then the leaders said to Baruch, “Go and hide, both you and Jeremiah. And do not let anyone know where you are.”

The King Burns Jeremiah’s Book

²⁰ So they went to the king in the open space, but they had put the book in the room of Elishama the writer. And they told all the words to the king. ²¹ Then the king sent Jehudi to get the book, and he took it out of the room of Elishama the writer. And Jehudi read it to the king and to all the leaders who stood beside him. ²² It was the ninth month, and the king was sitting in the winter house with a fire burning in the fireplace in front of him. ²³ When Jehudi had read three or four parts, the king cut them with a small knife and threw them into the fire in the fireplace. He did this until the book was destroyed in the fire. ²⁴ The king and all his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, and they did not tear their clothes. ²⁵ Elnathan and Delaiah and Gemariah begged the king not to burn the book, but he would not listen to them. ²⁶ And the king told Jerahmeel the king’s son, Seraiah the son of Azriel, and Shelemiah the son of Abdeel to take hold of Baruch the writer and Jeremiah the man of God. But the Lord had hidden them.

Jeremiah Writes Another Book

²⁷ Now the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah after the king had burned the book with the words Jeremiah had told Baruch to write down. The Lord said, ²⁸ “Take another book and write in it all the words that were in the first book which Jehoiakim the king of Judah burned. ²⁹ And about Jehoiakim the king of Judah you will say, ‘This is what the Lord says: “You have burned this book, saying, ‘Why have you written in it that the king of Babylon will be sure to come and destroy this land and put an end to every man and animal in it?’” ³⁰ So this is what the Lord says about Jehoiakim king of Judah: “He will have no one to sit on the throne of David. And his dead body will be thrown out to the heat of the day and the cold of the night. ³¹ I will punish him and his children and his servants for their sin. And I will bring on them and the people of Jerusalem and the men of Judah all the trouble that I have said would come to them, because they would not listen.”’” ³² Then Jeremiah took another book and gave it to Baruch the son of Neraiah, the writer. And as Jeremiah told them to him, he wrote down all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire. And many words of the same kind were added to them.

Jeremiah in Prison

37 Zedekiah the son of Josiah, whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had made king in the land of Judah, ruled in place of Coniah the son of Jehoiakim. ² But he and his servants and the people of the land would not listen to what the Lord said through Jeremiah the man of God.

³ King Zedekiah sent Jehucal the son of Shelemiah, and Zephaniah the son of Maaseiah, the religious leader, to Jeremiah the man of God, saying, “Pray to the Lord our God for us.” ⁴ Now Jeremiah was still free to come and go among the people, for they had not yet put him in prison. ⁵ The army of Pharaoh had come out of Egypt. And when the Babylonian army which had been around Jerusalem heard the news about them, they left Jerusalem.

⁶ Then the Word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the man of God, saying, ⁷ “This is what the Lord God of Israel says: ‘Tell the king of Judah, who sent you to ask Me what will happen, “See, Pharaoh’s army which has come to help you is going to return to its own land of Egypt. ⁸ Then the Babylonians will return and fight against this city. They will take it and burn it with fire.”’ ⁹ The Lord says, ‘Do not fool yourselves, saying, “For sure the Babylonians will go away from us.” For they will not go. ¹⁰ Even if you had won the battle against the whole Babylonian army fighting with you, and only men who were hurt were left in their tents, they would rise up and burn this city with fire.’”

¹¹ Now the Babylonian army had left Jerusalem because of Pharaoh’s army. ¹² And so Jeremiah left Jerusalem to go to the land of Benjamin to take his land there among the people. ¹³ While he was at the Gate of Benjamin, a soldier was there watching. His name was Irijah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Hananiah. He took hold of Jeremiah the man of God, saying, “You are going over to the Babylonians!” ¹⁴ But Jeremiah said, “It is a lie! I am not going over to the Babylonians.” But Irijah would not listen to him. He took hold of Jeremiah and brought him to the leaders. ¹⁵ The leaders were angry with Jeremiah and beat him. They put him in prison in the house of Jonathan the writer, which they had made into a prison.

¹⁶ After Jeremiah had been in an under-ground prison many days, ¹⁷ King Zedekiah sent for him and had him brought to his house. The king asked him in secret, “Is there any word from the Lord?” And Jeremiah said, “There is!” Then he said, “You will be given over to the king of Babylon!” ¹⁸ Jeremiah also said to King Zedekiah, “In what way have I sinned against you or your servants, or against these people? Why have you put me in prison? ¹⁹ Where are your men who spoke to you in God’s name, saying, ‘The king of Babylon will not come against you or against this land’? ²⁰ But now I ask you to listen, O my lord the king. Hear what I ask, and do not make me return to the house of Jonathan the writer, or I will die there.” ²¹ So King Zedekiah had them put Jeremiah in the open space of the prison. And a loaf of bread was given to him every day from the bread makers’ street, until all the bread in the city was gone. So Jeremiah stayed in the open space of the prison.