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Jeremiah 37
A verdict on Zedekiah
1 Zedekiah son of Josiah became king, succeeding Coniah son of Jehoiakim: Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had made him king of the land of Judah.
2 But neither he nor his servants nor the people of the country paid any attention to the words Yahweh spoke through the prophet Jeremiah.
Zedekiah consults Jeremiah during the respite of 588
3 King Zedekiah sent Jehucal son of Shelemiah and the priest Zephaniah son of Maaseiah to the prophet Jeremiah with this message, ‘Intercede for us with Yahweh our God’.
4 Now Jeremiah was still moving freely among the people: he had not yet been put in prison.
5 Meanwhile Pharaoh’s army was on the move from Egypt and the Chaldaeans besieging Jerusalem had raised the siege when they heard the news.
6 Then the word of Yahweh was addressed to the prophet Jeremiah,
7 ‘Yahweh, the God of Israel, says this: To the king of Judah who sent you to consult me make this reply, “Is Pharaoh’s army marching to your aid? It will withdraw to its own country, Egypt.
8 The Chaldaeans will return to attack this city; they will capture it and burn it down.
9 Do not deceive yourselves and say: The Chaldaeans are leaving us for good. They are not leaving.
10 Even if you cut to pieces the whole Chaldaean army now fighting against you until there were only the wounded left, they would stand up again, each man in his tent, to burn this city down.”‘
The arrest of Jeremiah. Improvement in his treatment
11 At the time when the Chaldaean army, threatened by the army of Pharaoh, had raised the siege of Jerusalem,
12 Jeremiah started to leave Jerusalem and go to the land of Benjamin, there among his own people to divide his property.
13 He was at the Benjamin Gate when a sentry on duty there, Irijah son of Shelemiah, son of Hananiah, arrested the prophet Jeremiah. ‘You are deserting to the Chaldaeans’ he said.
14 ‘It is a lie!’ Jeremiah answered. ‘I am not deserting to the Chaldaeans.’ But Irijah would not listen to Jeremiah and took him under arrest to the officials.
15 The officials, furious with Jeremiah, had him beaten and shut up in the house of Jonathan the secretary which had been turned into a prison.
16 Thus Jeremiah found himself in an underground cell. And there for a long time he stayed.
17 King Zedekiah had him sent for, and he questioned him privately in his palace. ‘Is there any word from Yahweh?’ he asked. ‘There is’ Jeremiah answered. ‘”You will be handed over,” he said “into the power of the king of Babylon.”‘
18 .Jeremiah then said to King Zedekiah, ‘What wrong have I done to you or your servants or this people, for you to put me in prison?
19 Where are your prophets now who prophesied, “The king of Babylon will not attack you or this country”?
20 Let my lord king be pleased to listen to me now; let my request meet your favour. Do not have me taken back to the house of Jonathan the secretary, or I shall die there.’
21 King Zedekiah then gave an order, and Jeremiah was confined in the Court of the Guard and given a loaf of bread a day from the Street of the Bakers as long as there was bread left in the city. So Jeremiah stayed in the Court of the Guard.