Jeremiah 42:10–18

¹⁰‘If you will indeed stay in this land, then I will rebuild and not demolish you,^k and I will plant and not uproot you, because I relent concerning the disaster that I have brought on you.^{l 11}Don’t be afraid of the king of Babylon^m whom you now fear; don’t be afraid of him’—this is the Lord’s declaration—‘because I am with you to save youⁿ and rescue you from him. ¹²I will grant you compassion,^o and he^A will have compassion on you and allow you to return to your own soil.’

¹³“But if you say, ‘We will not stay in this land,’^p in order to disobey the Lord your God, ¹⁴and if you say, ‘No, instead we’ll go to the land of Egypt^q where we will not see war or hear the sound of the trumpet^r or hunger for food, and we’ll live there,’ ¹⁵then hear the word of the Lord, remnant of Judah! This is what the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel,^s says: ‘If you are firmly resolved to go to Egypt^t and stay there for a while, ¹⁶then the sword^u you fear will overtake you there in the land of Egypt, and the famine you are worried about will follow on your heels^B there to Egypt, and you will die there. ¹⁷All who resolve to go to Egypt to stay there for a while will die by the sword, famine, and plague. They will have no survivor or fugitive from the disaster I will bring on them.’

¹⁸“For this is what the Lord of Armies, the God of Israel, says: ‘Just as my anger and fury were poured out on Jerusalem’s residents,^v so will my fury pour out on you if you go to Egypt. You will become an example for cursing, scorn,^w execration, and disgrace, and you will never see this place again.’