Jeremiah 28:1–11

Jeremiah and the Prophet Hananiah

28^*That same year,^h in the fifth month of the fourth year that Zedekiah was king, Hananiah son of Azzur, a prophet from the town of Gibeon, spoke to me in the Temple. In the presence of the priests and of the people he told me ²that the Lord Almighty, the God of Israel, had said: “I have broken the power of the king of Babylonia. ³Within two years I will bring back to this place all the temple treasures that King Nebuchadnezzar took to Babylonia. ⁴I will also bring back the king of Judah, Jehoiachin son of Jehoiakim, along with all the people of Judah who went into exile in Babylonia. Yes, I will break the power of the king of Babylonia. I, the Lord, have spoken.”

⁵Then in the presence of the priests and of all the people who were standing in the Temple, I said to Hananiah: ⁶“Wonderful! I hope the Lord will do this! I certainly hope he will make your prophecy come true and will bring back from Babylonia all the temple treasures and all the people who were taken away as prisoners. ⁷But listen to what I say to you and to the people. ⁸The prophets who spoke long ago, before my time and yours, predicted that war, starvation, and disease would come to many nations and powerful kingdoms. ⁹But a prophet who predicts peace can only be recognized as a prophet whom the Lord has truly sent when that prophet’s predictions come true.”

¹⁰Then Hananiah took the yoke off my neck, broke it in pieces, ¹¹and said in the presence of all the people: “The Lord has said that this is how he will break the yoke that King Nebuchadnezzar has put on the neck of all the nations; and he will do this within two years.” Then I left.