Jeremiah 38:14–39:14

Zedekiah’s Fears and Jeremiah’s Advice

¹⁴Then Zedekiah the king sent and had Jeremiah the prophet brought to him at the third entrance of the house of the Lord. And the king said to Jeremiah, “I will ^lask you something. Hide nothing from me.”

¹⁵Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, “If I declare it to you, will you not surely put me to death? And if I give you advice, you will not listen to me.”

¹⁶So Zedekiah the king swore secretly to Jeremiah, saying, “As the Lord lives, ^mwho made our very souls, I will not put you to death, nor will I give you into the hand of these men who seek your life.”

¹⁷Then Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, “Thus says the Lord, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: ‘If you surely ⁿsurrender ^6oto the king of Babylon’s princes, then your soul shall live; this city shall not be burned with fire, and you and your house shall live. ¹⁸But if you do not ⁷surrender to the king of Babylon’s princes, then this city shall be given into the hand of the Chaldeans; they shall burn it with fire, and ^pyou shall not escape from their hand.’ ”

¹⁹And Zedekiah the king said to Jeremiah, “I am afraid of the Jews who have ^qdefected to the Chaldeans, lest they deliver me into their hand, and they ^rabuse me.”

²⁰But Jeremiah said, “They shall not deliver you. Please, obey the voice of the Lord which I speak to you. So it shall be ^swell with you, and your soul shall live. ²¹But if you refuse to ⁸surrender, this is the word that the Lord has shown me: ²²‘Now behold, all the ^twomen who are left in the king of Judah’s house shall be surrendered to the king of Babylon’s princes, and those women shall say:

“Your close friends have ⁹set upon you

And prevailed against you;

Your feet have sunk in the mire,

And they have ¹turned away again.”

²³‘So they shall surrender all your wives and ^uchildren to the Chaldeans. ^vYou shall not escape from their hand, but shall be taken by the hand of the king of Babylon. And you shall cause this city to be burned with fire.’ ”

²⁴Then Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, “Let no one know of these words, and you shall not die. ²⁵But if the princes hear that I have talked with you, and they come to you and say to you, ‘Declare to us now what you have said to the king, and also what the king said to you; do not hide it from us, and we will not put you to death,’ ²⁶then you shall say to them, ^w‘I presented my request before the king, that he would not make me return ^xto Jonathan’s house to die there.’ ”

²⁷Then all the princes came to Jeremiah and asked him. And he told them according to all these words that the king had commanded. So they stopped speaking with him, for the conversation had not been heard. ²⁸Now ^yJeremiah remained in the court of the prison until the day that Jerusalem was taken. And he was there when Jerusalem was taken.

The Fall of Jerusalem

39In the ^aninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and all his army came against Jerusalem, and besieged it. ²In the ^beleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, on the ninth day of the month, the ¹city was penetrated.

^3cThen all the princes of the king of Babylon came in and sat in the Middle Gate: Nergal-Sharezer, Samgar-Nebo, Sarsechim, ²Rabsaris, Nergal-Sarezer, ³Rabmag, with the rest of the princes of the king of Babylon.

^4dSo it was, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, that they fled and went out of the city by night, by way of the king’s garden, by the gate between the two walls. And he went out by way of the ⁴plain. ⁵But the Chaldean army pursued them and ^eovertook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. And when they had captured him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, to ^fRiblah in the land of Hamath, where he pronounced judgment on him. ⁶Then the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his ^geyes in Riblah; the king of Babylon also killed all the ^hnobles of Judah. ⁷Moreover ⁱhe put out Zedekiah’s eyes, and bound him with bronze ⁵fetters to carry him off to Babylon. ^8jAnd the Chaldeans burned the king’s house and the houses of the people with ^kfire, and broke down the ^lwalls of Jerusalem. ^9mThen Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive to Babylon the remnant of the people who remained in the city and those who ⁿdefected to him, with the rest of the people who remained. ¹⁰But Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left in the land of Judah the ^opoor people, who had nothing, and gave them vineyards and fields ⁶at the same time.

Jeremiah Goes Free

¹¹Now Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon gave charge concerning Jeremiah to Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard, saying, ¹²“Take him and look after him, and do him no ^pharm; but do to him just as he says to you.” ¹³So Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard sent Nebushasban, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sharezer, Rabmag, and all the king of Babylon’s chief officers; ¹⁴then they sent someone ^qto take Jeremiah from the court of the prison, and committed him ^rto Gedaliah the son of ^sAhikam, the son of Shaphan, that he should take him home. So he dwelt among the people.