Study Desk

Then they asked Barukh, "Tell us now, how did you write all these words? At his dictation?"

Barukh answered them, "He said all these words to me with his mouth, and I wrote them with ink in the scroll."

The king was sitting in his winter house; and since it was the ninth month, he had a fire burning in the stove in front of him.

But even though they heard all these words, neither the king nor any of his servants grew afraid or tore their clothes.

Therefore Adonai says this about Y'hoyakim king of Y'hudah: "He will have no one to occupy David's throne; and his dead body will be thrown out to lie in the heat by day and in the frost by night.

Moreover, I will punish him, his offspring and his officials for their wickedness; and I will bring on them, the inhabitants of Yerushalayim and the people of Y'hudah all the disaster I have decreed against them, to which they have paid no attention."'"

But neither he, his servants nor the people of the land paid attention to the words of Adonai , which he spoke through the prophet Yirmeyahu.

Even if you were to strike the entire army of the Kasdim fighting against you, to the degree that only their wounded were left, they would still rise up every man from his tent and burn this city to the ground.'"

Yirmeyahu left Yerushalayim to go to the territory of Binyamin to receive his share of an inheritance there. He was passing through the crowds

Then Tzidkiyahu the king sent and had him brought; and the king asked him secretly, in his palace, "Is there any word from Adonai ?" "There is," Yirmeyahu said. "You will be handed over to the king of Bavel."

"Here is what Adonai says: whoever remains in this city will die by sword, famine and plague; but whoever leaves and surrenders to the Kasdim will stay alive; his own life will be his only ‘spoils of war,' but he will stay alive.

In the ninth year of Tzidkiyahu king of Y'hudah, in the tenth month, N'vukhadretzar king of Bavel marched against Yerushalayim with his entire army and began to lay siege against it.

The king of Bavel slaughtered the sons of Tzidkiyahu before his eyes in Rivlah; the king of Bavel also slaughtered all the leading men of Y'hudah.

Now when all the field force commanders and their men heard that the king of Bavel had made G'dalyahu the son of Achikam governor in the land and had committed to his care men, women, children and some of the poorest people in the land of those who had not been carried captive to Bavel;

The next day, before his assassination of G'dalyahu had become known,

Don't be afraid of the king of Bavel — of whom you are afraid. Don't be afraid of him,' says Adonai , ‘for I am with you to save you and to rescue you from his power.

Tell them: ‘This is what Adonai -Tzva'ot, the God of Isra'el, says: "I will summon N'vukhadretzar the king of Bavel, my servant, take him and set his throne on these stones I laid here; he will come and spread his royal canopy over them.

I will light a fire in the temples of the gods of Egypt, and he will burn [those gods] or take them captive. He will fold up the land of Egypt like a shepherd folding up his cloak, and leave there victorious.

It is because you offered incense, sinned against Adonai , didn't listen to what Adonai said, and didn't live by his Torah, regulations and instructions that this disaster has befallen you, as it is today."

Adonai says, ‘I will hand over Pharaoh Hofra king of Egypt to his enemies, to those seeking his life — just as I handed Tzidkiyahu king of Y'hudah over to N'vukhadretzar king of Bavel, his enemy, who sought his life.'"