King James Version · Babylon and the exile
Jeremiah 20
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Now Pashur the son of the priest, who was also chief governor in the , heard that prophesied these things. Then Pashur smote the , and put him in the stocks that were in the high of , which was by the . And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth out of the stocks. Then said unto him, hath not called thy name Pashur, but Magor–missabib. For thus saith , Behold, I will make thee a terror to thyself, and to all thy friends: and they shall fall of their , and thine eyes shall behold it: and I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of , and he shall carry them into , and shall them with . Moreover I will all the strength of this city, and all the labours thereof, and all the precious things thereof, and all the of the kings of Judah will I give into the hand of their , which shall spoil them, and take them, and carry them to . And thou, Pashur, and all that in thine house shall go into : and thou shalt come to , and there thou shalt , and shalt be buried there, thou, and all thy friends, to whom thou hast prophesied lies. O , thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me. For since I spake, I cried out, I cried and spoil; because the word of was made a unto me, and a derision, daily. Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine as a burning shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay. For I heard the defaming of many, fear on every side. Report, say they, and we will report it. All my familiars watched for my halting, saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our on him. But is with me as a mighty terrible one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail: they shall be greatly ; for they shall not prosper: their confusion shall never be forgotten. But, O , that triest , and seest the reins and , let me see thy on them: for unto thee have I opened my cause. Sing unto , ye : for he hath the of from the hand of . be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother me be . be the man who brought tidings to , saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad. And let that man be as the cities which overthrew, and not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide; Because he slew me not from the ; or that my mother might have been my , and her to be always great with me. Wherefore came I forth out of the to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with ?
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Babylon and the exile, 612 BC to 539 BC ›
Babylon replaces Assyria, Jerusalem and its temple are destroyed in 586 BC, and the leadership of Judah lives in Mesopotamia without a king, a temple, or a country.
- Babylon
- Nebuchadnezzar II rebuilds the city on a scale meant to be seen from a distance: the Ishtar Gate in glazed blue brick, the processional way, the ziggurat, and gardens later counted among the wonders of the world. Babylonian tablets record rations issued to the captive king Jehoiachin of Judah by name, which is one of the tidier points of contact between the Bible and the archives.
- Egypt
- Briefly resurgent. Pharaoh Neco marches north, kills King Josiah at Megiddo, and installs and deposes kings in Jerusalem, until Babylon beats him decisively at Carchemish in 605 BC. Jeremiah spends his career saying that betting on Egypt is suicide, and is proved right.
- Judah
- Deported in stages, then destroyed. The temple is burned, the walls broken, and the leadership marched to Mesopotamia. What happens next is one of the strangest survivals in history: a people keeps its identity without land, king, or sanctuary, and comes out of it with its scriptures more central than before.
- Further afield
- An extraordinary century for ideas everywhere at once. Thales and the first Greek philosophers, Solon's reforms at Athens, the Buddha in India, Confucius and Lao Tzu in China, and Zoroaster in Persia all fall within a few generations of the exile.
All of Jeremiah