World English Bible · Babylon and the exile
Jeremiah 36
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
In the fourth year of the son of , king of Judah, this word came to from , saying, "Take a of a book, and write in it all the words that I have spoken to you against Israel, against Judah, and against all the nations, from the day I spoke to you, from the days of even to this day. It may be that the house of Judah will hear all the evil which I intend to do to them, that they may each return from his evil way; that I may forgive their and their ." Then called the son of ; and wrote from the of all words, which he had spoken to him, on a of a book. commanded , saying, "I am restricted. I can't go into house. Therefore you go, and read from which you have written from my , words, in the ears of the people in house on the day. Also you shall read them in the ears of all Judah who come out of their cities. It may be they will present their before , and will each return from his evil way; for has pronounced great and against this people." the son of did according to all that the commanded him, reading in the book words in house. Now in the fifth year of the son of , king of Judah, in the ninth month, all the people in and all the people who came from the cities of Judah to , proclaimed a before . Then read the words of from the book in house, in the room of Gemariah the son of the , in the upper court, at the entry of the new of house, in the ears of all the people. When the son of Gemariah, the son of , had heard out of the book all words, he went down into the king's house, into the room; and behold, all the princes were sitting there, Elishama the , Delaiah the son of Shemaiah, the son of , Gemariah the son of , the son of , and all the princes. Then declared to them all the words that he had heard, when read the book in the ears of the people. Therefore all the princes sent the son of , the son of , the son of Cushi, to , saying, "Take in your hand in which you have read in the ears of the people, and come." So the son of took in his hand, and came to them. 15They said to him, "Sit down now, and read it in our hearing." So read it in their hearing. Now when they had heard all the words, they turned in fear one toward another, and said to , "We will surely tell the king of all these words." They asked , saying, "Tell us now, how did you write all these words at his ?" Then answered them, "He dictated all these words to me with his , and I wrote them with ink in the book." Then the princes said to , "You and go hide. Don't let anyone know where you are." They went in to the king into the court, but they had laid up in the room of Elishama the . Then they told all the words in the hearing of the king. So the king sent to get , and he took it out of the room of Elishama the . read it in the hearing of the king, and in the hearing of all the princes who stood beside the king. Now the king was sitting in the winter house in the ninth month, and there was a in the brazier burning before him. When had read three or four columns, the king cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the that was in the brazier, until all was consumed in the that was in the brazier. The king and his servants who heard all these words were not afraid, and didn't tear their garments. Moreover and Delaiah and Gemariah had made intercession to the king that he would not burn ; but he would not listen to them. The king commanded Jerahmeel the king's son, and the son of , and the son of Abdeel, to arrest the and the ; but hid them. Then word came to , after the king had burned , and the words which wrote at the of , saying, "Take again another , and write in it all the former words that were in the first , which the king of Judah has burned. Concerning king of Judah you shall say, ' says: "You have burned this , saying, 'Why have you written therein, saying, "The king of will certainly come and destroy this land, and will cause to cease from there man and animal"?'" Therefore says concerning king of Judah: "He will have no one to sit on . His body will be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the frost. I will punish him, his , and his servants for their . I will bring on them, on the inhabitants of , and on the men of Judah, all the evil that I have pronounced against them, but they didn't listen."'" Then took another , and gave it to the , the son of , who wrote therein from the of all the words of the book which king of Judah had burned in the ; and many similar words were added to them.
A public domain modern English translation, free to read and share. 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