The Lord spoke to me. He said:

“Tell these people this, Jeremiah: ¹  ‘My eyes overflow with tears day and night without ceasing. ²  For my people, my dear children, ³  have suffered a crushing blow. They have suffered a serious wound. ⁴ 

The Lord told Jeremiah, “Tell ¹  Shemaiah the Nehelamite ² 

So, Jeremiah, ¹  do not pray for these people. Do not cry out to me or petition me on their behalf. Do not plead with me to save them. ²  For I will not listen to them when they call out to me for help when disaster strikes them.” ³ 

Before Jeremiah could turn to leave, the captain of the guard added, “Go back ¹  to Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam and grandson of Shaphan, whom the king of Babylon appointed to govern ²  the towns of Judah. Go back and live with him ³  among the people. Or go wherever else you choose.” Then the captain of the guard gave Jeremiah some food and a present and let him go.

Then I said to the people of Judah, ¹  “Listen and pay attention! Do not be arrogant! For the Lord has spoken.

“Do not get married and do not have children here in this land.

The Lord continued, ¹  “Now break the jar in front of those who have come here with you.

Then they will say, ‘Under these conditions I can enjoy sweet sleep when I wake up and look around.’” ¹ 

Now Daniel lived on until the first ¹  year of Cyrus the king.

The Lord said to me, ¹  “I have made you like a metal assayer to test my people like ore. ²  You are to observe them and evaluate how they behave.” ³ 

The Lord said to me, ¹  “Tell them, ‘The Lord says, Do people not get back up when they fall down? Do they not turn around when they go the wrong way? ² 

Then the Lord told me about ¹  some men from Anathoth ²  who were threatening to kill me. ³  They had threatened, ⁴  “Stop prophesying in the name of the Lord or we will kill you!” ⁵ 

The Lord said, “Jerusalem, ¹  I will surely send you away for your own good. I will surely ²  bring the enemy upon you in a time of trouble and distress.

He sent it with Elasah son of Shaphan ¹  and Gemariah son of Hilkiah. ²  King Zedekiah of Judah had sent these men to Babylon to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. ³  The letter said:

Yet in days to come I will reverse Moab’s ill fortune.” ¹  says the Lord. ²  The judgment against Moab ends here.

The following events occurred in that same year, early in the reign of King Zedekiah of Judah. To be more precise, it was the fifth month of the fourth year of his reign. ¹  The prophet Hananiah son of Azzur, who was from Gibeon, spoke to Jeremiah ²  in the Lord’s temple in the presence of the priests and all the people. ³ 

The Lord ¹  began to speak to him ²  in the thirteenth year that Josiah son of Amon ruled over Judah.

“I looked at the land and saw ¹  that it was an empty wasteland. ²  I looked up at the sky, and its light had vanished.

Then I said, ¹  “There is no cure ²  for my grief! I am sick at heart!