CHAPTER 26
1 In the beginning of the realm of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, this word was made of the Lord, and said,
2 The Lord said these things, Stand thou in the foreyard of the house of the Lord, and thou shalt speak to all the cities of Judah, from which they come for to worship in the house of the Lord, all the words which I command to thee, that thou speak to them; do not thou withdraw a word;
3 if peradventure they hear, and be converted, each man from his evil way, and it repent me of the evil, which I thought to do to them, for the malices of their studies.
4 And thou shalt say to them, The Lord saith these things, If ye hear not me, that ye go in my law which I gave to you,
5 that ye hear the words of my servants, prophets, which I rising by night, and dressing, sent to you, and ye heard not;
6 I shall give this house as Shiloh, and I shall give this city into cursing to all folks of earth.
7 And the priests, and prophets, and all the people heard Jeremy speaking these words in the house of the Lord.
8 And when Jeremy had [ful] filled speaking all things, which the Lord had commanded to him, that he should speak to all the people, the priests, and [the] prophets, and all the people took him, and said, Die he by death;
9 why prophesied he in the name of the Lord, and said, This house shall be as Shiloh, and this city shall be desolate, for no dweller there is? And all the people was gathered together against Jeremy, in the house of the Lord.
10 And the princes of Judah heard all these words; and they ascended [or went up] from the king’s house into the house of the Lord, and sat in the entering [or the entry] of the new gate of the house of the Lord.
11 And the priests and [the] prophets spake to the princes, and to all the people, and said, Doom of death is to this man, for he prophesied against this city, as ye heard with your ears.
12 And Jeremy said to all the princes, and to all the people, saying, The Lord sent me, that I should prophesy to this house, and to this city, all the words which ye heard.
13 Now therefore make ye good your ways, and your studies, and hear ye the voice of your Lord God; and it shall repent the Lord of the evil which he spake against you.
14 Lo! forsooth I am in your hands; do ye to me, as it is good and rightful [or right] before your eyes.
15 Nevertheless know ye, and [well] know, that if ye slay me, ye shall betray innocent blood against yourselves, and against this city, and the dwellers thereof; for in truth the Lord sent me to you, that I should speak in your ears all these words.
16 And the princes and all the people said to the priests and prophets, Doom of death is not to this man; for he spake to us in the name of our Lord God.
17 Therefore men of the elder men of the land rose up, and said to all the company of the people, and spake,
18 Micah of Moresheth was a prophet in the days of Hezekiah, king of Judah; and he said to all the people of Judah, saying, The Lord of hosts saith these things, Zion shall be eared as a field, and Jerusalem shall be into an heap of stones, and the hill of the house of the Lord shall be into high things of woods.
19 Whether Hezekiah, king of Judah, and all Judah condemned him by death? Whether they dreaded not the Lord, and besought the face of the Lord? and it repented the Lord of the evil which he spake against them. Therefore do we not great evil against our souls.
20 Also Urijah, the son of Shemaiah, of Kiriathjearim, was a man prophesying in the name of the Lord; and he prophesied against this city, and against this land, by all the words of Jeremy.
21 And king Jehoiakim, and all the mighty men, and princes of them, heard these words; and the king sought to slay him; and Urijah heard, and dreaded, and he fled, and entered into Egypt.
22 And king Jehoiakim sent men into Egypt, Elnathan, the son of Achbor, and men with him, into Egypt;
23 and they led Urijah out of Egypt, and brought him to king Jehoiakim; and the king killed him with sword, and casted forth his carrion in the sepulchres of the common people unnoble.
24 Therefore the hand of Ahikam, son of Shaphan, was with Jeremy, that he was not betaken into the hands of the people, and that it killed not him.