Everyone was supposed to free their male and female Hebrew slaves. No one was supposed to keep a fellow Judean enslaved.

But after I have uprooted the people of those nations, I will relent and have pity on them. I will restore the people of each of those nations to their own lands and to their own country.

I said, “Oh, mother, how I regret that you ever gave birth to me! I am always starting arguments and quarrels with the people of this land. I have not lent money to anyone and I have not borrowed from anyone. Yet all of these people are treating me with contempt.”

So I, Jeremiah, tell you, “Each of you people should say to his friend or his relative, ‘How did the Lord answer? Or what did the Lord say?’

However, King Jehoiakim sent some men to Egypt, including Elnathan son of Achbor,

eighty men arrived from Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria. They had shaved off their beards, torn their clothes, and cut themselves to show they were mourning. They were carrying grain offerings and incense to present at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem.

Kill all the farmers who sow the seed in the land of Babylon. Kill all those who wield the sickle at harvest time. Let all the foreigners return to their own people. Let them hurry back to their own lands to escape destruction by that enemy army.

So these officials said to the king, “This man must be put to death. For he is demoralizing the soldiers who are left in the city as well as all the other people there by these things he is saying. This man is not seeking to help these people but is trying to harm them.”

They are like lusty, well-fed stallions. Each of them lusts after his neighbor’s wife.

Kings will come against it with their armies. They will encamp in siege all around it. Each of them will devastate the portion assigned to him.

Lord, we know that people do not control their own destiny. It is not in their power to determine what will happen to them.

“Hear the terms of the covenant I made with Israel and pass them on to the people of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem.

The Lord said to me, “The people of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem have plotted rebellion against me!

Not one of them will survive. I will bring disaster on those men from Anathoth who threatened you. A day of reckoning is coming for them.”

I, the Lord, probe into people’s minds. I examine people’s hearts. I deal with each person according to how he has behaved. I give them what they deserve based on what they have done.

But they just keep saying, ‘We do not care what you say! We will do whatever we want to do! We will continue to behave wickedly and stubbornly!’”

I will send men against it to destroy it with their axes and hatchets. They will hack up its fine cedar panels and columns and throw them into the fire.

So I, the Lord, affirm that I am opposed to those prophets who steal messages from one another that they claim are from me.

Rather, each person will die for his own sins. The teeth of the person who eats the sour grapes will themselves grow numb.

Then Zedekiah told Jeremiah, “Do not let anyone know about the conversation we have had. If you do, you will die.