and the third row, a jacinth, an agate, and an amethyst;

and the third row, a jacinth, an agate, and an amethyst;

“Then our father said, ‘Go back and buy us a little food.’

Their young grow strong, and grow up in the open; they go off, and do not return to them.

You may live among us, and the land will be open to you. Live in it, travel freely in it, and acquire property in it.”

Boaz chose ten of the village leaders and said, “Sit down here!” So they sat down.

Relent, let there be no falsehood; reconsider, for my righteousness is intact!

The watchman replies, “Morning is coming, but then night. If you want to ask, ask; come back again.”

The Lord told me, “Tell the king and the queen mother, ‘Surrender your thrones, for your glorious crowns will be removed from your heads.

The Lord continued, “In every town in the land I will purge them like straw blown away by the wind. I will destroy my people. I will kill off their children. I will do so because they did not change their behavior.

“Yet even now,” the Lord says, “return to me with all your heart – with fasting, weeping, and mourning. Tear your hearts, not just your garments!”

So he said to his servants, “You two stay here with the donkey while the boy and I go up there. We will worship and then return to you.”

They captured as plunder all their wealth, all their little ones, and their wives, including everything in the houses.

When they finished eating the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Return, buy us a little more food.”

Now therefore, please stay the night here also, that I may know what more the Lord might say to me.”

They went to the hill country and stayed there for three days, long enough for those chasing them to return. Their pursuers looked all along the way but did not find them.

Messengers told David what had happened, so he summoned them, for the men were thoroughly humiliated. The king said, “Stay in Jericho until your beards have grown again; then you may come back.”

Gedaliah took an oath so as to give them and their troops some assurance of safety. He said, “You don’t need to be afraid to submit to the Babylonian officials. Settle down in the land and submit to the king of Babylon. Then things will go well for you.”

The men of Judah captured 10,000 men alive. They took them to the top of a cliff and threw them over. All the captives fell to their death.

The leading men of the cities send their servants for water. They go to the cisterns, but they do not find any water there. They return with their containers empty. Disappointed and dismayed, they bury their faces in their hands.