The prophet Hananiah then took the yoke off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck and broke it.

Micaiah, who was the son of Gemariah and the grandson of Shaphan, heard Baruch read from the scroll everything the Lord had said. ¹ 

The following events also occurred ¹  while the Babylonian forces ²  had temporarily withdrawn from Jerusalem ³  because the army of Pharaoh was coming.

The king of Babylon ordered them to be executed ¹  at Riblah in the territory of Hamath. So Judah was taken into exile away from its land.

And I will drive you out of my sight just like I drove out your relatives, the people of Israel.’” ¹ 

Then the Lord said to me, “Even if Moses and Samuel stood before me pleading for ¹  these people, I would not feel pity for them! ²  Get them away from me! Tell them to go away! ³ 

So ¹  I will carry you far off ²  and throw you away. I will send both you and the city I gave to you and to your ancestors out of my sight. ³ 

I will bring war, starvation, and disease ¹  on them until they are completely destroyed from the land I gave them and their ancestors.’” ² 

Do not listen to them, ¹  because their prophecies are lies. ²  Listening to them will only cause you ³  to be taken far away from your native land. I will drive you out of your country and you will die in exile. ⁴ 

But shortly after the prophet Hananiah had broken the yoke off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck, the Lord spoke to Jeremiah.

So the Lord says, ‘I will most assuredly remove ¹  you from the face of the earth. You will die this very year because you have counseled rebellion against the Lord.’” ² 

When the time for them to be rescued comes,” ¹  says the Lord who rules over all, ²  “I will rescue you from foreign subjugation. ³  I will deliver you from captivity. ⁴  Foreigners will then no longer subjugate them.

At that time the Babylonian forces ¹  had temporarily given up their siege against Jerusalem. ²  They had had it under siege, but withdrew when they heard that the army of Pharaoh had set out from Egypt. ³ )

What follows is a record of what happened to Jerusalem and Judah because of the Lord’s anger when he drove them out of his sight. ¹  Zedekiah rebelled against the king of Babylon.

“I, the Lord, also have something to say concerning ¹  the wicked nations who surround my land ²  and have attacked and plundered ³  the land that I gave to my people as a permanent possession. ⁴  I say: ‘I will uproot the people of those nations from their lands and I will free the people of Judah who have been taken there. ⁵ 

So I will throw you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your ancestors have ever known. There you must worship other gods day and night, for I will show you no mercy.’”

But for now I, the Lord, say: ¹  “I will send many enemies who will catch these people like fishermen. After that I will send others who will hunt them out like hunters from all the mountains, all the hills, and the crevices in the rocks. ² 

Then he spoke up in the presence of all the people. “The Lord says, ‘In the same way I will break the yoke of servitude of all the nations to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon ¹  before two years are over.’” After he heard this, the prophet Jeremiah departed and went on his way. ² 

This will happen because ¹  the people of this city have aroused my anger and my wrath since the time they built it until now. ²  They have made me so angry that I am determined to remove ³  it from my sight.

The king sent Jehudi to get the scroll. He went and got it from the room of Elishama, the royal secretary. Then he himself ¹  read it to the king and all the officials who were standing around him.