Jeremiah 42
42
1Johanan, Jezaniah,#42.1 Jezaniah: Hebrew “Jezaniah son of Hoshaiah”; one ancient translation “Azariah son of Hoshaiah” (see also 43.2 and the note there). the other army officers, and everyone else in the group, came to me 2and said, “Please, Jeremiah, pray to the Lord your God for us. Judah used to have many people, but as you can see, only a few of us are left. 3Ask the Lord to tell us where he wants us to go and what he wants us to do.”
4“All right,” I answered, “I will pray to the Lord your God, and I will tell you everything he says.”
5They answered, “The Lord himself will be our witness that we promise to do whatever he says, 6even if it isn't what we want to do. We will obey the Lord so that all will go well for us.”
7Ten days later, the Lord gave me an answer for 8Johanan, the officers, and the other people. So I called them together 9and told them that the Lord God of Israel had said:
You asked Jeremiah to pray and find out what you should do. 10I am sorry that I had to punish you, and so I now tell you to stay here in Judah, where I will plant you and build you up, instead of tearing you down and uprooting you. 11Don't be afraid of the King of Babylonia. I will protect you from him, 12and I will even force him to have mercy on you and give back your farms.
13But you might keep on saying, “We won't stay here in Judah, and we won't obey the Lord our God. 14We are going to Egypt, where there is plenty of food and no danger of war.”
15People of Judah, you survived when the Babylonian army attacked. Now you are planning to move to Egypt, and if you do go, this is what will happen. 16-17You are afraid of war, starvation, and disease here in Judah, but they will follow you to Egypt and kill you there. None of you will survive the disasters I will send.
18I, the Lord, was angry with the people of Jerusalem and punished them. And if you go to Egypt, I will be angry and punish you the same way. You will never again see your homeland. People will be horrified at what I do to you, and they will use the name of your city as a curse word.
Jeremiah Gives a Warning
19I told the people:
You escaped the disaster that struck Judah, but now the Lord warns you to stay away from Egypt. 20You asked me to pray and find out what the Lord our God wants you to do, and you promised to obey him. But that was a terrible mistake, 21because now that I have given you the Lord's answer, you refuse to obey him. 22And so, you will die in Egypt from war, hunger, and disease.
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Jeremiah 42: CEVDCI
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Contemporary English Version, Second Edition (CEV®)
© 2006 American Bible Society. All rights reserved.
Jeremiah 42
42
1While they were at Geruth Kimham, Johanan son of Kareah and Jezaniah son of Hoshaiah went to Jeremiah the prophet. All the army officers went with Johanan and Jezaniah. All the people, from the least important to the most important, went to Jeremiah. 2They said to him, “Jeremiah, please listen to what we ask. Pray to the Lord your God for all those who are survivors from the family of Judah. Jeremiah, you can see that there are not many of us left. At one time there were many of us. 3Jeremiah, pray that the Lord your God will tell us where we should go and what we should do.”
4Then Jeremiah the prophet answered, “I understand what you want me to do. I will pray to the Lord your God, as you asked me to do. I will tell you everything the Lord says. I will not hide anything from you.”
5Then the people said to Jeremiah, “If we don’t do everything the Lord your God tells us, then we hope the Lord will be a true and faithful witness against us. We know he will send you to tell us what to do. 6It doesn’t matter if we like the message or if we don’t like the message. We will obey the Lord our God. We are sending you to the Lord for a message from him. We will obey what he says. Then good things will happen to us. Yes, we will obey the Lord our God.”
7At the end of ten days, the message from the Lord came to Jeremiah. 8Then Jeremiah called together Johanan son of Kareah and the army officers who were with him. He also called all the other people together, from the least important to the most important. 9Then Jeremiah said to them, “You sent me to the Lord, the God of Israel, and I asked him what you wanted me to ask. This is what he says: 10‘If you will stay in Judah, I will make you strong—I will not destroy you. I will plant you, and I will not pull you up. I will do this because I am sad about the terrible things that I made happen to you. 11Now you are afraid of the king of Babylon. But don’t be afraid of him. Don’t be afraid of the king of Babylon,’ says the Lord, ‘because I am with you. I will save you. I will rescue you. He will not get his hands on you. 12I will be kind to you, and the king of Babylon will also treat you with mercy. He will bring you back to your land.’ 13But you might say, ‘We will not stay in Judah.’ If you say that, you will disobey the Lord your God. 14And you might say, ‘No, we will go and live in Egypt. We will not be bothered with war there. We will not hear the trumpets of war, and in Egypt we will not be hungry.’ 15If you say that, listen to this message from the Lord, you survivors from Judah. This is what the Lord All-Powerful, the God of the people of Israel, says: ‘If you decide to go and live in Egypt, this will happen: 16You are afraid of the sword of war, but it will defeat you there. And you are worried about hunger, but you will be hungry in Egypt. You will die there. 17Everyone who decides to go live in Egypt will die by war, hunger, or disease. Not one person who goes to Egypt will survive. Not one of them will escape the terrible things that I will bring to them.’
18“This is what the Lord All-Powerful, the God of the people of Israel, says: ‘I showed my anger against Jerusalem. I punished the people who lived there. In the same way I will show my anger against everyone who goes to Egypt. People will use you as an example when they ask for bad things to happen to other people. You will become like a curse word. People will be ashamed of you, and they will insult you. And you will never see Judah again.’
19“Survivors of Judah, the Lord told you: ‘Don’t go to Egypt.’ I warn you right now, 20you are making a mistake that will cause your deaths. You sent me to the Lord your God. You said to me, ‘Pray to the Lord our God for us. Tell us everything the Lord our God says to do. We will obey him.’ 21So today I have told you the message from the Lord. But you have not obeyed the Lord your God. You have not done all that he sent me to tell you to do. 22So now be sure you understand this: You want to go live in Egypt. But these things will happen to you in Egypt: You will die by a sword, or hunger, or terrible sickness.”
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