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Jeremiah 29:1-32 — A Letter to the Exiles

Jer.29.1-32

¹These are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the prophet sent from Jerusalem to the remaining elders of the exiles, and to the priests, the prophets, and all the people whom Nebuchadnezzar had carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon. ²This was after King Jeconiah, the queen mother, the court officials, the officials of Judah and Jerusalem, and the craftsmen and metalworkers had gone out from Jerusalem. ³He sent it by the hand of Elasah son of Shaphan and Gemariah son of Hilkiah, whom Zedekiah king of Judah sent to Babylon, to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon. It said: ⁴Thus says Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I sent away from Jerusalem to Babylon: ⁵Build houses and live in them. Plant gardens and eat their fruit. ⁶Take wives and have sons and daughters. Take wives for your sons, and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters. Multiply there, and do not decrease. ⁷Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to Yahweh on its behalf, for in its welfare you will have welfare. ⁸For thus says Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel: Do not let your prophets who are among you and your diviners deceive you, and do not listen to the dreams that you dream . ⁹For they are prophesying lies to you in my name. I did not send them, declares Yahweh. ¹⁰For thus says Yahweh: When seventy years for Babylon are completed, I will attend to you, and I will fulfill my good word to you by bringing you back to this place. ¹¹For I know the plans that I have for you, declares Yahweh, plans for peace and not for harm, to give you a future and a hope. ¹²Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will hear you. ¹³You will seek me and find me, when you seek me with all your heart. ¹⁴I will let myself be found by you, declares Yahweh, and I will restore your fortunes and gather you from all the nations and from all the places where I have driven you, declares Yahweh. I will bring you back to the place from which I sent you into exile. ¹⁵Because you say, “Yahweh has raised up prophets for us in Babylon,” ¹⁶thus says Yahweh concerning the king who sits on David’s throne and all the people who live in this city, your brothers who did not go out with you into exile: ¹⁷Thus says Yahweh of Hosts: Look, I am sending against them the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, and I will make them like rotten figs that cannot be eaten because they are so bad. ¹⁸I will pursue them with the sword, with famine, and with pestilence, and I will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, a curse, a desolation, an object of hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them. ¹⁹because they did not listen to my words, declares Yahweh, which I sent to them by my servants the prophets, sending them again and again. And you did not listen, declares Yahweh. ²⁰But you, hear the word of Yahweh, all you exiles whom I sent from Jerusalem to Babylon. ²¹Thus says Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel, concerning Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, who are prophesying lies to you in my name: Look, I am giving them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will strike them down before your eyes. ²²Because of them a curse will be used by all the exiles of Judah who are in Babylon, saying, ‘May Yahweh make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab, whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire.’ ²³For they have committed an outrageous sin in Israel: they have committed adultery with their neighbors’ wives, and they have spoken in my name a lie that I did not command them. I am the one who knows, and I am witness, declares Yahweh. ²⁴And to Shemaiah the Nehelamite you shall say: ²⁵Thus says Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel: Because you have sent letters in your own name to all the people who are in Jerusalem, and to Zephaniah son of Maaseiah the priest, and to all the priests, saying: ²⁶‘Yahweh has made you priest in place of Jehoiada the priest, to be overseers in the house of Yahweh over every madman who sets himself up as a prophet, so that you should put him in the stocks and in the collar. ²⁷So now, why have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth, who is prophesying to you? ²⁸For this is why he sent to us in Babylon, saying, ‘It will be a long stay. Build houses and live in them, and plant gardens and eat their fruit.’ ²⁹Zephaniah the priest read this letter in the hearing of Jeremiah the prophet. ³⁰Then the word of Yahweh came to Jeremiah: ³¹Send to all the exiles, saying, ‘Thus says Yahweh concerning Shemaiah the Nehelamite: Because Shemaiah has prophesied to you, though I did not send him, and has made you trust in a lie, ³²therefore thus says Yahweh: Look, I am about to punish Shemaiah the Nehelamite and his offspring. He shall have no one living among this people, and he shall not see the good I am doing for my people, declares Yahweh, for he has spoken rebellion against Yahweh .’

Translation Notes

4/11/2026

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