The Excellence of the Restored Nation

¹While Jeremiah was still confined in the courtyard of the guard, the word of the LORD came to him a second time:

²“Thus says the LORD who made the earth,the LORD who formed it and established it, the LORD is His name:

³Call to Me, and I will answer and show you great and unsearchable things you do not know.

⁴For this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says about the houses of this city and the palaces of the kings of Judah that have been torn down for defense against the siege ramps and the sword:

⁵The Chaldeans are coming to fightand to fill those places with the corpses of the men I will strike down in My anger and in My wrath. I have hidden My face from this city because of all its wickedness.

⁶Nevertheless, I will bring to it health and healing, and I will heal its people and reveal to them the abundance of peace and truth.

⁷I will restore Judah and Israel from captivityand will rebuild them as in former times.

⁸And I will cleanse them from all the iniquity they have committed against Me, and will forgive all their sins of rebellion against Me.

⁹So this city will bring Me renown, joy, praise, and glory before all the nations of the earth, who will hear of all the good I do for it. They will tremble in awe because of all the goodness and prosperity that I will provide for it.

¹⁰This is what the LORD says: In this place you say is a wasteland without man or beast, in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem that are deserted—inhabited by neither man nor beast—there will be heard again

¹¹the sounds of joy and gladness, the voices of the bride and bridegroom, and the voices of those bringing thank offerings into the house of the LORD, saying:‘Give thanks to the LORD of Hosts,for the LORD is good;His loving devotion endures forever.’For I will restore the land from captivityas in former times, says the LORD.

¹²This is what the LORD of Hosts says: In this desolate place, without man or beast, and in all its cities, there will once more be pastures for shepherds to rest their flocks.

¹³In the cities of the hill country, the foothills,and the Negev, in the land of Benjamin and the cities surrounding Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, the flocks will again pass under the hands of the one who counts them, says the LORD.

The Covenant with David

¹⁴Behold, the days are coming,declares the LORD,when I will fulfill the gracious promisethat I have spokento the house of Israeland the house of Judah.

¹⁵In those days and at that timeI will cause to sprout for David a righteous Branch,and He will administer justiceand righteousness in the land.

¹⁶In those days Judah will be saved,and Jerusalem will dwell securely,and this is the name by which it will be called:The LORD Our Righteousness.

¹⁷For this is what the LORD says: David will never lack a man to sit on the throne of the house of Israel,

¹⁸nor will the priests who are Levites ever fail to have a man before Me to offer burnt offerings, to burn grain offerings, and to present sacrifices.”

¹⁹And the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah:

²⁰“This is what the LORD says: If you can break My covenant with the day and My covenant with the night, so that day and night cease to occupy their appointed time,

²¹then My covenant may also be broken with David My servant and with My ministers the Levites who are priests, so that David will not have a son to reign on his throne.

²²As the hosts of heaven cannot be counted and as the sand on the seashore cannot be measured, so too will I multiply the descendants of My servant David and the Levites who minister before Me.”

²³Moreover, the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah:

²⁴“Have you not noticed what these people are saying: ‘The LORD has rejected the two families He had chosen’? So they despise My people and no longer regard them as a nation.

²⁵This is what the LORD says: If I have not established My covenant with the day and the night and the fixed order of heaven and earth,

²⁶then I would also reject the descendants of Jacob and of My servant David, so as not to take from his descendants rulers over the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. For I will restore them from captivityand will have compassion on them.”

Jeremiah Buys Hanamel’s Field

¹This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD in the tenth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, which was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar.

²At that time the army of the king of Babylon was besieging Jerusalem, and Jeremiah the prophet was imprisoned in the courtyard of the guard, which was in the palace of the king of Judah.

³For Zedekiah king of Judah had imprisoned him, saying: “Why are you prophesying like this? You claim that the LORD says, ‘Behold, I am about to deliver this city into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he will capture it.

⁴Zedekiah king of Judah will not escape from the hands of the Chaldeans,but he will surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, and will speak with him face to face and see him eye to eye.

⁵He will take Zedekiah to Babylon, where he will stay until I attend to him, declares the LORD. If you fight against the Chaldeans, you will not succeed.’”

⁶Jeremiah replied, “The word of the LORD came to me, saying:

⁷Behold! Hanamel, the son of your uncle Shallum, is coming to you to say, ‘Buy for yourself my field in Anathoth, for you have the right of redemption to buy it.’

⁸Then, as the LORD had said, my cousin Hanamel came to me in the courtyard of the guard and urged me, ‘Please buy my field in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin, for you own the right of inheritance and redemption. Buy it for yourself.’”Then I knew that this was the word of the LORD.

⁹So I bought the field in Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel, and I weighed out seventeen shekels of silver.

¹⁰I signed and sealed the deed, called in witnesses, and weighed out the silver on the scales.

¹¹Then I took the deed of purchase—the sealed copy with its terms and conditions, as well as the open copy—

¹²and I gave this deed to Baruch son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah, in the sight of my cousin Hanamel and the witnesses who were signing the purchase agreement and all the Jews sitting in the courtyard of the guard.

¹³In their sight I instructed Baruch,

¹⁴“This is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Take these deeds—both the sealed copy and the open copy of the deed of purchase—and put them in a clay jar to preserve them for a long time.

¹⁵For this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Houses, fields, and vineyards will again be bought in this land.”

Jeremiah Prays for Understanding

¹⁶After I had given the deed of purchase to Baruch son of Neriah, I prayed to the LORD:

¹⁷“Oh, Lord GOD! You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and outstretched arm. Nothing is too difficult for You!

¹⁸You show loving devotion to thousands but lay the iniquity of the fathers into the lapsof their children after them, O great and mighty God whose name is the LORD of Hosts,

¹⁹the One great in counsel and mighty in deed, whose eyes are on all the ways of the sons of men, to reward each one according to his ways and according to the fruit of his deeds.

²⁰You performed signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, and You do so to this very day, both in Israel and among all mankind. And You have made a name for Yourself, as is the case to this day.

²¹You brought Your people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs and wonders, with a strong hand and an outstretched arm, and with great terror.

²²You gave them this land that You had sworn to give their fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey.

²³They came in and possessed it, but they did not obey Your voice or walk in Your law. They failed to perform all that You commanded them to do, and so You have brought upon them all this disaster.

²⁴See how the siege ramps are mounted against the city to capture it. And by sword and famine and plague, the city has been given into the hands of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it. What You have spoken has happened, as You now see!

²⁵Yet You, O Lord GOD, have said to me, ‘Buy for yourself the field with silver and call in witnesses, even though the city has been delivered into the hands of the Chaldeans!’”

The LORD Answers Jeremiah

²⁶Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah:

²⁷“Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh. Is anything too difficult for Me?

²⁸Therefore this is what the LORD says: Behold, I am about to deliver this city into the hands of the Chaldeans and of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, who will capture it.

²⁹And the Chaldeans who are fighting against this city will come in, set it on fire, and burn it, along with the houses of those who provoked Me to anger by burning incense to Baal on their rooftops and by pouring out drink offerings to other gods.

³⁰For the children of Israel and of Judah have done nothing but evil in My sight from their youth; indeed, they have done nothing but provoke Me to anger by the work of their hands, declares the LORD.

³¹For this city has aroused My wrath and fury from the day it was built until now. Therefore I will remove it from My presence

³²because of all the evil the children of Israel and of Judah have done to provoke Me to anger—they, their kings, their officials, their priests and prophets, the men of Judah, and the residents of Jerusalem.

³³They have turned their backs to Me and not their faces. Though I taught them again and again,they would not listen or respond to discipline.

³⁴They have placed their abominations in the house that bears My Name, and so have defiled it.

³⁵They have built the high places of Baal in the Valley of Ben-hinnom to make their sons and daughters pass through the fire to Molech—something I never commanded them, nor had it ever entered My mind, that they should commit such an abomination and cause Judah to sin.

A Promise of Restoration

³⁶Now therefore, about this city of which you say, ‘It will be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon by sword and famine and plague,’ this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says:

³⁷I will surely gather My people from all the lands to which I have banished them in My furious anger and great wrath, and I will return them to this place and make them dwell in safety.

³⁸They will be My people, and I will be their God.

³⁹I will give them one heart and one way, so that they will always fear Me for their own good and for the good of their children after them.

⁴⁰I will make an everlasting covenant with them: I will never turn away from doing good to them, and I will put My fear in their hearts, so that they will never turn away from Me.

⁴¹Yes, I will rejoice in doing them good, and I will faithfully plant them in this land with all My heart and with all My soul.

⁴²For this is what the LORD says: Just as I have brought all this great disaster on this people, so I will bring on them all the good I have promised them.

⁴³And fields will be bought in this land about which you are saying, ‘It is a desolation, without man or beast; it has been delivered into the hands of the Chaldeans.’

⁴⁴Fields will be purchased with silver, and deeds will be signed, sealed, and witnessed in the land of Benjamin, in the areas surrounding Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah—the cities of the hill country, the foothills,and the Negev—because I will restore them from captivity,declares the LORD.”

A Call to Justice and Mercy

¹In the fourth year of King Darius, the word of the LORD came to Zechariah on the fourth day of the ninth month, the month of Chislev.

²Now the people of Bethel had sent Sharezer and Regem-melech, along with their men,to plead before the LORD

³by asking the priests of the house of the LORD of Hosts, as well as the prophets, “Should I weep and fast in the fifth month, as I have done these many years?”

⁴Then the word of the LORD of Hosts came to me, saying,

⁵“Ask all the people of the land and the priests, ‘When you fasted and mourned in the fifth and seventh months for these seventy years, was it really for Me that you fasted?

⁶And when you were eating and drinking, were you not doing so simply for yourselves?

⁷Are these not the words that the LORD proclaimed through the earlier prophets, when Jerusalem and its surrounding towns were populous and prosperous, and the Negev and the foothillswere inhabited?’”

⁸Then the word of the LORD came to Zechariah, saying,

⁹“This is what the LORD of Hosts says: ‘Administer true justice. Show loving devotionand compassion to one another.

¹⁰Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. And do not plot evil in your hearts against one another.’

¹¹But they refused to pay attention and turned a stubborn shoulder; they stopped up their ears from hearing.

¹²They made their hearts like flint and would not listen to the law or to the words that the LORD of Hosts had sent by His Spirit through the earlier prophets. Therefore great anger came from the LORD of Hosts.

¹³And just as I had called and they would not listen, so when they called I would not listen, says the LORD of Hosts.

¹⁴But I scattered them with a whirlwind among all the nations that they had not known, and the land was left desolate behind them so that no one could come or go. Thus they turned the pleasant land into a desolation.”

Hear Us, O Shepherd of Israel

¹Hear us, O Shepherd of Israel,who leads Joseph like a flock;You who sit enthroned between the cherubim,shine forth

²before Ephraim, Benjamin, and Manasseh.Rally Your mighty powerand come to save us.

³Restore us, O God,and cause Your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.

⁴O LORD God of Hosts,how long will Your anger smolderagainst the prayers of Your people?

⁵You fed them with the bread of tearsand made them drink the full measure of their tears.

⁶You make us contend with our neighbors;our enemies mock us.

⁷Restore us, O God of Hosts,and cause Your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.

⁸You uprooted a vine from Egypt;You drove out the nations and transplanted it.

⁹You cleared the ground for it,and it took root and filled the land.

¹⁰The mountains were covered by its shade,and the mighty cedars with its branches.

¹¹It sent out its branches to the Sea,and its shoots toward the River.

¹²Why have You broken down its walls,so that all who pass by pick its fruit?

¹³The boar from the forest ravages it,and the creatures of the field feed upon it.

¹⁴Return, O God of Hosts, we pray!Look down from heaven and see!Attend to this vine—

¹⁵the root Your right hand has planted,the son You have raised up for Yourself.

¹⁶Your vine has been cut down and burned;they perish at the rebuke of Your countenance.

¹⁷Let Your hand be upon the man at Your right hand,on the son of man You have raised up for Yourself.

¹⁸Then we will not turn away from You;revive us, and we will call on Your name.

¹⁹Restore us, O LORD God of Hosts;cause Your face to shine upon us,that we may be saved.