Open English Translation JER Chapter 38

38 Four officials, Mattan’s son Shefatyah, Pashhur’s son Gedalyah, Shelemyah’s son Yehukal, and Malkiyah’s son Pashhur heard the messages that Yirmeyah was telling all the people, saying: 2 Yahweh says this: Anyone who stays in this city will be killed by fighting, famine, or deadly diseases, but anyone who goes out to the Babylonians will survive—they won’t be killed. 3 Yahweh says that this city will definitely be taken over and captured by the Babylonian king.

4 So those officials went to King Tsidkiyah and requested that Yirmeyah be executed because (they claimed) his messages were discouraging their warriors defending the city and discouraging all the people. They claimed that he wasn’t advancing the people’s safety, but causing harm.

5 “All right,” King Tsidkiyah replied. “Do whatever you want with him, because no king can argue against all of you.” 6 So they took Yirmeyah and put him into the water storage cistern carved out by the king’s son Malkiyah. It was right there in the guards’ courtyard, and they lowered Yirmeyah down with ropes. There wasn’t any water left in the cistern, but it was still muddy at the bottom and he sank down into the mud.

7 Now the Kushite Eved-Melek was one of the trusted servants in the king’s house and he heard that they had put Yirmeyah down into the cistern. Meanwhile, the king was sitting at the Benyamin Gate. 8 So Eved-Melek left the palace and went and spoke with the king, 9 “My master the king, those men have been evil in the way they’ve mistreated the prophet Yirmeyah. They threw him into a cistern so he’d die in it from hunger, since there’s no food left in the city.” 10 Then the king ordered Eved-Melek to take command of thirty of the king’s men to go and get the prophet Yirmeyah out of the cistern so he wouldn’t die down there. 11 So Eved-Melek led the men to a storeroom for clothing under the king’s house where they got some rags and worn-out clothes. Then they let them down by ropes to Yirmeyah in the cistern 12 and told him to use the rags and old clothes under his armpits to protect him from being hurt by the ropes. Yirmeyah did that, 13 then they pulled him up with the ropes—that’s how they got him up out from the mud in the cistern. Then he stayed in the guards’ courtyard.

14 One day King Tsidkiyah (Zedekiah) summoned the prophet Yirmeyah to meet him at the third entrance to the temple and told him, “I want to ask you something. Don’t refuse to answer honestly and truthfully.”

15 “Ha, if I tell you the truth, you’ll order me to be executed,” Yirmeyah replied. “And if I give you good advice, you won’t take any notice of what I say.”

16 But King Tsidkiyah privately promised Yirmeyah, “As our creator Yahweh lives, I won’t execute you or hand you over to those men who want to see you dead.”

17 “Okay,” Yirmeyah answered the king, “Yisrael’s god, Commander-in-chief Yahweh says this: If you indeed go out to the Babylonian king’s officials, then you’ll live, and this city won’t be burnt down. You and your family would live. 18 But if you don’t go out to his officials, then this city will be handed over to the Babylonians. They’ll burn it down, and you wouldn’t be able to escape from their power.”

19 “But I’m afraid of the Judaneans who’ve already deserted to the Babylonians,” the king confided to Yirmeyah. “You see, I might be handed over to them and they might treat me cruelly.”

20 “The Babylonians won’t hand you over to those Jews,” Yirmeyah responded. “Obey Yahweh’s message from Yahweh that I’m passing on to you, so that things will go well for you, and so that you’ll live through this. 21 However, if you refuse to surrender, then this is what Yahweh has shown me: 22 Listen king of Yehudah, all the women who are left in your palace will be taken out to the Babylonian king’s commanders. Those women will tell you,

‘You were deceived by your friends—they’ve ruined you.

Now your feet are stuck in the mud, and your friends have turned away.’

23 Yes, all your wives and children will be taken out to the Babylonians and you yourself won’t escape from them either. You’ll be taken captive by the Babylonian king, and this city will be burnt down.”

24 Then Tsidkiyah told Yirmeyah, “Don’t tell anyone else what we spoke about or you might die. 25 If the officials hear that I’ve have talked with you, and if they come and demand, ‘Tell us what you said to the king—don’t hide it from us or we’ll kill you,’ 26 then you must tell them, ‘I was just pleading to the king not to return me to the dungeon in Yonatan’s house or I’d die there.’ 27 Then sure enough the officials came to Yirmeyah and questioned him and he answered them as the king had instructed him. They couldn’t say anything else because they hadn’t heard the conversation, 28 so Yirmeyah remained in the guards’ courtyard until the day that Yerushalem was captured.[ref]