9. He had ordered all the people to free their Hebrew slaves—both men and women. No one was to keep a fellow Judean in bondage.
10. The officials and all the people had obeyed the king’s command,
11. but later they changed their minds. They took back the men and women they had freed, forcing them to be slaves again.
12. So the lord gave them this message through Jeremiah:
13. “This is what the lord, the God of Israel, says: I made a covenant with your ancestors long ago when I rescued them from their slavery in Egypt.
14. I told them that every Hebrew slave must be freed after serving six years. But your ancestors paid no attention to me.