1. And these are the words of the letter which Yirmeyah the prophet sent from Yerushalayim to the rest of the elders of the exile, and to the priests, and to the prophets and to all the people whom Neḇuḵaḏnetstsar had exiled from Yerushalayim to Baḇel –
2. after Yeḵonyah the sovereign, and the sovereigness mother, and the eunuchs, and the heads of Yehuḏah and Yerushalayim, and the craftsmen, and the smiths had gone into exile from Yerushalayim –
3. by the hand of El‛asah son of Shaphan, and Gemaryah the son of Ḥilqiyah, whom Tsiḏqiyah sovereign of Yehuḏah sent to Baḇel, to Neḇuḵaḏnetstsar the sovereign of Baḇel, saying,
4. “Thus said יהוה of hosts, Elohim of Yisra’ĕl, to all the exiles whom I exiled from Yerushalayim to Baḇel,
5. ‘Build houses and dwell in them, plant gardens and eat their fruit.
6. ‘Take wives and bring forth sons and daughters. And take wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, and let them bear sons and daughters, and be increased there, and not diminished.
7. ‘And seek the peace of the city where I have exiled you, and pray to יהוה for it, for in its peace you have peace.’
8. “For thus said יהוה of hosts, Elohim of Yisra’ĕl, ‘Let not your prophets and your diviners who are in your midst deceive you, neither listen to the dreams which you are dreaming.
9. ‘For they are prophesying falsely to you in My Name. I have not sent them,’ declares יהוה.
10. “For thus said יהוה, ‘When seventy years are completed, at Baḇel I shall visit you and establish My good word toward you, to bring you back to this place.
11. ‘For I know the plans I am planning for you,’ declares יהוה, ‘plans of peace and not of evil, to give you a future and an expectancy.
12. ‘Then you shall call on Me, and shall come and pray to Me, and I shall listen to you.
13. ‘And you shall seek Me, and shall find Me, when you search for Me with all your heart.
14. ‘And I shall be found by you,’ declares יהוה, ‘and I shall turn back your captivity, and shall gather you from all the gentiles and from all the places where I have driven you, declares יהוה. And I shall bring you back to the place from which I have exiled you.’
15. “Because you have said, ‘יהוה has raised up prophets for us in Baḇel’ –
16. thus said יהוה concerning the sovereign who sits on the throne of Dawiḏ, concerning all the people who dwell in this city, and concerning your brothers who have not gone out with you into exile,
17. thus said יהוה of hosts, ‘See, I am sending on them the sword, the scarcity of food, and the pestilence. And I shall make them like spoilt figs, so spoilt as to be uneatable.
18. ‘And I shall pursue them with the sword, with scarcity of food, and with pestilence. And I shall make them a horror among all the reigns of the earth, to be a curse, and an astonishment, and a hissing, and a reproach among all the gentiles where I have driven them.