34. Also our kings, our princes, our priests, and our fathers have not kept your law, nor listened to your commandments and your testimonies with which you testified against them.
35. For they have not served you in their kingdom, and in your great goodness that you gave them, and in the large and rich land which you gave before them. They did not turn from their wicked works.
36. “Behold, we are servants today, and as for the land that you gave to our fathers to eat its fruit and its good, behold, we are servants in it.
37. It yields much increase to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins. Also they have power over our bodies and over our livestock, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress.
38. Yet for all this, we make a sure covenant, and write it; and our princes, our Levites, and our priests, seal it.”