Baruch 1

1And these are the words of the book that Baruch son of Neriah, son of Maaseiah, son of Zedekiah, son of Hasadiah, son of Hilkiah, wrote in Babylon,

2in the fifth year, on the seventh day of the month, at the time when the Chaldeans captured Jerusalem and burned it with fire.

3And Baruch read the words of this book in the hearing of Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and in the hearing of all the people who came to the book,

4and in the hearing of the nobles and the sons of kings, and in the hearing of the elders, and in the hearing of all the people, from the least to the greatest, all who were dwelling in Babylon by the river Sud.

5and they were weeping and fasting and praying before the Lord,

6And they collected silver, according to what each one’s hand was able to provide.

7and they sent to Jerusalem, to Jehoiakim son of Hilkiah, son of Shallum, the priest, and to the priests, and to all the people who were found with him in Jerusalem,

8when he received the vessels of the house of the Lord that had been carried out from the temple, to return them to the land of Judah, on the tenth of Sivan—silver vessels that Zedekiah son of Josiah, king of Judah, had made—

9after Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had taken Jeconiah and the rulers and the prisoners and the mighty men and the people of the land from Jerusalem into exile, and had brought him to Babylon.

10And they said, ‘Behold, we have sent you money; and with the money buy burnt offerings and sin offerings and frankincense, and prepare a grain offering and offer them on the altar of the Lord our God,’

11And pray for the life of Nebuchodonosor king of Babylon, and for the life of Baltasar his son, so that their days may be like the days of heaven upon the earth.

12And the Lord will give us strength and enlighten our eyes, and we will live under the shadow of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and under the shadow of Belshazzar his son, and we will serve them many days and find favor before them.

13And pray for us to the Lord our God, because we have sinned against the Lord our God, and the anger of the Lord and his wrath has not turned away from us to this day.

14And you shall read this book that we have sent to you, to proclaim in the house of the Lord on a feast day and on days of appointed time,

15And you shall say, ‘To the Lord our God belongs righteousness, but to us shame of face, as it is this day—to the people of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem,’

16and to our kings and our rulers and our priests and our prophets and our fathers,

17in which we sinned before the Lord

18and we disobeyed him, and did not listen to the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in the commandments of the Lord that he set before us,

19From the day when the Lord brought our fathers out from the land of Egypt until this day, we have been disobedient to the Lord our God, and we have been negligent in not listening to his voice.

20And the calamities and the curse that the Lord appointed for Moses his servant clung to us, on the day when he brought our fathers out to give us a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day.

21And we did not listen to the voice of the Lord our God, according to all the words of the prophets whom he sent to us,

22And each of us went off in the intent of his evil heart, to serve other gods, to do evil in the sight of the Lord our God.