Jeremiah 25:1-11 - Seventy Years Of Servitude

¹ The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah (the same was the first year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon), ² which Jeremiah the prophet spoke to all the people of Judah, and to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying: ³ "From the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, even to this day, these twenty-three years, the word of the LORD has come to me, and I have spoken to you, rising up early and speaking; but you have not listened. ⁴ The LORD has sent to you all his servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them (but you have not listened, nor inclined your ear to hear) ⁵ saying, 'Return now everyone from his evil way, and from the evil of your doings, and dwell in the land that the LORD has given to you and to your fathers, from of old and even forevermore; ⁶ and do not go after other gods to serve them or worship them, and do not provoke me to anger with the work of your hands; and I will do you no harm.

⁷ Yet you have not listened to me,' says the LORD; 'that you may provoke me to anger with the work of your hands to your own hurt.'

⁸ Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts: 'Because you have not heard my words, ⁹ behold, I will send and take all the families of the north,' says the LORD, 'and I will send to Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against its inhabitants, and against all these nations around; and I will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and a hissing, and perpetual desolations. ¹⁰ Moreover I will take from them the voice of mirth and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the lamp. ¹¹ This whole land shall be a desolation, and an astonishment; and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years.