¹ How is the gold become dim! how is the most fine gold changed! the stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the head of every street.

² The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

³ Even the sea-monsters draw out the breast, they nurse their young ones: the daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

⁴ The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst: the young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it to them.

⁵ They that fed delicately are desolate in the streets: they that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.

⁶ For the punishment of the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the punishment of the sin of Sodom, that was overthrown as in a moment, and no hands stayed on her.

⁷ Her Nazarites were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk, they were more ruddy in body than rubies, their polishing was of sapphire:

⁸ Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets: their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick.

⁹ They that are slain with the sword are better than they that are slain with hunger: for these pine away, stricken through for want of the fruits of the field.

¹⁰ The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children: they were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

¹¹ The LORD hath accomplished his fury; he hath poured out his fierce anger, and hath kindled a fire in Zion, and it hath devoured her foundations.

¹² The kings of the earth, and all the inhabitants of the world, would not have believed that the adversary and the enemy would have entered into the gates of Jerusalem.

¹³ For the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her.

¹⁴ They have wandered as blind men in the streets, they have polluted themselves with blood, so that men could not touch their garments.

¹⁵ They cried to them, Depart ye; it is unclean; depart, depart, touch not: when they fled away and wandered, they said among the heathen, They shall no more sojourn there.

¹⁶ The anger of the LORD hath divided them; he will no more regard them: they respected not the persons of the priests, they favored not the elders.

¹⁷ As for us, our eyes as yet failed for our vain help: in our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save us.

¹⁸ They hunt our steps, that we cannot go in our streets: our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end is come.

¹⁹ Our persecutors are swifter than the eagles of heaven: they pursued us upon the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness.

²⁰ The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD, was taken in their pits, of whom we said, Under his shadow we shall live among the heathen.

²¹ Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz; the cup also shall pass through to thee: thou shalt be drunken, and shalt make thyself naked.

²² The punishment of thy iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion; he will no more carry thee away into captivity: he will visit thy iniquity, O daughter of Edom; he will disclose thy sins.

¹ And it came to pass in the ninth year of his reign, in the tenth month, in the tenth day of the month, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came, he, and all his army, against Jerusalem, and encamped against it; and they built forts against it on all sides.

² And the city was besieged to the eleventh year of king Zedekiah.

³ And on the ninth day of the fourth month the famine prevailed in the city, and there was no bread for the people of the land.

⁴ And the city was broken up, and all the men of war fled by night by the way of the gate between two walls, which is by the king's garden: (now the Chaldees were against the city on all sides:) and the king went the way towards the plain.

⁵ And the army of the Chaldees pursued the king, and overtook him in the plains of Jericho: and all his army were scattered from him.

⁶ So they took the king, and brought him to the king of Babylon to Riblah; and they gave judgment upon him.

⁷ And they slew the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and put out the eyes of Zedekiah, and bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him to Babylon.

⁸ And in the fifth month, on the seventh day of the month, which is the nineteenth year of king Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, came Nebuzar-adan, captain of the guard, a servant of the king of Babylon, to Jerusalem:

⁹ And he burnt the house of the LORD, and the king's house, and all the houses of Jerusalem, and every great man's house he burnt with fire.

¹⁰ And all the army of the Chaldees, that were with the captain of the guard, broke down the walls of Jerusalem on all sides.

¹¹ Now the rest of the people that were left in the city, and the fugitives that fell away to the king of Babylon, with the remnant of the multitude, did Nebuzar-adan the captain of the guard carry away.

¹² But the captain of the guard left of the poor of the land to be vine-dressers and husbandmen.

¹³ And the pillars of brass that were in the house of the LORD, and the bases, and the brazen sea that was in the house of the LORD, did the Chaldees break in pieces, and carried the brass of them to Babylon.

¹⁴ And the pots, and the shovels, and the snuffers, and the spoons, and all the vessels of brass with which they ministered, they took away.

¹⁵ And the fire-pans, and the bowls, and such things as were of gold, in gold, and of silver, in silver, the captain of the guard took away.

¹⁶ The two pillars, one sea, and the bases which Solomon had made for the house of the LORD; the brass of all these vessels was without weight.

¹⁷ The hight of the one pillar was eighteen cubits, and the capital upon it was brass: and the hight of the capital three cubits; and the wreathen work, and pomegranates upon the capital around, all of brass: and like to these had the second pillar with wreathen work.

¹⁸ And the captain of the guard took Seraiah the chief priest, and Zephaniah the second priest, and the three keepers of the door:

¹⁹ And out of the city he took an officer that was set over the men of war, and five men of them that were in the king's presence, who were found in the city, and the principal scribe of the host, who mustered the people of the land, and sixty men of the people of the land that were found in the city:

²⁰ And Nebuzar-adan captain of the guard took these, and brought them to the king of Babylon to Riblah:

²¹ And the king of Babylon smote them, and slew them at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah was carried away out of their land.

²² And as for the people that remained in the land of Judah, whom Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon had left, even over them he made Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, ruler.

²³ And when all the captains of the armies, they and their men, heard that the king of Babylon had made Gedaliah governor, there came to Gedaliah to Mizpah, even Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, and Johanan the son of Careah, and Seraiah the son of Tanhumeth the Netophathite, and Jaazaniah the son of Maachathite, they and their men.

²⁴ And Gedaliah swore to them, and to their men, and said to them, Fear not to be the servants of the Chaldees: dwell in the land, and serve the king of Babylon; and it shall be well with you.

²⁵ But it came to pass in the seventh month, that Ishmael the son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, of the seed royal, came, and ten men with him, and smote Gedaliah, that he died, and the Jews and the Chaldees that were with him at Mizpah.

²⁶ And all the people, both small and great, and the captains of the armies, arose, and came to Egypt: for they were afraid of the Chaldees.

²⁷ And it came to pass in the seven and thirtieth year of the captivity of Jehoiachin king of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the seven and twentieth day of the month, that Evil-merodach king of Babylon, in the year that he began to reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah out of prison;

²⁸ And he spoke kindly to him, and set his throne above the throne of the kings that were with him in Babylon;

²⁹ And changed his prison garments: and he ate bread continually before him all the days of his life.

³⁰ And his allowance was a continual allowance given him by the king, a daily rate for every day, all the days of his life.