Jeremiah 38

Thy Life Shall Be for a Prey

Jerusalem's princes lower Jeremiah into a mud-bottomed cistern for telling the people to surrender; a foreign eunuch pulls him out, and the king asks in secret what the Lord says and will not do it.

Zedekiah’s reign (597–586 B.C. by the Bible Dictionary), in the last months of the siege; the chapter names no year Read with footnotes in Gospel Library

Background

Jerusalem is under siege by Babylon. Zedekiah, Jehoiachin's uncle, had been put on the throne by Babylon and then rebelled.

Jerusalem is under siege by Babylon. Zedekiah, Jehoiachin's uncle, had been put on the throne by Babylon and then rebelled. Chapters 34–38 are “narratives of the treatment of the prophet and other events during the last times of the siege.” Jeremiah's message throughout is that the city will fall and that surrender is the way to live. For that he was already arrested once, accused of “fleeing to join the Chaldeans,” beaten, and confined, and the king moved him to “the court of the prison” (Jer. 37:11–21).

This chapter happens inside that courtyard. Four princes who hear what he has been saying demand his death. The king hands him over, the princes lower him into a cistern, a court eunuch from Cush gets the king to reverse the order, and Zedekiah then calls Jeremiah for a private interview that ends in a promise of secrecy.

The Book of Mormon touches this chapter: Nephi says that in Jerusalem “Jeremiah have they cast into prison” (1 Ne. 7:14). Chapter 39 tells how it all ended.

The thread through the chapter

Everyone in this chapter hears the same word: stay and die, or go out and live.

Everyone in this chapter hears the same word: stay and die, or go out and live. What differs is what each person does with it. The princes want the speaker silenced rather than the message weighed. The king believes the message enough to ask for it twice, in secret, and will not act on it because he is afraid of his own officials and of his own people. A foreigner who has no stake in the argument sees only a man dying in a pit and goes to the king.

The chapter ties these three responses together with one promise. Jeremiah offers Zedekiah his life, and the Lord later offers it to Ebed-melech in nearly the same words, “thy life shall be for a prey unto thee: because thou hast put thy trust in me” (Jer. 39:18). The king who is offered rescue refuses it, and the man who is not even in the conversation receives it. The mud in verse 6 and the mud in verse 22 mark the difference: the prophet who is pulled out of it is not the one who ends up in it.

Tap any highlighted phrase to open a note beneath its versein the margin.

Verses 1–6

The princes ask for his death

In plain words

Four officials heard Jeremiah telling the people, “The Lord says: whoever stays in this city will die by sword, famine, and plague, but whoever goes out to the Chaldeans will live; he will keep his life as his only spoil. This city will certainly be handed over to the Babylonian army.” They said to the king, “This man must die. He is discouraging the soldiers and everyone else with these words. He is not seeking the good of this people but their harm.” Zedekiah said, “He is in your hands; the king can do nothing against you.” So they took Jeremiah and let him down by ropes into the cistern of Malchiah the king's son, in the courtyard of the guard. It had no water, only mud, and Jeremiah sank in it.

1 Then Shephatiah the son of Mattan, and Gedaliah the son of Pashur, and Jucal the son of Shelemiah, and Pashur the son of Malchiah, heard the words that Jeremiah had spoken unto all the people, saying,

Context #

The men who once asked for his prayers

Two of the four officials are men Zedekiah had earlier sent to Jeremiah for help.

Two of the four officials are men Zedekiah had earlier sent to Jeremiah for help. Pashur the son of Melchiah (“Malchiah” in this chapter) was sent with Zephaniah to inquire of the Lord through him (Jer. 21:1), and Jehucal the son of Shelemiah (“Jucal” here) was sent to say, “Pray now unto the Lord our God for us” (Jer. 37:3). The men asking for his death are the men who had asked for his prayers.

This Pashur is not the Pashur the son of Immer, the priest and chief governor of the temple, who struck Jeremiah and put him in the stocks (Jer. 20:1–2). Shephatiah and Gedaliah are not named anywhere else. One reading takes Gedaliah to be a son of the Pashur of chapter 20, but the text does not say so, and nothing in the chapter depends on it.

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Jeremiah, Trans. David Patrick and James Kennedy. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1874–1880; in Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, online at Bible Hub.

2 Thus saith the LORD, He that remaineth in this city shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence: but he that goeth forth to the Chaldeans shall live; for he shall have his life for a prey, and shall live.

Context #

The message from the siege's first days

Jeremiah is not saying anything new: this is what he said when the siege began.

Jeremiah is not saying anything new: this is what he said when the siege began. The same words are in Jer. 21:9: “he that goeth out, and falleth to the Chaldeans that besiege you, he shall live, and his life shall be unto him for a prey.”

“For a prey” means as plunder: the one thing a survivor carries out of a lost city is his life. The Lord uses the phrase for Baruch, who is to seek no great things for himself, “but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey” (Jer. 45:5), and for Ebed-melech (Jer. 39:18). In each case the promise is life itself with everything else lost.

The princes hear this as treason, and “from a strictly political point of view, one can understand why the Jewish leaders reacted so strongly.” But “Jeremiah was not speaking from a political point of view; he spoke for the Lord,” and that is the way his advice was meant: a way for the people and the royal family “to preserve their lives by surrendering to the Chaldeans.”

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Chapter 24: The Babylonian Captivity (Jeremiah 20–22; 24–29; 32; 34–45; 52; Lamentations), Old Testament Student Manual: 1 Kings–Malachi (2003).

3 Thus saith the LORD, This city shall surely be given into the hand of the king of Babylon’s army, which shall take it.

4 Therefore the princes said unto the king, We beseech thee, let this man be put to death: for thus he weakeneth the hands of the men of war that remain in this city, and the hands of all the people, in speaking such words unto them: for this man seeketh not the welfare of this people, but the hurt.

Latter-day Prophets #

The worldly want the prophet silenced

The princes ask for Jeremiah's death because of what he says, not because he has been shown wrong.

The princes ask for Jeremiah's death because of what he says, not because he has been shown wrong. Their argument is that he “weakeneth the hands of the men of war.” The same demand had been made earlier: the priests and prophets said, “This man is worthy to die” (Jer. 26:11), the verse the Church edition's footnote gives here.

President Ezra Taft Benson described the pattern in general terms: “When the prophet points out the sins of the world, the worldly either want to close the mouth of the prophet, or else act as if the prophet didn't exist, rather than repent of their sins. Popularity is never a test of truth. Many a prophet has been killed or cast out.”

Sources: Ezra Taft Benson, “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet”, BYU devotional, Feb. 26, 1980. The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

5 Then Zedekiah the king said, Behold, he is in your hand: for the king is not he that can do any thing against you.

Context #

A king who cannot, or will not

Zedekiah answers that he is powerless against his princes, and the rest of the chapter shows how far that is true.

Zedekiah answers that he is powerless against his princes, and the rest of the chapter shows how far that is true. He had been set on the throne by Babylon, when “Jehoiachin rebelled against Babylon, he was deposed and his uncle, Zedekiah, was placed on the throne,” and then, “ignoring the repeated warnings of Jeremiah, he rebelled.”

The scene shows “the weak, vacillating character of King Zedekiah”: he gives Jeremiah up here, yet “when Jeremiah's friends pleaded for his life, Zedekiah relented and had him secretly delivered out of the prison” (verses 7–13). The same man who says he cannot refuse the princes can overrule them in a few verses, once someone else brings him the argument. His problem in this chapter is less lack of authority than lack of resolve.

Sources: Chapter 24: The Babylonian Captivity (Jeremiah 20–22; 24–29; 32; 34–45; 52; Lamentations), Old Testament Student Manual: 1 Kings–Malachi (2003).

6 Then took they Jeremiah, and cast him into the dungeon of Malchiah the son of Hammelech, that was in the court of the prison: and they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in the dungeon there was no water, but mire: so Jeremiah sunk in the mire.

Language #

A cistern in the prison yard

The “dungeon” is a cistern, an empty water pit. The Hebrew is bor, “the pit,” and modern translations render the verse “cistern,” with no water “but only mud.”

The “dungeon” is a cistern, an empty water pit. The Hebrew is bor, “the pit,” and modern translations render the verse “cistern,” with no water “but only mud.” Its owner is “Malchiah the son of Hammelech,” and hammelech is Hebrew for “the king,” so this was the cistern of Malchiah the king's son, standing in the guard's courtyard, and the princes used it.

This is a second place of confinement. Earlier Jeremiah had been put in the house of Jonathan the scribe, which the princes “had made … the prison” (Jer. 37:15), and then moved at the king's order to “the court of the prison” (Jer. 37:21). The cistern was in that courtyard, so he did not leave the place where he was already held.

Sources: Westminster Leningrad Codex (the Masoretic Hebrew text), Read in the Hebrew–English interlinear on Bible Hub. The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Related Scriptures #

Nephi on Jeremiah in prison

Nephi tells his brothers that “they have rejected the prophets, and Jeremiah have they cast into prison” (1 Ne. 7:14).

Nephi tells his brothers that “they have rejected the prophets, and Jeremiah have they cast into prison” (1 Ne. 7:14). At first glance he seems to mean the imprisonment of chapters 37–38, but the dates are a problem: those chapters place it toward the end of Zedekiah's reign, while Nephi's account opens at its beginning and Lehi's family left soon afterward. So several researchers have argued that Nephi had in mind an earlier imprisonment.

One BYU proposal is that Jeremiah, “accused of being pro-Babylonian, was imprisoned during the last year of the reign of Jehoiakim,” for the same reasons he was imprisoned later under Zedekiah, and that this imprisonment may have run “late in Jehoiakim's kingship or early in Zedekiah's.” Another proposal puts the arrest Nephi meant in 605 B.C., after the first scroll of his prophecies (Jer. 36:5). It is also possible that Nephi heard of the imprisonment in this chapter secondhand on one of the brothers' trips back to Jerusalem, since he does not say how much time passed before the family left for good, or that he learned of it by revelation. These are hypotheses about the timing, and the chapter's own events do not depend on the answer. What is plain is that Nephi, a contemporary, knew that Jerusalem imprisoned its prophet.

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Scripture Central, “How Could Nephi Have Known about Jeremiah’s Imprisonment?”, KnoWhy #463. S. Kent Brown and David Rolph Seely, “Jeremiah’s Imprisonment and the Date of Lehi’s Departure”, Religious Educator 2, no. 1 (2001): 15–32.

Verses 7–13

Ebed-melech draws him up

In plain words

Ebed-melech, a Cushite who was a court official, heard that Jeremiah was in the cistern. The king was sitting at the Benjamin Gate. Ebed-melech went out and said, “My lord the king, these men have done evil in all they have done to Jeremiah. He will die of hunger where he is, for there is no more bread in the city.” The king told him, “Take thirty men and lift Jeremiah out before he dies.” Ebed-melech took the men, went to a room under the treasury in the palace, took worn-out rags and clothes, and let them down by ropes to Jeremiah. He said, “Put these rags under your armpits, under the ropes.” Jeremiah did, and they pulled him up. He stayed in the courtyard of the guard.

7 Now when Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, one of the eunuchs which was in the king’s house, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the dungeon; the king then sitting in the gate of Benjamin;

Context #

A foreigner at court

Ebed-melech is a foreign court official, “the Ethiopian” of the KJV, in Hebrew a Cushite.

Ebed-melech is a foreign court official, “the Ethiopian” of the KJV, in Hebrew a Cushite. The word “eunuch” describes a class of men “attached to the courts of eastern rulers,” who “watch over the harems and also were often given positions as trusted officials”; the Bible Dictionary lists this passage among its examples.

The men of Jeremiah's own people shut him in a pit, and a man from outside Israel gets the king to open it. He finds the king sitting in the gate of Benjamin and points to the famine as a reason for hurry (“there is no more bread in the city,” verse 9); Jeremiah had been given a daily piece of bread “until all the bread in the city were spent” (Jer. 37:21).

The Lord did not forget it. While Jeremiah was still shut up in the court of the prison, the word came to him: “Go and speak to Ebed-melech the Ethiopian,” and the promise follows: “I will surely deliver thee… because thou hast put thy trust in me” (Jer. 39:15–18).

Sources: “Eunuch”, Bible Dictionary. Westminster Leningrad Codex (the Masoretic Hebrew text), Read in the Hebrew–English interlinear on Bible Hub. The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

8 Ebed-melech went forth out of the king’s house, and spake to the king, saying,

9 My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the dungeon; and he is like to die for hunger in the place where he is: for there is no more bread in the city.

10 Then the king commanded Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, Take from hence thirty men with thee, and take up Jeremiah the prophet out of the dungeon, before he die.

11 So Ebed-melech took the men with him, and went into the house of the king under the treasury, and took thence old cast clouts and old rotten rags, and let them down by cords into the dungeon to Jeremiah.

12 And Ebed-melech the Ethiopian said unto Jeremiah, Put now these old cast clouts and rotten rags under thine armholes under the cords. And Jeremiah did so.

13 So they drew up Jeremiah with cords, and took him up out of the dungeon: and Jeremiah remained in the court of the prison.

Verses 14–23

The king asks in secret

In plain words

King Zedekiah had Jeremiah brought to him at the third entrance of the Lord's house and said, “I will ask you something; hide nothing from me.” Jeremiah said, “If I tell you, will you not surely kill me? And if I advise you, you will not listen.” The king swore secretly, “As the Lord lives, who gave us life, I will not kill you or hand you over to these men.” Jeremiah said, “Thus says the Lord, the God of hosts: If you will go out to the Babylonian officers, you will live, and this city will not be burned, and your household will live. If you do not, the city will be given to the Chaldeans, who will burn it, and you will not escape.” Zedekiah said, “I am afraid of the Jews who have gone over to the Chaldeans, in case they hand me over to be abused.” Jeremiah said, “They will not. Obey the Lord, and it will go well with you. But if you refuse, this is what the Lord has shown me: all the women left in your palace will be led out to Babylon's officers, saying, ‘Your trusted friends misled you and overpowered you; now your feet are sunk in the mud, and they have turned back.’ All your wives and children will be brought out to the Chaldeans, you will not escape, and you will be seized by the king of Babylon and this city will be burned.”

14 Then Zedekiah the king sent, and took Jeremiah the prophet unto him into the third entry that is in the house of the LORD: and the king said unto Jeremiah, I will ask thee a thing; hide nothing from me.

Context #

The king asks in secret

Zedekiah has Jeremiah brought to a private place in the temple precinct and asks for the word of the Lord, as he had once before, “secretly in his house” (Jer. 37:17).

Zedekiah has Jeremiah brought to a private place in the temple precinct and asks for the word of the Lord, as he had once before, “secretly in his house” (Jer. 37:17). The location is not known: “Nothing further is known about the situation and the nature of this entrance.” That is one reading, and it fits what the text itself gives, a name and nothing else.

Secrecy is the pattern of the whole chapter: he wants the Lord's word, but not where the princes can hear it. Jeremiah's answer in verse 15 shows he knows it. He asks whether the king will kill him for speaking and whether he will listen if advised, and the king's oath in verse 16 answers only the first.

15 Then Jeremiah said unto Zedekiah, If I declare it unto thee, wilt thou not surely put me to death? and if I give thee counsel, wilt thou not hearken unto me?

16 So Zedekiah the king sware secretly unto Jeremiah, saying, As the LORD liveth, that made us this soul, I will not put thee to death, neither will I give thee into the hand of these men that seek thy life.

17 Then said Jeremiah unto Zedekiah, Thus saith the LORD, the God of hosts, the God of Israel; If thou wilt assuredly go forth unto the king of Babylon’s princes, then thy soul shall live, and this city shall not be burned with fire; and thou shalt live, and thine house:

Latter-day Prophets #

If thou wilt assuredly go forth

The offer is conditional and complete: “If thou wilt assuredly go forth unto the king of Babylon's princes,” the king lives, his house lives, and the city is not burned; if not,…

The offer is conditional and complete: “If thou wilt assuredly go forth unto the king of Babylon's princes,” the king lives, his house lives, and the city is not burned; if not, the city is given to the Chaldeans, “and thou shalt not escape out of their hand.” “Go forth” means to surrender to the Babylonian officers, “submitting to the Babylonians rather than fighting against them.”

Latter-day prophets have taught the principle behind such a choice: the Lord's counsel through His prophet is to be followed even when it is unwelcome. Elder M. Russell Ballard: “When we hear the counsel of the Lord expressed through the words of the President of the Church, our response should be positive and prompt. History has shown that there is safety, peace, prosperity, and happiness in responding to prophetic counsel.” President Benson added that “how we respond to the words of a living prophet when he tells us what we need to know, but would rather not hear, is a test of our faithfulness.” Zedekiah is the case where the test is plainly failed: the counsel was clear, he believed enough to ask for it twice, and he would not go.

Sources: Lesson 136: Jeremiah 34–41, Old Testament Seminary Teacher Manual. M. Russell Ballard, “His Word Ye Shall Receive”, general conference, Apr. 2001. Ezra Taft Benson, “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet”, BYU devotional, Feb. 26, 1980.

18 But if thou wilt not go forth to the king of Babylon’s princes, then shall this city be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they shall burn it with fire, and thou shalt not escape out of their hand.

19 And Zedekiah the king said unto Jeremiah, I am afraid of the Jews that are fallen to the Chaldeans, lest they deliver me into their hand, and they mock me.

Language #

Afraid of his own people

The king's reason for refusing is fear of being humiliated by his own subjects.

The king's reason for refusing is fear of being humiliated by his own subjects. The Church edition's footnote shows that “mock” translates a Hebrew verb meaning “maltreat,” so the fear is of rough treatment at the hands of Jews who had gone over to the Chaldeans (“fallen,” footnote: “have deserted to”), not only of being laughed at.

Jeremiah answers with a flat promise, “They shall not deliver thee,” and a plea: “Obey, I beseech thee, the voice of the Lord.” The king weighs what Jeremiah says against what his people might do to him, and the people win: his fear is of “being mocked or hurt by Jews who had joined or been captured by the Babylonians.”

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Lesson 136: Jeremiah 34–41, Old Testament Seminary Teacher Manual.

20 But Jeremiah said, They shall not deliver thee. Obey, I beseech thee, the voice of the LORD, which I speak unto thee: so it shall be well unto thee, and thy soul shall live.

21 But if thou refuse to go forth, this is the word that the LORD hath shewed me:

22 And, behold, all the women that are left in the king of Judah’s house shall be brought forth to the king of Babylon’s princes, and those women shall say, Thy friends have set thee on, and have prevailed against thee: thy feet are sunk in the mire, and they are turned away back.

Literary Structure #

The king in the mire

The women's taunt gives the king the pit he had put the prophet in. In verse 6 “Jeremiah sunk in the mire”; in verse 22 the women of the palace say to Zedekiah, “thy feet are sunk…

The women's taunt gives the king the pit he had put the prophet in. In verse 6 “Jeremiah sunk in the mire”; in verse 22 the women of the palace say to Zedekiah, “thy feet are sunk in the mire.” The Hebrew verb for “sink” is the same in both verses (taba'), though the words for the mud differ (tit in verse 6, bots in verse 22). The women add, “Thy friends have set thee on, and have prevailed against thee.”

The echo sets the two men side by side: the prophet whom the princes lowered into the mud is raised out of it by a foreigner, and the king who gave him up to them is told that he will end in it.

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Westminster Leningrad Codex (the Masoretic Hebrew text), Read in the Hebrew–English interlinear on Bible Hub.

23 So they shall bring out all thy wives and thy children to the Chaldeans: and thou shalt not escape out of their hand, but shalt be taken by the hand of the king of Babylon: and thou shalt cause this city to be burned with fire.

Related Scriptures #

How it ended

Chapter 39 reports the outcome, and it is what verses 18–23 describe. Zedekiah fled by night; “the Chaldeans' army pursued after them, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of…

Chapter 39 reports the outcome, and it is what verses 18–23 describe. Zedekiah fled by night; “the Chaldeans' army pursued after them, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho”; at Riblah “the king of Babylon slew the sons of Zedekiah … before his eyes,” put out his eyes, and bound him to take him to Babylon (Jer. 39:4–7).

“Thou shalt cause this city to be burned” is the consequence of refusing, not a charge that he lit the fire: the offer in verse 17 was that the city need not be burned if he went out. The Book of Mormon adds a detail the Bible does not give: Nephi son of Helaman says, “the sons of Zedekiah were not slain, all except it were Mulek” (Hel. 8:21), for “one son, Mulek, came to the Western Hemisphere.”

Sources: The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. “Zedekiah”, Bible Dictionary.

Verses 24–28

Keep it quiet

In plain words

Zedekiah said, “Let no one know about this conversation, or you will die. If the officials hear that I spoke with you and ask what you said, tell them, ‘I was pleading with the king not to send me back to Jonathan's house to die there.’” The officials did come and question him, and he told them just what the king had commanded. They stopped asking, because the conversation had not been overheard. Jeremiah stayed in the courtyard of the guard until the day Jerusalem was captured.

24 Then said Zedekiah unto Jeremiah, Let no man know of these words, and thou shalt not die.

25 But if the princes hear that I have talked with thee, and they come unto thee, and say unto thee, Declare unto us now what thou hast said unto the king, hide it not from us, and we will not put thee to death; also what the king said unto thee:

26 Then thou shalt say unto them, I presented my supplication before the king, that he would not cause me to return to Jonathan’s house, to die there.

Context #

What Jeremiah told the princes

The answer the king gives Jeremiah to use is a true statement that leaves out the main subject.

The answer the king gives Jeremiah to use is a true statement that leaves out the main subject. Jeremiah had in fact made this plea, asking the king “that thou cause me not to return to the house of Jonathan the scribe, lest I die there” (Jer. 37:20). So when the princes asked, he told them “according to all these words that the king had commanded,” and they “left off speaking with him; for the matter was not perceived.”

The text reports this without comment. What it does show is that Zedekiah arranged the cover story, and that the plan was to protect both of them: one reading is that he wanted to spare himself the princes' reproaches and, “perhaps,” spare the prophet further persecution.

27 Then came all the princes unto Jeremiah, and asked him: and he told them according to all these words that the king had commanded. So they left off speaking with him; for the matter was not perceived.

28 So Jeremiah abode in the court of the prison until the day that Jerusalem was taken: and he was there when Jerusalem was taken.

Context #

Until the day Jerusalem was taken

Jeremiah stays in the courtyard until the city falls, and then the Babylonians free him.

Jeremiah stays in the courtyard until the city falls, and then the Babylonians free him. Nebuchadrezzar “gave charge concerning Jeremiah” to his captain: “Take him, and look well to him, and do him no harm” (Jer. 39:11–12); the men Nebuzar-adan sent “took Jeremiah out of the court of the prison, and committed him unto Gedaliah” (Jer. 39:14). “Because Jeremiah had foretold Babylon's eventual success, he was released by the Chaldeans and allowed to remain in Jerusalem as a free person.”

The prophet who was called a traitor for saying the city would fall is released by the people whose victory he predicted.

Seeing Christ in Jeremiah 38

This chapter does not name the Messiah. When Jesus asked His disciples who people said He was, they answered, “Some say that thou art John the Baptist: some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets” (Matt. 16:14), so Jeremiah was a name people reached for in thinking about Jesus. Nephi son of Helaman names Jeremiah among the prophets whose words about Jerusalem were fulfilled and asks why the Son of God should not come “according to his prophecy” (Hel. 8:20). Zedekiah is told what to do to live and does not do it; the promise made to Ebed-melech, “I will surely deliver thee,” is made because he trusted the Lord (Jer. 39:18).

Worth exploring next

The rest of the story. Read Jer. 37 for the first arrest and Jer. 39 for the fall and Ebed-melech's reward.
The same message at the start of the siege. Compare Jer. 21:1–10.
The Book of Mormon's Jerusalem. Read 1 Ne. 7:13–15 and Hel. 8:19–21.
An earlier demand for his death. Read Jer. 26:7–16.

This chapter elsewhere in scripture

1 Ne. 7:14 — Nephi says Jerusalem had cast Jeremiah into prison; which imprisonment he means is discussed in the note on verse 6.
Hel. 8:20–21 — Nephi son of Helaman names Jeremiah, the destruction of Jerusalem, and Mulek, the one son of Zedekiah who was not slain.

Sources & further reading

“Jeremiah”, Bible Dictionary.
Chapter 24: The Babylonian Captivity (Jeremiah 20–22; 24–29; 32; 34–45; 52; Lamentations), Old Testament Student Manual: 1 Kings–Malachi (2003).
Lesson 136: Jeremiah 34–41, Old Testament Seminary Teacher Manual.
The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Jeremiah, Trans. David Patrick and James Kennedy. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1874–1880; in Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, online at Bible Hub.
Ezra Taft Benson, “Fourteen Fundamentals in Following the Prophet”, BYU devotional, Feb. 26, 1980.
M. Russell Ballard, “His Word Ye Shall Receive”, general conference, Apr. 2001.
Westminster Leningrad Codex (the Masoretic Hebrew text), Read in the Hebrew–English interlinear on Bible Hub.
“Eunuch”, Bible Dictionary.
“Zedekiah”, Bible Dictionary.
Scripture Central, “How Could Nephi Have Known about Jeremiah’s Imprisonment?”, KnoWhy #463.
S. Kent Brown and David Rolph Seely, “Jeremiah’s Imprisonment and the Date of Lehi’s Departure”, Religious Educator 2, no. 1 (2001): 15–32.

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