Immerse: Prophets - Flipbook - Page 291
40:13–41:13
J eremiah
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us. Settle in the towns you have taken, and live off the land. Harvest the
grapes and summer fruits and olives, and store them away.”
When the Judeans in Moab, Ammon, Edom, and the other nearby coun
tries heard that the king of Babylon had left a few people in Judah and that
Gedaliah was the governor, they began to return to Judah from the places
to which they had fled. They stopped at Mizpah to meet with Gedaliah
and then went into the Judean countryside to gather a great harvest of
grapes and other crops.
Soon after this, Johanan son of Kareah and the other military leaders
came to Gedal iah at Mizpah. They said to him, “Did you know that Baalis,
king of Ammon, has sent Ishmael son of Nethaniah to assassinate you?”
But Gedal iah refused to believe them.
Later Johanan had a private conference with Gedal iah and volunteered
to kill Ishmael secretly. “Why should we let him come and murder you?”
Johanan asked. “What will happen then to the Judeans who have returned?
Why should the few of us who are still left be scattered and lost?”
But Gedal iah said to Johanan, “I forbid you to do any such thing, for you
are lying about Ishmael.”
But in midautumn of that year, Ishmael son of Nethaniah and grandson of
Elishama, who was a member of the royal family and had been one of the
king’s high officials, went to Mizpah with ten men to meet Gedaliah. While
they were eating together, Ishmael and his ten men suddenly jumped up,
drew their swords, and killed Gedaliah, whom the king of Babylon had
appointed governor. Ishmael also killed all the Judeans and the Babylonian
soldiers who were with Gedal iah at Mizpah.
The next day, before anyone had heard about Gedaliah’s murder, eighty
men arrived from Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria to worship at the Temple
of the Lord. They had shaved off their beards, torn their clothes, and cut
themselves, and had brought along grain offerings and frankincense. Ish
mael left Mizpah to meet them, weeping as he went. When he reached
them, he said, “Oh, come and see what has happened to Gedal iah!”
But as soon as they were all inside the town, Ishmael and his men killed
all but ten of them and threw their bodies into a cistern. The other ten
had talked Ishmael into letting them go by promising to bring him their
stores of wheat, barley, olive oil, and honey that they had hidden away.
The cistern where Ishmael dumped the bodies of the men he murdered
was the large one dug by King Asa when he fortified Mizpah to protect
himself against King Baas ha of Israel. Ishmael son of Nethaniah filled it
with corpses.
Then Ishmael made captives of the king’s daughters and the other people
who had been left under Gedaliah’s care in Mizpah by Nebuzaradan, the
