Jeremiah 24

1 Jehovah showed me this vision. Behold, two baskets of figs were set before the temple of Jehovah. This was after Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, had carried away captive Jeconiah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, and the artificers, and the smiths, from Jerusalem, and had led them to Babylon.

2 One of the baskets contained very good figs, like those which are first ripe. The other contained very bad figs, so bad that they could not be eaten.

3 And Jehovah said to me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said: Figs; the good figs, exceedingly good; and the bad, exceedingly bad, so bad that they cannot be eaten.

4 Then came the word of Jehovah to me, saying:

5 Thus saith Jehovah, the God of Israel: As these good figs, so will I regard the captives of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of Chaldaea for their good;

6 yea, I will set my eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land; and I will build them up, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up.

7 And I will give them a heart to know me, that I am Jehovah; and they shall be my people, and I will be their God; for they shall return to me with their whole heart.

8 And as the bad figs, which are so bad that they cannot be eaten, saith Jehovah, so will I make Zedekiah, the king of Judah, and his princes, and the residue of Jerusalem, those that are left in this land, and those that dwell in the land of Egypt;

9 and I will give them up to oppression and affliction in all the kingdoms of the earth; yea, to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places whither I shall drive them.

10 And I will send the sword, the famine, and the pestilence among them, till they be consumed from the land, which I gave to them and to their fathers.