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Baruch 1:1-3:8
New American Bible (Revised Edition)

I. Letter to Jerusalem

Chapter 1

A. Historical Setting

1 Now these are the words of the scroll which Baruch, son of Neriah, son of Mahseiah, son of Zedekiah, son of Hasadiah, son of Hilkiah, wrote in Babylon,(A) 2 in the fifth year, on the seventh day of the month,[a] at the time the Chaldeans took Jerusalem and destroyed it with fire.(B) 3 (C)Baruch read the words of this scroll in the hearing of Jeconiah, son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and all the people who came to the reading:(D) 4 the nobles, kings’ sons, elders, and all the people, small and great—all who lived in Babylon by the river Sud.[b]

5 They wept, fasted, and prayed before the Lord, 6 and collected such funds as each could afford.(E) 7 These they sent to Jerusalem, to Jehoiakim the priest, son of Hilkiah, son of Shallum, and to the priests and the whole people who were with him in Jerusalem. 8 (At the same time he[c] received the vessels of the house of the Lord that had been removed from the temple, to restore them to the land of Judah, on the tenth of Sivan. These silver vessels Zedekiah, son of Josiah, king of Judah, had had made 9 (F)after Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, carried off as captives Jeconiah and the princes, the skilled workers, the nobles, and the people of the land from Jerusalem, and brought them to Babylon.)

B. Confession of Guilt

10 The message was: “We send you funds, with which you are to procure burnt offerings, sin offerings, and frankincense, and to prepare grain offerings; offer these[d] on the altar of the Lord our God,(G) 11 and pray for the life of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and of Belshazzar, his son,[e] that their lifetimes may be as the days of the heavens above the earth.(H) 12 Pray that the Lord may give us strength, and light to our eyes, that we may live under the protective shadow of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, and of Belshazzar, his son, to serve them many days, and find favor in their sight. 13 Pray for us to the Lord, our God, for we have sinned against the Lord, our God. Even to this day the wrath of the Lord and his anger have not turned away from us. 14 On the feast day and during the days of assembly, read aloud in the house of the Lord this scroll that we send you:(I)

15 [f]“To the Lord our God belongs justice; to us, people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem, to be shamefaced, as on this day—(J) 16 to us, our kings, rulers, priests, and prophets, and our ancestors. 17 We have sinned in the Lord’s sight 18 and disobeyed him. We have not listened to the voice of the Lord, our God, so as to follow the precepts the Lord set before us. 19 From the day the Lord led our ancestors out of the land of Egypt until the present day, we have been disobedient to the Lord, our God, and neglected to listen to his voice. 20 Even today evils cling to us, the curse the Lord pronounced to Moses, his servant, at the time he led our ancestors out of the land of Egypt to give us a land flowing with milk and honey.(K) 21 For we did not listen to the voice of the Lord, our God, in all the words of the prophets he sent us, 22 but each of us has followed the inclinations of our wicked hearts, served other gods, and done evil in the sight of the Lord, our God.

Chapter 2

1 “So the Lord carried out the warning he had uttered against us: against our judges, who governed Israel, against our kings and princes, and against the people of Israel and Judah. 2 Nowhere under heaven has anything been done like what he did in Jerusalem, as was written in the law of Moses:[g](L) 3 that we would each eat[h] the flesh of our sons, each the flesh of our daughters. 4 He has made us subject to all the kingdoms around us, an object of reproach and horror among all the peoples around us, where the Lord has scattered us.(M) 5 We are brought low, not raised high,(N) because we sinned against the Lord, our God, not listening to his voice.

6 “To the Lord, our God, belongs justice; to us and to our ancestors, to be shamefaced, as on this day.(O) 7 All the evils of which the Lord had warned us have come upon us. 8 We did not entreat the favor of the Lord by turning, each one, from the designs of our evil hearts. 9 The Lord kept watch over the evils, and brought them home to us; for the Lord is just in all the works he commanded us to do,(P) 10 but we did not listen to his voice, or follow the precepts of the Lord which he had set before us.

C. Prayer for Deliverance

11 [i]“And now, Lord, God of Israel, who led your people out of the land of Egypt with a strong hand, with signs and wonders and great might, and with an upraised arm, so that you have made for yourself a name to the present day:(Q) 12 we have sinned, we have committed sacrilege, we have violated all your statutes, Lord, our God.(R) 13 Withdraw your anger from us, for we are left few in number among the nations where you have scattered us. 14 Hear, Lord, our prayer of supplication, and deliver us for your own sake: grant us favor in the sight of those who brought us into exile, 15 that the whole earth may know that you are the Lord, our God, and that Israel[j] and his descendants bear your name.(S) 16 Lord, look down from your holy dwelling and take thought of us; Lord, incline your ear to hear us.(T) 17 Open your eyes and see: it is not the dead in Hades,[k] whose breath has been taken from within them, who will declare the glory and vindication to the Lord.(U) 18 The person who is deeply grieved, who walks bowed and feeble, with failing eyes and famished soul, will declare your glory and justice, Lord!(V)

19 “Not on the just deeds of our ancestors and our kings do we base our plea for mercy in your sight, Lord, our God. 20 You have sent your wrath and anger upon us, as you had warned us through your servants the prophets: 21 Thus says the Lord: Bend your necks and serve the king of Babylon, that you may continue in the land I gave your ancestors;(W) 22 [l]for if you do not listen to the Lord’s voice so as to serve the king of Babylon, 23 I will silence from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the cry of joy and the cry of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride; and all the land shall be deserted, without inhabitants.(X) 24 But we did not listen to your voice, or serve the king of Babylon, and you carried out the threats you had made through your servants the prophets, that the bones of our kings and the bones of our ancestors would be brought out from their burial places.(Y) 25 And indeed, they lie exposed[m] to the heat of day and the frost of night. They died in great suffering, by famine and sword and plague.(Z) 26 And you reduced the house which bears your name[n] to what it is today, because of the wickedness of the house of Israel and the house of Judah.(AA)

God’s Promises Recalled. 27 “But with us, Lord, our God, you have dealt in all your clemency and in all your great mercy. 28 [o]Thus you spoke through your servant Moses, the day you ordered him to write down your law in the presence of the Israelites: 29 ‘If you do not listen to my voice, surely this great and numerous throng will dwindle away among the nations to which I will scatter them.(AB) 30 For I know they will not listen to me, because they are a stiff-necked people. But in the land of their exile they shall have a change of heart;(AC) 31 they shall know that I, the Lord, am their God. I will give them a heart and ears that listen;(AD) 32 and they shall praise me in the land of their exile, and shall remember my name.(AE) 33 Then they shall turn back from their stiff-necked stubbornness, and from their evil deeds, because they shall remember the ways of their ancestors, who sinned against the Lord.(AF) 34 And I will bring them back to the land I promised on oath to their ancestors, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and they shall rule it. I will make them increase; they shall not be few. 35 And I will establish for them an eternal covenant: I will be their God, and they shall be my people; and I will never again remove my people Israel from the land I gave them.’(AG)

Chapter 3

1 “Lord Almighty, God of Israel, the anguished soul, the dismayed spirit cries out to you. 2 Hear, Lord, and have mercy, for you are a merciful God; have mercy on us, who have sinned against you: 3 for you are enthroned forever, while we are perishing forever.(AH) 4 Lord Almighty, God of Israel, hear the prayer of the dead of Israel, children who sinned against you; they did not listen to the voice of the Lord, their God, and their evils cling to us.(AI) 5 Do not remember the wicked deeds of our ancestors, but remember at this time your power and your name, 6 for you are the Lord our God; and you, Lord, we will praise! 7 This is why you put into our hearts the fear of you: that we may call upon your name, and praise you in our exile, when we have removed from our hearts all the wickedness of our ancestors who sinned against you.(AJ) 8 See, today we are in exile, where you have scattered us, an object of reproach and cursing and punishment for all the wicked deeds of our ancestors, who withdrew from the Lord, our God.”

Footnotes

  1. 1:2 In the fifth year, on the seventh day of the month: Jerusalem fell on the seventh day of the fifth month in 587 B.C.; cf. 2 Kgs 25:8; Jer 52:12. Either the text read originally “the fifth month,” or it refers to the observance of an anniversary of the fall of Jerusalem.
  2. 1:4 The river Sud: probably one of the Babylonian canals, not otherwise identified; or possibly a misreading of Ahava; cf. Ezr 8:21, 31.
  3. 1:8–9 He: apparently Baruch; less likely Jehoiakim the priest (v. 7). The silver vessels here described are distinct from the vessels referred to in 2 Kgs 25:14 and Ezr 1:7–9. The author of this note may have thought of the fifth year (v. 1) of Zedekiah, in view of Jer 28:1; 29:1–3. A “fifth year,” again with no month mentioned, is given in Ez 1:2 for the inaugural vision of Ezekiel’s prophetic career.
  4. 1:10 Offer these: since 2:26 suggests that the Temple is destroyed, the mention of sacrifices here may be an anachronism. Nevertheless, Jer 41:5 indicates that some people continued to worship at the Temple site after Nebuchadnezzar’s destruction of the Temple.
  5. 1:11 Nebuchadnezzar…Belshazzar, his son: Belshazzar was the son of Nabonidus, the last king of Babylon, not of Nebuchadnezzar, the destroyer of Jerusalem. Belshazzar was co-regent for a few years while his father was away in Arabia. Later Jewish tradition seems to have simplified the end of the Babylonian empire (cf. Dn 5:1–2), for three kings came between Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus.
  6. 1:15–2:10 This confession of sin is similar to Dn 9:7–14, and echoes ideas from Deuteronomy and Jeremiah; cf. also Neh 9.
  7. 2:2 Law of Moses: cf. Dt 28:53–57.
  8. 2:3 We would each eat: such dreadful events were the result of the prolonged siege of Jerusalem; cf. Lam 2:20.
  9. 2:11–35 An earnest appeal for divine mercy, along with confession of sin; cf. Dn 9:15–19.
  10. 2:15 Israel: the Israelites claimed descent from the patriarch Jacob, who had received the name Israel in a mysterious encounter with God (Gn 32:29). Thus the Deity was sometimes referred to as “the God of Israel” (Gn 33:20; Ex 5:1).
  11. 2:17 Hades: this is the Greek translation of Hebrew sheol, the nether world.
  12. 2:22–24 These words are very similar to Jer 7:34; 27:9, 12.
  13. 2:25 They lie exposed: Jeremiah’s words threatened Jehoiakim with being left unburied (Jer 22:19; 36:30).
  14. 2:26 The house which bears your name: the Temple of Jerusalem; cf. Dt 12:11; Jer 7:11. What it is today: during the exile it lay in ruins.
  15. 2:28–35 These words do not actually quote anything Moses is recorded as having said, but they present the substance of a passage such as Dt 30:1–10, which envisions exile, repentance, and restoration.
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Scripture texts, prefaces, introductions, footnotes and cross references used in this work are taken from the New American Bible, revised edition © 2010, 1991, 1986, 1970 Confraternity of Christian Doctrine, Inc., Washington, DC All Rights Reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.