²⁷ The Lord will scatter you among the peoples, and there shall remain but a handful of you among the nations to which the Lord will drive you. ²⁸ There you shall serve gods that are works of human hands, of wood and stone, gods which can neither see nor hear, neither eat nor smell.^(A)

⁶ But if ever you and your descendants turn from following me, fail to keep my commandments and statutes which I set before you, and proceed to serve other gods and bow down to them, ⁷ I will cut off Israel from the land I gave them and repudiate the house I have consecrated for my name. Israel shall become a proverb and a byword among all nations, ^8 (A)and this house shall become a heap of ruins. Every passerby shall gasp in horror and ask, “Why has the Lord done such things to this land and to this house?” ⁹ And the answer will come: “Because they abandoned the Lord, their God, who brought their ancestors out of the land of Egypt, and they embraced other gods, bowing down to them and serving them. That is why the Lord has brought upon them all this evil.”

After Building the Temple.^[a]

⁶ The king was therefore arrested and brought to Riblah to the king of Babylon, who pronounced sentence on him. ⁷ They slew Zedekiah’s sons before his eyes; then they put out his eyes, bound him with fetters, and brought him to Babylon.

¹¹ and Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard, led into exile the last of the army remaining in the city, and those who had deserted^[a] to the king of Babylon, and the last of the commoners.