Jeremiah 43 (NLT)
Jeremiah Taken to Egypt
When Jeremiah had finished giving this message from the Lord their God to all the people, 2 Azariah son of Hoshaiah and Johanan son of Kareah and all the other proud men said to Jeremiah, “You lie! The Lord our God hasn’t forbidden us to go to Egypt! 3 Baruch son of Neriah has convinced you to say this, because he wants us to stay here and be killed by the Babylonians or be carried off into exile.”
They say, God would have said what we wanted him to say. You are lying to us and you are against us.
“How strange it is that ungodly men always think the Word of God is against them, whereas they are set against it!”
–F. B. Meyer
4 So Johanan and the other guerrilla leaders and all the people refused to obey the Lord’s command to stay in Judah. 5 Johanan and the other leaders took with them all the people who had returned from the nearby countries to which they had fled. 6 In the crowd were men, women, and children, the king’s daughters, and all those whom Nebuzaradan, the captain of the guard, had left with Gedaliah. The prophet Jeremiah and Baruch were also included. 7 The people refused to obey the voice of the Lord and went to Egypt, going as far as the city of Tahpanhes.
And so, following their own plans, they go to Egypt. They even drag Jeremiah along with them.
“It must have been for him one of the most tragic events of his life, since it dashed for ever all hopes he may have had to end his days in his homeland, where Yahweh had promised one day to restore the national life of his people.”
–J. A. Thompson
8 Then at Tahpanhes, the Lord gave another message to Jeremiah. He said, 9 “While the people of Judah are watching, take some large rocks and bury them under the pavement stones at the entrance of Pharaoh’s palace here in Tahpanhes. 10 Then say to the people of Judah, ‘This is what the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, says: I will certainly bring my servant Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, here to Egypt. I will set his throne over these stones that I have hidden. He will spread his royal canopy over them. 11 And when he comes, he will destroy the land of Egypt. He will bring death to those destined for death, captivity to those destined for captivity, and war to those destined for war. 12 He will set fire to the temples of Egypt’s gods; he will burn the temples and carry the idols away as plunder. He will pick clean the land of Egypt as a shepherd picks fleas from his cloak. And he himself will leave unharmed. 13 He will break down the sacred pillars standing in the temple of the sun in Egypt, and he will burn down the temples of Egypt’s gods.’”
Jeremiah assures them that Nebuchadnezzar will come to Egypt and bring disaster with him both for them and for the Egyptians.
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Music:
Jeremiah goes to Egypt in chapter 43 and after chapter 44 we hear nothing more about him. It is assumed he died in Egypt; tradition has it he was stoned to death by his own people.
HERE is music composed for the 1978 movie Death on the Nile, based on a book by Agatha Christie. (Fun movie, with an all-star cast, great scenes of several cultural highlights of Egypt, and Academy Award-winning costumes!)
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New Living Translation (NLT) Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright© 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
DWELLING in the Word 
