Bible Strands
Jeremiah 26:19
Did Hezekiah king of Judah or anyone else in Judah put him to death? Did Hezekiah not fear the LORD and seek His favor, and did not the LORD relent of the disaster He had pronounced against them? But we are about to bring great harm on ourselves!”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — A speaker addresses the people of Judah during Jeremiah’s trial, invoking Hezekiah’s reign to argue against executing the prophet. The context places this warning immediately before the account of Uriah’s similar prophetic condemnation (Jeremiah 26:18, Jeremiah 26:20).
The words — חִזְקִיָּ֨הוּ (chiz.ki.Ya.hu) = Hezekiah, and הֲ/לֹא֮ (ha./Lo') = did not. These anchor the rhetorical question in a specific royal precedent and frame the argument as a negated expectation.
The thread — The pattern of national repentance averting judgment appears in Exodus 32:14 and 2 Samuel 24:16. The immediate literary context tracks Jeremiah’s prophecy alongside Micah (Jeremiah 26:18) and Uriah (Jeremiah 26:20).
Why it lands — The text demands a reader to recognize that rejecting a divinely sent warning replicates the very harm the warning seeks to prevent. It contrasts a past precedent of fear and divine mercy with a present trajectory of self-inflicted disaster.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him at all to death? did he not fear the Lord, and besought the Lord, and the Lord repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against them? Thus might we procure great evil against our souls.
Cross-references
- Exodus 32:14 So the LORD relented from the calamity He had threatened to bring on His people.
- 2 Samuel 24:16 But when the angel stretched out his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the LORD relented from the calamity and said to the angel who was destroying the people, “Enough! Withdraw your hand now!” At that time the angel of the LORD was by the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.
- 2 Chronicles 29:6 For our fathers were unfaithful and did evil in the sight of the LORD our God. They abandoned Him, turned their faces away from the dwelling place of the LORD, and turned their backs on Him.
- Isaiah 37:15 And Hezekiah prayed to the LORD:
- Numbers 35:33 Do not pollute the land where you live, for bloodshed pollutes the land, and no atonement can be made for the land on which the blood is shed, except by the blood of the one who shed it.
- 2 Chronicles 32:25 But because his heart was proud, Hezekiah did not repay the favor shown to him. Therefore wrath came upon him and upon Judah and Jerusalem.
- Isaiah 37:1 On hearing this report, King Hezekiah tore his clothes, put on sackcloth, and entered the house of the LORD.
- Isaiah 37:4 Perhaps the LORD your God will hear the words of the Rabshakeh, whom his master the king of Assyria has sent to defy the living God, and He will rebuke him for the words that the LORD your God has heard. Therefore lift up a prayer for the remnant that still survives.”
- Acts 5:39 But if it is from God, you will not be able to stop them. You may even find yourselves fighting against God.”
- Numbers 16:38 As for the censers of those who sinned at the cost of their own lives, hammer them into sheets to overlay the altar, for these were presented before the LORD, and so have become holy. They will serve as a sign to the Israelites.”