Bible Strands
Jeremiah 38:9
“My lord the king, these men have acted wickedly in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet. They have dropped him into the cistern, where he will starve to death, for there is no more bread in the city.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Ebed-melech the Cushite addresses King Zedekiah after leaving the royal palace, reporting the princes' actions against Jeremiah just before the king issues a rescue order.
The words — The Hebrew הֵרֵ֜עוּ (he.Re.'u) translates literally to "they have done evil," while אֲדֹנִי (a.do.N/i) and הַמֶּלֶךְ (ha.Melekh) literally render "my lord" and "the king."
The thread — The report of starvation in a confined space parallels Jeremiah 37:21, where Zedekiah previously ordered Jeremiah placed in a guard courtyard with a daily loaf, and anticipates the life-or-death urgency seen in Esther 7:4.
Why it lands — The text records a direct factual warning about imminent death from lack of bread, requiring the reader to recognize that royal silence enables lethal neglect and that intervention must be swift to preserve life.
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
My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the dungeon; and he is like to die for hunger in the place where he is: for there is no more bread in the city.
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 37:21 So King Zedekiah gave orders for Jeremiah to be placed in the courtyard of the guard and given a loaf of bread daily from the street of the bakers, until all the bread in the city was gone. So Jeremiah remained in the courtyard of the guard.
- Esther 7:4 For my people and I have been sold out to destruction, death, and annihilation. If we had merely been sold as menservants and maidservants, I would have remained silent, because no such distress would justify burdening the king.”
- Job 31:34 because I greatly feared the crowds and the contempt of the clans terrified me, so that I kept silent and would not go outside—
- Proverbs 24:11 Rescue those being led away to death, and restrain those stumbling toward the slaughter.
- Proverbs 31:8 Open your mouth for those with no voice, for the cause of all the dispossessed.
- Jeremiah 52:6 By the ninth day of the fourth month, the famine in the city was so severe that the people of the land had no food.