4. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon:
5. Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their fruits.
6. Take wives and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your daughters to husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters. Increase there; do not decrease.
7. Seek the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you; pray for it to the Lord, for upon its welfare your own depends.
8. For thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Do not be deceived by the prophets and diviners who are among you; do not listen to those among you who dream dreams,
9. for they prophesy lies to you in my name; I did not send them—oracle of the Lord.
10. For thus says the Lord: Only after seventy years have elapsed for Babylon will I deal with you and fulfill for you my promise to bring you back to this place.
11. For I know well the plans I have in mind for you—oracle of the Lord—plans for your welfare and not for woe, so as to give you a future of hope.
12. When you call me, and come and pray to me, I will listen to you.
13. When you look for me, you will find me. Yes, when you seek me with all your heart,
14. I will let you find me—oracle of the Lord—and I will change your lot; I will gather you together from all the nations and all the places to which I have banished you—oracle of the Lord—and bring you back to the place from which I have exiled you.
15. As for your saying, “The Lord has raised up for us prophets here in Babylon”—
16. Thus says the Lord concerning the king sitting on David’s throne and all the people living in this city, your kinsmen who did not go with you into exile;
17. thus says the Lord of hosts: I am sending against them sword, famine, and pestilence. I will make them like rotten figs, so spoiled that they cannot be eaten.
18. I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence, and make them an object of horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, a curse, a desolation, a hissing, and a reproach to all the nations among which I have banished them,
19. because they did not listen to my words—oracle of the Lord—even though I kept sending them my servants the prophets, but they would not listen to them—oracle of the Lord.