1The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, in the days of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah, king of Judah, saying,
2Go into the house of the Rechabites, and have talk with them, and take them into the house of the Lord, into one of the rooms, and give them wine.
3Then I took Jaazaniah, the son of Jeremiah, the son of Habazziniah, and his brothers and all his sons and all the Rechabites;
4And I took them into the house of the Lord, into the room of the sons of Hanan, the son of Igdaliah, the man of God, which was near the rulers' room, which was over the room of Maaseiah, the son of Shallum, the keeper of the door;
5And I put before the sons of the Rechabites basins full of wine and cups, and I said to them, Take some wine.
6But they said, We will take no wine: for Jonadab, the son of Rechab our father, gave us orders, saying, You are to take no wine, you or your sons, for ever:
7And you are to make no houses, or put in seed, or get vine-gardens planted, or have any: but all your days you are to go on living in tents, so that you may have a long life in the land where you are living as in a strange country.
8And we have kept the rules of Jonadab, the son of Rechab our father, in everything which he gave us orders to do, drinking no wine all our days, we and our wives and our sons and our daughters;
9Building no houses for ourselves, having no vine-gardens or fields or seed:
10But we have been living in tents, and have done everything which Jonadab our father gave us orders to do.
11But when Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, came up into the land, we said, Come, let us go to Jerusalem, away from the army of the Chaldaeans and from the army of the Aramaeans: and so we are living in Jerusalem.
12Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, saying,
13This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: Go and say to the men of Judah and the people of Jerusalem, Is there no hope of teaching you to give ear to my words? says the Lord.
14The orders which Jonadab, the son of Rechab, gave to his sons to take no wine, are done, and to this day they take no wine, for they do the orders of their father: but I have sent my words to you, getting up early and sending them, and you have not given ear to me.
15And I have sent you all my servants the prophets, getting up early and sending them, saying, Come back, now, every man from his evil way, and do better, and go not after other gods to become their servants, and you will go on living in the land which I have given to you and to your fathers: but your ears have not been open, and you have not given attention to me.
16Though the sons of Jonadab the son of Rechab have done the orders of their father which he gave them, this people has not given ear to me:
17For this reason the Lord, the God of armies, the God of Israel, has said, See, I will send on Judah and on all the people of Jerusalem all the evil which I said I would do to them: because I sent my words to them, but they did not give ear; crying out to them, but they gave no answer.
18But to the Rechabites Jeremiah said, This is what the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said: Because you have done the orders of Jonadab your father, and have kept his rules, and done everything as he gave you orders to do it;
19For this reason the Lord of armies, the God of Israel, has said, Jonadab, the son of Rechab, will never be without a man to take his place before me.