3 Thus says Yahweh, ‘Surely this city will be given into the hand of the army of the king of Babylon, and he will capture it.’ ”
4 Then the officials said to the king, “Please, this man must be killed, because he is making slack the hands of the soldiers who are left in this city, and the hands of all the people, by speaking to them words like these, for this man is not seeking for welfare to this people, but only for harm.”
5 And Zedekiah the king said, “Look, he is in your hand, for the king is not able to do a thing against you.”
6 So they took Jeremiah and threw him into the pit of Malchiah, the son of the king, which was in the courtyard of the guard. And they let Jeremiah down by ropes. Now in the pit there was no water, but only mud, and Jeremiah sank in the mud.
7 When Ebed-melech the Cushite, a eunuch who was in the house of the king, heard that they had put Jeremiah into the pit—now the king was sitting at the Gate of Benjamin—
8 Ebed-melech went out from the house of the king and spoke to the king, saying,
9 “My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, in that they have thrown him into the pit, and he will die there because of starvation, for there is no longer any bread in the city.”