For he didn't leave to Yeho'achaz of the people save fifty horsemen, and ten chariots, and ten thousand footmen; for the king of Syria destroyed them, and made them like the dust in threshing.
He carried away all Yerushalayim, and all the princes, and all the mighty men of valor, even ten thousand captives, and all the craftsmen and the smiths; none remained, save the poorest sort of the people of the land.
Their children also multiplied you as the stars of the sky, and brought them into the land concerning which you did say to their fathers, that they should go in to possess it.
Therefore the curse has devoured the earth, and those who dwell therein are found guilty. Therefore the inhabitants of the earth are burned, and few men left.
If there are yet a tenth in it, it also shall in turn be eaten up: as a terebinth, and as an oak, whose stock remains, when they are felled; so the holy seed is its stock.*
and said to Yirmeyahu the prophet, Let, we pray you, our supplication be presented before you, and pray for us to the LORD your God, even for all this remnant; for we are left but a few of many, as your eyes do see us:
I will send the wild animals among you, which will rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number; and your roads will become desolate.
For thus says the Lord GOD: *The city that went forth a thousand shall have a hundred left, and that which went forth one hundred shall have ten left to the house of Yisra'el.*
Unless the Lord had shortened the days, no flesh would have been saved; but for the sake of the chosen ones, whom he picked out, he shortened the days.