for the bustling city with its mansions will be deserted. The high ground and watchtower will be empty, becoming the joy of wild donkeys and a grazing ground for flocks.
But if you do not listen to me, if you treat the Sabbath as any other day on which you carry loads through the gates of Jerusalem, then I will set its gates on fire, and that fire will consume even the palaces of Jerusalem, and no one will be able to extinguish it!’ ”
For Death has crept in through our windows, forcing its way past our fortified defenses, cutting down the child playing outside and the young men in the streets.
That was when the Babylonians broke through the city wall. That same night, Zedekiah and his soldiers tried to escape through the gate between the two walls near the royal garden even though they knew the enemy had the city surrounded. They fled toward the Jordan Valley,