²⁵ ·I have not [^LDo you think I have…?] come to attack and destroy this place without ·an order from the Lord [^Lthe Lord]. The Lord himself told me to come ·to [against] this country and destroy it.’”

²⁶ Then Eliakim son of Hilkiah, Shebna, and Joah said to the field commander, “Please speak to us in the Aramaic language. We understand it. Don’t speak to us in ·Hebrew [Judean], because the people on the city wall can hear you.”

²⁷ “No,” the commander said, “my ·master [lord] did not send me to tell these ·things [words] only to your ·master [lord] and you. He sent me to speak also to those people sitting on the wall who, like you, will have to eat their own dung and drink their own urine.”