Jeremiah 37:15-16

The officials angrily beat Jeremiah and confined him in the house of a scribe named Jonathan, which they had converted into a jail. This reference begins what some scholars have referred to as "Jeremiah’s passion." Jeremiah remained in an underground dungeon for many days. The Hebrew words describing this cell are difficult to interpret. They may describe "a complex of large, underground cisterns that had been converted into a prison," [Note: Dyer, "Jeremiah," p. 1182.] or "a vaulted cell in a dungeon." [Note: Feinberg, "Jeremiah," p. 613.] Jeremiah feared for his life there (Jeremiah 37:20). The hostile attitude of Zedekiah’s officials contrasts sharply with that of Jehoiakim’s officials in the previous chapter (Jeremiah 36:11-19).