k begins with a prayer and
confession which the Jews at Babylon make, acknowledging that they are
yet this day in captivity for a reproach and a curse, and to be subject
to payments according to all the iniquities of their fathers which
departed from the Lord our God. Then beginneth the book:

Hear, Israel, the commandments of life: give ear to understand wisdom.
Let them that dwell about Sion come, and remember the captivity of my
sons and daughters, which the Everlasting hath brought upon them. Be of
good cheer, O my children, crying unto the Lord, and He shall deliver
you from the power and hand of the enemies. I sent you out with mourning
and weeping: but God will give you to me again with joy and gladness for
ever. Put off, O Jerusalem, the garment of thy mourning and affliction,
and put on the comeliness of the glory that cometh from God for ever;
for behold, thy children gathereth from the west and from the east and
return out of captivity with glory.

[With this book of Baruch there is an Epistle of Jeremy, which he sent
unto them that were to be led captive into Babylon because of their
sins. The prophet describes the idols and the conduct of the priests and
those who attend the heathen temples and warns the captives not to
worship the false gods in Babylon.]

SONG OF THE THREE HOLY CHILDREN

[This Song is not in the Hebrew of the Book of Daniel.]

They walked in the midst of the fire praising God and blessing the Lord.
Azarias opened his mouth in the midst of the flame and made confession
of sins, and prayer for deliverance to the confusion of their enemies.
Whereupon, the king's servants that put them in ceased not to make the
oven hot with rosin, pitch, tow, and small wood, so that the flame
passed through and burned those Chaldeans it found about the furnace.
But the Angel of the Lord came down into the oven and made the midst of
the furnace as it had been a moist whistling wind, so that the fire
touched Azarias and his fellows not at all, neither hurt nor troubled
them. Then the three, as out of one mouth, praised, glorified, and
blessed God in the furnace, saying: The Lord hath delivered us from
hell, and saved us from the hand of death: for his mercy endureth for
ever.

THE HISTORY OF SUSANNA

There dwelt a man in Babylon called Joacim. And he took a wife whose
name was Susanna, a very fair woman, and one that feared the Lord. The
same year were appointed two of the ancients of the people