I remember being told that a certain book in the Tanach had to be rewritten after it was lost during the Kings period. Is it considered true? If it is, are there mekorot/academic sources for this?
I tried searching, but my google searches didn't come up with anything.
The Sefer Eicha was destroyed by King Yehoyakim who threw it into a fire and rewritten by Yirmiyahu at the command of Hashem.
23: And it came to pass, when Jehudi read three or four verses, he rent it with a scribe's razor, and cast [it] onto the fire which was on the brazier until the entire roll was consumed on the fire that was on the brazier.
Rashi
three… verses: Our Rabbis (Moed Katan 26a) stated. This was the Scroll of Lamentations. They read before him, (1:1) “How…(:2) She weeps… (ibid. 3) Judah has been exiled…(ibid. 4) The roads of Zion are mournful.” Despite all this, he was not troubled. He said, “I am the king over the survivors.” As soon as he read (ibid. 5), Her adversaries have become the head, “ he said,” From now on, I am [no longer] the king." Immediately, he rent it with a scribe’s razor.
Then again
28: Take for yourself again another roll and write upon it all the original words that were on the first roll, which Jehoiakim the king of Judah, burned.
The Invisible Man By Rabbi Jack Abramowitz
The officers went to King Yehoyakim and gave the scroll to the scribe for safekeeping before telling the king its contents. The king had the scroll brought to him and read. (It was winter, so he had a fire burning for warmth.) When only three or four verses had been read (three or four pages, according to the Radak), the king sliced the scroll with a razor and threw the scroll on the fire. He simply wasn’t concerned by what he had heard. Some of his officers asked him not to burn the scroll, but the king would not comply.
King Yehoyakim instructed some of his men to go and get Jeremiah and Baruch, but G-d had hidden them. (The Radak says miraculously. He suggests that G-d enveloped them in darkness or made their pursuers unable to see them.)
G-d told Jeremiah to write the scroll over again, plus a message for Yehoyakim: You burned the scroll because it foretold that Nebuchadnezzar would raze the land. Therefore, G-d says that Yehoyakim’s line would lose the throne and his corpse would be tossed out. Jeremiah re-wrote the scroll, along with the updates. (And, as we know from the Book of Kings, Yehoyakim’s son ruled only three months before he was succeeded by his uncle, Tzidkiyahu. Furthermore, We read more about Yehoyakim’s funeral – or lack thereof – earlier, in chapter 22. Remember, these prophecies are not necessarily collected in chronological order!)
