Yeremia 1:3

1:3 The Lord also spoke to him when Jehoiakim son of Josiah ruled over Judah, and he continued to speak to him until the fifth month of the eleventh year ¹  that Zedekiah son of Josiah ruled over Judah. That was when the people of Jerusalem ²  were taken into exile. ³ 

Yeremia 1:15

1:15 For I will soon summon all the peoples of the kingdoms of the north,” says the Lord. “They will come and their kings will set up their thrones ⁴  near the entrances of the gates of Jerusalem. ⁵  They will attack all the walls surrounding it, and all the towns in Judah. ⁶ 

Yeremia 2:8

2:8 Your priests ⁷  did not ask, ‘Where is the Lord?’ ⁸ 

Those responsible for teaching my law ⁹  did not really know me. ¹⁰ 

Your rulers rebelled against me.

Your prophets prophesied in the name of the god Baal. ¹¹ 

They all worshiped idols that could not help them. ¹² 

Yeremia 4:4

4:4 Just as ritual circumcision cuts away the foreskin

as an external symbol of dedicated covenant commitment,

you must genuinely dedicate yourselves to the Lord

and get rid of everything that hinders your commitment to me, ¹³ 

people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem.

If you do not, ¹⁴  my anger will blaze up like a flaming fire against you

that no one will be able to extinguish.

That will happen because of the evil you have done.”

Yeremia 12:5

12:5 The Lord answered, ¹⁵ 

“If you have raced on foot against men and they have worn you out,

how will you be able to compete with horses?

And if you feel secure only ¹⁶  in safe and open country, ¹⁷ 

how will you manage in the thick undergrowth along the Jordan River? ¹⁸ 

Yeremia 14:19

14:19 Then I said,

“Lord, ¹⁹  have you completely rejected the nation of Judah?

Do you despise ²⁰  the city of Zion?

Why have you struck us with such force

that we are beyond recovery? ²¹ 

We hope for peace, but nothing good has come of it.

We hope for a time of relief from our troubles, but experience terror. ²² 

Yeremia 16:15

16:15 But in that time they will affirm them with ‘I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the people of Israel from the land of the north and from all the other lands where he had banished them.’ At that time I will bring them back to the land I gave their ancestors.” ²³ 

Yeremia 18:6

18:6 “I, the Lord, say: ²⁴  ‘O nation of Israel, can I not deal with you as this potter deals with the clay? ²⁵  In my hands, you, O nation of Israel, are just like the clay in this potter’s hand.’

Yeremia 18:21

18:21 So let their children die of starvation.

Let them be cut down by the sword. ²⁶ 

Let their wives lose their husbands and children.

Let the older men die of disease ²⁷ 

and the younger men die by the sword in battle.

Yeremia 20:9

20:9 Sometimes I think, “I will make no mention of his message.

I will not speak as his messenger ²⁸  any more.”

But then ²⁹  his message becomes like a fire

locked up inside of me, burning in my heart and soul. ³⁰ 

I grow weary of trying to hold it in;

I cannot contain it.

Yeremia 21:12

21:12 O royal family descended from David. ³¹ 

The Lord says:

‘See to it that people each day ³²  are judged fairly. ³³ 

Deliver those who have been robbed from those ³⁴  who oppress them.

Otherwise, my wrath will blaze out against you.

It will burn like a fire that cannot be put out

because of the evil that you have done. ³⁵ 

Yeremia 24:8

24:8 “I, the Lord, also solemnly assert: ‘King Zedekiah of Judah, his officials, and the people who remain in Jerusalem ³⁶  or who have gone to live in Egypt are like those bad figs. I consider them to be just like those bad figs that are so bad they cannot be eaten. ³⁷ 

Yeremia 25:9

25:9 So I, the Lord, affirm that ³⁸  I will send for all the peoples of the north ³⁹  and my servant, ⁴⁰  King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and all the nations that surround it. I will utterly destroy ⁴¹  this land, its inhabitants, and all the nations that surround it ⁴²  and make them everlasting ruins. ⁴³  I will make them objects of horror and hissing scorn. ⁴⁴ 

Yeremia 25:12

25:12 “‘But when the seventy years are over, I will punish the king of Babylon and his nation ⁴⁵  for their sins. I will make the land of Babylon ⁴⁶  an everlasting ruin. ⁴⁷  I, the Lord, affirm it! ⁴⁸ 

Yeremia 30:10

30:10 So I, the Lord, tell you not to be afraid,

you descendants of Jacob, my servants. ⁴⁹ 

Do not be terrified, people of Israel.

For I will rescue you and your descendants

from a faraway land where you are captives. ⁵⁰ 

The descendants of Jacob will return to their land and enjoy peace.

They will be secure and no one will terrify them. ⁵¹ 

Yeremia 44:30

44:30 I, the Lord, promise that ⁵²  I will hand Pharaoh Hophra ⁵³  king of Egypt over to his enemies who are seeking to kill him. I will do that just as surely as I handed King Zedekiah of Judah over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, his enemy who was seeking to kill him.’”

[1:3]  ¹ sn This would have been August, 586 b.c. according to modern reckoning.

[1:3]  ² map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[1:3]  ³ tn Heb “and it [the word of the Lord] came in the days of Jehoiakim…until the end of the eleventh year of Zedekiah…until the carrying away captive of Jerusalem in the fifth month.”

[1:15]  ⁴ tn Heb “they will each set up.” The pronoun “they” refers back to the “kingdoms” in the preceding sentence. However, kingdoms do not sit on thrones; their kings do. This is an example of a figure of speech called metonymy where the kingdom is put for its king. For a similar use see 2 Chr 12:8.

[1:15]  ⁵ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[1:15]  ⁶ tn Or “They will come and set up their thrones in the entrances of the gates of Jerusalem. They will destroy all the walls surrounding it and also destroy all the towns in Judah.” The text of v. 15b reads in Hebrew, “they will each set up his throne [near? in?] the entrance of the gates of Jerusalem and against all its walls…and against all the towns….” Commentators are divided over whether the passage refers to the kings setting up their thrones after victory in preparation for passing judgment on their defeated enemies in the city or whether it refers to setting up siege against it. There is no Hebrew preposition before the word for “the entrance” so that it could be “in” (which would imply victory) or “at/near” (which would imply siege), and the same verb + object (i.e., “they will set up their thrones”) governs all the locative statements. It is most often taken to refer to the aftermath of victory because of the supposed parallel in Jer 43:8-13 and the supposed fulfillment in Jer 39:3. Though this may fit well with the first part of the compound expression, it does not fit well with the latter part which is most naturally taken to refer to hostile attacks against Jerusalem and the other cities of Judah. The translation given in the text is intended to reflect the idea of an army setting up for siege. The alternate translation is intended to reflect the other view.

[2:8]  ⁷ tn Heb “The priests…the ones who grasp my law…the shepherds…the prophets…they…”

[2:8]  ⁸ sn See the study note on 2:6.

[2:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “those who handle my law.”

[2:8]  sn The reference is likely to the priests and Levites who were responsible for teaching the law (so Jer 18:18; cf. Deut 33:10). According to Jer 8:8 it could possibly refer to the scribes who copied the law.

[2:8]  ¹⁰ tn Or “were not committed to me.” The Hebrew verb rendered “know” refers to more than mere intellectual knowledge. It carries also the ideas of emotional and volitional commitment as well intimacy. See for example its use in contexts like Hos 4:1; 6:6.

[2:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “by Baal.”

[2:8]  ¹² tn Heb “and they followed after those things [the word is plural] which do not profit.” The poetic structure of the verse, four lines in which a distinct subject appears at the beginning followed by a fifth line beginning with a prepositional phrase and no distinct subject, argues that this line is climactic and refers to all four classes enumerated in the preceding lines. See W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 1:88-89. There may be a play or pun in the Hebrew text on the name for the god Baal (בַּעַל, ba’al) and the verb “cannot help you” (Heb “do not profit”) which is spelled יַעַל (ya’al).

[4:4]  ¹³ tn Heb “Circumcise yourselves to the Lord and remove the foreskin of your heart.” The translation is again an attempt to bring out the meaning of a metaphor. The mention of the “foreskin of the heart” shows that the passage is obviously metaphorical and involves heart attitude, not an external rite.

[4:4]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “lest.”

[12:5]  ¹⁵ tn The words “The Lord answered” are not in the text but are implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[12:5]  ¹⁶ tn Some commentaries and English versions follow the suggestion given in HALOT 116 s.v. II בָּטַח that a homonym meaning “to stumble, fall down” is involved here and in Prov 14:16. The evidence for this homonym is questionable because both passages can be explained on other grounds with the usual root.

[12:5]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “a land of tranquility.” The expression involves a figure of substitution where the feeling engendered is substituted for the conditions that engender it. For the idea see Isa 32:18. The translation both here and in the following line is intended to bring out the contrast implicit in the emotive connotations connected with “peaceful country” and “thicket along the Jordan.”

[12:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “the thicket along the Jordan.” The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[12:5]  sn The thick undergrowth along the Jordan River refers to the thick woods and underbrush alongside the Jordan where lions were known to have lived, and hence the area was considered dangerous. See Jer 49:14; 50:44. The Lord here seems to be telling Jeremiah that the situation will only get worse. If he has trouble contending with the plot from his fellow townsmen, what will he do when the whole country sets up a cry against him?

[14:19]  ¹⁹ tn The words, “Then I said, ‘Lord” are not in the Hebrew text. It is obvious from the context that the Lord is addressee. The question of the identity of the speaker is the same as that raised in vv. 7-9 and the arguments set forth there are applicable here as well. Jeremiah is here identifying with the people and doing what they refuse to do, i.e., confess their sins and express their trust in him.

[14:19]  ²⁰ tn Heb “does your soul despise.” Here as in many places the word “soul” stands as part for whole for the person himself emphasizing emotional and volitional aspects of the person. However, in contemporary English one does not regularly speak of the “soul” in contexts such as this but of the person.

[14:19]  sn There is probably a subtle allusion to the curses called down on the nation for failure to keep their covenant with God. The word used here is somewhat rare (גָּעַל, ga’al). It is used of Israel’s rejection of God’s stipulations and of God’s response to their rejection of him and his stipulations in Lev 26:11, 15, 30, 43-44. That the allusion is intended is probable when account is taken of the last line of v. 21.

[14:19]  ²¹ tn Heb “Why have you struck us and there is no healing for us.” The statement involves poetic exaggeration (hyperbole) for rhetorical effect.

[14:19]  ²² tn Heb “[We hope] for a time of healing but behold terror.”

[14:19]  sn The last two lines of this verse are repeated word for word from 8:15. There they are spoken by the people.

[16:15]  ²³ tn These two verses which constitute one long sentence with compound, complex subordinations has been broken up for sake of English style. It reads, “Therefore, behold the days are coming, says the Lord [Heb ‘oracle of the Lord’] and it will not be said any longer, ‘By the life of the Lord who…Egypt’ but ‘by the life of the Lord who…’ and I will bring them back….”

[18:6]  ²⁴ tn This phrase (literally “Oracle of the Lord”) has been handled this way on several occasions when it occurs within first person addresses where the Lord is the speaker. See, e.g., 16:16; 17:24.

[18:6]  ²⁵ tn The words “deals with the clay” are not in the text. They are part of an elliptical comparison and are supplied in the translation here for clarity.

[18:21]  ²⁶ tn Heb “be poured out to the hand [= power] of the sword.” For this same expression see Ezek 35:5; Ps 63:10 (63:11 HT). Comparison with those two passages show that it involved death by violent means, perhaps death in battle.

[18:21]  ²⁷ tn Heb “be slain by death.” The commentaries are generally agreed that this refers to death by disease or plague as in 15:2. Hence, the reference is to the deadly trio of sword, starvation, and disease which were often connected with war. See the notes on 15:2.

[20:9]  ²⁸ tn Heb “speak in his name.” This idiom occurs in passages where someone functions as the messenger under the authority of another. See Exod 5:23; Deut 18:19, 29:20; Jer 14:14. The antecedent in the first line is quite commonly misidentified as being “him,” i.e., the Lord. Comparison, however, with the rest of the context, especially the consequential clause “then it becomes” (וְהָיָה, vÿhayah), and Jer 23:36 shows that it is “the word of the Lord.”

[20:9]  ²⁹ tn The English sentence has again been restructured for the sake of English style. The Hebrew construction involves two vav consecutive perfects in a condition and consequence relation, “If I say to myself…then it [his word] becomes.” See GKC 337 §112.kk for the construction.

[20:9]  ³⁰ sn Heb “It is in my heart like a burning fire, shut up in my bones.” In addition to standing as part for the whole, the “bones” for the person (e.g., Ps 35:10), the bones were associated with fear (e.g., Job 4:14) and with pain (e.g., Job 33:19, Ps 102:3 [102:4 HT]) and joy or sorrow (e.g., Ps 51:8 [51:10 HT]). As has been mentioned several times, the heart was connected with intellectual and volitional concerns.

[21:12]  ³¹ tn Heb “house of David.” This is essentially equivalent to the royal court in v. 11.

[21:12]  ³² tn Heb “to the morning” = “morning by morning” or “each morning.” See Isa 33:2 and Amos 4:4 for parallel usage.

[21:12]  ³³ sn The kings of Israel and Judah were responsible for justice. See Pss 122:5. The king himself was the final court of appeals judging from the incident of David with the wise woman of Tekoa (2 Sam 14), Solomon and the two prostitutes (1 Kgs 3:16-28), and Absalom’s attempts to win the hearts of the people of Israel by interfering with due process (2 Sam 15:2-4). How the system was designed to operate may be seen from 2 Chr 19:4-11.

[21:12]  ³⁴ tn Heb “from the hand [or power] of.”

[21:12]  ³⁵ tn Heb “Lest my wrath go out like fire and burn with no one to put it out because of the evil of your deeds.”

[24:8]  ³⁶ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[24:8]  ³⁷ tn Heb “Like the bad figs which cannot be eaten from badness [= because they are so bad] surely [emphatic כִּי, ki] so I regard Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his officials and the remnant of Jerusalem which remains in this land and those who are living in Egypt.” The sentence has been restructured in the translation to conform more to contemporary English style. For the use of נָתַן (natan) meaning “regard” or “treat like” see BDB 681 s.v. נָתַן 3.c and compare the usage in Ezek 28:6;Gen 42:30.

[25:9]  ³⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[25:9]  ³⁹ sn The many allusions to trouble coming from the north are now clarified: it is the armies of Babylon which included within it contingents from many nations. See 1:14, 15; 4:6; 6:1, 22; 10:22; 13:20 for earlier allusions.

[25:9]  ⁴⁰ sn Nebuchadnezzar is called the Lord’s servant also in Jer 27:6; 43:10. He was the Lord’s servant in that he was the agent used by the Lord to punish his disobedient people. Assyria was earlier referred to as the Lord’s “rod” (Isa 10:5-6) and Cyrus is called his “shepherd” and his “anointed” (Isa 44:28; 45:1). P. C. Craigie, P. H. Kelley, and J. F. Drinkard (Jeremiah 1-25 [WBC], 364) make the interesting observation that the terms here are very similar to the terms in v. 4. The people of Judah ignored the servants, the prophets, he sent to turn them away from evil. So he will send other servants whom they cannot ignore.

[25:9]  ⁴¹ tn The word used here was used in the early years of Israel’s conquest for the action of killing all the men, women, and children in the cities of Canaan, destroying all their livestock, and burning their cities down. This policy was intended to prevent Israel from being corrupted by paganism (Deut 7:2; 20:17-18; Josh 6:18, 21). It was to be extended to any city that led Israel away from worshiping God (Deut 13:15) and any Israelite who brought an idol into his house (Deut 7:26). Here the policy is being directed against Judah as well as against her neighbors because of her persistent failure to heed God’s warnings through the prophets. For further usage of this term in application to foreign nations in the book of Jeremiah see 50:21, 26; 51:3.

[25:9]  ⁴² tn Heb “will utterly destroy them.” The referent (this land, its inhabitants, and the nations surrounding it) has been specified in the translation for clarity, since the previous “them” referred to Nebuchadnezzar and his armies.

[25:9]  sn This is essentially the introduction to the “judgment on the nations” in vv. 15-29 which begins with Jerusalem and Judah (v. 18) and ultimately ends with Babylon itself (“Sheshach” in v. 26; see note there for explanation of the term).

[25:9]  ⁴³ sn The Hebrew word translated “everlasting” is the word often translated “eternal.” However, it sometimes has a more limited time reference. For example it refers to the lifetime of a person who became a “lasting slave” to another person (see Exod 21:6; Deut 15:17). It is also used to refer to the long life wished for a king (1 Kgs 1:31; Neh 2:3). The time frame here is to be qualified at least with reference to Judah and Jerusalem as seventy years (see 29:10-14 and compare v. 12).

[25:9]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “I will make them an object of horror and a hissing and everlasting ruins.” The sentence has been broken up to separate the last object from the first two which are of slightly different connotation, i.e., they denote the reaction to the latter.

[25:9]  sn Compare Jer 18:16 and 19:8 and the study note at 18:16.

[25:12]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “that nation.”

[25:12]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “the land of the Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for the use of the term “Chaldeans.”

[25:12]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “I will visit upon the king of Babylon and upon that nation, oracle of the Lord, their iniquity even upon the land of the Chaldeans and I will make it everlasting ruins.” The sentence has been restructured to avoid ambiguity and to conform the style more to contemporary English.

[25:12]  sn Compare Isa 13:19-22 and Jer 50:39-40.

[25:12]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[30:10]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “So do not be afraid, my servant Jacob, oracle of the Lord.” Here and elsewhere in the verse the terms Jacob and Israel are poetic for the people of Israel descended from the patriarch Jacob. The terms have been supplied throughout with plural referents for greater clarity.

[30:10]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “For I will rescue you from far away, your descendants from the land of their captivity.”

[30:10]  ⁵¹ sn Compare the ideals of the Mosaic covenant in Lev 26:6, the Davidic covenant in 2 Sam 7:10-11, and the new covenant in Ezek 34:25-31.

[44:30]  ⁵² tn Heb “Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold I will hand…’” The first person and indirect quote have been chosen because the Lord is already identified as the speaker and the indirect quote eliminates an extra level of embedded quotes.

[44:30]  ⁵³ sn Hophra ruled over Egypt from 589-570 b.c. He was the Pharaoh who incited Zedekiah to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar and whose army proved ineffective in providing any long-term relief to Jerusalem when it was under siege (see Jer 37 and especially the study note on 37:5). He was assassinated following a power struggle with a court official who had earlier saved him from a rebellion of his own troops and had ruled as co-regent with him.