Yeremia 1:9

1:9 Then the Lord reached out his hand and touched my mouth and said to me, “I will most assuredly give you the words you are to speak for me. ¹ 

Yeremia 1:11

Visions Confirming Jeremiah’s Call and Commission

1:11 Later the Lord asked me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I answered, “I see a branch of an almond tree.”

Yeremia 4:17

4:17 They will surround Jerusalem ² 

like men guarding a field ³ 

because they have rebelled against me,”

says the Lord.

Yeremia 4:27

4:27 All this will happen because the Lord said, ⁴ 

“The whole land will be desolate;

however, I will not completely destroy it.

Yeremia 7:1

Faulty Religion and Unethical Behavior Will Lead to Judgment

7:1 The Lord said to Jeremiah: ⁵ 

Yeremia 7:3

7:3 The Lord God of Israel who rules over all ⁶  says: Change the way you have been living and do what is right. ⁷  If you do, I will allow you to continue to live in this land. ⁸ 

Yeremia 21:8

21:8 “But ⁹  tell the people of Jerusalem ¹⁰  that the Lord says, ‘I will give you a choice between two courses of action. One will result in life; the other will result in death. ¹¹ 

Yeremia 21:11

Warnings to the Royal Court

21:11 The Lord told me to say ¹²  to the royal court ¹³  of Judah,

“Listen to what the Lord says,

Yeremia 30:9

30:9 But they will be subject ¹⁴  to the Lord their God

and to the Davidic ruler whom I will raise up as king over them. ¹⁵ 

Yeremia 31:1

31:1 At that time I will be the God of all the clans of Israel ¹⁶ 

and they will be my people.

I, the Lord, affirm it!” ¹⁷ 

Yeremia 34:4

34:4 However, listen to what I, the Lord, promise you, King Zedekiah of Judah. I, the Lord, promise that ¹⁸  you will not die in battle or be executed. ¹⁹ 

Yeremia 35:19

35:19 So the Lord God of Israel who rules over all says, ‘Jonadab son of Rechab will never lack a male descendant to serve me.’” ²⁰ 

Yeremia 40:2

40:2 The captain of the royal guard took Jeremiah aside and said to him, “The Lord your God threatened this place with this disaster.

Yeremia 48:47

48:47 Yet in days to come

I will reverse Moab’s ill fortune.” ²¹ 

says the Lord. ²² 

The judgment against Moab ends here.

[1:9]  ¹ tn Heb “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth.” This is an example of the Hebrew “scheduling” perfect or the “prophetic” perfect where a future event is viewed as so certain it is spoken of as past. The Hebrew particle rendered here “assuredly” (Heb הִנֵּה, hinneh) underlines the certitude of the promise for the future. See the translator’s note on v. 6.

[1:9]  sn The passage is reminiscent of Deut 18:18 which refers to the Lord’s promise of future revelation through a line of prophets who, like Moses, would speak God’s word.

[4:17]  ² tn Heb “will surround her.” The antecedent is Jerusalem in the preceding verse. The referent is again made explicit in the translation to avoid any possible lack of clarity. The verb form here is a form of the verb that emphasizes the fact as being as good as done (i.e., it is a prophetic perfect).

[4:17]  ³ sn There is some irony involved in the choice of the simile since the men guarding a field were there to keep thieves from getting in and stealing the crops. Here the besiegers are guarding the city to keep people from getting out.

[4:27]  ⁴ tn Heb “For this is what the Lord said,”

[7:1]  ⁵ tn Heb “The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord.”

[7:3]  ⁶ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God Israel.”

[7:3]  sn Compare the use of similar titles in 2:19; 5:14; 6:6 and see the explanation in the study note at 2:19. In this instance the title appears to emphasize the Lord as the heavenly King who drags his disobedient vassals into court (and threatens them with judgment).

[7:3]  ⁷ tn Or “Make good your ways and your actions.” J. Bright’s translation (“Reform the whole pattern of your conduct”; Jeremiah [AB], 52) is excellent.

[7:3]  ⁸ tn Heb “place” but this might be misunderstood to refer to the temple.

[21:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “And/But unto this people you shall say…” “But” is suggested here by the unusual word order which offsets what they are to say to Zedekiah (v. 3).

[21:8]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “these people.”

[21:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Behold I am setting before you the way of life and the way of death.”

[21:11]  ¹² tn The words “The Lord told me to say” are not in the text. They have been supplied in the translation for clarity. This text has been treated in two very different ways depending upon how one views the connection of the words “and to/concerning the household of the King of Judah, ‘Hear the word of the Lord:…’” with the preceding and following. Some treat the words that follow as a continuation of Jeremiah’s response to the delegation sent by Zedekiah (cf. vv. 3, 8). Others treat this as introducing a new set of oracles parallel to those in 23:9-40 which are introduced by the heading “to/concerning the prophets.” There are three reasons why this is the more probable connection: (1) the parallelism in expression with 23:9; (2) the other introductions in vv. 3, 8 use the preposition אֶל (’el) instead of לְ (lÿ) used here, and they have the formal introduction “you shall say…”; (3) the warning or challenge here would mitigate the judgment pronounced on the king and the city in vv. 4-7. Verses 8-9 are different. They are not a mitigation but an offer of escape for those who surrender. Hence, these words are a title “Now concerning the royal court.” (The vav [ו] that introduces this is disjunctive = “Now.”) However, since the imperative that follows is masculine plural and addressed to the royal house, something needs to be added to introduce it. Hence the translation supplies “The Lord told me to say” to avoid confusion or mistakenly connecting it with the preceding.

[21:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “house” or “household.” It is clear from 22:1-6 that this involved the King, the royal family, and the court officials.

[30:9]  ¹⁴ tn The word “subject” in this verse and “subjugate” are from the same root word in Hebrew. A deliberate contrast is drawn between the two powers that they will serve.

[30:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “and to David their king whom I will raise up for them.”

[30:9]  sn The Davidic ruler which I will raise up as king over them refers to a descendant of David who would be raised up over a regathered and reunited Israel and Judah. He is called “David” in Hos 3:5, Ezek 34:23-24; 37:24-25 and referred to as a shoot or sprig of Jesse in Isa 11:1, 10 and a “righteous branch” springing from David (the Davidic line). He is called “David” because he is from the Davidic line and because David is the type of the ideal king whom the prophets looked forward to. See further the study notes on 23:5 for this ideal king and for his relation to the NT fulfillment in the person of Jesus the Christ.

[31:1]  ¹⁶ sn This verse repeats v. 22 but with specific reference to all the clans of Israel, i.e., to all Israel and Judah. It functions here as a transition to the next section which will deal with the restoration of Israel (31:3-20) and Judah (31:21-25) and their reunification in the land (31:27-29) under a new covenant relation with God (31:31-37). See also the study note on 30:3 for further reference to this reunification in Jeremiah and the other prophets.

[31:1]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[34:4]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “However, hear the word of the Lord, Zedekiah king of Judah, ‘Thus says the Lord to you, “You will not die by the sword.”’” The translation has tried to avoid the complexity created by embedding quotes within quotes and has used the first person address within the Lord’s speech as has also been done elsewhere.

[34:4]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “by the sword.”

[34:4]  sn The contrast is between death in battle or by execution and death in the normal course of life. Zedekiah was captured, had to witness the execution of his sons, had his eyes put out, and was taken to Babylon where he died after a lengthy imprisonment (Jer 52:10-11).

[35:19]  ²⁰ tn Heb “There shall not be cut to Jonadab son of Rechab a man standing before me all the days.” For the first part of this idiom see 33:17-18 where it is applied to David always having a descendant to occupy the throne and the Levites will always have priests to offer up sacrifices. For the latter part of the idiom “to stand before” referring to service see BDB 764 s.v. עָמַד 1.e and compare the usage in 1 Kgs 1:2; 2 Kgs 3:14; Jer 15:19; Deut 10:8. As comparison with those passages will show, it refers to attending on, or serving a superior, a king, or the Lord. It is used of both prophets (e.g., 1 Kgs 17:1) and priests (e.g., Deut 10:8) serving the Lord. Its most common use is to refer to priestly service. The nature of the service is not further defined in this case, though several of the commentaries point out a Mishnaic tradition that the Rechabites later were given the function of bringing wood for the altar.

[48:47]  ²¹ tn See 29:14; 30:3 and the translator’s note on 29:14 for the idiom used here.

[48:47]  ²² tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”