Yeremia 26:10

26:10 However, some of the officials ¹  of Judah heard about what was happening ²  and they rushed up to the Lord’s temple from the royal palace. They set up court ³  at the entrance of the New Gate of the Lord’s temple. ⁴ 

Yeremia 27:22

27:22 He has said, ‘They will be carried off to Babylon. They will remain there until it is time for me to show consideration for them again. ⁵  Then I will bring them back and restore them to this place.’ I, the Lord, affirm this!” ⁶ 

Yeremia 46:11

46:11 Go up to Gilead and get medicinal ointment, ⁷ 

you dear poor people of Egypt. ⁸ 

But it will prove useless no matter how much medicine you use; ⁹ 

there will be no healing for you.

Yeremia 48:15

48:15 Moab will be destroyed. Its towns will be invaded.

Its finest young men will be slaughtered. ¹⁰ 

I, the King, the Lord who rules over all, ¹¹  affirm it! ¹² 

Yeremia 48:18

48:18 Come down from your place of honor;

sit on the dry ground, ¹³  you who live in Dibon. ¹⁴ 

For the one who will destroy Moab will attack you;

he will destroy your fortifications.

Yeremia 49:28

Judgment Against Kedar and Hazor

49:28 The Lord spoke about Kedar ¹⁵  and the kingdoms of Hazor ¹⁶  that King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon conquered.

“Army of Babylon, ¹⁷  go and attack Kedar.

Lay waste those who live in the eastern desert. ¹⁸ 

Yeremia 49:31

49:31 The Lord says, ¹⁹  “Army of Babylon, ²⁰  go and attack

a nation that lives in peace and security.

They have no gates or walls to protect them. ²¹ 

They live all alone.

Yeremia 50:3

50:3 For a nation from the north ²²  will attack Babylon.

It will lay her land waste.

People and animals will flee out of it.

No one will inhabit it.’

[26:10]  ¹ sn These officials of Judah were officials from the royal court. They may have included some of the officials mentioned in Jer 36:12-25. They would have been concerned about any possible “illegal” proceedings going on in the temple.

[26:10]  ² tn Heb “these things.”

[26:10]  ³ tn Heb “they sat” or “they took their seats.” However, the context is one of judicial trial.

[26:10]  sn The gateway or gate complex of an ancient Near Eastern city was often used for court assemblies (cf. Deut 21:19; 22:15; Ruth 4:1; Isa 29:21). Here the gate of the temple was used for the convening of a court to try Jeremiah for the charge of being a false prophet.

[26:10]  ⁴ tn The translation follows many Hebrew mss and ancient versions in reading the word “house” (= temple) here. The majority of Hebrew mss do not have this word. It is, however, implicit in the construction “the New Gate of the Lord.”

[26:10]  sn The location of the New Gate is uncertain. It is mentioned again in Jer 36:10 where it is connected with the upper (i.e., inner) court of the temple. Some equate it with the Upper Gate that Jotham rebuilt during his reign (2 Kgs 15:35; Jotham reigned from 750-735 b.c.). That gate, however, has already been referred to as the Upper Gate of Benjamin in Jer 20:2 (for more detail see the study note there) and would not likely have been called something different here.

[27:22]  ⁵ tn This verb is a little difficult to render here. The word is used in the sense of taking note of something and acting according to what is noticed. It is the word that has been translated several times throughout Jeremiah as “punish [someone].” It is also used in the opposite of sense of taking note and “show consideration for” (or “care for;” see, e.g., Ruth 1:6). Here the nuance is positive and is further clarified by the actions that follow, bringing them back and restoring them.

[27:22]  ⁶ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[46:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “balm.” See 8:22 and the notes on this phrase there.

[46:11]  ⁸ sn Heb “Virgin Daughter of Egypt.” See the study note on Jer 14:17 for the significance of the use of this figure. The use of the figure here perhaps refers to the fact that Egypt’s geographical isolation allowed her safety and protection that a virgin living at home would enjoy under her father’s protection (so F. B. Huey, Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 379). By her involvement in the politics of Palestine she had forfeited that safety and protection and was now suffering for it.

[46:11]  ⁹ tn Heb “In vain you multiply [= make use of many] medicines.”

[48:15]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “will go down to the slaughter.”

[48:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.” For an explanation of the translation and meaning of this title see the study note on 2:19.

[48:15]  ¹² tn Heb “Oracle of the King whose name is Yahweh of armies.” The first person form has again been adopted because the Lord is the speaker throughout this oracle/ these oracles (cf. v. 1).

[48:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “sit in thirst.” The abstract “thirst” is put for the concrete, i.e., thirsty or parched ground (cf. Deut 8:19; Isa 35:7; Ps 107:33) for the concrete. There is no need to emend to “filth” (צֹאָה [tso’ah] for צָמָא [tsama’]) as is sometimes suggested.

[48:18]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “inhabitant of Daughter Dibon.” “Daughter” is used here as often in Jeremiah for the personification of a city, a country, or its inhabitants. The word “inhabitant” is to be understood as a collective as also in v. 19.

[48:18]  sn Dibon was an important fortified city located on the “King’s Highway,” the main north-south road in Transjordan. It was the site at which the Moabite Stone was found in 1868 and was one of the cities mentioned on it. It was four miles north of the Arnon River and thirteen miles east of the Dead Sea. It was one of the main cities on the northern plateau and had been conquered from Sihon and allotted to the tribe of Reuben (Josh 13:17).

[49:28]  ¹⁵ sn Kedar appears to refer to an Arabic tribe of nomads descended from Ishmael (Gen 25:13). They are associated here with the people who live in the eastern desert (Heb “the children of the east”; בְּנֵי־קֶדֶם, bÿne-qedem). In Isa 21:16 they are associated with the Temanites and the Dedanites, Arabic tribes in the north Arabian desert. They were sheep breeders (Isa 60:7) who lived in tents (Ps 120:5) and unwalled villages (Isa 42:11). According to Assyrian records they clashed with Assyria from the time of Shalmaneser in 850 until the time of Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal in the late seventh century. According to the Babylonian Chronicles, Nebuchadnezzar defeated them in 599 b.c.

[49:28]  ¹⁶ sn Hazor. Nothing is know about this Hazor other than what is said here in vv. 28, 30, 33. They appear to also be nomadic tent dwellers who had a loose association with the Kedarites.

[49:28]  ¹⁷ tn The words “Army of Babylon” are not in the Hebrew text but are implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[49:28]  ¹⁸ sn Heb “the children of the east.” Nothing much is known about them other than their association with the Midianites and Amalekites in their attack on Israel in the time of Gideon (Judg 6:3, 33) and the fact that God would let tribes from the eastern desert capture Moab and Ammon in the future (Ezek 25:4, 10). Midian and Amalek were consider to be located in the region in north Arabia east of Ezion Geber. That would put them in the same general locality as the region of Kedar. The parallelism here suggests that they are the same as the people of Kedar. The words here are apparently addressed to the armies of Nebuchadnezzar.

[49:31]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[49:31]  ²⁰ tn The words “Army of Babylon” are not in the text but are implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[49:31]  ²¹ tn Heb “no gates and no bar,” i.e., “that lives securely without gates or bars.” The phrase is used by the figure of species for genus (synecdoche) to refer to the fact that they have no defenses, i.e., no walls, gates, or bars on the gates. The figure has been interpreted in the translation for the benefit of the average reader.

[50:3]  ²² sn A nation from the north refers to Medo-Persia which at the time of the conquest of Babylon in 539 b.c. had conquered all the nations to the north, the northwest, and the northeast of Babylon forming a vast empire to the north and east of Babylon. Contingents of these many nations were included in her army and reference is made to them in 50:9 and 51:27-28. There is also some irony involved here because the “enemy from the north” referred to so often in Jeremiah (cf. 1:14; 4:6; 6:1) has been identified with Babylon (cf. 25:9). Here in a kind of talionic justice Judah’s nemesis from the north will be attacked and devastated by an enemy from the north.