Yeremia 2:25

2:25 Do not chase after other gods until your shoes wear out

and your throats become dry. ¹ 

But you say, ‘It is useless for you to try and stop me

because I love those foreign gods ²  and want to pursue them!’

Yeremia 9:4

9:4 Everyone must be on his guard around his friends.

He must not even trust any of his relatives. ³ 

For every one of them will find some way to cheat him. ⁴ 

And all of his friends will tell lies about him.

Yeremia 23:4

23:4 I will install rulers ⁵  over them who will care for them. Then they will no longer need to fear or be terrified. None of them will turn up missing. ⁶  I, the Lord, promise it! ⁷ 

Yeremia 39:14

39:14 sent and had Jeremiah brought from the courtyard of the guardhouse. They turned him over to Gedaliah, ⁸  the son of Ahikam and the grandson of Shaphan, to take him home with him. ⁹  But Jeremiah stayed among the people. ¹⁰ 

Yeremia 39:18

39:18 I will certainly save you. You will not fall victim to violence. ¹¹  You will escape with your life ¹²  because you trust in me. I, the Lord, affirm it!”’” ¹³ 

Yeremia 50:33

50:33 The Lord who rules over all ¹⁴  says,

“The people of Israel are oppressed.

So too are the people of Judah. ¹⁵ 

All those who took them captive are holding them prisoners.

They refuse to set them free.

Yeremia 51:39

51:39 When their appetites are all stirred up, ¹⁶ 

I will set out a banquet for them.

I will make them drunk

so that they will pass out, ¹⁷ 

they will fall asleep forever,

they will never wake up,” ¹⁸ 

says the Lord. ¹⁹ 

[2:25]  ¹ tn Heb “Refrain your feet from being bare and your throat from being dry/thirsty.”

[2:25]  ² tn Heb “It is useless! No!” For this idiom, see Jer 18:12; NEB “No; I am desperate.”

[9:4]  ³ tn Heb “Be on your guard…Do not trust.” The verbs are second masculine plural of direct address and there seems no way to translate literally and not give the mistaken impression that Jeremiah is being addressed. This is another example of the tendency in Hebrew style to turn from description to direct address (a figure of speech called apostrophe).

[9:4]  ⁴ tn Heb “cheating, each of them will cheat.”

[9:4]  sn There is perhaps an intentional pun and allusion here to Gen 27:36 and the wordplay on the name Jacob there. The text here reads עָקוֹב יַעְקֹב (’aqob ya’qob).

[23:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “shepherds.”

[23:4]  ⁶ tn There are various nuances of the word פָּקַד (paqad) represented in vv. 2, 4. See Ps 8:4 (8:5 HT) and Zech 10:3 for “care for/take care of” (cf. BDB 823 s.v. פָּקַד Qal.A.1.a). See Exod 20:5; Amos 3:2; Jer 9:24; 11:22 for “punish” (cf. BDB 823 s.v. פָּקַד Qal.A.3). See 1 Kgs 20:39 and 2 Kgs 10:19 for “be missing” (cf. BDB 823 s.v. פָּקַד Niph.1).

[23:4]  sn There is an extended play on the Hebrew word פָּקַד which is a word with rather broad English equivalents. Here the word refers to the fault of the shepherds/rulers who have not “taken care” of the sheep/people (v. 2), the “punishment” for the evil they have done in not taking care of them (v. 2), and the fact that after the Lord assigns new shepherds/rulers over them they will be cared for in such a way that none of them “will turn up missing” (v. 4).

[23:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[39:14]  ⁸ sn Gedaliah. This is the first reference to this individual whom Nebuchadnezzar appointed governor over the people who were left to live in Judah (cf. 40:5; 2 Kgs 25:22). His father was the man who spoke up for Jeremiah when he was accused of being a false prophet by some of the priests and prophets (26:24). His grandfather was the royal secretary under Josiah who brought the discovery of the book of the law to Josiah’s attention, read it to him, and was involved in helping Josiah institute his reforms (2 Kgs 22:8-10).

[39:14]  ⁹ tn The meaning of the last phrase is uncertain. An alternate translation is “to take him home with him.” The text reads literally “to bring him into the house.” However, it is unclear whether “the house” refers to Jeremiah’s house or to Gedaliah’s. The fact that Nebuzaradan later offers Jeremiah the option of going back to Gedaliah (40:5) suggests that the house is here Gedaliah’s where Jeremiah would be looked out for in accord with Nebuchadnezzar’s command (v. 12).

[39:14]  ¹⁰ tn Many translate this last clause as a conclusion or summary remark, “So Jeremiah stayed…” However, it is better to translate it as an adversative because it probably refers to the fact that rather than staying with Gedaliah in the governor’s residence Jeremiah stayed among the people. That is how he wound up being led off as a prisoner to Ramah. See further the study note on 40:1. According to IBHS 550 §33.2.1d the vav (ו) consecutive can have either of these values (see examples 11 and 12 for the adversative or contrastive nuance).

[39:18]  ¹¹ sn Heb “you will not fall by the sword.” In the context this would include death in battle and execution as a prisoner of war.

[39:18]  ¹² tn Heb “your life will be to you for spoil.” For the meaning of this idiom see the study note on 21:9 and compare the usage in 21:9; 38:2; 45:4.

[39:18]  ¹³ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[50:33]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.” For an explanation of this title see the study note on 2:19.

[50:33]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Oppressed are the people of Israel and the people of Judah together,” i.e., both the people of Israel and Judah are oppressed. However, neither of these renderings is very poetic. The translation seeks to achieve the same meaning with better poetic expression.

[51:39]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “When they are hot.”

[51:39]  ¹⁷ tc The translation follows the suggestion of KBL 707 s.v. עָלַז and a number of modern commentaries (e.g., Bright, J. A. Thompson, and W. L. Holladay) in reading יְעֻלְּפוּ (ye’ullÿfu) for יַעֲלֹזוּ (ya’alozu) in the sense of “swoon away” or “grow faint” (see KBL 710 s.v. עָלַף Pual). That appears to be the verb that the LXX (the Greek version) was reading when they translated καρωθῶσιν (karwqwsin, “they will be stupefied”). For parallel usage KBL cites Isa 51:20. This fits the context much better than “they will exult” in the Hebrew text.

[51:39]  ¹⁸ sn The central figure here is the figure of the cup of the Lord’s wrath (cf. 25:15-29, especially v. 26). Here the Babylonians have been made to drink so deeply of it that they fall into a drunken sleep from which they will never wake up (i.e., they die, death being compared to sleep [cf. Ps 13:3 (13:4 HT); 76:5 (76:6 HT); 90:5]). Compare the usage in Jer 51:57 for this same figure.

[51:39]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”