Yeremia 1:7

1:7 The Lord said to me, “Do not say, ‘I am too young.’ But go ¹  to whomever I send you and say whatever I tell you.

Yeremia 7:2

7:2 “Stand in the gate of the Lord’s temple and proclaim ²  this message: ‘Listen, all you people of Judah who have passed through these gates to worship the Lord. ³  Hear what the Lord has to say.

Yeremia 25:3-7

25:3 “For the last twenty-three years, from the thirteenth year that Josiah son of Amon was ruling in Judah ⁴  until now, the Lord has been speaking to me. I told you over and over again ⁵  what he said. ⁶  But you would not listen. 25:4 Over and over again ⁷  the Lord has sent ⁸  his servants the prophets to you. But you have not listened or paid attention. ⁹  25:5 He said through them, ¹⁰  ‘Each of you must turn from your wicked ways and stop doing the evil things you are doing. ¹¹  If you do, I will allow you to continue to live here in the land that I gave to you and your ancestors as a lasting possession. ¹²  25:6 Do not pay allegiance to ¹³  other gods and worship and serve them. Do not make me angry by the things that you do. ¹⁴  Then I will not cause you any harm.’ 25:7 So, now the Lord says, ¹⁵  ‘You have not listened to me. But ¹⁶  you have made me angry by the things that you have done. ¹⁷  Thus you have brought harm on yourselves.’

Yeremia 26:2-6

26:2 The Lord said, “Go stand in the courtyard of the Lord’s temple. ¹⁸  Speak out to all the people who are coming from the towns of Judah to worship in the Lord’s temple. Tell them everything I command you to tell them. Do not leave out a single word! 26:3 Maybe they will pay attention and each of them will stop living the evil way they do. ¹⁹  If they do that, then I will forgo destroying them ²⁰  as I had intended to do because of the wicked things they have been doing. ²¹  26:4 Tell them that the Lord says, ²²  ‘You must obey me! You must live according to the way I have instructed you in my laws. ²³  26:5 You must pay attention to the exhortations of my servants the prophets. I have sent them to you over and over again. ²⁴  But you have not paid any attention to them. 26:6 If you do not obey me, ²⁵  then I will do to this temple what I did to Shiloh. ²⁶  And I will make this city an example to be used in curses by people from all the nations on the earth.’”

Yeremia 36:2

36:2 “Get a scroll. ²⁷  Write on it everything I have told you to say ²⁸  about Israel, Judah, and all the other nations since I began to speak to you in the reign of Josiah until now. ²⁹ 

[1:7]  ¹ tn Or “For you must go and say.” The Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) is likely adversative here after a negative statement (cf. BDB 474 s.v. כִּי 3.e). The Lord is probably not giving a rationale for the denial of Jeremiah’s objection but redirecting his focus, i.e., “do not say…but go…and say.”

[7:2]  ² tn Heb “Proclaim there…” The adverb is unnecessary in English style.

[7:2]  ³ sn That is, all those who have passed through the gates of the outer court and are standing in the courtyard of the temple.

[25:3]  ⁴ sn The year referred to would be 627 b.c. The same year is referred to in 1:2 in reference to his call to be a prophet.

[25:3]  ⁵ tn For the idiom involved here see the notes at 7:13 and 11:7.

[25:3]  ⁶ tn The words “what he said” are not in the text but are implicit. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[25:4]  ⁷ tn For the idiom involved here see the notes at 7:13 and 11:7.

[25:4]  ⁸ tn The vav consecutive with the perfect in a past narrative is a little unusual. Here it is probably indicating repeated action in past time in keeping with the idiom that precedes and follows it. See GKC 332 §112.f for other possible examples.

[25:4]  ⁹ tn Heb “inclined your ear to hear.” This is idiomatic for “paying attention.” It is often parallel with “listen” as here or with “pay attention” (see, e.g., Prov 4:20; 51:1).

[25:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “saying.” The infinitive goes back to “he sent”; i.e., “he sent, saying.”

[25:5]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Turn [masc. pl.] each person from his wicked way and from the evil of your [masc. pl.] doings.” See the same demand in 23:22.

[25:5]  ¹² tn Heb “gave to you and your fathers with reference to from ancient times even unto forever.” See the same idiom in 7:7.

[25:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “follow after.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for this idiom.

[25:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

[25:7]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[25:7]  ¹⁶ tn This is a rather clear case where the Hebrew particle לְמַעַן (lÿma’an) introduces a consequence and not a purpose, contrary to the dictum of BDB 775 s.v. מַעַן note 1. They have not listened to him in order to make him angry but with the result that they have made him angry by going their own way. Jeremiah appears to use this particle for result rather than purpose on several other occasions (see, e.g., 7:18, 19; 27:10, 15; 32:29).

[25:7]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

[26:2]  ¹⁸ sn It is generally agreed that the incident recorded in this chapter relates to the temple message that Jeremiah gave in 7:1-15. The message there is summarized here in vv. 3-6. The primary interest here is in the response to that message.

[26:3]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “will turn from his wicked way.”

[26:3]  ²⁰ tn For the idiom and translation of terms involved here see 18:8 and the translator’s note there.

[26:3]  sn The Lord is being consistent in the application of the principle laid down in Jer 18:7-8 that reformation of character will result in the withdrawal of the punishment of “uprooting, tearing down, destroying.” His prophecies of doom are conditional threats, open to change with change in behavior.

[26:3]  ²¹ tn Heb “because of the wickedness of their deeds.”

[26:4]  ²² tn Heb “thus says the Lord, ‘…’.” The use of the indirect quotation in the translation eliminates one level of embedded quotation to avoid confusion.

[26:4]  ²³ tn Heb “by walking in my law which I set before you.”

[26:4]  sn Examples of those laws are found in Jer 7:5-6, 9. The law was summarized or epitomized in the ten commandments which are called the “words of the covenant” in Exod 34:28, but it contained much more. However, when Israel is taken to task by God, it often relates to their failure to live up to the standards of the ten commandments (Heb “the ten words”; see Hos 4:1-3; Jer 7:9).

[26:5]  ²⁴ tn See the translator’s note on 7:13 for the idiom here.

[26:6]  ²⁵ tn 26:4-6 are all one long sentence containing a long condition with subordinate clauses (vv. 4-5) and a compound consequence in v. 6: Heb “If you will not obey me by walking in my law…by paying attention to the words of the prophets which…and you did not pay heed, then I will make…and I will make…” The sentence has been broken down in conformity to contemporary English style but an attempt has been made to reflect all the subordinations in the English translation.

[26:6]  ²⁶ sn See the study note on Jer 7:13.

[36:2]  ²⁷ sn Heb “a roll [or scroll] of a document.” Scrolls consisted of pieces of leather or parchment sewn together and rolled up on wooden rollers. The writing was written from right to left and from top to bottom in columns and the scroll unrolled from the left roller and rolled onto the right one as the scroll was read. The scroll varied in length depending on the contents. This scroll was probably not all that long since it was read three times in a single day (vv. 10-11, 15-16, 21-23).

[36:2]  ²⁸ sn The intent is hardly that of giving a verbatim report of everything that the Lord had told him to say or of everything that he had actually said. What the scroll undoubtedly contained was a synopsis of Jeremiah’s messages as constructed from his memory.

[36:2]  ²⁹ sn This refers to the messages that Jeremiah delivered during the last eighteen years of Josiah, the three month reign of Jehoahaz and the first four years of Jehoiakim’s reign (the period between Josiah’s thirteenth year [cf. 1:2] and the fourth year of Jehoiakim [v. 1]). The exact content of this scroll is unknown since many of the messages in the present book are undated. It is also not known what relation this scroll had to the present form of the book of Jeremiah, since this scroll was destroyed and another one written that contained more than this one did (cf. v. 32). Since Jeremiah continued his ministry down to the fall of Jerusalem in 587/6 b.c. (1:2) and beyond (cf. Jer 40-44) much more was added to those two scrolls even later.