Yeremia 13:7

13:7 So I went to Perath and dug up ¹  the shorts from the place where I had buried them. I found ²  that they were ruined; they were good for nothing.

Yeremia 26:21

26:21 When the king and all his bodyguards ³  and officials heard what he was prophesying, ⁴  the king sought to have him executed. But Uriah found out about it and fled to Egypt out of fear. ⁵ 

Yeremia 30:16

30:16 But ⁶  all who destroyed you will be destroyed.

All your enemies will go into exile.

Those who plundered you will be plundered.

I will cause those who pillaged you to be pillaged. ⁷ 

Yeremia 50:3

50:3 For a nation from the north ⁸  will attack Babylon.

It will lay her land waste.

People and animals will flee out of it.

No one will inhabit it.’

Yeremia 50:6

50:6 “My people have been lost sheep.

Their shepherds ⁹  have allow them to go astray.

They have wandered around in the mountains.

They have roamed from one mountain and hill to another. ¹⁰ 

They have forgotten their resting place.

Yeremia 51:9

51:9 Foreigners living there will say, ¹¹ 

‘We tried to heal her, but she could not be healed.

Let’s leave Babylonia ¹²  and each go back to his own country.

For judgment on her will be vast in its proportions.

It will be like it is piled up to heaven, stacked up into the clouds.’ ¹³ 

[13:7]  ¹ tn Heb “dug and took.”

[13:7]  ² tn Heb “And behold.”

[26:21]  ³ tn Heb “all his mighty men/soldiers.” It is unlikely that this included all the army. It more likely was the palace guards or royal bodyguards (see 2 Sam 23 where the same word is used of David’s elite corps).

[26:21]  ⁴ tn Heb “his words.”

[26:21]  ⁵ tn Heb “But Uriah heard and feared and fled and entered Egypt.”

[30:16]  ⁶ tn For the translation of this particle, which is normally translated “therefore” and often introduces an announcement of judgment, compare the usage at Jer 16:14 and the translator’s note there. Here as there it introduces a contrast, a rather unexpected announcement of salvation. For a similar use see also Hos 2:14 (2:16 HT). Recognition of this usage makes the proposed emendation of BHS of לָכֵן כָּל (lakhen kol) to וְכָל (vÿkhol) unnecessary.

[30:16]  ⁷ sn With the exception of the second line there is a definite attempt at wordplay in each line to underline the principle of lex talionis on a national and political level. This principle has already been appealed to in the case of the end of Babylonian sovereignty in 25:14; 27:7.

[50:3]  ⁸ 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.

[50:6]  ⁹ sn The shepherds are the priests, prophets, and leaders who have led Israel into idolatry (2:8).

[50:6]  ¹⁰ sn The allusion here, if it is not merely a part of the metaphor of the wandering sheep, is to the worship of the false gods on the high hills (2:20, 3:2).

[51:9]  ¹¹ tn The words “Foreigners living there will say” are not in the text but are implicit from the third line. These words are generally assumed by the commentaries and are explicitly added in TEV and NCV which are attempting to clarify the text for the average reader.

[51:9]  ¹² tn Heb “Leave/abandon her.” However, it is smoother in the English translation to make this verb equivalent to the cohortative that follows.

[51:9]  ¹³ tn This is an admittedly very paraphrastic translation that tries to make the figurative nuance of the Hebrew original understandable for the average reader. The Hebrew text reads: “For her judgment [or punishment (cf. BDB 1078 s.v. מִשְׁפָּט 1.f) = ‘execution of judgment’] touches the heavens, and is lifted up as far as the clouds.” The figure of hyperbole or exaggeration is being used here to indicate the vastness of Babylon’s punishment which is the reason to escape (vv. 6, 9c). For this figure see Deut 1:28 in comparison with Num 13:28 and see also Deut 9:1. In both of the passages in Deut it refers to an exaggeration about the height of the walls of fortified cities. The figure also may be a play on Gen 11:4 where the nations gather in Babylon to build a tower that reaches to the skies. The present translation has interpreted the perfects here as prophetic because it has not happened yet or they would not be encouraging one another to leave and escape. For the idea here compare 50:16.