Yeremia 20:4

20:4 For the Lord says, ‘I will make both you and your friends terrified of what will happen to you. ¹  You will see all of them die by the swords of their enemies. ²  I will hand all the people of Judah over to the king of Babylon. He will carry some of them away into exile in Babylon and he will kill others of them with the sword.

Yeremia 25:9

25:9 So I, the Lord, affirm that ³  I will send for all the peoples of the north ⁴  and my servant, ⁵  King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and all the nations that surround it. I will utterly destroy ⁶  this land, its inhabitants, and all the nations that surround it ⁷  and make them everlasting ruins. ⁸  I will make them objects of horror and hissing scorn. ⁹ 

Yeremia 42:18

42:18 For ¹⁰  the Lord God of Israel who rules over all ¹¹  says, ‘If you go to Egypt, I will pour out my wrath on you just as I poured out my anger and wrath on the citizens of Jerusalem. ¹²  You will become an object of horror and ridicule, an example of those who have been cursed and that people use in pronouncing a curse. ¹³  You will never see this place again.’ ¹⁴ 

Yeremia 44:12

44:12 I will see to it that all the Judean remnant that was determined to go ¹⁵  and live in the land of Egypt will be destroyed. Here in the land of Egypt they will fall in battle ¹⁶  or perish from starvation. People of every class ¹⁷  will die in war or from starvation. They will become an object of horror and ridicule, an example of those who have been cursed and that people use in pronouncing a curse. ¹⁸ 

[20:4]  ¹ tn Heb “I will make you an object of terror to both you and your friends.”

[20:4]  ² tn Heb “And they will fall by the sword of their enemies and [with] your eyes seeing [it].”

[25:9]  ³ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[25:9]  ⁴ sn The many allusions to trouble coming from the north are now clarified: it is the armies of Babylon which included within it contingents from many nations. See 1:14, 15; 4:6; 6:1, 22; 10:22; 13:20 for earlier allusions.

[25:9]  ⁵ sn Nebuchadnezzar is called the Lord’s servant also in Jer 27:6; 43:10. He was the Lord’s servant in that he was the agent used by the Lord to punish his disobedient people. Assyria was earlier referred to as the Lord’s “rod” (Isa 10:5-6) and Cyrus is called his “shepherd” and his “anointed” (Isa 44:28; 45:1). P. C. Craigie, P. H. Kelley, and J. F. Drinkard (Jeremiah 1-25 [WBC], 364) make the interesting observation that the terms here are very similar to the terms in v. 4. The people of Judah ignored the servants, the prophets, he sent to turn them away from evil. So he will send other servants whom they cannot ignore.

[25:9]  ⁶ tn The word used here was used in the early years of Israel’s conquest for the action of killing all the men, women, and children in the cities of Canaan, destroying all their livestock, and burning their cities down. This policy was intended to prevent Israel from being corrupted by paganism (Deut 7:2; 20:17-18; Josh 6:18, 21). It was to be extended to any city that led Israel away from worshiping God (Deut 13:15) and any Israelite who brought an idol into his house (Deut 7:26). Here the policy is being directed against Judah as well as against her neighbors because of her persistent failure to heed God’s warnings through the prophets. For further usage of this term in application to foreign nations in the book of Jeremiah see 50:21, 26; 51:3.

[25:9]  ⁷ tn Heb “will utterly destroy them.” The referent (this land, its inhabitants, and the nations surrounding it) has been specified in the translation for clarity, since the previous “them” referred to Nebuchadnezzar and his armies.

[25:9]  sn This is essentially the introduction to the “judgment on the nations” in vv. 15-29 which begins with Jerusalem and Judah (v. 18) and ultimately ends with Babylon itself (“Sheshach” in v. 26; see note there for explanation of the term).

[25:9]  ⁸ sn The Hebrew word translated “everlasting” is the word often translated “eternal.” However, it sometimes has a more limited time reference. For example it refers to the lifetime of a person who became a “lasting slave” to another person (see Exod 21:6; Deut 15:17). It is also used to refer to the long life wished for a king (1 Kgs 1:31; Neh 2:3). The time frame here is to be qualified at least with reference to Judah and Jerusalem as seventy years (see 29:10-14 and compare v. 12).

[25:9]  ⁹ tn Heb “I will make them an object of horror and a hissing and everlasting ruins.” The sentence has been broken up to separate the last object from the first two which are of slightly different connotation, i.e., they denote the reaction to the latter.

[25:9]  sn Compare Jer 18:16 and 19:8 and the study note at 18:16.

[42:18]  ¹⁰ tn Or “Indeed.”

[42:18]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.” See the study note on 2:19 for the translation and significance of this title.

[42:18]  ¹² map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[42:18]  ¹³ tn See the study note on 24:9 and the usage in 29:22 for the meaning and significance of this last phrase.

[42:18]  ¹⁴ tn Or “land.” The reference is, of course, to the land of Judah.

[44:12]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “they set their face to go.” Compare 44:11 and 42:14 and see the translator’s note at 42:15.

[44:12]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “fall by the sword.”

[44:12]  ¹⁷ tn Or “All of them without distinction,” or “All of them from the least important to the most important”; Heb “From the least to the greatest.” See the translator’s note on 42:1 for the meaning of this idiom.

[44:12]  ¹⁸ tn See the study note on 24:9 and the usage in 29:22 for the meaning and significance of this last phrase.

[44:12]  sn See Jer 42:18 for parallel usage.