Yeremia 3:25

3:25 Let us acknowledge ¹  our shame.

Let us bear the disgrace that we deserve. ² 

For we have sinned against the Lord our God,

both we and our ancestors.

From earliest times to this very day

we have not obeyed the Lord our God.’

Yeremia 14:12

14:12 Even if they fast, I will not hear their cries for help. Even if they offer burnt offerings and grain offerings, I will not accept them. ³  Instead, I will kill them through wars, famines, and plagues.” ⁴ 

Yeremia 23:5

23:5 “I, the Lord, promise ⁵  that a new time will certainly come ⁶ 

when I will raise up for them a righteous branch, ⁷  a descendant of David.

He will rule over them with wisdom and understanding ⁸ 

and will do what is just and right in the land. ⁹ 

Yeremia 36:12

36:12 He went down to the chamber of the royal secretary in the king’s palace and found all the court officials in session there. Elishama ¹⁰  the royal secretary, Delaiah son of Shemaiah, Elnathan son of Achbor, ¹¹  Gemariah son of Shaphan, Zedekiah son of Hananiah, and all the other officials were seated there.

[3:25]  ¹ tn Heb “Let us lie down in….”

[3:25]  ² tn Heb “Let us be covered with disgrace.”

[14:12]  ³ sn See 6:16-20 for parallels.

[14:12]  ⁴ tn Heb “through sword, starvation, and plague.”

[14:12]  sn These were penalties (curses) that were to be imposed on Israel for failure to keep her covenant with God (cf. Lev 26:23-26). These three occur together fourteen other times in the book of Jeremiah.

[23:5]  ⁵ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[23:5]  ⁶ tn Heb “Behold the days are coming.”

[23:5]  ⁷ tn Heb “a righteous sprig to David” or “a righteous shoot” (NAB).

[23:5]  sn This passage and the parallel in Jer 33:15 are part of a growing number of prayers and prophecies regarding an ideal ruler to come forth from the Davidic line who will bring the justice, security, and well-being that the continuing line of Davidic rulers did not. Though there were periodic kings like Josiah who did fulfill the ideals set forth in Jer 22:3 (see Jer 22:15), by and large they were more like Jehoiakim who did not (see Jer 22:13). Hence the Lord brought to an end the Davidic rule. The potential for the ideal, however, remained because of God’s promise to David (2 Sam 7:16). The Davidic line became like a tree which was cut down, leaving only a stump. But from that stump God would bring forth a “shoot,” a “sprig” which would fulfill the ideals of kingship. See Isa 11:1-6 and Zech 3:8, 6:12 for this metaphor and compare Dan 4:14-15, 23, 26 for a different but related use of the metaphor.

[23:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “he will reign as king and act wisely.” This is another example of the use of two verbs joined by “and” where one becomes the adverbial modifier of the other (hendiadys). For the nuance of the verb “act wisely” rather than “prosper” see Amos 5:13; Ps 2:10 (cf. BDB 968 s.v. שָׂכַל Hiph.5).

[23:5]  ⁹ sn This has been the constant emphasis in this section. See 22:3 for the demand, 22:15 for its fulfillment, and 22:13 for its abuse. The ideal king would follow in the footsteps of his illustrious ancestor David (2 Sam 8:15) who set this forth as an ideal for his dynasty (2 Sam 23:3) and prayed for it to be true of his son Solomon (Ps 72:1-2).

[36:12]  ¹⁰ sn If, as many believe, this man was the same as the Elishama mentioned in Jer 41:1; 2 Kgs 25:25, he was also a member of the royal family.

[36:12]  ¹¹ sn This man has already been mentioned in Jer 26:22 as the official who was sent to Egypt to extradite the prophet Uriah that Jehoiakim had executed. Though he was instrumental in the death of that prophet, he appears to have been favorably disposed to Jeremiah or at least impressed by the seriousness of his messages, because he is one of the officials that urged Baruch and Jeremiah to hide (v. 19), and he counseled Jehoiakim not to burn the scroll (v. 25).