Yeremia 52:8

52:8 But the Babylonian army chased after the king. They caught up with Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho, ¹  and his entire army deserted him.

Yeremia 10:21

10:21 For our leaders ²  are stupid.

They have not sought the Lord’s advice. ³ 

So they do not act wisely,

and the people they are responsible for ⁴  have all been scattered.

Yeremia 13:24

13:24 “The Lord says, ⁵ 

‘That is why I will scatter your people ⁶  like chaff

that is blown away by a desert wind. ⁷ 

Yeremia 31:10

31:10 Hear what the Lord has to say, O nations.

Proclaim it in the faraway lands along the sea.

Say, “The one who scattered Israel will regather them.

He will watch over his people like a shepherd watches over his flock.”

Yeremia 18:17

18:17 I will scatter them before their enemies

like dust blowing in front of a burning east wind.

I will turn my back on them and not look favorably on them ⁸ 

when disaster strikes them.”

Yeremia 49:36

49:36 I will cause enemies to blow through Elam from every direction

like the winds blowing in from the four quarters of heaven.

I will scatter the people of Elam to the four winds.

There will not be any nation where the refugees of Elam will not go. ⁹ 

Yeremia 9:16

9:16 I will scatter them among nations that neither they nor their ancestors ¹⁰  have known anything about. I will send people chasing after them with swords ¹¹  until I have destroyed them.’” ¹² 

Yeremia 30:11

30:11 For I, the Lord, affirm ¹³  that

I will be with you and will rescue you.

I will completely destroy all the nations where I scattered you.

But I will not completely destroy you.

I will indeed discipline you, but only in due measure.

I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished.” ¹⁴ 

Yeremia 49:32

49:32 Their camels will be taken as plunder.

Their vast herds will be taken as spoil.

I will scatter to the four winds

those desert peoples who cut their hair short at the temples. ¹⁵ 

I will bring disaster against them

from every direction,” says the Lord. ¹⁶ 

Yeremia 23:2

23:2 So the Lord God of Israel has this to say about the leaders who are ruling over his people: “You have caused my people ¹⁷  to be dispersed and driven into exile. You have not taken care of them. So I will punish you for the evil that you have done. ¹⁸  I, the Lord, affirm it! ¹⁹ 

Yeremia 40:15

40:15 Then Johanan son of Kareah spoke privately to Gedaliah there at Mizpah, “Let me go and kill Ishmael the son of Nethaniah before anyone knows about it. Otherwise he will kill you ²⁰  and all the Judeans who have rallied around you will be scattered. Then what remains of Judah will disappear.”

Yeremia 23:8

23:8 But at that time they will affirm them with “I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the descendants of the former nation of Israel ²¹  from the land of the north and from all the other lands where he had banished ²²  them.” ²³  At that time they will live in their own land.’”

Yeremia 29:18

29:18 I will chase after them with war, ²⁴  starvation, and disease. I will make all the kingdoms of the earth horrified at what happens to them. I will make them examples of those who are cursed, objects of horror, hissing scorn, and ridicule among all the nations where I exile them.

Yeremia 32:37

32:37 ‘I will certainly regather my people from all the countries where I will have exiled ²⁵  them in my anger, fury, and great wrath. I will bring them back to this place and allow them to live here in safety.

Yeremia 27:10

27:10 Do not listen to them, ²⁶  because their prophecies are lies. ²⁷  Listening to them will only cause you ²⁸  to be taken far away from your native land. I will drive you out of your country and you will die in exile. ²⁹ 

Yeremia 24:9

24:9 I will bring such disaster on them that all the kingdoms of the earth will be horrified. I will make them an object of reproach, a proverbial example of disaster. I will make them an object of ridicule, an example to be used in curses. ³⁰  That is how they will be remembered wherever I banish them. ³¹ 

Yeremia 43:5

43:5 Instead Johanan son of Kareah and all the army officers led off all the Judean remnant who had come back to live in the land of Judah from all the nations where they had been scattered. ³² 

Yeremia 16:15

16:15 But in that time they will affirm them with ‘I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the people of Israel from the land of the north and from all the other lands where he had banished them.’ At that time I will bring them back to the land I gave their ancestors.” ³³ 

Yeremia 27:15

27:15 For I, the Lord, affirm ³⁴  that I did not send them. They are prophesying lies to you. If you ³⁵  listen to them, I will drive you and the prophets who are prophesying lies out of the land and you will all die in exile.” ³⁶ 

Yeremia 40:12

40:12 So all these Judeans returned to the land of Judah from the places where they had been scattered. They came to Gedaliah at Mizpah. Thus they harvested a large amount of wine and dates and figs. ³⁷ 

Yeremia 49:5

49:5 I will bring terror on you from every side,”

says the Lord God who rules over all. ³⁸ 

“You will be scattered in every direction. ³⁹ 

No one will gather the fugitives back together.

Yeremia 3:8

3:8 She also saw ⁴⁰  that I gave wayward Israel her divorce papers and sent her away because of her adulterous worship of other gods. ⁴¹  Even after her unfaithful sister Judah had seen this, ⁴²  she still was not afraid, and she too went and gave herself like a prostitute to other gods. ⁴³ 

Yeremia 29:14

29:14 I will make myself available to you,’ ⁴⁴  says the Lord. ⁴⁵  ‘Then I will reverse your plight ⁴⁶  and will regather you from all the nations and all the places where I have exiled you,’ says the Lord. ⁴⁷  ‘I will bring you back to the place from which I exiled you.’

Yeremia 46:28

46:28 I, the Lord, tell ⁴⁸  you not to be afraid,

you descendants of Jacob, my servant,

for I am with you.

Though I completely destroy all the nations where I scatter you,

I will not completely destroy you.

I will indeed discipline you but only in due measure.

I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished.” ⁴⁹ 

Yeremia 23:1

New Leaders over a Regathered Remnant

23:1 The Lord says, ⁵⁰  “The leaders of my people are sure to be judged. ⁵¹  They were supposed to watch over my people like shepherds watch over their sheep. But they are causing my people to be destroyed and scattered. ⁵² 

Yeremia 3:1

3:1 “If a man divorces his wife

and she leaves him and becomes another man’s wife,

he may not take her back again. ⁵³ 

Doing that would utterly defile the land. ⁵⁴ 

But you, Israel, have given yourself as a prostitute to many gods. ⁵⁵ 

So what makes you think you can return to me?” ⁵⁶ 

says the Lord.

Yeremia 8:3

8:3 However, I will leave some of these wicked people alive and banish them to other places. But wherever these people who survive may go, they will wish they had died rather than lived,” ⁵⁷  says the Lord who rules over all. ⁵⁸ 

Yeremia 25:34

25:34 Wail and cry out in anguish, you rulers!

Roll in the dust, you who shepherd flocks of people! ⁵⁹ 

The time for you to be slaughtered has come.

You will lie scattered and fallen like broken pieces of fine pottery. ⁶⁰ 

Yeremia 3:7

3:7 Yet even after she had done all that, I thought that she might come back to me. ⁶¹  But she did not. Her sister, unfaithful Judah, saw what she did. ⁶² 

Yeremia 15:19

15:19 Because of this, the Lord said, ⁶³ 

“You must repent of such words and thoughts!

If you do, I will restore you to the privilege of serving me. ⁶⁴ 

If you say what is worthwhile instead of what is worthless,

I will again allow you to be my spokesman. ⁶⁵ 

They must become as you have been.

You must not become like them. ⁶⁶ 

Yeremia 23:3

23:3 Then I myself will regather those of my people ⁶⁷  who are still alive from all the countries where I have driven them. I will bring them back to their homeland. ⁶⁸  They will greatly increase in number.

Yeremia 34:17

34:17 So I, the Lord, say: “You have not really obeyed me and granted freedom to your neighbor and fellow countryman. ⁶⁹  Therefore, I will grant you freedom, the freedom ⁷⁰  to die in war, or by starvation or disease. I, the Lord, affirm it! ⁷¹  I will make all the kingdoms of the earth horrified at what happens to you. ⁷² 

[52:8]  ¹ map For location see Map5 B2; Map6 E1; Map7 E1; Map8 E3; Map10 A2; Map11 A1.

[10:21]  ² tn Heb “the shepherds.”

[10:21]  ³ tn Heb “They have not sought the Lord.”

[10:21]  sn The idiom translated sought the Lord’s advice quite commonly refers to inquiring for the Lord’s guidance through a prophet. See for example Exod 18:15; 1 Sam 9:9; 1 Kgs 22:8. It would not exclude consulting the law.

[10:21]  ⁴ tn Heb “all their flock (or “pasturage”).”

[10:21]  sn This verse uses the figure of rulers as shepherds and the people they ruled as sheep. It is a common figure in the Bible. See Ezek 34 for an extended development of this metaphor.

[13:24]  ⁵ tn The words, “The Lord says” are not in the text at this point. The words “an oracle of the Lord” does, however, occur in the middle of the next verse and it is obvious the Lord is the speaker. The words have been moved up from the next verse to enhance clarity.

[13:24]  ⁶ tn Heb “them.” This is another example of the rapid shift in pronouns seen several times in the book of Jeremiah. The pronouns in the preceding and the following are second feminine singular. It might be argued that “them” goes back to the “flock”/“sheep” in v. 20, but the next verse refers the fate described here to “you” (feminine singular). This may be another example of the kind of metaphoric shifts in referents discussed in the notes on 13:20 above. Besides, it would sound a little odd in the translation to speak of scattering one person like chaff.

[13:24]  ⁷ sn Compare the threat using the same metaphor in Jer 4:11-12.

[18:17]  ⁸ tc Heb “I will show them [my] back and not [my] face.” This reading follows the suggestion of some of the versions and some of the Masoretes. The MT reads “I will look on their back and not on their faces.”

[18:17]  sn To “turn the back” is universally recognized as a symbol of rejection. The turning of the face toward one is the subject of the beautiful Aaronic blessing in Num 6:24-26.

[49:36]  ⁹ tn Or more simply, “I will bring enemies against Elam from every direction. / And I will scatter the people of Elam to the four winds. // There won’t be any nation / where the refugees of Elam will not go.” Or more literally, “I will bring the four winds against Elam / from the four quarters of heaven. / I will scatter….” However, the winds are not to be understood literally here. God isn’t going to “blow the Elamites” out of Elam with natural forces. The winds must figuratively represent enemy forces that God will use to drive them out. Translating literally would be misleading at this point.

[9:16]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “fathers.”

[9:16]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I will send the sword after them.” The sword here is probably not completely literal but refers to death by violent means, including death by the sword.

[9:16]  ¹² sn He will destroy them but not completely. See Jer 5:18; 30:11; 46:28.

[30:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[30:11]  ¹⁴ tn The translation “entirely unpunished” is intended to reflect the emphatic construction of the infinitive absolute before the finite verb.

[49:32]  ¹⁵ tn See the translator’s note at Jer 9:26 and compare the usage in 9:26 and 25:23.

[49:32]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[23:2]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “about the shepherds who are shepherding my people. ‘You have caused my sheep….’” For the metaphor see the study note on the previous verse.

[23:2]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “Therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, concerning the shepherds who should be shepherding my people: You have scattered my sheep and driven them away and you have not taken care of them. Behold I will visit upon you the evil of your deeds.” “Therefore” announces the judgment which does not come until “Behold.” It is interrupted by the messenger formula and a further indictment. The original has been broken up to conform more to contemporary English style, the metaphors have been interpreted for clarity and the connections between the indictments and the judgments have been carried by “So.”

[23:2]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[40:15]  ²⁰ tn Heb “Why should he kill you?” However, this is one of those cases listed in BDB 554 s.v. מָה 4.d(b) where it introduces a question introducing rhetorically the reason why something should not be done. In cases like this BDB notes that it approximates the meaning “lest” and is translated in Greek by μήποτε (mhpote) or μή (mh) as the Greek version does here. Hence it is separated from the preceding and translated “otherwise” for the sake of English style.

[23:8]  ²¹ tn Heb “descendants of the house of Israel.”

[23:8]  ²² tc It is probably preferable to read the third masculine singular plus suffix (הִדִּיחָם, hiddikham) here with the Greek version and the parallel passage in 16:15 rather than the first singular plus suffix in the MT (הִדַּחְתִּים, hiddakhtim). If this is not a case of mere graphic confusion, the MT could have arisen under the influence of the first person in v. 3. Though sudden shifts in person have been common in the book of Jeremiah, that is unlikely in a context reporting an oath.

[23:8]  ²³ tn This passage is the same as 16:14-15 with a few minor variations in Hebrew wording. The notes on that passage should be consulted for the rendering here. This passage has the Niphal of the verb “to say” rather than the impersonal use of the Qal. It adds the idea of “bringing out” to the idea of “bringing up out” and (Heb “who brought up and who brought out,” probably a case of hendiadys) before “the people [here “seed” rather than “children”] of Israel [here “house of Israel”] from the land of the north.” These are minor variations and do not affect the sense in any way. So the passage is rendered in much the same way.

[23:8]  sn This passage looks forward to a new and greater Exodus, one that so outstrips the earlier one that the earlier will not serve as the model of deliverance any longer. This same ideal was the subject of Isaiah’s earlier prophecies in Isa 11:11-12, 15-16; 43:16-21; 49:8-13; 51: 1-11.

[29:18]  ²⁴ tn Heb “with the sword.”

[32:37]  ²⁵ tn The verb here should be interpreted as a future perfect; though some of the people have already been exiled (in 605 and 597 b.c.), some have not yet been exiled at the time this prophesy is given (see study note on v. 1 for the date). However, contemporary English style does not regularly use the future perfect, choosing instead to use the simple future or the simple perfect as the present translation has done here.

[27:10]  ²⁶ tn The words “Don’t listen to them” have been repeated from v. 9a to pick up the causal connection between v. 9a and v. 10 that is formally introduced by a causal particle in v. 10 in the original text.

[27:10]  ²⁷ tn Heb “they are prophesying a lie.”

[27:10]  ²⁸ tn Heb “lies will result in your being taken far…” (לְמַעַן [lÿma’an] + infinitive). This is a rather clear case of the particle לְמַעַן introducing result (contra BDB 775 s.v. מַעַן note 1. There is no irony in this statement; it is a bold prediction).

[27:10]  ²⁹ tn The words “out of your country” are not in the text but are implicit in the meaning of the verb. The words “in exile” are also not in the text but are implicit in the context. These words have been supplied in the translation for clarity.

[24:9]  ³⁰ tn Or “an object of reproach in peoples’ proverbs…an object of ridicule in people’s curses.” The alternate translation treats the two pairs which are introduced without vavs (ו) but are joined by vavs as examples of hendiadys. This is very possible here but the chain does not contain this pairing in 25:18; 29:18.

[24:9]  sn For an example of how the “example used in curses” worked, see Jer 29:22. Sodom and Gomorrah evidently function much that same way (see 23:14; 49:18; 50:40; Deut 29:23; Zeph 2:9).

[24:9]  ³¹ tn Heb “I will make them for a terror for disaster to all the kingdoms of the earth, for a reproach and for a proverb, for a taunt and a curse in all the places which I banish them there.” The complex Hebrew sentence has been broken down into equivalent shorter sentences to conform more with contemporary English style.

[43:5]  ³² sn These are the people who are referred to in Jer 40:11-12.

[16:15]  ³³ tn These two verses which constitute one long sentence with compound, complex subordinations has been broken up for sake of English style. It reads, “Therefore, behold the days are coming, says the Lord [Heb ‘oracle of the Lord’] and it will not be said any longer, ‘By the life of the Lord who…Egypt’ but ‘by the life of the Lord who…’ and I will bring them back….”

[27:15]  ³⁴ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[27:15]  ³⁵ sn The verbs are again plural referring to the king and his royal advisers.

[27:15]  ³⁶ tn Heb “…drive you out and you will perish, you and the prophets who are prophesying lies.”

[27:15]  sn For the fulfillment of this prophecy see Jer 39:5-7; 52:7-11; 2 Kgs 25:4-7.

[40:12]  ³⁷ tn Heb “summer fruit.” “Summer fruit” is meaningless to most modern readers; dates and figs are what is involved.

[49:5]  ³⁸ tn Heb “The Lord Yahweh of armies.” For an explanation of the rendering here and of the significance of this title see the study note on 2:19.

[49:5]  ³⁹ tn Heb “You will be scattered each man [straight] before him.”

[3:8]  ⁴⁰ tc Heb “she [‘her sister, unfaithful Judah’ from the preceding verse] saw” with one Hebrew ms, some Greek mss, and the Syriac version. The MT reads “I saw” which may be a case of attraction to the verb at the beginning of the previous verse.

[3:8]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “because she committed adultery.” The translation is intended to spell out the significance of the metaphor.

[3:8]  ⁴² tn The words “Even after her unfaithful sister, Judah, had seen this” are not in the Hebrew text but are implicit in the connection and are supplied for clarification.

[3:8]  ⁴³ tn Heb “she played the prostitute there.” This is a metaphor for Israel’s worship; she gave herself to the worship of other gods like a prostitute gives herself to her lovers. There seems no clear way to completely spell out the metaphor in the translation.

[29:14]  ⁴⁴ tn Heb “I will let myself be found by you.” For this nuance of the verb see BDB 594 s.v. מָצָא Niph.1.f and compare the usage in Isa 65:1; 2 Chr 15:2. The Greek version already noted that nuance when it translated the phrase “I will manifest myself to you.”

[29:14]  ⁴⁵ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[29:14]  ⁴⁶ tn Heb “restore your fortune.” Alternately, “I will bring you back from exile.” This idiom occurs twenty-six times in the OT and in several cases it is clearly not referring to return from exile but restoration of fortunes (e.g., Job 42:10; Hos 6:11–7:1; Jer 33:11). It is often followed as here by “regather” or “bring back” (e.g., Jer 30:3; Ezek 29:14) so it is often misunderstood as “bringing back the exiles.” The versions (LXX, Vulg., Tg., Pesh.) often translate the idiom as “to go away into captivity,” deriving the noun from שְׁבִי (shÿvi, “captivity”). However, the use of this expression in Old Aramaic documents of Sefire parallels the biblical idiom: “the gods restored the fortunes of the house of my father again” (J. A. Fitzmyer, The Aramaic Inscriptions of Sefire [BibOr], 100-101, 119-20). The idiom means “to turn someone's fortune, bring about change” or “to reestablish as it was” (HALOT 1386 s.v. 3.c). In Ezek 16:53 it is paralleled by the expression “to restore the situation which prevailed earlier.” This amounts to restitutio in integrum, which is applicable to the circumstances surrounding the return of the exiles.

[29:14]  ⁴⁷ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[46:28]  ⁴⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.” Again the first person is adopted because the Lord is speaking and the indirect quotation is used to avoid an embedded quotation with quotation marks on either side.

[46:28]  ⁴⁹ tn The translation “entirely unpunished” is intended to reflect the emphatic construction of the infinitive absolute before the finite verb.

[23:1]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[23:1]  ⁵¹ sn Heb This particle once again introduces a judgment speech. The indictment is found in v. 1 and the announcement of judgment in v. 2. This leads into an oracle of deliverance in vv. 3-4. See also the note on the word “judged” in 22:13.

[23:1]  ⁵² tn Heb “Woe to the shepherds who are killing and scattering the sheep of my pasture.” See the study note on 22:13 for the significance of “Sure to be judged” (Heb “Woe”) See the study note for the significance of the metaphor introduced here.

[23:1]  sn Verses 1-4 of ch. 23 are an extended metaphor in which the rulers are compared to shepherds and the people are compared to sheep. This metaphor has already been met with in 10:21 and is found elsewhere in the context of the Lord’s covenant with David (cf. 2 Sam 7:7-8; Ps 78:70-72). The sheep are God’s people and he is the ultimate shepherd who is personally concerned about their care (cf. Pss 23:1; 80:2). He has set rulers over them as his under-shepherds and they are responsible to him for the care of his sheep (see 22:3-4). They have been lax shepherds, allowing the sheep to be scattered and destroyed. So he will punish them. As the true shepherd of Israel he will regather his scattered flock and place new shepherds (rulers) over them. These verses lead to a promise of an ideal ruler set over an Israel which has experienced a new and better Exodus (vv. 6-8). For a more complete development of this metaphor with similar messianic and eschatological implications see Ezek 34. The metaphor has been interpreted in the translation but some of the flavor left in the simile.

[3:1]  ⁵³ tn Heb “May he go back to her again?” The question is rhetorical and expects a negative answer.

[3:1]  sn For the legal background for the illustration that is used here see Deut 24:1-4.

[3:1]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “Would the land not be utterly defiled?” The stative is here rendered actively to connect better with the preceding. The question is rhetorical and expects a positive answer.

[3:1]  ⁵⁵ tn Heb “But you have played the prostitute with many lovers.”

[3:1]  ⁵⁶ tn Heb “Returning to me.” The form is the bare infinitive which the KJV and ASV have interpreted as an imperative “Yet, return to me!” However, it is more likely that a question is intended, expressing surprise in the light of the law alluded to and the facts cited. For the use of the infinitive absolute in the place of a finite verb, cf. GKC 346 §113.ee. For the introduction of a question without a question marker, cf. GKC 473 §150.a.

[8:3]  ⁵⁷ tn Heb “Death will be chosen rather than life by the remnant who are left from this wicked family in all the places where I have banished them.” The sentence is broken up and restructured to avoid possible confusion because of the complexity of the English to some modern readers. There appears to be an extra “those who are left” that was inadvertently copied from the preceding line. It is missing from one Hebrew ms and from the Greek and Syriac versions and is probably not a part of the original text.

[8:3]  ⁵⁸ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

[8:3]  sn For the significance of this title see the notes at 2:19 and 7:3.

[25:34]  ⁵⁹ tn Heb “Wail and cry out, you shepherds. Roll in the dust, you leaders of the flock.” The terms have been reversed to explain the figure.

[25:34]  sn The term “shepherd” has been used several times in the book of Jeremiah to refer to the leaders of the people who were responsible for taking care of their people who are compared to a flock. (See Jer 23:1-4 and the notes there.) Here the figure has some irony involved in it. It is the shepherds who are to be slaughtered like sheep. They may have considered themselves “choice vessels” (the literal translation of “fine pottery”), but they would be slaughtered and lie scattered on the ground (v. 33) like broken pottery.

[25:34]  ⁶⁰ tn The meaning of this line is debated. The Greek version does not have the words “lie scattered” and it reads the words “like broken pieces of fine pottery” (Heb “like choice vessels”; כִּכְלִי חֶמְדָּה, kikhli khemdah) as “like choice rams” (כְּאֵילֵי חֶמְדָּה, kÿ’ele khemdah); i.e., “the days have been completed for you to be slaughtered and you will fall like choice rams.” The reading of the Greek version fits the context better, but is probably secondary for that very reason. The word translated “lie scattered” (תְּפוֹצָה, tÿfotsah) occurs nowhere else and the switch to the simile of “choice vessels” is rather abrupt. However, this section has been characterized by switching metaphors. The key to the interpretation and translation here is the consequential nature of the verbal actions involved. “Fall” does not merely refer to the action but the effect, i.e., “lie fallen” (cf. BDB 657 s.v. נָפַל 7 and compare Judg 3:25; 1 Sam 31:8). Though the noun translated “lie scattered” does not occur elsewhere, the verb does. It is quite commonly used of dispersing people and that has led many to see that as the reference here. The word, however, can be used of scattering other things like seed (Isa 28:25), arrows (2 Sam 22:15; metaphorical for lightning), etc. Here it follows “slaughtered” and refers to their dead bodies. The simile (Heb “ fallen like choice vessels”) is elliptical, referring to “broken pieces” of choice vessels. In this sense the simile fits in perfectly with v. 33.

[3:7]  ⁶¹ tn Or “I said to her, ‘Come back to me!’” The verb אָמַר (’amar) usually means “to say,” but here it means “to think,” of an assumption that turns out to be wrong (so HALOT 66.4 s.v. אמר); cf. Gen 44:28; Jer 3:19; Pss 82:6; 139:11; Job 29:18; Ruth 4:4; Lam 3:18.

[3:7]  sn Open theists suggest that passages such as this indicate God has limited foreknowledge; however, more traditional theologians view this passage as an extended metaphor in which God presents himself as a deserted husband, hoping against hope that his adulterous wife might return to him. The point of the metaphor is not to make an assertion about God’s foreknowledge, but to develop the theme of God’s heartbreak due to Israel’s unrepentance.

[3:7]  ⁶² tn The words “what she did” are not in the text but are implicit from the context and are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[15:19]  ⁶³ tn Heb “So the Lord said thus.”

[15:19]  ⁶⁴ tn Heb “If you return [ = repent], I will restore [more literally, ‘cause you to return’] that you may stand before me.” For the idiom of “standing before” in the sense of serving see BDB 764 s.v. עָמַד Qal.1.e and compare the usage in 1 Kgs 10:8; 12:8; 17:1; Deut 10:8.

[15:19]  ⁶⁵ tn Heb “you shall be as my mouth.”

[15:19]  sn For the classic statement of the prophet as God’s “mouth/mouthpiece,” = “spokesman,” see Exod 4:15-16; 7:1-2.

[15:19]  ⁶⁶ tn Heb “They must turn/return to you and you must not turn/return to them.”

[15:19]  sn Once again the root “return” (שׁוּב, shuv) is being played on as in 3:1–4:4. See the threefold call to repentance in 3:12, 14, 22. The verb is used here four times “repent,” “restore,” and “become” twice. He is to serve as a model of repentance, not an imitator of their apostasy. In accusing God of being unreliable he was coming dangerously close to their kind of behavior.

[23:3]  ⁶⁷ tn Heb “my sheep.”

[23:3]  ⁶⁸ tn Heb “their fold.”

[34:17]  ⁶⁹ tn The Hebrew text has a compound object, the two terms of which have been synonyms in vv. 14, 15. G. L. Keown, P. J. Scalise, and T. G. Smothers (Jeremiah 26-52 [WBC], 189) make the interesting observation that these two terms (Heb “brother” and “neighbor”) emphasize the relationships that should have taken precedence over their being viewed as mere slaves.

[34:17]  ⁷⁰ sn This is, of course, a metaphorical and ironical use of the term “to grant freedom to.” It is, however, a typical statement of the concept of talionic justice which is quite often operative in God’s judgments in the OT (cf., e.g., Obad 15).

[34:17]  ⁷¹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[34:17]  ⁷² sn Compare Jer 15:4; 24:9; 29:18.