Jeremiah 2:7

2:7 I brought you ¹  into a fertile land

so you could enjoy ²  its fruits and its rich bounty.

But when you entered my land, you defiled it; ³ 

you made the land I call my own ⁴  loathsome to me.

Jeremiah 3:1-2

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. ⁵ 

Doing that would utterly defile the land. ⁶ 

But you, Israel, have given yourself as a prostitute to many gods. ⁷ 

So what makes you think you can return to me?” ⁸ 

says the Lord.

3:2 “Look up at the hilltops and consider this. ⁹ 

You have had sex with other gods on every one of them. ¹⁰ 

You waited for those gods like a thief lying in wait in the desert. ¹¹ 

You defiled the land by your wicked prostitution to other gods. ¹² 

Jeremiah 3:9

3:9 Because she took her prostitution so lightly, she defiled the land ¹³  through her adulterous worship of gods made of wood and stone. ¹⁴ 

Leviticus 18:27-28

18:27 for the people who were in the land before you have done all these abominations, ¹⁵  and the land has become unclean. 18:28 So do not make the land vomit you out because you defile it ¹⁶  just as it has vomited out the nations ¹⁷  that were before you.

Numbers 35:33-34

35:33 “You must not pollute the land where you live, for blood defiles the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed there, except by the blood of the person who shed it. 35:34 Therefore do not defile the land that you will inhabit, in which I live, for I the Lord live among the Israelites.”

Psalms 106:38

106:38 They shed innocent blood –

the blood of their sons and daughters,

whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan.

The land was polluted by bloodshed. ¹⁸ 

Isaiah 24:5

24:5 The earth is defiled by ¹⁹  its inhabitants, ²⁰ 

for they have violated laws,

disregarded the regulation, ²¹ 

and broken the permanent treaty. ²² 

Micah 2:10

2:10 But you are the ones who will be forced to leave! ²³ 

For this land is not secure! ²⁴ 

Sin will thoroughly destroy it! ²⁵ 

Zephaniah 3:1-5

Jerusalem is Corrupt

3:1 The filthy, ²⁶  stained city is as good as dead;

the city filled with oppressors is finished! ²⁷ 

3:2 She is disobedient; ²⁸ 

she refuses correction. ²⁹ 

She does not trust the Lord;

she does not seek the advice of ³⁰  her God.

3:3 Her princes ³¹  are as fierce as roaring lions; ³² 

her rulers ³³  are as hungry as wolves in the desert, ³⁴ 

who completely devour their prey by morning. ³⁵ 

3:4 Her prophets are proud; ³⁶ 

they are deceitful men.

Her priests defile what is holy; ³⁷ 

they break God’s laws. ³⁸ 

3:5 The just Lord resides ³⁹  within her;

he commits no unjust acts. ⁴⁰ 

Every morning he reveals ⁴¹  his justice.

At dawn he appears without fail. ⁴² 

Yet the unjust know no shame.

[2:7]  ¹ sn Note how contemporary Israel is again identified with her early ancestors. See the study note on 2:2.

[2:7]  ² tn Heb “eat.”

[2:7]  ³ sn I.e., made it ceremonially unclean. See Lev 18:19-30; Num 35:34; Deut 21:23.

[2:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “my inheritance.” Or “the land [i.e., inheritance] I gave you,” reading the pronoun as indicating source rather than possession. The parallelism and the common use in Jeremiah of the term to refer to the land or people as the Lord’s (e.g., 12:7, 8, 9; 16:18; 50:11) make the possessive use more likely here.

[3:1]  ⁵ tn Heb “May he go back to her again?” The question is rhetorical and expects a negative answer.

[3:1]  ⁶ 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]  ⁷ tn Heb “But you have played the prostitute with many lovers.”

[3:1]  ⁸ 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.

[3:2]  ⁹ tn Heb “and see.”

[3:2]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Where have you not been ravished?” The rhetorical question expects the answer “nowhere,” which suggests she has engaged in the worship of pagan gods on every one of the hilltops.

[3:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “You sat for them [the lovers, i.e., the foreign gods] beside the road like an Arab in the desert.”

[3:2]  ¹² tn Heb “by your prostitution and your wickedness.” This is probably an example of hendiadys where, when two nouns are joined by “and,” one expresses the main idea and the other qualifies it.

[3:9]  ¹³ tc The translation reads the form as a causative (Hiphil, תַּהֲנֵף, tahanef) with some of the versions in place of the simple stative (Qal, תֶּחֱנַף, tekhenaf) in the MT.

[3:9]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “because of the lightness of her prostitution, she defiled the land and committed adultery with stone and wood.”

[18:27]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “for all these abominations the men of the land who were before you have done.”

[18:28]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “And the land will not vomit you out in your defiling it.”

[18:28]  ¹⁷ tc The MT reads the singular “nation” and is followed by ASV, NASB, NRSV; the LXX, Syriac, and Targum have the plural “nations” (cf. v. 24).

[106:38]  ¹⁸ sn Num 35:33-34 explains that bloodshed defiles a land.

[24:5]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “beneath”; cf. KJV, ASV, NRSV “under”; NAB “because of.”

[24:5]  ²⁰ sn Isa 26:21 suggests that the earth’s inhabitants defiled the earth by shedding the blood of their fellow human beings. See also Num 35:33-34, which assumes that bloodshed defiles a land.

[24:5]  ²¹ tn Heb “moved past [the?] regulation.”

[24:5]  ²² tn Or “everlasting covenant” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NAB “the ancient covenant”; CEV “their agreement that was to last forever.”

[2:10]  ²³ tn Heb “Arise and go!” These imperatives are rhetorical. Those who wrongly drove widows and orphans from their homes and land inheritances will themselves be driven out of the land (cf. Isa 5:8-17). This is an example of poetic justice.

[2:10]  ²⁴ tn Heb “for this is no resting place.” The Lord speaks to the oppressors.

[2:10]  ²⁵ tn Heb “uncleanness will destroy, and destruction will be severe.”

[3:1]  ²⁶ tn The present translation assumes מֹרְאָה (mor’ah) is derived from רֹאִי (ro’i,“excrement”; see Jastrow 1436 s.v. רֳאִי). The following participle, “stained,” supports this interpretation (cf. NEB “filthy and foul”; NRSV “soiled, defiled”). Another option is to derive the form from מָרָה (marah, “to rebel”); in this case the term should be translated “rebellious” (cf. NASB, NIV “rebellious and defiled”). This idea is supported by v. 2. For discussion of the two options, see HALOT 630 s.v. I מרא and J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah (OTL), 206.

[3:1]  ²⁷ tn Heb “Woe, soiled and stained one, oppressive city.” The verb “is finished” is supplied in the second line. On the Hebrew word הוֹי (hoy, “ah, woe”), see the note on the word “dead” in 2:5.

[3:2]  ²⁸ tn Heb “she does not hear a voice” Refusing to listen is equated with disobedience.

[3:2]  ²⁹ tn Heb “she does not receive correction.” The Hebrew phrase, when negated, refers elsewhere to rejecting verbal advice (Jer 17:23; 32:33; 35:13) and refusing to learn from experience (Jer 2:30; 5:3).

[3:2]  ³⁰ tn Heb “draw near to.” The present translation assumes that the expression “draw near to” refers to seeking God’s will (see 1 Sam 14:36).

[3:3]  ³¹ tn Or “officials.”

[3:3]  ³² tn Heb “her princes in her midst are roaring lions.” The metaphor has been translated as a simile (“as fierce as”) for clarity.

[3:3]  ³³ tn Traditionally “judges.”

[3:3]  ³⁴ tn Heb “her judges [are] wolves of the evening,” that is, wolves that prowl at night. The translation assumes an emendation to עֲרָבָה (’aravah, “desert”). For a discussion of this and other options, see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 128. The metaphor has been translated as a simile (“as hungry as”) for clarity.

[3:3]  ³⁵ tn Heb “they do not gnaw [a bone] at morning.” The precise meaning of the line is unclear. The statement may mean these wolves devour their prey so completely that not even a bone is left to gnaw by the time morning arrives. For a discussion of this and other options, see Adele Berlin, Zephaniah (AB 25A), 129.

[3:4]  ³⁶ sn Applied to prophets, the word פֹּחֲזִים (pokhazim, “proud”) probably refers to their audacity in passing off their own words as genuine prophecies from the Lord (see Jer 23:32).

[3:4]  ³⁷ tn Or “defile the temple.”

[3:4]  ³⁸ tn Heb “they treat violently [the] law.”

[3:5]  ³⁹ tn The word “resides” is supplied for clarification.

[3:5]  ⁴⁰ tn Or “he does no injustice.”

[3:5]  ⁴¹ tn Heb “gives”; or “dispenses.”

[3:5]  ⁴² tn Heb “at the light he is not missing.” Note that NASB (which capitalizes pronouns referring to Deity) has divided the lines differently: “Every morning He brings His justice to light; // He does not fail.”