Deuteronomy 8:19

8:19 Now if you forget the Lord your God at all ¹  and follow other gods, worshiping and prostrating yourselves before them, I testify to you today that you will surely be annihilated.

Deuteronomy 11:28

11:28 and the curse if you pay no attention ²  to his ³  commandments and turn from the way I am setting before ⁴  you today to pursue ⁵  other gods you have not known.

Exodus 34:14-16

34:14 For you must not worship ⁶  any other god, ⁷  for the Lord, whose name ⁸  is Jealous, is a jealous God. 34:15 Be careful ⁹  not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, for when ¹⁰  they prostitute themselves ¹¹  to their gods and sacrifice to their gods, and someone invites you, ¹²  you will eat from his sacrifice; 34:16 and you then take ¹³  his daughters for your sons, and when his daughters prostitute themselves to their gods, they will make your sons prostitute themselves to their gods as well.

Jeremiah 25:6

25:6 Do not pay allegiance to ¹⁴  other gods and worship and serve them. Do not make me angry by the things that you do. ¹⁵  Then I will not cause you any harm.’

Jeremiah 25:1

Seventy Years of Servitude for Failure to Give Heed

25:1 In the fourth year that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was king of Judah, the Lord spoke to Jeremiah ¹⁶  concerning all the people of Judah. (That was the same as the first year that Nebuchadnezzar was king of Babylon.) ¹⁷ 

Jeremiah 5:21

5:21 Tell them: ‘Hear this,

you foolish people who have no understanding,

who have eyes but do not discern,

who have ears but do not perceive: ¹⁸ 

¹ tn Heb “if forgetting, you forget.” The infinitive absolute is used for emphasis; the translation indicates this with the words “at all” (cf. KJV).

² tn Heb “do not listen to,” that is, do not obey.

³ tn Heb “the commandments of the Lord your God.” The pronoun has been used in the translation for stylistic reasons to avoid redundancy.

⁴ tn Heb “am commanding” (so NASB, NRSV).

⁵ tn Heb “walk after”; NIV “by following”; NLT “by worshiping.” This is a violation of the first commandment, the most serious of the covenant violations (Deut 5:6-7).

⁶ tn Heb “bow down.”

⁷ sn In Exod 20:3 it was “gods.”

⁸ sn Here, too, the emphasis on God’s being a jealous God is repeated (see Exod 20:5). The use of “name” here is to stress that this is his nature, his character.

⁹ tn The sentence begins simply “lest you make a covenant”; it is undoubtedly a continuation of the imperative introduced earlier, and so that is supplied here.

¹⁰ tn The verb is a perfect with a vav consecutive. In the literal form of the sentence, this clause tells what might happen if the people made a covenant with the inhabitants of the land: “Take heed…lest you make a covenant…and then they prostitute themselves…and sacrifice…and invite…and you eat.” The sequence lays out an entire scenario.

¹¹ tn The verb זָנָה (zanah) means “to play the prostitute; to commit whoredom; to be a harlot” or something similar. It is used here and elsewhere in the Bible for departing from pure religion and engaging in pagan religion. The use of the word in this figurative sense is fitting, because the relationship between God and his people is pictured as a marriage, and to be unfaithful to it was a sin. This is also why God is described as a “jealous” or “impassioned” God. The figure may not be merely a metaphorical use, but perhaps a metonymy, since there actually was sexual immorality at the Canaanite altars and poles.

¹² tn There is no subject for the verb. It could be rendered “and one invites you,” or it could be made a passive.

¹³ tn In the construction this verb would follow as a possible outcome of the last event, and so remain in the verbal sequence. If the people participate in the festivals of the land, then they will intermarry, and that could lead to further involvement with idolatry.

¹⁴ tn Heb “follow after.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for this idiom.

¹⁵ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

¹⁶ tn Heb “The word was to Jeremiah.” It is implicit from the context that it was the Lord’s word. The verbal expression is more in keeping with contemporary English style.

¹⁷ sn The year referred to would be 605 b.c. Jehoiakim had been placed on the throne of Judah as a puppet king by Pharaoh Necho after the defeat of Josiah at Megiddo in 609 b.c. (2 Kgs 23:34-35). According to Jer 46:2 Nebuchadnezzar defeated Necho at Carchemish in that same year. After defeating Necho, Nebuchadnezzar had hurried back to Babylon where he was made king. After being made king he then returned to Judah and attacked Jerusalem (Dan 1:1. The date given there is the third year of Jehoiakim but scholars are generally agreed that the dating there is based on a different system than the one here. It did not count the part of the year before New Year’s day as an official part of the king’s official rule. Hence, the third year there is the fourth year here.) The identity of the foe from the north referred to in general terms (4:6; 6:1; 15:12) now becomes clear.

¹⁸ tn Heb “they have eyes but they do not see, they have ears but they do not hear.”