59:3 For your hands are stained with blood
and your fingers with sin;
your lips speak lies,
your tongue utters malicious words.
59:4 No one is concerned about justice; 1
no one sets forth his case truthfully.
They depend on false words 2 and tell lies;
they conceive of oppression 3
and give birth to sin.
59:5 They hatch the eggs of a poisonous snake
and spin a spider’s web.
Whoever eats their eggs will die,
a poisonous snake is hatched. 4
59:6 Their webs cannot be used for clothing;
they cannot cover themselves with what they make.
Their deeds are sinful;
they commit violent crimes. 5
59:7 They are eager to do evil, 6
quick to shed innocent blood. 7
Their thoughts are sinful;
they crush and destroy. 8
59:8 They are unfamiliar with peace;
their deeds are unjust. 9
They use deceitful methods,
and whoever deals with them is unfamiliar with peace. 10
59:9 For this reason deliverance 11 is far from us 12
and salvation does not reach us.
We wait for light, 13 but see only darkness; 14
we wait for 15 a bright light, 16 but live 17 in deep darkness. 18
59:10 We grope along the wall like the blind,
we grope like those who cannot see; 19
we stumble at noontime as if it were evening.
Though others are strong, we are like dead men. 20
59:11 We all growl like bears,
we coo mournfully like doves;
we wait for deliverance, 21 but there is none,
for salvation, but it is far from us.
59:12 For you are aware of our many rebellious deeds, 22
and our sins testify against us;
indeed, we are aware of our rebellious deeds;
we know our sins all too well. 23
59:13 We have rebelled and tried to deceive the Lord;
we turned back from following our God.
We stir up 24 oppression and rebellion;
we tell lies we concocted in our minds. 25
59:14 Justice is driven back;
godliness 26 stands far off.
Indeed, 27 honesty stumbles in the city square
and morality is not even able to enter.
59:15 Honesty has disappeared;
the one who tries to avoid evil is robbed.
The Lord watches and is displeased, 28
for there is no justice.
9:2 (9:1) I wish I had a lodging place in the desert
where I could spend some time like a weary traveler. 29
Then I would desert my people
and walk away from them
because they are all unfaithful to God,
a congregation 30 of people that has been disloyal to him. 31
9:3 The Lord says, 32
“These people are like soldiers who have readied their bows.
Their tongues are always ready to shoot out lies. 33
They have become powerful in the land,
but they have not done so by honest means. 34
Indeed, they do one evil thing after another 35
and do not pay attention to me. 36
9:4 Everyone must be on his guard around his friends.
He must not even trust any of his relatives. 37
For every one of them will find some way to cheat him. 38
And all of his friends will tell lies about him.
9:5 One friend deceives another
and no one tells the truth.
These people have trained themselves 39 to tell lies.
They do wrong and are unable to repent.
9:6 They do one act of violence after another,
and one deceitful thing after another. 40
They refuse to pay attention to me,” 41
says the Lord.
9:8 Their tongues are like deadly arrows. 42
They are always telling lies. 43
Friendly words for their neighbors come from their mouths.
But their minds are thinking up ways to trap them. 44
7:1 whenever I want to heal Israel,
the sin of Ephraim is revealed,
and the evil deeds of Samaria are exposed.
For they do what is wrong;
thieves break into houses,
and gangs rob people out in the streets.
7:13 Woe to them! For they have fled from me!
Destruction to them! For they have rebelled against me!
I want to deliver 45 them,
but they have lied to me.
3:13 “Their throats are open graves, 46
they deceive with their tongues,
the poison of asps is under their lips.” 47
1 tn Heb “no one pleads with justice.”
2 tn Heb “nothing”; NAB “emptiness.”
3 tn Or “trouble” (NIV), or “harm.”
4 tn Heb “that which is pressed in hatches [as] a snake.”
5 tn Heb “their deeds are deeds of sin, and the work of violence [is] in their hands.”
6 tn Heb “their feet run to evil.”
7 tn Heb “they quickly pour out innocent blood.”
8 tn Heb “their thoughts are thoughts of sin, destruction and crushing [are] in their roadways.”
9 tn Heb “a way of peace they do not know, and there is no justice in their pathways.”
10 tn Heb “their paths they make crooked, everyone who walks in it does not know peace.”
11 tn מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat), which refers to “justice” in the earlier verses, here refers to “justice from God,” or “vindication.” Because the people are unjust, God refuses to vindicate them before their enemies. See v. 11.
12 sn The prophet speaks on behalf of the sinful nation and confesses its sins.
13 sn Light here symbolizes prosperity and blessing.
14 tn Heb “but, look, darkness”; NIV “but all is darkness.”
15 tn The words “we wait for” are supplied in the translation; the verb is understood by ellipsis (note the preceding line).
16 tn The plural noun form may indicate degree here.
17 tn Or “walk about”; NCV “all we have is darkness.”
18 tn The plural noun form may indicate degree here.
19 tn Heb “like there are no eyes.”
20 tn Heb among the strong, like dead men.”
21 tn See the note at v. 9.
22 tn Heb “for many are our rebellious deeds before you.”
23 tn Heb “indeed [or “for”] our rebellious deeds (are) with us, and our sins, we know them.”
24 tn Heb “speaking.” A new sentence was started here in the translation for stylistic reasons.
25 tn Heb “conceiving and uttering from the heart words of falsehood.”
26 tn Or “righteousness” (ASV, NASB, NIV, NRSV); KJV, NAB “justice.”
27 tn Or “for” (KJV, NRSV).
28 tn Heb “and it is displeasing in his eyes.”
29 tn Heb “I wish I had in the desert a lodging place [inn, or place to spend the night] for travelers.”
30 tn Or “bunch,” but this loses the irony; the word is used for the solemn assemblies at the religious feasts.
31 tn Heb “they are all adulterers, a congregation of unfaithful people.” However, spiritual adultery is, of course, meant, not literal adultery. So the literal translation would be misleading.
32 tn The words “The
33 tn Heb “They have readied [or strung] their tongue as their bow for lies.”
34 tn Heb “but not through honesty.”
35 tn Heb “they go from evil to evil.”
36 tn Or “do not acknowledge me”; Heb “do not know me.” But “knowing” in Hebrew thought often involves more than intellectual knowledge; it involves emotional and volitional commitment as well. For יָדַע meaning “acknowledge” see 1 Chr 28:9; Isa 29:21; Hos 2:20; Prov 3:6. This word is also found in ancient Near Eastern treaty contexts where it has the idea of a vassal king acknowledging the sovereignty of a greater king (cf. H. Huffmon, “The Treaty Background of Hebrew yada,” BASOR 181 [1966]: 31-37).
37 tn Heb “Be on your guard…Do not trust.” The verbs are second masculine plural of direct address and there seems no way to translate literally and not give the mistaken impression that Jeremiah is being addressed. This is another example of the tendency in Hebrew style to turn from description to direct address (a figure of speech called apostrophe).
38 tn Heb “cheating, each of them will cheat.”
39 tn Heb “their tongues.” However, this is probably not a natural idiom in contemporary English and the tongue may stand as a part for the whole anyway.
40 tc An alternate reading for vv. 5d-6b is: “They wear themselves out doing wrong. Jeremiah, you live in the midst of deceitful people. They deceitfully refuse to take any thought of/acknowledge me.” The translation which has been adopted is based on a redivision of the lines, a redivision of some of the words, and a revocalization of some of the consonants. The MT reads literally “doing wrong they weary themselves. Your sitting in the midst of deceit; in deceit they refuse to know me” (הַעֲוֵה נִלְאוּ׃ שִׁבְתְּךָ בְּתוֹךְ מִרְמָה בְּמִרְמָה מֵאֲנוּ דַעַת־אוֹתִי). The Greek version reads literally “they do wrong and they do not cease to turn themselves around. Usury upon usury and deceit upon deceit. They do not want to know me.” This suggests that one should read the Hebrew text as שֻׁב׃ תֹּךְ בְּתוֹךְ מִרְ־מָה בְּמִרְ־מָה מֵאֲנוּ דַעַת אוֹתִי הַעֲוֵה נִלְאוּ, which translated literally yields “doing evil [= “they do evil” using the Hiphil infinitive absolute as a finite verb (cf. GKC 346 §113.ff)] they are not able [cf. KBL 468 s.v. לָאָה Niph.3 and see Exod 7:18 for parallel use] to repent. Oppression on oppression [cf. BDB 1067 s.v. תֹּךְ, II תּוֹךְ]; deceit on deceit. They refuse to know me.” This reading has ancient support and avoids the introduction of an unexpected second masculine suffix into the context. It has been adopted here along with a number of modern commentaries (cf., e.g., W. McKane, Jeremiah [ICC], 1:201) and English versions as the more likely reading.
41 tn Or “do not acknowledge me”; Heb “do not know me.” See the note on the phrase “do not take any thought of me” in 9:3.
42 tc This reading follows the Masoretic consonants (the Kethib, a Qal active participle from שָׁחַט, shakhat). The Masoretes preferred to read “a sharpened arrow” (the Qere, a Qal passive participle from the same root or a homonym, meaning “hammered, beaten”). See HALOT 1354 s.v. II שָׁחַט for discussion. The exact meaning of the word makes little difference to the meaning of the metaphor itself.
43 tn Heb “They speak deceit.”
44 tn Heb “With his mouth a person speaks peace to his neighbor, but in his heart he sets an ambush for him.”
45 tn Heb “redeem” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NCV, TEV “save”; CEV “I would have rescued them.”
46 tn Grk “their throat is an opened grave.”
47 sn A quotation from Pss 5:9; 140:3.