Jeremiah 11:21

11:21 Then the Lord told me about ¹  some men from Anathoth ²  who were threatening to kill me. ³  They had threatened, ⁴  “Stop prophesying in the name of the Lord or we will kill you!” ⁵ 

Jeremiah 32:7-9

32:7 ‘Hanamel, the son of your uncle Shallum, will come to you soon. He will say to you, “Buy my field at Anathoth because you are entitled ⁶  as my closest relative to buy it.”’ ⁷  32:8 Now it happened just as the Lord had said! My cousin Hanamel ⁸  came to me in the courtyard of the guardhouse. He said to me, ‘Buy my field which is at Anathoth in the territory of the tribe of Benjamin. Buy it for yourself since you are entitled as my closest relative to take possession of it for yourself.’ When this happened, I recognized that the Lord had indeed spoken to me. 32:9 So I bought the field at Anathoth from my cousin Hanamel. I weighed out seven ounces of silver and gave it to him to pay for it. ⁹ 

Joshua 21:17-18

21:17 From the tribe of Benjamin they assigned ¹⁰  Gibeon, Geba, 21:18 Anathoth, and Almon, along with the grazing areas of each – a total of four cities.

Joshua 21:1

Levitical Cities

21:1 The tribal leaders of the Levites went before Eleazar the priest and Joshua son of Nun and the Israelite tribal leaders

Joshua 6:1

6:1 Now Jericho ¹¹  was shut tightly ¹²  because of the Israelites. No one was allowed to leave or enter. ¹³ 

¹ tn Heb “Therefore thus says the Lord.” This phrase is anticipatory of the same phrase at the beginning of v. 22 and is introductory to what the Lord says about them. The translation seeks to show the connection of the “therefore” which is sometimes rather loose (cf. BDB 487 s.v. כֵּן 3.d[b]) with the actual response which is not given until v. 22.

² tn Heb “the men of Anathoth.” However, this does not involve all of the people, only the conspirators. The literal might lead to confusion later since v. 21 mentions that there will not be any of them left alive. However, it is known from Ezra 2:23 that there were survivors.

³ tc The MT reads the 2nd person masculine singular suffix “your life,” but LXX reflects an alternative reading of the 1st person common singular suffix “my life.”

⁴ tn Heb “who were seeking my life, saying…” The sentence is broken up in conformity with contemporary English style.

⁵ tn Heb “or you will die by our hand.”

⁶ tn Heb “your right.” The term מִשְׁפָּט (mishpat) here and in v. 8 refers to legal entitlement for the option to purchase a property (BDB 1049 s.v. מִשְׁפָּט 5; cf. Deut 21:17).

⁷ sn Underlying this request are the laws of redemption of property spelled out in Lev 25:25-34 and illustrated in Ruth 4:3-4. Under these laws, if a property owner became impoverished and had to sell his land, the nearest male relative had the right and duty to buy it so that it would not pass out of the use of the extended family. The land, however, would not actually belong to Jeremiah because in the year of Jubilee it reverted to its original owner. All Jeremiah was actually buying was the right to use it (Lev 25:13-17). Buying the field, thus, did not make any sense (thus Jeremiah’s complaint in v. 25) other than the fact that the Lord intended to use Jeremiah’s act as a symbol of a restored future in the land.

⁸ tn Heb “And according to the word of the Lord my cousin Hanamel came to me to the courtyard of the guardhouse and said, ‘…’” The sentence has been broken down to conform better with contemporary English style.

⁹ tn Heb “I weighed out the money [more literally, “silver”] for him, seventeen shekels of silver.”

¹⁰ tn The words “they assigned” are supplied for clarification (also in vv. 23, 25).

¹¹ map For location see Map5-B2; Map6-E1; Map7-E1; Map8-E3; Map10-A2; Map11-A1.

¹² tn Heb “was shutting and shut up.” HALOT 2:743 paraphrases, “blocking [any way of access] and blocked [against any who would leave].”

¹³ tn Heb “there was no one going out and there was no one coming in.”