15:9 The mother who had seven children 1 will grow faint.
All the breath will go out of her. 2
Her pride and joy will be taken from her in the prime of their life.
It will seem as if the sun had set while it was still day. 3
She will suffer shame and humiliation. 4
I will cause any of them who are still left alive
to be killed in war by the onslaughts of their enemies,” 5
says the Lord.
49:37 I will make the people of Elam terrified of their enemies,
who are seeking to kill them.
I will vent my fierce anger
and bring disaster upon them,” 13 says the Lord. 14
“I will send armies chasing after them 15
until I have completely destroyed them.
1 tn Heb “who gave birth to seven.”
2 tn The meaning of this line is debated. Some understand this line to mean “she has breathed out her life” (cf., e.g., BDB 656 s.v. נָפַח and 656 s.v. ֶנפֶשׁ 1.c). However, as several commentaries have noted (e.g., W. McKane, Jeremiah [ICC], 1:341; J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 109) it makes little sense to talk about her suffering shame and embarrassment if she has breathed her last. Both the Greek and Latin versions understand “soul” not as the object but as the subject and the idea being one of fainting under despair. This idea seems likely in light of the parallelism. Bright suggests the phrase means either “she gasped out her breath” or “her throat gasped.” The former is more likely. One might also render “she fainted dead away,” but that idiom might not be familiar to all readers.
3 tn Heb “Her sun went down while it was still day.”
4 sn She has lost her position of honor and the source of her pride. For the concepts here see 1 Sam 2:5.
5 tn Heb “I will deliver those of them that survive to the sword before their enemies.” The referent of “them” is ambiguous. Does it refer to the children of the widow (nearer context) or the people themselves (more remote context, v. 7)? Perhaps it was meant to include both. Verse seven spoke of the destruction of the people and the killing off of the children.
6 sn There is perhaps a two-fold wordplay in the use of this word. One involves the sound play with the word for “jar,” which has been explained as a water decanter. The word here is בַקֹּתִי (vaqqoti). The word for jar in v. 1 is בַקְבֻּק (vaqbuq). There may also be a play on the literal use of this word to refer to the laying waste or destruction of a land (see Isa 24:3; Nah 2:3). Many modern commentaries think that at this point Jeremiah emptied out the contents of the jar, symbolizing the “emptying” out of their plans.
7 sn This refers to the fact that they will die in battle. The sword would be only one of the weapons that strikes them down. It is one of the trio of “sword,” “starvation,” and “disease” which were the concomitants of war referred to so often in the book of Jeremiah. Starvation is referred to in v. 9.
8 tn Heb “I will cause them to fall by the sword before their enemies and in the hand of those who seek their soul [= life].” In this context the two are meant as obvious qualifications of one entity, not two. Some rearrangement of the qualifiers had to be made in the English translation to convey this.
11 tn This verse has been restructured to try to bring out the proper thought and subordinations reflected in the verse without making the sentence too long and complex in English: Heb “I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters. And they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and in the straits which their enemies who are seeking their lives reduce them to.” This also shows the agency through which God’s causation was effected, i.e., the siege.
16 tn Heb “I will make you an object of terror to both you and your friends.”
17 tn Heb “And they will fall by the sword of their enemies and [with] your eyes seeing [it].”
21 tn Heb “Take them [the goods, etc.] as plunder and seize them.”
26 tn Heb “I will bring disaster upon them, even my fierce anger.”
27 tn Heb “Oracle of the
28 tn Heb “I will send the sword after them.”
31 tn Heb “And afterward.”
32 tn Heb “oracle of the