Jeremiah 16:6

16:6 Rich and poor alike will die in this land. They will not be buried or mourned. People will not cut their bodies or shave off their hair to show their grief for them. ¹ 

Jeremiah 8:2

8:2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon and the stars. ²  These are things they ³  adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance, ⁴  from which they sought guidance, and worshiped. The bones of these people ⁵  will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 16:4

16:4 They will die of deadly diseases. No one will mourn for them. They will not be buried. Their dead bodies will lie like manure spread on the ground. They will be killed in war or die of starvation. Their corpses will be food for the birds and wild animals.

Jeremiah 19:11

19:11 Tell them the Lord who rules over all says, ⁷  ‘I will do just as Jeremiah has done. ⁸  I will smash this nation and this city as though it were a potter’s vessel which is broken beyond repair. ⁹  The dead will be buried here in Topheth until there is no more room to bury them.’ ¹⁰ 

Jeremiah 25:33

25:33 Those who have been killed by the Lord at that time

will be scattered from one end of the earth to the other.

They will not be mourned over, gathered up, or buried. ¹¹ 

Their dead bodies will lie scattered over the ground like manure.

¹ sn These were apparently pagan customs associated with mourning (Isa 15:2; Jer 47:5) which were forbidden in Israel (Lev 19:8; 21:5) but apparently practiced anyway (Jer 41:5).

² tc MT, 4QJer^a and LXX read “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJer^c reads “the sun and all the stars.”

³ tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”

⁴ tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

⁵ tn Heb “they will not” but the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.

⁶ tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”

³ tn Heb “Thus says Yahweh of armies.” For this title see the study note on 2:19. The translation attempts to avoid the confusion of embedding quotes within quotes by reducing this one to an indirect quote.

⁴ tn The adverb “Thus” or “Like this” normally points back to something previously mentioned. See, e.g., Exod 29:35; Num 11:15; 15:11; Deut 25:9.

⁵ tn Heb “Like this I will break this people and this city, just as one breaks the vessel of a potter which is not able to be repaired.”

⁶ sn See Jer 7:22-23 for parallels.

⁴ sn The intent here is to emphasize the large quantity of those who are killed – there will be too many to insure proper mourning rites and proper burial.