2:17 You have brought all this on yourself, Israel, 1
by deserting the Lord your God when he was leading you along the right path. 2
2:18 What good will it do you 3 then 4 to go down to Egypt
to seek help from the Egyptians? 5
What good will it do you 6 to go over to Assyria
to seek help from the Assyrians? 7
2:19 Your own wickedness will bring about your punishment.
Your unfaithful acts will bring down discipline on you. 8
Know, then, and realize how utterly harmful 9
it was for you to reject me, the Lord your God, 10
to show no respect for me,” 11
says the Lord God who rules over all. 12
4:17 They will surround Jerusalem 13
like men guarding a field 14
because they have rebelled against me,”
says the Lord.
4:18 “The way you have lived and the things you have done 15
will bring this on you.
This is the punishment you deserve, and it will be painful indeed. 16
The pain will be so bad it will pierce your heart.” 17
5:29 I will certainly punish them for doing such things!” says the Lord.
“I will certainly bring retribution on such a nation as this! 22
9:12 I said, 23
“Who is wise enough to understand why this has happened? 24
Who has a word from the Lord that can explain it? 25
Why does the land lie in ruins?
Why is it as scorched as a desert through which no one travels?”
9:13 The Lord answered, “This has happened because these people have rejected my laws which I gave them. They have not obeyed me or followed those laws. 26 9:14 Instead they have followed the stubborn inclinations of their own hearts. They have paid allegiance to 27 the gods called Baal, 28 as their fathers 29 taught them to do.
11:17 For though I, the Lord who rules over all, 30 planted you in the land, 31
I now decree that disaster will come on you 32
because the nations of Israel and Judah have done evil
and have made me angry by offering sacrifices to the god Baal.” 33
“O my God, I am ashamed and embarrassed to lift my face to you, my God! For our iniquities have climbed higher than our heads, and our guilt extends to the heavens. 9:7 From the days of our fathers until this very day our guilt has been great. Because of our iniquities we, along with our kings and 48 priests, have been delivered over by the local kings 49 to sword, captivity, plunder, and embarrassment – right up to the present time.
9:8 “But now briefly 50 we have received mercy from the Lord our God, in that he has left us a remnant and has given us a secure position 51 in his holy place. Thus our God has enlightened our eyes 52 and has given us a little relief in our time of servitude. 9:9 Although we are slaves, our God has not abandoned us in our servitude. He has extended kindness to us in the sight of the kings of Persia, in that he has revived us 53 to restore the temple of our God and to raise 54 up its ruins and to give us a protective wall in Judah and Jerusalem. 55
9:10 “And now what are we able to say after this, our God? For we have forsaken your commandments 9:11 which you commanded us through your servants the prophets with these words: 56 ‘The land that you are entering to possess is a land defiled by the impurities of the local residents! 57 With their abominations they have filled it from one end to the other with their filthiness.
ח (Khet)
1:8 Jerusalem committed terrible sin; 59
therefore she became an object of scorn. 60
All who admired 61 her have despised her 62
because they have seen her nakedness. 63
She groans aloud 64
and turns away in shame. 65
מ (Mem)
4:13 But it happened 66 due to the sins of her prophets 67
and the iniquities of her priests,
who poured out in her midst
the blood of the righteous.
8:17 He said to me, “Do you see, son of man? Is it a trivial thing that the house of Judah commits these abominations they are practicing here? For they have filled the land with violence and provoked me to anger still further. Look, they are putting the branch to their nose! 68 8:18 Therefore I will act with fury! My eye will not pity them nor will I spare 69 them. When they have shouted in my ears, I will not listen to them.”
9:9 He said to me, “The sin of the house of Israel and Judah is extremely great; the land is full of murder, and the city is full of corruption, 70 for they say, ‘The Lord has abandoned the land, and the Lord does not see!’ 71
22:30 “I looked for a man from among them who would repair the wall and stand in the gap before me on behalf of the land, so that I would not destroy it, but I found no one. 78 22:31 So I have poured my anger on them, and destroyed them with the fire of my fury. I hereby repay them for what they have done, 79 declares the sovereign Lord.”
7:13 “‘It then came about that just as I 81 cried out, but they would not obey, so they will cry out, but I will not listen,’ the Lord Lord who rules over all had said.
1 tn Heb “Are you not bringing this on yourself.” The question is rhetorical and expects a positive answer.
2 tn Heb “at the time of leading you in the way.”
3 tn Heb “What to you to the way.”
4 tn The introductory particle וְעַתָּה (vÿ’attah, “and now”) carries a logical, not temporal, connotation here (cf. BDB 274 s.v. עַתָּה 2.b).
5 tn Heb “to drink water from the Shihor [a branch of the Nile].” The reference is to seeking help through political alliance with Egypt as opposed to trusting in God for help. This is an extension of the figure in 2:13.
6 tn Heb “What to you to the way.”
7 tn Heb “to drink water from the River [a common designation in biblical Hebrew for the Euphrates River].” This refers to seeking help through political alliance. See the preceding note.
8 tn Or “teach you a lesson”; Heb “rebuke/chide you.”
9 tn Heb “how evil and bitter.” The reference is to the consequences of their acts. This is a figure of speech (hendiadys) where two nouns or adjectives joined by “and” introduce a main concept modified by the other noun or adjective.
10 tn Heb “to leave the
11 tn Heb “and no fear of me was on you.”
12 tn Heb “the Lord Yahweh, [the God of] hosts.” For the title Lord
13 tn Heb “will surround her.” The antecedent is Jerusalem in the preceding verse. The referent is again made explicit in the translation to avoid any possible lack of clarity. The verb form here is a form of the verb that emphasizes the fact as being as good as done (i.e., it is a prophetic perfect).
14 sn There is some irony involved in the choice of the simile since the men guarding a field were there to keep thieves from getting in and stealing the crops. Here the besiegers are guarding the city to keep people from getting out.
15 tn Heb “Your way and your deeds.”
16 tn Heb “How bitter!”
17 tn Heb “Indeed, it reaches to your heart.” The subject must be the pain alluded to in the last half of the preceding line; the verb is masculine, agreeing with the adjective translated “painful.” The only other possible antecedent “punishment” is feminine.
18 tn The word, “Jeremiah,” is not in the text but the second person address in the second half of the verse is obviously to him. The word is supplied in the translation here for clarity.
19 tn The MT reads the second masculine plural; this is probably a case of attraction to the second masculine plural pronoun in the preceding line. An alternative would be to understand a shift from speaking first to the people in the first half of the verse and then speaking to Jeremiah in the second half where the verb is second masculine singular. E.g., “When you [people] say, “Why…?” then you, Jeremiah, tell them…”
20 tn Heb “As you left me and…, so you will….” The translation was chosen so as to break up a rather long and complex sentence.
21 sn This is probably a case of deliberate ambiguity (double entendre). The adjective “foreigners” is used for both foreign people (so Jer 30:8; 51:51) and foreign gods (so Jer 2:25; 3:13). See also Jer 16:13 for the idea of having to serve other gods in the lands of exile.
22 tn Heb “Should I not punish…? Should I not bring retribution…?” The rhetorical questions function as emphatic declarations.
23 tn The words, “I said” are not in the text. It is not clear that a shift in speaker has taken place. However, the words of the verse are very unlikely to be a continuation of the
24 tn Heb “Who is the wise man that he may understand this?”
25 tn Heb “And [who is the man] to whom the mouth of the
26 tn Heb “and they have not walked in it (with “it” referring to “my law”).
27 tn Heb “they have gone/followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.
28 tn Heb “the Baals,” referring either to the pagan gods called “Baals” or the images of Baal (so NLT).
29 tn Or “forefathers,” or “ancestors.” Here the referent could be the immediate parents or, by their example, more distant ancestors.
30 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”
31 tn The words “in the land” are not in the text but are supplied in the translation to clarify the meaning of the metaphor.
32 tn Heb “For Yahweh of armies who planted you speaks disaster upon you.” Because of the way the term
33 tn Heb “pronounced disaster…on account of the evil of the house of Israel and the house of Judah which they have done to make me angry [or thus making me angry] by sacrificing to Baal.” The lines have been broken up in conformity with contemporary English style.
34 tn These two sentences have been recast in English to break up a long Hebrew sentence and incorporate the oracular formula “says the
35 tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 12, 13, 15, 19).
36 tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the explanation of the idiom.
37 tn Heb “But me they have abandoned and my law they have not kept.” The objects are thrown forward to bring out the contrast which has rhetorical force. However, such a sentence in English would be highly unnatural.
38 sn For the argumentation here compare Jer 7:23-26.
39 map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.
40 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.”
41 sn Careful comparison of the use of this term throughout this passage and comparison with 7:31-33 which is parallel to several verses in this passage will show that the reference is to the Valley of Ben Hinnom which will become a Valley of Slaughter (see v. 6 and 7:32).
42 tn Heb “which everyone who hears it [or about it] his ears will ring.” This is proverbial for a tremendous disaster. See 1 Sam 3:11; 2 Kgs 21:12 for similar prophecies.
43 tn The text merely has “they.” But since a reference is made later to “they” and “their ancestors,” the referent must be to the people that the leaders of the people and leaders of the priests represent.
44 sn Heb “have made this city foreign.” The verb here is one that is built off of the noun and adjective which relate to foreign nations. Comparison may be made to Jer 2:21 where the adjective refers to the strange, wild vine as opposed to the choice vine the
45 tn Heb “fathers.”
46 tn Heb “the blood of innocent ones.” This must be a reference to child sacrifice as explained in the next verse. Some have seen a reference to the sins of social injustice alluded to in 2 Kgs 21:16 and 24:4 but those are connected with the city itself. Hence the word children is supplied in the translation to make the referent explicit.
47 tn Heb “I said.”
48 tc The MT lacks “and” here, but see the LXX and Vulgate.
49 tn Heb “the kings of the lands.”
50 tn Heb “according to a little moment.”
51 tn Heb “a peg” or “tent peg.” The imagery behind this word is drawn from the experience of nomads who put down pegs as they pitched their tents and made camp after times of travel.
52 tn Heb “to cause our eyes to shine.” The expression is a figure of speech for “to revive.” See DCH 1:160 s.v. אור Hi.7.
53 tn Heb “has granted us reviving.”
54 tn Heb “to cause to stand.”
55 map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.
56 tn Heb “through your servants the prophets, saying.”
57 tn Heb “the peoples of the lands.”
58 tn Heb “you have done truth.”
59 tc The MT reads חֵטְא (khet’, “sin”), but the BHS editors suggest the vocalization חָטֹא (khato’, “sin”), Qal infinitive absolute.
60 tn Heb “she has become an object of head-nodding” (לְנִידָה הָיָתָה, lÿniydah hayatah). This reflects the ancient Near Eastern custom of shaking the head in scorn (e.g., Jer 18:16; Ps 44:15 [HT 14]), hence the translation “object of scorn.” There is debate whether נִידָה (nidah) means (1) “object of head-shaking” from נוּד (nud, “to shake,” BDB 626-27 s.v. נוּד); (2) “unclean thing” from נָדַה (nadah, “to be impure”); or (3) “wanderer” from נָדַד (nadad, “to wander,” BDB 622 s.v. I נָדַד). The LXX and Rashi connected it to נָדַד (nadad, “to wander”); however, several important early Greek recensions (Aquila and Symmachus) and Syriac translated it as “unclean thing.” The modern English versions are split: (1) “unclean thing” (NASB); “unclean” (NIV); (2) “a mockery” (NRSV).
61 sn The Piel participle of כָּבֵד (kaved) is infrequent and usually translated formulaically as those who honor someone. The feminine nuance may be best represented as “her admirers have despised her.”
62 tn The verb הִזִּילוּהָ (hizziluha) is generally understood as a rare form of Hiphil perfect 3rd person common plural + 3rd person feminine singular suffix from I זָלַל (zalal, “to despise”): “they despise her.” This follows the I nun (ן) pattern with daghesh (dot) in zayin (ז) rather than the expected geminate pattern הִזִילּוּהָ (hizilluha) with daghesh in lamed (ל) (GKC 178-79 §67.l).
63 sn The expression have seen her nakedness is a common metaphor to describe the plunder and looting of a city by a conquering army, probably drawn on the ignominious and heinous custom of raping the women of a conquered city as well.
64 tn Heb “groan” or “sigh.” The verb אָנַח (’anakh, appearing only in Niphal) means “sigh” (BDB 58 s.v. 1) or “groan” (HALOT 70-71 s.v.) as an expression of grief (Prov 29:2; Isa 24:7; Lam 1:4, 8; Ezek 9:4; 21:11). The word גַּם (gam) is usually a particle meaning “also,” but has been shown from Ugaritic to have the meaning “aloud.” See T. McDaniel, “Philological Studies in Lamentations, I-II,” Bib 49 (1968): 31-32.
65 tn Heb “and turns backward.”
66 tn These words do not appear in the Hebrew, but are supplied to make sense of the line. The introductory causal preposition מִן (min) (“because”) indicates that this phrase – or something like it – is implied through elision.
67 tn There is no main verb in the verse; it is an extended prepositional phrase. One must either assume a verbal idea such as “But it happened due to…” or connect it to the following verses, which themselves are quite difficult. The former option was employed in the present translation.
68 tn It is not clear what the practice of “holding a branch to the nose” indicates. A possible parallel is the Syrian relief of a king holding a flower to his nose as he worships the stars (ANEP 281). See L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 1:145-46. The LXX glosses the expression as “Behold, they are like mockers.”
69 tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.
70 tn Or “lawlessness” (NAB); “perversity” (NRSV). The Hebrew word occurs only here in the OT, and its meaning is uncertain. The similar phrase in 7:23 has a common word for “violence.”
71 sn The saying is virtually identical to that of the elders in Ezek 8:12.
72 tn Heb “a conspiracy of her prophets is in her midst.” The LXX reads “whose princes” rather than “a conspiracy of prophets.” The prophets are mentioned later in the paragraph (v. 28). If one follows the LXX in verse 25, then five distinct groups are mentioned in vv. 25-29: princes, priests, officials, prophets, and the people of the land. For a defense of the Septuagintal reading, see L. C. Allen, Ezekiel (WBC), 2:32, and D. I. Block, Ezekiel (NICOT), 1:720, n. 4.
73 tn Heb “her widows they have multiplied.” The statement alludes to their murderous acts.
74 tn Or “between the consecrated and the common.”
75 tn Heb “hide their eyes from.” The idiom means to disregard or ignore something or someone (see Lev 20:4; 1 Sam 12:3; Prov 28:27; Isa 1:15).
76 tn Heb “her prophets coat for themselves with whitewash.” The expression may be based on Ezek 13:10-15.
77 tn Heb “and the foreigner they have oppressed without justice.”
78 tn Heb “I did not find.”
79 tn Heb “their way on their head I have placed.”
80 tn The Hebrew term שָׁמִיר (shamir) means literally “hardness” and since it is said in Ezek 3:9 to be harder than flint, many scholars suggest that it refers to diamond. It is unlikely that diamond was known to ancient Israel, however, so probably a hard stone like emery or corundum is in view. The translation nevertheless uses “diamond” because in modern times it has become proverbial for its hardness. A number of English versions use “flint” here (e.g., NASB, NIV).
81 tn Heb “he.” Since the third person pronoun refers to the