Jeremiah 25:12

25:12 “‘But when the seventy years are over, I will punish the king of Babylon and his nation ¹  for their sins. I will make the land of Babylon ²  an everlasting ruin. ³  I, the Lord, affirm it! ⁴ 

Jeremiah 27:7

27:7 All nations must serve him and his son and grandson ⁵  until the time comes for his own nation to fall. ⁶  Then many nations and great kings will in turn subjugate Babylon. ⁷ 

Jeremiah 27:22

27:22 He has said, ‘They will be carried off to Babylon. They will remain there until it is time for me to show consideration for them again. ⁸  Then I will bring them back and restore them to this place.’ I, the Lord, affirm this!” ⁹ 

Jeremiah 27:2

27:2 The Lord told me, ¹⁰  “Make a yoke ¹¹  out of leather straps and wooden crossbars and put it on your neck.

Jeremiah 36:21-23

36:21 The king sent Jehudi to get the scroll. He went and got it from the room of Elishama, the royal secretary. Then he himself ¹²  read it to the king and all the officials who were standing around him. 36:22 Since it was the ninth month of the year, the king was sitting in his winter quarters. ¹³  A fire was burning in the firepot in front of him. ¹⁴  36:23 As soon as Jehudi had read three or four columns ¹⁵  of the scroll, the king ¹⁶  would cut them off with a penknife ¹⁷  and throw them on the fire in the firepot. He kept doing so until the whole scroll was burned up in the fire. ¹⁸ 

Ezra 1:1-2

The Decree of Cyrus

1:1 ¹⁹ In the first ²⁰  year of King Cyrus of Persia, in order to fulfill the Lord’s message ²¹  spoken through ²²  Jeremiah, ²³  the Lord stirred the mind ²⁴  of King Cyrus of Persia. He disseminated ²⁵  a proclamation ²⁶  throughout his entire kingdom, announcing in a written edict ²⁷  the following: ²⁸ 

1:2 “Thus says King Cyrus of Persia:

“‘The Lord God of heaven has given me all the kingdoms of the earth. He has instructed me to build a temple ²⁹  for him in Jerusalem, ³⁰  which is in Judah.

Daniel 9:2

9:2 in the first year of his reign ³¹  I, Daniel, came to understand from the sacred books ³²  that, according to the word of the LORD ³³  disclosed to the prophet Jeremiah, the years for the fulfilling of the desolation of Jerusalem ³⁴  were seventy in number.

Zechariah 7:5

7:5 “Speak to all the people and priests of the land as follows: ‘When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and seventh ³⁵  months through all these seventy years, did you truly fast for me – for me, indeed?

¹ tn Heb “that nation.”

² tn Heb “the land of the Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for the use of the term “Chaldeans.”

³ tn Heb “I will visit upon the king of Babylon and upon that nation, oracle of the Lord, their iniquity even upon the land of the Chaldeans and I will make it everlasting ruins.” The sentence has been restructured to avoid ambiguity and to conform the style more to contemporary English.

⁴ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

⁵ sn This is a figure that emphasizes that they will serve for a long time but not for an unlimited duration. The kingdom of Babylon lasted a relatively short time by ancient standards. It lasted from 605 b.c. when Nebuchadnezzar defeated Necho at Carchemish until the fall of Babylon in 538 b.c. There were only four rulers. Nebuchadnezzar was succeeded by his son, Evil Merodach (cf. 52:31), and two other rulers who were not descended from him.

⁶ tn Heb “until the time of his land, even his, comes.” The independent pronoun is placed here for emphasis on the possessive pronoun. The word “time” is used by substitution for the things that are done in it (compare in the NT John 2:4; 7:30; 8:20 “his hour had not yet come”).

⁷ tn Heb “him.” This is a good example of the figure of substitution where the person is put for his descendants or the nation or subject he rules. (See Gen 28:13-14 for another good example and Acts 22:7 in the NT.)

⁹ tn This verb is a little difficult to render here. The word is used in the sense of taking note of something and acting according to what is noticed. It is the word that has been translated several times throughout Jeremiah as “punish [someone].” It is also used in the opposite of sense of taking note and “show consideration for” (or “care for;” see, e.g., Ruth 1:6). Here the nuance is positive and is further clarified by the actions that follow, bringing them back and restoring them.

¹⁰ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

¹³ tn There is some disjunction in the narrative of this chapter. The introduction in v. 1 presents this as a third person narrative. But the rest of the passage reports the narrative in first person. Thus the text reads here “Thus the Lord said to me…” In vv. 12, 16 the narrative picks up in first person report and never indicates that Jeremiah carried out the command in vv. 2-4 that introduces the message which he repeats in summary form himself to Zedekiah. The report is thus an “unedited” first person report. This may create some confusion for some readers, but it is best to leave it in first person here because of the continuation in vv. 12, 16.

¹⁴ sn The yoke is a common biblical symbol of political servitude (see, e.g., Deut 28:48; 1 Kgs 12:4, 9, 10). From the context of 1 Kgs 12 it is clear that it applied to taxation and the provision of conscript labor. In international political contexts it involved the payment of heavy tribute which was often conscripted from the citizens (see, e.g., 2 Kgs 15:19-20; 23:34-35) and the furnishing of military contingents for the sovereign’s armies (see, e.g., 2 Kgs 24:2). Jeremiah’s message here combines both a symbolic action (the wearing of a yoke) and words of explanation as in Jer 19:1-13. (See Isa 20:1-6 for an example outside of Jeremiah.) The casting off of the yoke has been used earlier in Jer 2:20, 5:5 to refer to Israel’s failure to remain spiritually “subject” or faithful to God.

¹⁷ tn Heb “and Jehudi read it.” However, Jehudi has been the subject of the preceding; so it would be awkward in English to use the personal subject. The translation has chosen to bring out the idea that Jehudi himself read it by using the reflexive.

²¹ tn Heb “in the autumn house.” Commentators are agreed that this was not a separate building or palace but the winter quarters in the palace.

²² tc Heb “the fire in the firepot was burning before him.” The translation assumes that the word “fire” (אֵשׁ, ’esh) has dropped out after the particle אֶת (’et) because of the similar beginnings of the two words. The word “fire” is found in the Greek, Syriac, and Targumic translations according to BHS. The particle אֵת should be retained rather than dropped as an erroneous writing of אֵשׁ. Its presence is to be explained as the usage of the sign of the accusative introducing a new subject (cf. BDB 85 s.v. אֶת 3.α and compare the usage in 27:8; 38:16 [in the Kethib]; 45:4).

²⁵ tn Heb “doors.” This is the only time the word “door” is used in this way but all the commentaries and lexicons agree that it means “columns.” The meaning is figurative based on the similarity of shape.

²⁶ tn Heb “he.” The majority of commentaries and English versions are agreed that “he” is the king. However, since a penknife (Heb “a scribe’s razor”) is used to cut the columns off, it is possible that Jehudi himself did it. However, even if Jehudi himself did it, he was acting on the king’s orders.

²⁷ sn Heb “a scribe’s razor.” There is some irony involved here since a scribe’s razor was used to trim the sheets to be sewn together, scrape them in preparation for writing, and to erase errors. What was normally used to prepare the scroll was used to destroy it.

²⁸ tn Heb “until the whole scroll was consumed upon the fire which was in the fire pot.”

²⁹ sn In addition to the canonical books of Ezra and Nehemiah, there are two deuterocanonical books that are also called “Ezra.” Exactly how these books are designated varies in ancient literature. In the Septuagint (LXX) canonical Ezra is called Second Esdras, but in the Latin Vulgate it is called First Esdras. Our Nehemiah is called Third Esdras in some manuscripts of the LXX, but it is known as Second Esdras in the Latin Vulgate. (In the earliest LXX manuscripts Ezra and Nehemiah were regarded as one book, as they were in some Hebrew manuscripts.) The deuterocanonical books of Ezra are called First and Fourth Esdras in the LXX, but Third and Fourth Esdras in the Latin Vulgate. The titles for the so-called books of Ezra are thus rather confusing, a fact that one must keep in mind when consulting this material.

³⁰ sn The first year of Cyrus would be ca. 539 B.C. Cyrus reigned in Persia from ca. 539-530 B.C.

³¹ tn Heb “the word of the Lord.”

³² tc The MT reads מִפִּי (mippi, “from the mouth of”), but this should probably be emended to בְּפִי (bÿfi, “by the mouth of”), which is the way the parallel passage in 2 Chr 36:22 reads. This is also reflected in the LXX, which is either reflecting an alternate textual tradition of בְּפִי or is attempting to harmonize Ezra 1:1 in light of 2 Chronicles.

³³ sn Cf. Jer 29:10; 25:11-14. Jeremiah had prophesied that after a time of seventy years the Jews would return “to this place.” How these seventy years are to be reckoned is a matter of debate among scholars. Some understand the period to refer to the approximate length of Babylon’s ascendancy as a world power, beginning either with the fall of Nineveh (612 b.c.) or with Nebuchadnezzar’s coronation (605 b.c.) and continuing till the fall of Babylon to the Persians in 539 b.c. Others take the seventy years to refer to the period from the destruction of the temple in 586 b.c. till its rebuilding in 516 b.c.

³⁴ tn Heb “spirit.” The Hebrew noun רוּחַ (ruakh, “spirit”) has a broad range of meanings (see BDB 924-26 s.v.). Here, it probably refers to (1) “mind” as the seat of mental acts (e.g., Exod 28:3; Deut 34:9; Isa 29:24; 40:13; Ezek 11:5; 20:32; 1 Chr 28:12; cf. BDB 925 s.v. 6) or (2) “will” as the seat of volitional decisions (e.g., Exod 35:5, 22; Pss 51:12, 14; 57:8; 2 Chr 29:31; cf. BDB 925 s.v. 7). So also in v. 5.

³⁵ tn Heb “caused to pass.”

³⁶ tn Heb “a voice.” The Hebrew noun קוֹל (qol, “voice, sound”) has a broad range of meanings, including the metonymical (cause – effect) nuance “proclamation” (e.g., Exod 36:6; 2 Chr 24:9; 30:5; 36:22; Ezra 1:1; 10:7; Neh 8:15). See BDB 877 s.v. 3.a.2.

³⁷ sn For an interesting extrabiblical parallel to this edict see the Cyrus cylinder (ANET 315-16).

³⁸ tn Heb “in writing, saying.”

³³ tn Heb “house.” The Hebrew noun בַּיִת (bayit, “house”) is often used in reference to the temple of Yahweh (BDB 108 s.v. 1.a). This is also frequent elsewhere in Ezra and Nehemiah (e.g., Ezra 1:3, 4, 5, 7; 2:68; 3:8, 9, 11, 12; 4:3; 6:22; 7:27; 8:17, 25, 29, 30, 33, 36; 9:9; 10:1, 6, 9).

³⁴ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

³⁷ tc This phrase, repeated from v. 1, is absent in Theodotion.

³⁸ tn The Hebrew text has “books”; the word “sacred” has been added in the translation to clarify that it is Scriptures that are referred to.

³⁹ sn The tetragrammaton (the four Hebrew letters which constitute the divine Name, YHWH) appears eight times in this chapter, and nowhere else in the book of Daniel.

⁴⁰ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁴¹ tn The seventh month apparently refers to the anniversary of the assassination of Gedaliah, governor of Judah (Jer 40:13-14; 41:1), in approximately 581 b.c.