Jeremiah 51:40

51:40 “I will lead them off to be slaughtered

like lambs, rams, and male goats.” ¹ 

Jeremiah 46:24

46:24 Poor dear Egypt ²  will be put to shame.

She will be handed over to the people from the north.”

Jeremiah 31:2

Israel Will Be Restored and Join Judah in Worship

31:2 The Lord says,

“The people of Israel who survived

death at the hands of the enemy ³ 

will find favor in the wilderness

as they journey to find rest for themselves.

Jeremiah 48:46

48:46 Moab, you are doomed! ⁴ 

You people who worship Chemosh will be destroyed.

Your sons will be taken away captive.

Your daughters will be carried away into exile. ⁵ 

Jeremiah 50:41

50:41 “Look! An army is about to come from the north.

A mighty nation and many kings ⁶  are stirring into action

in faraway parts of the earth.

Jeremiah 6:11

6:11 I am as full of anger as you are, Lord, ⁷ 

I am tired of trying to hold it in.”

The Lord answered, ⁸ 

“Vent it, then, ⁹  on the children who play in the street

and on the young men who are gathered together.

Husbands and wives are to be included, ¹⁰ 

as well as the old and those who are advanced in years.

Jeremiah 5:21

5:21 Tell them: ‘Hear this,

you foolish people who have no understanding,

who have eyes but do not discern,

who have ears but do not perceive: ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 6:22

6:22 “This is what the Lord says:

‘Beware! An army ¹²  is coming from a land in the north.

A mighty nation is stirring into action in faraway parts of the earth.

Jeremiah 25:2

25:2 So the prophet Jeremiah spoke to all the people of Judah and to all the people who were living in Jerusalem. ¹³ 

Jeremiah 34:19

34:19 I will punish the leaders of Judah and Jerusalem, the court officials, ¹⁴  the priests, and all the other people of the land who passed between the pieces of the calf. ¹⁵ 

Jeremiah 41:12

41:12 So they took all their troops and went to fight against Ishmael son of Nethaniah. They caught up with him near the large pool ¹⁶  at Gibeon.

Jeremiah 17:19

Observance of the Sabbath Day Is a Key to the Future ¹⁷ 

17:19 The Lord told me, “Go and stand in the People’s Gate ¹⁸  through which the kings of Judah enter and leave the city. Then go and stand in all the other gates of the city of Jerusalem. ¹⁹ 

Jeremiah 25:1

Seventy Years of Servitude for Failure to Give Heed

25:1 In the fourth year that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was king of Judah, the Lord spoke to Jeremiah ²⁰  concerning all the people of Judah. (That was the same as the first year that Nebuchadnezzar was king of Babylon.) ²¹ 

Jeremiah 26:18

26:18 “Micah from Moresheth ²²  prophesied during the time Hezekiah was king of Judah. ²³  He told all the people of Judah,

‘The Lord who rules over all ²⁴  says,

“Zion ²⁵  will become a plowed field.

Jerusalem ²⁶  will become a pile of rubble.

The temple mount will become a mere wooded ridge.”’ ²⁷ 

Jeremiah 32:4

32:4 King Zedekiah of Judah will not escape from the Babylonians. ²⁸  He will certainly be handed over to the king of Babylon. He must answer personally to the king of Babylon and confront him face to face. ²⁹ 

Jeremiah 52:25

52:25 From the city he took an official who was in charge of the soldiers, seven of the king’s advisers who were discovered in the city, an official army secretary who drafted citizens ³⁰  for military service, and sixty citizens who were discovered in the middle of the city.

¹ tn Heb “I will bring them down like lambs to be slaughtered, like rams and he goats.”

² tn Heb “Daughter Egypt.” See the translator’s note on v. 19.

³ tn Heb “who survived the sword.”

⁴ tn Heb “Woe to you, Moab.” For the usage of this expression see 4:13, 31; 13:17 and the translator’s note on 4:13 and 10:19.

⁵ tn Heb “Your sons will be taken away into captivity, your daughters into exile.”

⁵ sn A mighty nation and many kings is an allusion to the Medo-Persian empire and the vassal kings who provided forces for the Medo-Persian armies.

⁶ tn Heb “I am full of the wrath of the Lord.”

⁷ tn These words are not in the text but are implicit from the words that follow. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

⁸ tn Heb “Pour it out.”

⁹ tn Heb “are to be captured.”

⁷ tn Heb “they have eyes but they do not see, they have ears but they do not hear.”

⁸ tn Heb “people.”

⁹ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁰ tn For the rendering of this term see the translator’s note on 29:2.

¹¹ tn This verse is not actually a sentence in the Hebrew original but is a prepositioned object to the verb in v. 20, “I will hand them over.” This construction is called casus pendens in the older grammars and is used to call attention to a subject or object (cf. GKC 458 §143.d and compare the usage in 33:24). The same nondescript “I will punish” which was used to resolve the complex sentence in the previous verse has been chosen to introduce the objects here before the more specific “I will hand them over” in the next verse.

¹¹ tn Heb “the many [or great] waters.” This is generally identified with the pool of Gibeon mentioned in 2 Sam 2:13.

¹² sn Observance of the Sabbath day (and the Sabbatical year) appears to have been a litmus test of the nation’s spirituality since it is mentioned in a number of passages besides this one (cf., e.g., Isa 56:2, 6; 58:13; Neh 13:15-18). Perhaps this is because the Sabbath day was the sign of the Mosaic covenant (Exod 31:13-17) just as the rainbow was the sign of the Noahic covenant (Gen 9:12, 13, 17) and circumcision was the sign of the Abrahamic covenant (Gen 17:11). This was not the only command they failed to obey, nor was their failure to obey this one the sole determining factor in the Lord’s decision to destroy Judah (cf. 7:23- 24; 11:7-8 in their contexts).

¹³ sn The identity and location of the People’s Gate is uncertain since it is mentioned nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible. Some identify it with the Benjamin Gate mentioned in Jer 37:13; 38:7 (cf. NAB), but there is no textual support for this in the Hebrew Bible or in any of the ancient versions.

¹⁴ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹³ tn Heb “The word was to Jeremiah.” It is implicit from the context that it was the Lord’s word. The verbal expression is more in keeping with contemporary English style.

¹⁴ sn The year referred to would be 605 b.c. Jehoiakim had been placed on the throne of Judah as a puppet king by Pharaoh Necho after the defeat of Josiah at Megiddo in 609 b.c. (2 Kgs 23:34-35). According to Jer 46:2 Nebuchadnezzar defeated Necho at Carchemish in that same year. After defeating Necho, Nebuchadnezzar had hurried back to Babylon where he was made king. After being made king he then returned to Judah and attacked Jerusalem (Dan 1:1. The date given there is the third year of Jehoiakim but scholars are generally agreed that the dating there is based on a different system than the one here. It did not count the part of the year before New Year’s day as an official part of the king’s official rule. Hence, the third year there is the fourth year here.) The identity of the foe from the north referred to in general terms (4:6; 6:1; 15:12) now becomes clear.

¹⁴ sn Micah from Moresheth was a contemporary of Isaiah (compare Mic 1:1 with Isa 1:1) from the country town of Moresheth in the hill country southwest of Jerusalem. The prophecy referred to is found in Mic 3:12. This is the only time in the OT where an OT prophet is quoted verbatim and identified.

¹⁵ sn Hezekiah was co-regent with his father Ahaz from 729-715 b.c. and sole ruler from 715-686 b.c. His father was a wicked king who was responsible for the incursions of the Assyrians (2 Kgs 16; 2 Chr 28). Hezekiah was a godly king, noted for his religious reforms and for his faith in the Lord in the face of the Assyrian threat (2 Kgs 18–19; 2 Chr 32:1-23). The deliverance of Jerusalem in response to his prayers of faith (2 Kgs 19:14-19, 29-36) was undoubtedly well-known to the people of Jerusalem and Judah and may have been one of the prime reasons for their misplaced trust in the inviolability of Zion/Jerusalem (see Ps 46, 76) though the people of Micah’s day already believed it too (Mic 3:11).

¹⁶ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

¹⁷ sn Zion was first of all the citadel that David captured (2 Sam 5:6-10), then the city of David and the enclosed temple area, then the whole city of Jerusalem. It is often in poetic parallelism with Jerusalem as it is here (see, e.g., Ps 76:2; Amos 1:2).

¹⁸ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

¹⁹ sn There is irony involved in this statement. The text reads literally “high places of a forest/thicket.” The “high places” were the illicit places of worship that Jerusalem was supposed to replace. Because of their sin, Jerusalem would be like one of the pagan places of worship with no place left sacrosanct. It would even be overgrown with trees and bushes. So much for its inviolability!

¹⁵ tn Heb “The Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for further explanation.

¹⁶ tn Heb “his [Zedekiah’s] mouth will speak with his [Nebuchadnezzar’s] mouth and his eyes will see his eyes.” The verbs here are an obligatory imperfect and its vav consecutive perfect equivalent. (See IBHS 508-9 §31.4g for discussion and examples of the former and IBHS 528 §32.2.1d, n. 16, for the latter.)

¹⁶ tn Heb “men, from the people of the land” (also later in this verse).