Jeremiah 7:26

7:26 But your ancestors ¹  did not listen to me nor pay attention to me. They became obstinate ²  and were more wicked than even their own forefathers.’”

Jeremiah 8:4

Willful Disregard of God Will Lead to Destruction

8:4 The Lord said to me, ³ 

“Tell them, ‘The Lord says,

Do people not get back up when they fall down?

Do they not turn around when they go the wrong way? ⁴ 

Jeremiah 10:23

10:23 Lord, we know that people do not control their own destiny. ⁵ 

It is not in their power to determine what will happen to them. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 16:2

16:2 “Do not get married and do not have children here in this land.

Jeremiah 23:21

23:21 I did not send those prophets.

Yet they were in a hurry to give their message. ⁷ 

I did not tell them anything.

Yet they prophesied anyway.

Jeremiah 30:19

30:19 Out of those places you will hear songs of thanksgiving ⁸ 

and the sounds of laughter and merriment.

I will increase their number and they will not dwindle away. ⁹ 

I will bring them honor and they will no longer be despised.

Jeremiah 44:5

44:5 But the people of Jerusalem and Judah ¹⁰  would not listen or pay any attention. They would not stop the wickedness they were doing nor quit sacrificing to other gods. ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 48:30

48:30 I, the Lord, affirm that ¹²  I know how arrogant they are.

But their pride is ill-founded.

Their boastings will prove to be false. ¹³ 

¹ tn Or “But your predecessors…”; Heb “But they….” There is a confusing interchange in the pronouns in vv. 25-26 which has led to some leveling in the ancient versions and the modern English versions. What is involved here are four levels of referents, the “you” of the present generation (vv. 21-22a), the ancestors who were delivered from Egypt (i.e., the “they” of vv. 22b-24), the “you” of v. 25 which involves all the Israelites from the Exodus to the time of speaking, and the “they” of v. 26 which cannot be the ancestors of vv. 22-24 (since they cannot be more wicked than themselves) but must be an indefinite entity which is a part of the “you” of v. 25, i.e., the more immediate ancestors of the present generation. If this is kept in mind, there is no need to level the pronouns to “they” and “them” or to “you” and “your” as some of the ancient versions and modern English versions have done.

² tn Heb “hardened [or made stiff] their neck.”

³ tn The words “the Lord said to me” are not in the text but are implicit from the context. They are supplied in the translation to make clear who is speaking and who is being addressed.

⁴ sn There is a play on two different nuances of the same Hebrew word that means “turn” and “return,” “turn away” and “turn back.”

⁵ tn Heb “Not to the man his way.” For the nuance of “fate, destiny, or the way things turn out” for the Hebrew word “way” see Hag 1:5, Isa 40:27 and probably Ps 49:13 (cf. KBL 218 s.v. דֶּרֶךְ 5). For the idea of “control” or “hold in one’s power” for the preposition “to” see Ps 3:8 (cf. BDB 513 s.v. לְ 5.b[a]).

⁶ tn Heb “Not to a man the walking and the establishing his step.”

⁷ tn Heb “Yet they ran.”

⁹ tn Heb “Out of them will come thanksgiving and a sound of those who are playful.”

¹⁰ sn Compare Jer 29:6.

¹¹ tn There appears to be a deliberate shift in the pronouns used in vv. 2-5. “You” refers to the people living in Egypt who are being addressed (v. 2) and to the people of present and past generations to whom the Lord persistently sent the prophets (v. 4). “They” refers to the people of Jerusalem and the towns of Judah who have suffered disaster (v. 2) because of the wickedness of sacrificing to other gods (vv. 3, 5). The referents have been explicitly identified in the translation for the sake of clarity.

¹² tn Heb “They did not listen or incline their ear [= pay attention] by turning from their wickedness by not sacrificing to other gods.” The לְ (lamed) + the negative + the infinitive is again epexegetical. The sentence has been restructured and more idiomatic English expressions have been used to better conform with contemporary English style but an attempt has been made to retain the basic relationships of subordination.

¹³ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

¹⁴ tn The meaning of this verse is somewhat uncertain: Heb “I know, oracle of the Lord,/ his arrogance and [that it is?] not true; // his boastings accomplish that which is not true.” Several of the modern English versions and commentaries redivide the verse and read something like, “I know his insolence…his boastings are false; his deeds are false (NRSV, REB).” However, the word translated “deeds” in the last line is a verb in the third person plural and can only have as its logical grammatical subject the word “boastings.” The adjective כֵּן (ken) + the negative לֹא (lo’) is evidently repeated here and applied to two different subjects “arrogance” and “boasting” to emphasize that Moab’s arrogant boasts will prove “untrue” (Cf. HALOT 459 s.v. II כֵּן 2.c for the meaning “untrue” for both this passage and the parallel one in Isa 16:6). There is some difference of opinion about the identification of the “I” in this verse. Most commentators see it as referring to the prophet. However, F. B. Huey (Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 395) is probably correct in seeing it as referring to the Lord. He points to the fact that the “I” in vv. 33, 35, 38 can only refer to God. The “I know” in v. 30 also clearly has the Lord as its subject. There are other cases in the book of Jeremiah where the Lord expresses his lament over the fate of a people (cf. 14:1-6, 17-18).