Jeremiah 9:21

9:21 ‘Death has climbed in ¹  through our windows.

It has entered into our fortified houses.

It has taken away our children who play in the streets.

It has taken away our young men who gather in the city squares.’

Jeremiah 11:22

11:22 So the Lord who rules over all ²  said, “I will surely ³  punish them! Their young men will be killed in battle. ⁴  Their sons and daughters will die of starvation.

Jeremiah 50:30

50:30 So her young men will fall in her city squares.

All her soldiers will be destroyed at that time,”

says the Lord. ⁵ 

Jeremiah 51:3-4

51:3 Do not give her archers time to string their bows

or to put on their coats of armor. ⁶ 

Do not spare any of her young men.

Completely destroy ⁷  her whole army.

51:4 Let them fall ⁸  slain in the land of Babylonia, ⁹ 

mortally wounded in the streets of her cities. ¹⁰ 

Lamentations 2:21

ש (Sin/Shin)

2:21 The young boys and old men

lie dead on the ground in the streets.

My young women ¹¹  and my young men

have fallen by the sword.

You killed them when you were angry; ¹² 

you slaughtered them without mercy. ¹³ 

Ezekiel 27:27

27:27 Your wealth, products, and merchandise, your sailors and captains,

your ship’s carpenters, ¹⁴  your merchants,

and all your fighting men within you,

along with all your crew who are in you,

will fall into the heart of the seas on the day of your downfall.

Amos 4:10

4:10 “I sent against you a plague like one of the Egyptian plagues. ¹⁵ 

I killed your young men with the sword,

along with the horses you had captured.

I made the stench from the corpses ¹⁶  rise up into your nostrils.

Still you did not come back to me.”

The Lord is speaking!

¹ sn Here Death is personified (treated as though it were a person). Some have seen as possible background to this lament an allusion to Mesopotamian mythology where the demon Lamastu climbs in through the windows of houses and over their walls to kill children and babies.

² tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

³ tn Heb “Behold I will.” For the function of this particle see the translator’s note on 1:6.

⁴ tn Heb “will die by the sword.” Here “sword” stands contextually for “battle” while “starvation” stands for death by starvation during siege.

⁵ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

⁶ tc The text and consequent meaning of these first two lines are uncertain. Literally the Masoretic reads “against let him string let him string the one who strings his bow and against let him raise himself up in his coat of armor.” This makes absolutely no sense and the ancient versions and Hebrew mss did not agree in reading this same text. Many Hebrew mss and all the versions as well as the Masoretes themselves (the text is left unpointed with a marginal note not to read it) delete the second “let him string.” The LXX (or Greek version) left out the words “against” at the beginning of the first two lines. It reads “Let the archer bend his bow and let the one who has armor put it on.” The Lucianic recension of the LXX and some Targum mss supplied the missing object “it” and thus read “Let the archer ready his bow against it and let him array himself against it in his coat of mail.” This makes good sense but does not answer the question of why the Hebrew text left off the suffix on the preposition twice in a row. Many Hebrew mss and the Syriac, Targum, and Vulgate (the Latin version) change the pointing of “against” (אֶל [’el]) to “not” (אַל [’al]) and thus read “Let the archer not string the bow and let him not array himself in his armor.” However, many commentators feel that this does not fit the context because it would apparently be addressed to the Babylonians, not the enemy, which would create a sudden shift in addressee with the second half of the verse. However, if it is understood in the sense taken here it refers to the enemy not allowing the Babylonian archers to get ready for the battle, i.e., a surprise attack. This sense is suggested as an alternative in J. Bright, Jeremiah (AB), 346, n. u-u, and J. A. Thompson, Jeremiah (NICOT), 747, n. 5, and is the interpretation adopted in TEV and probably also in NIrV.

⁷ sn For the concept underlying this word see the study note on “utterly destroy” in Jer 25:9 and compare the usage in 50:21, 26.

⁸ tn The majority of English versions and the commentaries understand the vav (ו) consecutive + perfect as a future here “They will fall.” However, it makes better sense in the light of the commands in the previous verse to understand this as an indirect third person command (= a jussive; see GKC 333 §112.q, r) as REB and NJPS do.

⁹ tn Heb “the land of the Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for explanation.

¹⁰ tn The words “cities” is not in the text. The text merely says “in her streets” but the antecedent is “land” and must then refer to the streets of the cities in the land.

¹¹ tn Heb “virgins.” The term “virgin” probably functions as a metonymy of association for single young women.

¹² tn Heb “in the day of your anger.” The construction בָּיוֹם (bayom, “in the day of…”) is a common Hebrew idiom, meaning “when…” (e.g., Gen 2:4; Lev 7:35; Num 3:1; Deut 4:15; 2 Sam 22:1; Pss 18:1; 138:3; Zech 8:9). This temporal idiom refers to a general time period, but uses the term “day” as a forceful rhetorical device to emphasize the vividness and drama of the event, depicting it as occurring within a single day. In the ancient Near East, military minded kings often referred to a successful campaign as “the day of X” in order to portray themselves as powerful conquerors who, as it were, could inaugurate and complete a victory military campaign within the span of one day.

¹³ tc The MT reads לֹא חָמָלְתָּ (lo’ khamalta, “You showed no mercy”). However, many medieval Hebrew mss and most of the ancient versions (Aramaic Targum, Syriac Peshitta and Latin Vulgate) read וְלֹא חָמָלְתָּ (vÿlo’ khamalta, “and You showed no mercy”).

¹⁴ tn Heb “your repairers of damage.” See v. 9.

¹⁵ tn Heb “in the manner [or “way”] of Egypt.”

¹⁶ tn Heb “of your camps [or “armies”].”