Jeremiah 1:18

1:18 I, the Lord, ¹  hereby promise to make you ²  as strong as a fortified city, an iron pillar, and a bronze wall. You will be able to stand up against all who live in ³  the land, including the kings of Judah, its officials, its priests and all the people of the land.

Jeremiah 34:13

34:13 “The Lord God of Israel has a message for you. ⁴  ‘I made a covenant with your ancestors ⁵  when I brought them out of Egypt where they had been slaves. ⁶  It stipulated, ⁷ 

[1:18]  ¹ tn See the note on “Jeremiah” at the beginning of v. 17.

[1:18]  ² tn Heb “today I have made you.” The Hebrew verb form here emphasizes the certainty of a yet future act; the Lord is promising to protect Jeremiah from any future attacks which may result from his faithfully carrying out his commission. See a similar use of the same Hebrew verb tense in v. 9, and see the translator’s note there.

[1:18]  ³ tn Heb “I make you a fortified city…against all the land….” The words “as strong as” and “so you will be able to stand against all the people of…” are given to clarify the meaning of the metaphor.

[34:13]  ⁴ tn Heb “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘…’” The style adopted here has been used to avoid a longer, more complex English sentence.

[34:13]  ⁵ tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 14, 15).

[34:13]  ⁶ tn Heb “out of the house of bondage.”

[34:13]  ⁷ tn Heb “made a covenant, saying.” This was only one of several stipulations of the covenant. The form used here has been chosen as an indirect way of relating the specific stipulation that is being focused upon to the general covenant that is referred to in v. 13.