Jeremiah 13:7

13:7 So I went to Perath and dug up ¹  the shorts from the place where I had buried them. I found ²  that they were ruined; they were good for nothing.

Jeremiah 13:2

13:2 So I bought the shorts as the Lord had told me to do ³  and put them on. ⁴ 

Jeremiah 13:4

13:4 “Take the shorts that you bought and are wearing ⁵  and go at once ⁶  to Perath. ⁷  Bury the shorts there ⁸  in a crack in the rocks.”

Jeremiah 13:6

13:6 Many days later the Lord said to me, “Go at once to Perath and get ⁹  the shorts I ordered you to bury there.”

Jeremiah 13:11

13:11 For,’ I say, ¹⁰  ‘just as shorts cling tightly to a person’s body, so I bound the whole nation of Israel and the whole nation of Judah ¹¹  tightly ¹²  to me.’ I intended for them to be my special people and to bring me fame, honor, and praise. ¹³  But they would not obey me.

[13:7]  ¹ tn Heb “dug and took.”

[13:7]  ² tn Heb “And behold.”

[13:2]  ³ tn Heb “according to the word of the Lord.”

[13:2]  ⁴ tn Heb “upon your loins.” The “loins” were the midriff of the body from the waist to the knees. For a further discussion including the figurative uses see R. C. Dentan, “Loins,” IDB 3:149-50.

[13:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “which are upon your loins.” See further the notes on v. 1.

[13:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “Get up and go.” The first verb is not literal but is idiomatic for the initiation of an action.

[13:4]  ⁷ tn There has been a great deal of debate about whether the place referred to here is a place (Parah [= Perath] mentioned in Josh 18:23, modern Khirbet Farah, near a spring ’ain Farah) about three and a half miles from Anathoth which was Jeremiah’s home town or the Euphrates River. Elsewhere the word “Perath” always refers to the Euphrates but it is either preceded by the word “river of” or there is contextual indication that the Euphrates is being referred to. Because a journey to the Euphrates and back would involve a journey of more than 700 miles (1,100 km) and take some months, scholars both ancient and modern have questioned whether “Perath” refers to the Euphrates here and if it does whether a real journey was involved. Most of the attempts to identify the place with the Euphrates involve misguided assumptions that this action was a symbolic message to Israel about exile or the corrupting influence of Assyria and Babylon. However, unlike the other symbolic acts in Jeremiah (and in Isaiah and Ezekiel) the symbolism is not part of a message to the people but to Jeremiah; the message is explained to him (vv. 9-11) not the people. In keeping with some of the wordplays that are somewhat common in Jeremiah it is likely that the reference here is to a place, Parah, which was near Jeremiah’s hometown, but whose name would naturally suggest to Jeremiah later in the Lord’s explanation in vv. 9-11 Assyria-Babylon as a place connected with Judah’s corruption (see the notes on vv. 9-10). For further discussion the reader should consult the commentaries, especially W. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 1:396 and W. McKane, Jeremiah (ICC), 1:285-92 who take opposite positions on this issue.

[13:4]  ⁸ sn The significance of this act is explained in vv. 9-10. See the notes there for explanation.

[13:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “Get from there.” The words “from there” are not necessary to the English sentence. They would lead to a redundancy later in the verse, i.e., “from there…bury there.”

[13:11]  ⁹ tn The words “I say” are “Oracle of the Lord” in Hebrew, and are located at the end of this statement in the Hebrew text rather than the beginning. However, they are rendered in the first person and placed at the beginning for smoother English style.

[13:11]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “all the house of Israel and all the house of Judah.”

[13:11]  ¹¹ tn It would be somewhat unnatural in English to render the play on the word translated here “cling tightly” and “bound tightly” in a literal way. They are from the same root word in Hebrew (דָּבַק, davaq), a word that emphasizes the closest of personal relationships and the loyalty connected with them. It is used, for example, of the relationship of a husband and a wife and the loyalty expected of them (cf. Gen 2:24; for other similar uses see Ruth 1:14; 2 Sam 20:2; Deut 11:22).

[13:11]  ¹² tn Heb “I bound them…in order that they might be to me for a people and for a name and for praise and for honor.” The sentence has been separated from the preceding and an equivalent idea expressed which is more in keeping with contemporary English style.