Jeremiah 16:20

16:20 Can people make their own gods?

No, what they make are not gods at all.” ¹ 

Jeremiah 2:11

2:11 Has a nation ever changed its gods

(even though they are not really gods at all)?

But my people have exchanged me, their glorious God, ² 

for a god that cannot help them at all! ³ 

Jeremiah 10:10

10:10 The Lord is the only true God.

He is the living God and the everlasting King.

When he shows his anger the earth shakes.

None of the nations can stand up to his fury.

Jeremiah 5:7

5:7 The Lord asked, ⁴ 

“How can I leave you unpunished, Jerusalem? ⁵ 

Your people ⁶  have rejected me

and have worshiped gods that are not gods at all. ⁷ 

Even though I supplied all their needs, ⁸  they were like an unfaithful wife to me. ⁹ 

They went flocking ¹⁰  to the houses of prostitutes. ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 7:6

7:6 Stop oppressing foreigners who live in your land, children who have lost their fathers, and women who have lost their husbands. ¹²  Stop killing innocent people ¹³  in this land. Stop paying allegiance to ¹⁴  other gods. That will only bring about your ruin. ¹⁵ 

Jeremiah 7:9

7:9 You steal. ¹⁶  You murder. You commit adultery. You lie when you swear on oath. You sacrifice to the god Baal. You pay allegiance to ¹⁷  other gods whom you have not previously known.

Jeremiah 23:36

23:36 You must no longer say that the Lord’s message is burdensome. ¹⁸  For what is ‘burdensome’ ¹⁹  really pertains to what a person himself says. ²⁰  You are misrepresenting ²¹  the words of our God, the living God, the Lord who rules over all. ²² 

Jeremiah 25:6

25:6 Do not pay allegiance to ²³  other gods and worship and serve them. Do not make me angry by the things that you do. ²⁴  Then I will not cause you any harm.’

Jeremiah 11:10

11:10 They have gone back to the evil ways ²⁵  of their ancestors of old who refused to obey what I told them. They, too, have paid allegiance to ²⁶  other gods and worshiped them. Both the nation of Israel and the nation of Judah ²⁷  have violated the covenant I made with their ancestors.

Jeremiah 13:10

13:10 These wicked people refuse to obey what I have said. ²⁸  They follow the stubborn inclinations of their own hearts and pay allegiance ²⁹  to other gods by worshiping and serving them. So ³⁰  they will become just like these linen shorts which are good for nothing.

Jeremiah 16:11

16:11 Then tell them that the Lord says, ³¹  ‘It is because your ancestors ³²  rejected me and paid allegiance to ³³  other gods. They have served them and worshiped them. But they have rejected me and not obeyed my law. ³⁴ 

Jeremiah 16:13

16:13 So I will throw you out of this land into a land that neither you nor your ancestors have ever known. There you must worship other gods day and night, for I will show you no mercy.’”

Jeremiah 50:40

50:40 I will destroy Babylonia just like I did

Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighboring towns.

No one will live there. ³⁵ 

No human being will settle in it,”

says the Lord. ³⁶ 

Jeremiah 35:15

35:15 I sent all my servants the prophets to warn you over and over again. They said, “Every one of you, stop doing the evil things you have been doing and do what is right. ³⁷  Do not pay allegiance to other gods ³⁸  and worship them. Then you can continue to live in this land that I gave to you and your ancestors.” But you did not pay any attention or listen to me.

[16:20]  ¹ tn Heb “and they are ‘no gods.’” For the construction here compare 2:11 and a similar construction in 2 Kgs 19:18 and see BDB 519 s.v. לֹא 1.b(b).

[2:11]  ² tn Heb “have exchanged their glory [i.e., the God in whom they glory].” This is a case of a figure of speech where the attribute of a person or thing is put for the person or thing. Compare the common phrase in Isaiah, the Holy One of Israel, obviously referring to the Lord, the God of Israel.

[2:11]  ³ tn Heb “what cannot profit.” The verb is singular and the allusion is likely to Baal. See the translator’s note on 2:8 for the likely pun or wordplay.

[5:7]  ³ tn These words are not in the text, but are supplied in the translation to make clear who is speaking.

[5:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “How can I forgive [or pardon] you.” The pronoun “you” is second feminine singular, referring to the city. See v. 1.

[5:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “your children.”

[5:7]  ⁶ tn Heb “and they have sworn [oaths] by not-gods.”

[5:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “I satisfied them to the full.”

[5:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “they committed adultery.” It is difficult to decide whether literal adultery with other women or spiritual adultery with other gods is meant. The word for adultery is used for both in the book of Jeremiah. For examples of its use for spiritual adultery see 3:8, 9; 9:2. For examples of its use for literal adultery see 7:9; 23:14. The context here could argue for either. The swearing by other gods and the implicit contradiction in their actions in contrast to the expected gratitude for supplying their needs argues for spiritual adultery. However, the reference to prostitution in the next line and the reference to chasing after their neighbor’s wives argues for literal adultery. The translation opts for spiritual adultery because of the contrast implicit in the concessive clause.

[5:7]  ⁹ tn There is a great deal of debate about the meaning of this word. Most of the modern English versions follow the lead of lexicographers who relate this word to a noun meaning “troop” and understand it to mean “they trooped together” (cf. BDB 151 s.v. גָּדַד Hithpo.2 and compare the usage in Mic 5:1 [4:14 HT]). A few of the modern English versions and commentaries follow the reading of the Greek and read a word meaning “they lodged” (reading ִיתְגּוֹרְרוּ [yitggorÿru] from I גּוּר [gur; cf. HALOT 177 s.v. Hithpo. and compare the usage in 1 Kgs 17:20] instead of יִתְגֹּדָדוּ [yitggodadu]). W. L. Holladay (Jeremiah [Hermeneia], 1:180) sees a reference here to the cultic practice of cutting oneself in supplication to pagan gods (cf. BDB 151 s.v. גָּדַד Hithpo.1 and compare the usage in 1 Kgs 18:28). The houses of prostitutes would then be a reference to ritual prostitutes at the pagan shrines. The translation follows BDB and the majority of modern English versions.

[5:7]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “to a house of a prostitute.”

[7:6]  ⁴ tn Heb “Stop oppressing foreigner, orphan, and widow.”

[7:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “Stop shedding innocent blood.”

[7:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “going/following after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom involved here.

[7:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “going after other gods to your ruin.”

[7:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “Will you steal…then say, ‘We are safe’?” Verses 9-10 are one long sentence in the Hebrew text.

[7:9]  ⁶ tn Heb “You go/follow after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom involved here.

[23:36]  ⁶ tn Heb “burden of the Lord.”

[23:36]  ⁷ tn Heb “the burden.”

[23:36]  ⁸ tn Heb “The burden is [or will be] to a man his word.” There is a good deal of ambiguity regarding how this line is to be rendered. For the major options and the issues involved W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah (Hermeneia), 1:651-52 should be consulted. Most of them are excluded by the observation that מַשָּׂא probably does not mean “oracle” anywhere in this passage (see note on v. 33 regarding the use of this word). Hence it does not mean “every man’s word becomes his oracle” as in NIV or “for that ‘burden’ [= oracle] is what he entrusts to the man of his word” (W. McKane, Jeremiah [ICC], 1:600-601). The latter is also ruled out by the fact that the antecedent of “his” on “his word” is clearly the word “man” in front of it. This would be the only case where the phrase “man of his word” occurs. There is also no textual reason for repointing the noun with the article as the noun with the interrogative to read “For how can his word become a burden to anyone?” There are, of course, other options but this is sufficient to show that the translation has been chosen after looking at other alternatives.

[23:36]  ⁹ tn Heb “turning.” See BDB 245 s.v. הָפַךְ Qal.1.c and Lev 13:55; Jer 13:33 “changing, altering.”

[23:36]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

[25:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “follow after.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for this idiom.

[25:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “make me angry with the work of your hands.” The term “work of your own hands” is often interpreted as a reference to idolatry as is clearly the case in Isa 2:8; 37:19. However, the parallelism in 25:14 and the context in 32:30 show that it is more general and refers to what they have done. That is likely the meaning here as well.

[11:10]  ⁸ tn Or “They have repeated the evil actions of….”

[11:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “have walked/followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

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

[13:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “to listen to my words.”

[13:10]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “and [they follow] after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

[13:10]  ¹¹ tn The structure of this verse is a little unusual. It consists of a subject, “this wicked people” qualified by several “which” clauses preceding a conjunction and a form which would normally be taken as a third person imperative (a Hebrew jussive; וִיהִי, vihi). This construction, called casus pendens by Hebrew grammarians, lays focus on the subject, here calling attention to the nature of Israel’s corruption which makes it rotten and useless to God. See GKC 458 §143.d for other examples of this construction.

[16:11]  ¹⁰ tn These two sentences have been recast in English to break up a long Hebrew sentence and incorporate the oracular formula “says the Lord (Heb ‘oracle of the Lord’)” which occurs after “Your fathers abandoned me.” In Hebrew the two sentences read: “When you tell them these things and they say, ‘…’, then tell them, ‘Because your ancestors abandoned me,’ oracle of the Lord.”

[16:11]  ¹¹ tn Heb “fathers” (also in vv. 12, 13, 15, 19).

[16:11]  ¹² tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the explanation of the idiom.

[16:11]  ¹³ tn Heb “But me they have abandoned and my law they have not kept.” The objects are thrown forward to bring out the contrast which has rhetorical force. However, such a sentence in English would be highly unnatural.

[50:40]  ¹¹ tn Heb “‘Like [when] God overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and the neighboring towns,’ oracle of the Lord, ‘no man will live there.’” The Lord is speaking so the first person has been substituted for “God.” The sentence has again been broken up to better conform with contemporary English style.

[50:40]  ¹² tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[35:15]  ¹² tn Heb “Turn, each of you, from his [= your] wicked way and make good your deeds.” Compare 18:11 where the same idiom occurs with the added term of “make good your ways.”

[35:15]  ¹³ tn Heb “Don’t go after/follow other gods.” See the translator’s note on 2:5 for an explanation of the idiom and see 11:10; 13:10; 25:6 for the same idiom.