Discovery BoxJeremiah 17:2
Context17:2 Their children are always thinking about 1 their 2 altars
and their sacred poles dedicated to the goddess Asherah, 3
set up beside the green trees on the high hills
Jeremiah 31:20
Context31:20 Indeed, the people of Israel are my dear children.
They are the children I take delight in. 4
For even though I must often rebuke them,
I still remember them with fondness.
So I am deeply moved with pity for them 5
and will surely have compassion on them.
I, the Lord, affirm it! 6
Jeremiah 4:16
Context‘Announce to the surrounding nations, 8
“The enemy is coming!” 9
Proclaim this message 10 to Jerusalem:
“Those who besiege cities 11 are coming from a distant land.
They are ready to raise the battle cry against 12 the towns in Judah.”’
Jeremiah 14:21
Context14:21 For the honor of your name, 13 do not treat Jerusalem 14 with contempt.
Do not treat with disdain the place where your glorious throne sits. 15
Be mindful of your covenant with us. Do not break it! 16
Jeremiah 15:15
Context“Lord, you know how I suffer. 18
Take thought of me and care for me.
Pay back for me those who have been persecuting me.
Do not be so patient with them that you allow them to kill me.
Be mindful of how I have put up with their insults for your sake.
Jeremiah 18:20
Context18:20 Should good be paid back with evil?
Yet they are virtually digging a pit to kill me. 19
Just remember how I stood before you
pleading on their behalf 20
to keep you from venting your anger on them. 21
Jeremiah 20:9
Context20:9 Sometimes I think, “I will make no mention of his message.
I will not speak as his messenger 22 any more.”
But then 23 his message becomes like a fire
locked up inside of me, burning in my heart and soul. 24
I grow weary of trying to hold it in;
I cannot contain it.
Jeremiah 23:36
Context23:36 You must no longer say that the Lord’s message is burdensome. 25 For what is ‘burdensome’ 26 really pertains to what a person himself says. 27 You are misrepresenting 28 the words of our God, the living God, the Lord who rules over all. 29
Jeremiah 51:50
Context51:50 You who have escaped the sword, 30
go, do not delay. 31
Remember the Lord in a faraway land.
Think about Jerusalem. 32
Jeremiah 2:2
Context2:2 “Go and declare in the hearing of the people of Jerusalem: 33 ‘This is what the Lord says: “I have fond memories of you, 34 how devoted you were to me in your early years. 35 I remember how you loved me like a new bride; you followed me through the wilderness, through a land that had never been planted.
Jeremiah 3:16
Context3:16 In those days, your population will greatly increase 36 in the land. At that time,” says the Lord, “people will no longer talk about having the ark 37 that contains the Lord’s covenant with us. 38 They will not call it to mind, remember it, or miss it. No, that will not be done any more! 39
Jeremiah 11:19
Context11:19 Before this I had been like a docile lamb ready to be led to the slaughter.
I did not know they were making plans to kill me. 40
I did not know they were saying, 41
“Let’s destroy the tree along with its fruit! 42
Let’s remove Jeremiah 43 from the world of the living
so people will not even be reminded of him any more.” 44
Jeremiah 14:10
Context14:10 Then the Lord spoke about these people. 45
“They truly 46 love to go astray.
They cannot keep from running away from me. 47
So I am not pleased with them.
I will now call to mind 48 the wrongs they have done 49
and punish them for their sins.”
Jeremiah 31:34
Context31:34 “People will no longer need to teach their neighbors and relatives to know me. 50 For all of them, from the least important to the most important, will know me,” 51 says the Lord. “For 52 I will forgive their sin and will no longer call to mind the wrong they have done.”
Jeremiah 44:21
Context44:21 “The Lord did indeed remember and call to mind what you did! He remembered the sacrifices you and your ancestors, your kings, your leaders, and all the rest of the people of the land offered to other gods 53 in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem. 54
[17:2] 1 tn It is difficult to convey in good English style the connection between this verse and the preceding. The text does not have a finite verb but a temporal preposition with an infinitive: Heb “while their children remember their altars…” It is also difficult to translate the verb “literally.” (i.e., what does “remember” their altars mean?). Hence it has been rendered “always think about.” Another possibility would be “have their altars…on their minds.”
[17:2] 2 tc This reading follows many Hebrew
[17:2] 3 sn Sacred poles dedicated to…Asherah. A leading deity of the Canaanite pantheon was Asherah, wife/sister of El and goddess of fertility. She was commonly worshiped at shrines in or near groves of evergreen trees, or, failing that, at places marked by wooden poles (Hebrew אֲשֵׁרִים [’asherim], plural). They were to be burned or cut down (Deut 7:5; 12:3; 16:21; Judg 6:25, 28, 30; 2 Kgs 18:4).
[31:20] 4 tn Heb “Is Ephraim a dear son to me or a child of delight?” For the substitution of Israel for Ephraim and the plural pronouns for the singular see the note on v. 18. According to BDB 210 s.v. הֲ 1.c the question is rhetorical having the force of an impassioned affirmation. See 1 Sam 2:27; Job 41:9 (41:1 HT) for parallel usage.
[31:20] 5 tn Heb “my stomach churns for him.” The parallelism shows that this refers to pity or compassion.
[31:20] 6 tn Heb “Oracle of the
[4:16] 7 tn The words “They are saying” are not in the text but are implicit in the connection and are supplied in the translation for clarification.
[4:16] 8 tn The word “surrounding” is not in the text but is implicit and is supplied in the translation for clarification.
[4:16] 9 tc Or “Here they come!” Heb “Look!” or “Behold!” Or “Announce to the surrounding nations, indeed [or yes] proclaim to Jerusalem, ‘Besiegers…’” The text is very elliptical here. Some of the modern English versions appear to be emending the text from הִנֵּה (hinneh, “behold”) to either הֵנָּה (hennah, “these things”; so NEB), or הַזֶּה (hazzeh, “this”; so NIV). The solution proposed here is as old as the LXX which reads, “Behold, they have come.”
[4:16] 10 tn The words, “this message,” are not in the text but are supplied in the translation to make the introduction of the quote easier.
[4:16] 11 tn Heb “Besiegers.” For the use of this verb to refer to besieging a city compare Isa 1:8.
[4:16] 12 tn Heb “They have raised their voices against.” The verb here, a vav (ו) consecutive with an imperfect, continues the nuance of the preceding participle “are coming.”
[14:21] 10 tn Heb “For the sake of your name.”
[14:21] 11 map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.
[14:21] 12 tn English versions quite commonly supply “us” as an object for the verb in the first line. This is probably wrong. The Hebrew text reads: “Do not treat with contempt for the sake of your name; do not treat with disdain your glorious throne.” This is case of poetic parallelism where the object is left hanging until the second line. For an example of this see Prov 13:1 in the original and consult E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 103-4. There has also been some disagreement whether “your glorious throne” refers to the temple (as in 17:12) or Jerusalem (as in 3:17). From the beginning of the prayer in v. 19 where a similar kind of verb has been used with respect to Zion/Jerusalem it would appear that the contextual referent is Jerusalem. The absence of an object from the first line makes it possible to retain part of the metaphor in the translation and still convey some meaning.
[14:21] 13 tn Heb “Remember, do not break your covenant with us.”
[15:15] 13 tn The words “I said” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation for clarity to mark the shift from the
[15:15] 14 tn The words “how I suffer” are not in the text but are implicit from the continuation. They are supplied in the translation for clarity. Jeremiah is not saying “you are all knowing.”
[18:20] 16 tn Or “They are plotting to kill me”; Heb “They have dug a pit for my soul.” This is a common metaphor for plotting against someone. See BDB 500 s.v. כָּרָה Qal and for an example see Pss 7:16 (7:15 HT) in its context.
[18:20] 17 tn Heb “to speak good concerning them” going back to the concept of “good” being paid back with evil.
[18:20] 18 tn Heb “to turn back your anger from them.”
[20:9] 19 tn Heb “speak in his name.” This idiom occurs in passages where someone functions as the messenger under the authority of another. See Exod 5:23; Deut 18:19, 29:20; Jer 14:14. The antecedent in the first line is quite commonly misidentified as being “him,” i.e., the
[20:9] 20 tn The English sentence has again been restructured for the sake of English style. The Hebrew construction involves two vav consecutive perfects in a condition and consequence relation, “If I say to myself…then it [his word] becomes.” See GKC 337 §112.kk for the construction.
[20:9] 21 sn Heb “It is in my heart like a burning fire, shut up in my bones.” In addition to standing as part for the whole, the “bones” for the person (e.g., Ps 35:10), the bones were associated with fear (e.g., Job 4:14) and with pain (e.g., Job 33:19, Ps 102:3 [102:4 HT]) and joy or sorrow (e.g., Ps 51:8 [51:10 HT]). As has been mentioned several times, the heart was connected with intellectual and volitional concerns.
[23:36] 22 tn Heb “burden of the
[23:36] 23 tn Heb “the burden.”
[23:36] 24 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] 25 tn Heb “turning.” See BDB 245 s.v. הָפַךְ Qal.1.c and Lev 13:55; Jer 13:33 “changing, altering.”
[23:36] 26 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”
[51:50] 25 sn God’s exiled people are told to leave doomed Babylon (see v. 45).
[51:50] 26 tn Heb “don’t stand.”
[51:50] 27 tn Heb “let Jerusalem go up upon your heart.” The “heart” is often viewed as the seat of one’s mental faculties and thought life.
[2:2] 28 map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.
[2:2] 29 tn Heb “I remember to/for you.”
[2:2] 30 tn Heb “the loyal love of your youth.”
[3:16] 31 tn Heb “you will become numerous and fruitful.”
[3:16] 33 tn Heb “the ark of the covenant.” It is called this because it contained the tables of the law which in abbreviated form constituted their covenant obligations to the
[3:16] 34 tn Or “Nor will another one be made”; Heb “one will not do/make [it?] again.”
[11:19] 34 tn Heb “against me.” The words “to kill me” are implicit from the context and are supplied in the translation for clarity.
[11:19] 35 tn The words “I did not know that they were saying” are not in the text. The quote is without formal introduction in the original. These words are supplied in the translation for clarity.
[11:19] 36 tn This word and its pronoun (לַחְמוֹ, lakhmo, “its bread”) is often emended to read “in/with its sap” = “in its prime” (either לֵחוֹ [lekho] or לֵחְמוֹ [lekhÿmo]); the latter would be more likely and the מוֹ (mo) could be explained as a rare use of the old poetic third plural suffix for the third singular; cf. GKC 258 §91.l for general use and Ps 11:7 and Job 27:23 for third singular use. Though this fits the context nicely the emendation is probably unnecessary since the word “bread” is sometimes used of other foodstuff than grain or its products (cf. BDB 537 s.v. לֶחֶם 2.a).
[11:19] 37 tn Heb “cut it [or him] off.” The metaphor of the tree may be continued, though the verb “cut off” is used also of killing people. The rendering clarifies the meaning of the metaphor.
[11:19] 38 tn Heb “so that his name will not be remembered any more.”
[14:10] 37 tn Heb “Thus said the
[14:10] 38 tn It is difficult to be certain how the particle כֵּן (ken, usually used for “thus, so”) is to be rendered here. BDB 485 s.v. כֵּן 1.b says that the force sometimes has to be elicited from the general context and points back to the line of v. 9. IHBS 666 §39.3.4e states that when there is no specific comparative clause preceding a general comparison is intended. They point to Judg 5:31 as a parallel. Ps 127:2 may also be an example if כִּי (ki) is not to be read (cf. BHS fn). “Truly” seemed the best way to render this idea in contemporary English.
[14:10] 39 tn Heb “They do not restrain their feet.” The idea of “away from me” is implicit in the context and is supplied in the translation for clarity.
[14:10] 41 tn Heb “their iniquities.”
[31:34] 40 tn Heb “teach…, saying, ‘Know the
[31:34] 41 sn This statement should be understood against the background of Jer 8:8-9 where class distinctions were drawn and certain people were considered to have more awareness and responsibility for knowing the law and also Jer 5:1-5 and 9:3-9 where the sinfulness of Israel was seen to be universal across these class distinctions and no trust was to be placed in friends, neighbors, or relatives because all without distinction had cast off God’s yoke (i.e., refused to submit themselves to his authority).
[31:34] 42 tn The Hebrew particle כִּי (ki) that introduces this clause refers to more than just the preceding clause (i.e., that all will know the
[44:21] 43 tn The words “to other gods” are not in the text but are implicit from the context (cf. v. 17). They are supplied in the translation for clarity. It was not the act of sacrifice that was wrong but the recipient.
[44:21] 44 tn Heb “The sacrifices which you sacrificed in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem, you and your fathers, your kings and your leaders and the people of the land, did not the
