Jeremiah 2:31

2:31 You people of this generation,

listen to what the Lord says.

“Have I been like a wilderness to you, Israel?

Have I been like a dark and dangerous land to you? ¹ 

Why then do you ²  say, ‘We are free to wander. ³ 

We will not come to you any more?’

Jeremiah 3:12

The Lord Calls on Israel and Judah to Repent

3:12 “Go and shout this message to my people in the countries in the north. ⁴  Tell them,

‘Come back to me, wayward Israel,’ says the Lord.

‘I will not continue to look on you with displeasure. ⁵ 

For I am merciful,’ says the Lord.

‘I will not be angry with you forever.

Jeremiah 3:19

3:19 “I thought to myself, ⁶ 

‘Oh what a joy it would be for me to treat you like a son! ⁷ 

What a joy it would be for me to give ⁸  you a pleasant land,

the most beautiful piece of property there is in all the world!’ ⁹ 

I thought you would call me, ‘Father’ ¹⁰ 

and would never cease being loyal to me. ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 8:2

8:2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon and the stars. ¹²  These are things they ¹³  adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance, ¹⁴  from which they sought guidance, and worshiped. The bones of these people ¹⁵  will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground. ¹⁶ 

Jeremiah 28:4

28:4 I will also bring back to this place Jehoiakim’s son King Jeconiah of Judah and all the exiles who were taken to Babylon.’ Indeed, the Lord affirms, ¹⁷  ‘I will break the yoke of servitude to the king of Babylon.’”

Jeremiah 28:11

28:11 Then he spoke up in the presence of all the people. “The Lord says, ‘In the same way I will break the yoke of servitude of all the nations to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon ¹⁸  before two years are over.’” After he heard this, the prophet Jeremiah departed and went on his way. ¹⁹ 

Jeremiah 34:22

34:22 For I, the Lord, affirm that ²⁰  I will soon give the order and bring them back to this city. They will fight against it and capture it and burn it down. I will also make the towns of Judah desolate so that there will be no one living in them.”’”

Jeremiah 36:32

36:32 Then Jeremiah got another scroll and gave it to the scribe Baruch son of Neriah. As Jeremiah dictated, Baruch wrote on this scroll everything that had been on the scroll that King Jehoiakim of Judah burned in the fire. They also added on this scroll several other messages of the same kind. ²¹ 

Jeremiah 38:22

38:22 All the women who are left in the royal palace of Judah will be led out to the officers of the king of Babylon. They will taunt you saying, ²² 

‘Your trusted friends misled you;

they have gotten the best of you.

Now that your feet are stuck in the mud,

they have turned their backs on you.’ ²³ 

Jeremiah 41:16

41:16 Johanan son of Kareah and all the army officers who were with him led off all the people who had been left alive at Mizpah. They had rescued them from Ishmael son of Nethaniah after he killed Gedaliah son of Ahikam. They led off the men, women, children, soldiers, and court officials whom they had brought away from Gibeon.

Jeremiah 44:14

44:14 None of the Judean remnant who have come to live in the land of Egypt will escape or survive to return to the land of Judah. Though they long to return and live there, none of them shall return except a few fugitives.’” ²⁴ 

Jeremiah 48:2

48:2 People will not praise Moab any more.

The enemy will capture Heshbon ²⁵  and plot ²⁶  how to destroy Moab, ²⁷ 

saying, ‘Come, let’s put an end to that nation!’

City of Madmen, you will also be destroyed. ²⁸ 

A destructive army will march against you. ²⁹ 

[2:31]  ¹ tn Heb “a land of the darkness of Yah [= thick or deep darkness].” The idea of danger is an added connotation of the word in this context.

[2:31]  ² tn Heb “my people.”

[2:31]  ³ tn Or more freely, “free to do as we please.” There is some debate about the meaning of this verb (רוּד, rud) because its usage is rare and its meaning is debated in the few passages where it does occur. The key to its meaning may rest in the emended text (reading וְרַדְתִּי [vÿradti] for וְיָרַדְתִּי [vÿyaradti]) in Judg 11:37 where it refers to the roaming of Jephthah’s daughter on the mountains of Israel.

[3:12]  ⁴ tn Heb “Go and proclaim these words to the north.” The translation assumes that the message is directed toward the exiles of northern Israel who have been scattered in the provinces of Assyria to the north.

[3:12]  ⁵ tn Heb “I will not cause my face to fall on you.”

[3:19]  ⁷ tn Heb “I, myself, said.” See note on “I thought that she might come back to me” in 3:7.

[3:19]  ⁸ tn Heb “How I would place you among the sons.” Israel appears to be addressed here contextually as the Lord’s wife (see the next verse). The pronouns of address in the first two lines are second feminine singular as are the readings of the two verbs preferred by the Masoretes (the Qere readings) in the third and fourth lines. The verbs that are written in the text in the third and fourth lines (the Kethib readings) are second masculine plural as is the verb describing Israel’s treachery in the next verse.

[3:19]  ⁹ tn The words “What a joy it would be for me to” are not in the Hebrew text but are implied in the parallel structure.

[3:19]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “the most beautiful heritage among the nations.”

[3:19]  ¹¹ tn Heb “my father.”

[3:19]  ¹² tn Heb “turn back from [following] after me.”

[8:2]  ¹⁰ tc MT, 4QJer^a and LXX read “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJer^c reads “the sun and all the stars.”

[8:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”

[8:2]  ¹² tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

[8:2]  ¹³ tn Heb “they will not” but the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.

[8:2]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”

[28:4]  ¹³ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[28:11]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “I will break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from upon the necks of all the nations.”

[28:11]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “Then the prophet Jeremiah went his way.”

[34:22]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[36:32]  ²² tn Heb “And he wrote upon it from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the scroll which Jehoiakim king of Judah burned in the fire. And many words like these were added to them besides [or further].” The translation uses the more active form in the last line because of the tendency in contemporary English style to avoid the passive. It also uses the words “everything” for “all the words” and “messages” for “words” because those are legitimate usages of these phrases, and they avoid the mistaken impression that Jeremiah repeated verbatim the words on the former scroll or repeated verbatim the messages that he had delivered during the course of the preceding twenty-three years.

[38:22]  ²⁵ tn Heb “And they will say.” The words “taunt you” are supplied in the translation to give the flavor of the words that follow.

[38:22]  ²⁶ tn Heb “The men of your friendship incited you and prevailed over you. Your feet are sunk in the mud. They turned backward.” The term “men of your friendship” (cf. BDB 1023 s.v. שָׁלוֹם 5.a) is used to refer to Jeremiah’s “so-called friends” in 20:10, to the trusted friend who deserted the psalmist in Ps 41:10, and to the allies of Edom in Obad 7. According to most commentators it refers here to the false prophets and counselors who urged the king to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar. The verb translated “misled” is a verb that often refers to inciting or instigating someone to do something, often with negative connotations (so BDB 694 s.v. סוּת Hiph.2). It is generally translated “deceive” or “mislead” in 2 Kgs 18:32; 2 Chr 32:11, 15. Here it refers to the fact that his pro-Egyptian counselors induced him to rebel. They have proven too powerful for him and prevailed on him (יָכֹל לְ, yakhol lÿ; see BDB 408 s.v. יָכֹל 2.b) to follow a policy which will prove detrimental to him, his family, and the city. The phrase “your feet are sunk in the mud” is figurative for being entangled in great difficulties (so BDB 371 s.v. טָבַע Hoph and compare the usage in the highly figurative description of trouble in Ps 69:2 [69:3 HT]).

[44:14]  ²⁸ tn Heb “There shall not be an escapee or a survivor to the remnant of Judah who came to sojourn there in the land of Egypt even to return to the land of Judah which they are lifting up their souls [= “longing/desiring” (BDB 672 s.v. נָשָׂא Piel.2)] to return to live there; for none shall return except fugitives.” The long, complex Hebrew original has been broken up and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style. Another possible structure would be “None of the Judean remnant who have come to live in the land of Egypt will escape or survive. None of them will escape or survive to return to the land of Judah where they long to return to live. Indeed (emphatic use of כִּי [ki]; cf. BDB 472 s.v. כִּי 1.e) none of them shall return except a few fugitives.” This verse is a good example of rhetorical hyperbole where a universal negative does not apply to absolutely all the particulars. Though the Lord denies at the outset that any will escape or survive the punishment of vv. 12-13 to return to Judah, he says at the end that a few fugitives will return (the two words for fugitive are from the same root and mean the same thing). (E. W. Bullinger, Figures of Speech, 618-19, might classify this as a synecdoche of genus where a universal negative does not deny particularity.) That this last statement is not a gloss or an afterthought is supported by what is said later in v. 28.

[48:2]  ³¹ sn Heshbon was originally a Moabite city but was captured by Sihon king of Og and made his capital (Num 21:26-30). It was captured from Sihon and originally assigned to the tribe of Reuben (Num 32:37; Josh 13:17). Later it was made a Levitical city and was assigned to the tribe of Gad (Josh 21:39). It formed the northern limits of Moab. It was located about eighteen miles east of the northern tip of the Dead Sea.

[48:2]  ³² sn There is a wordplay in Hebrew on the word “Heshbon” and the word “plot” (חָשְׁבוּ, khoshvu).

[48:2]  ³³ tn Heb “In Heshbon they plot evil against her [i.e., Moab].” The “they” is undefined, but it would scarcely be Moabites living in Heshbon. Hence TEV and CEV are probably correct in seeing a reference to the enemy which would imply the conquest of this city which lay on the northern border of Moab.

[48:2]  ³⁴ tn The meaning of this line is somewhat uncertain. The translation here follows all the modern English versions and commentaries in reading the place name “Madmen” even though the place is otherwise unknown and the Greek, Syriac, and Latin version all read this word as an emphasizing infinitive absolute of the following verb “will be destroyed,” i.e. דָּמוֹם יִדֹּמּוּ (damom yiddommu). Some see this word as a variant of the name Dimon in Isa 15:9 which in turn is a playful variant of the place name Dibon. There is once again a wordplay on the word “Madmen” and “will be destroyed”: מַדְמֵן (madmen) and יִדֹּמּוּ (yiddommu). For the meaning of the verb = “perish” or “be destroyed” see Jer 8:14; Ps 31:18.

[48:2]  ³⁵ tn Heb “A sword will follow after you.” The sword is again figurative of destructive forces, here the army of the Babylonians.