Jeremiah 20:4-5

20:4 For the Lord says, ‘I will make both you and your friends terrified of what will happen to you. ¹  You will see all of them die by the swords of their enemies. ²  I will hand all the people of Judah over to the king of Babylon. He will carry some of them away into exile in Babylon and he will kill others of them with the sword. 20:5 I will hand over all the wealth of this city to their enemies. I will hand over to them all the fruits of the labor of the people of this city and all their prized possessions, as well as all the treasures of the kings of Judah. Their enemies will seize it all as plunder ³  and carry it off to Babylon.

Jeremiah 27:6

27:6 I have at this time placed all these nations of yours under the power ⁴  of my servant, ⁵  King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. I have even made all the wild animals subject to him. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 28:14

28:14 For the Lord God of Israel who rules over all ⁷  says, “I have put an irresistible yoke of servitude on all these nations ⁸  so they will serve King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. And they will indeed serve him. I have even given him control over the wild animals.”’” ⁹ 

Jeremiah 29:26

29:26 “The Lord has made you priest in place of Jehoiada. ¹⁰  He has put you in charge in the Lord’s temple of controlling ¹¹  any lunatic ¹²  who pretends to be a prophet. ¹³  And it is your duty to put any such person in the stocks ¹⁴  with an iron collar around his neck. ¹⁵ 

Jeremiah 32:4

32:4 King Zedekiah of Judah will not escape from the Babylonians. ¹⁶  He will certainly be handed over to the king of Babylon. He must answer personally to the king of Babylon and confront him face to face. ¹⁷ 

Jeremiah 44:30

44:30 I, the Lord, promise that ¹⁸  I will hand Pharaoh Hophra ¹⁹  king of Egypt over to his enemies who are seeking to kill him. I will do that just as surely as I handed King Zedekiah of Judah over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, his enemy who was seeking to kill him.’”

[20:4]  ¹ tn Heb “I will make you an object of terror to both you and your friends.”

[20:4]  ² tn Heb “And they will fall by the sword of their enemies and [with] your eyes seeing [it].”

[20:5]  ³ tn Heb “Take them [the goods, etc.] as plunder and seize them.”

[27:6]  ⁵ tn Heb “have given…into the hand of.”

[27:6]  ⁶ sn See the study note on 25:9 for the significance of the application of this term to Nebuchadnezzar.

[27:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “I have given…to him to serve him.” The verb “give” in this syntactical situation is functioning like the Hiphil stem, i.e., as a causative. See Dan 1:9 for parallel usage. For the usage of “serve” meaning “be subject to” compare 2 Sam 22:44 and BDB 713 s.v. עָבַד 3.

[28:14]  ⁷ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.” See the study notes on 2:19 and 7:3 for this title.

[28:14]  ⁸ tn Heb “An iron yoke I have put on the necks of all these nations.”

[28:14]  ⁹ sn The emphasis is on the absoluteness of Nebuchadnezzar’s control. The statement is once again rhetorical and not to be taken literally. See the study note on 27:6.

[29:26]  ⁹ tn Heb “in place of Jehoiada the priest.” The word “the priest” is unnecessary to the English sentence.

[29:26]  ¹⁰ tc Heb “The Lord has appointed you priest in place of the priest Jehoiada to be overseer in the house of the Lord for/over.” The translation is based on a reading presupposed by several of the versions. The Hebrew text reads “The Lord has…to be overseers [in] the house of the Lord for/over.” The reading here follows that of the Greek, Syriac, and Latin versions in reading פָּקִיד בְּבֵית (paqid bÿvet) in place of פְּקִדִים בֵּית (pÿqidim bet). There has been a confusion of the ם (mem) and בּ (bet) and a transposition of the י (yod) and ד (dalet).

[29:26]  ¹¹ sn The Hebrew term translated lunatic applies to anyone who exhibits irrational behavior. It was used for example of David who drooled and scratched on the city gate to convince Achish not to arrest him as a politically dangerous threat (1 Sam 21:14). It was often used contemptuously of the prophets by those who wanted to play down the significance of their words (2 Kgs 9:11; Hos 9:7 and here).

[29:26]  ¹² tn The verb here is a good example of what IBHS 431 §26.2f calls the estimative-declarative reflexive where a person presents himself in a certain light. For examples of this usage see 2 Sam 13:5; Prov 13:7.

[29:26]  ¹³ tn See the translator’s note on 20:2 for this word which only occurs here and in 20:2-3.

[29:26]  ¹⁴ tn This word only occurs here in the Hebrew Bible. All the lexicons are agreed as seeing it referring to a collar placed around the neck. The basis for this definition are the cognate languages (see, e.g., HALOT 958-59 s.v. צִינֹק for the most complete discussion).

[32:4]  ¹¹ tn Heb “The Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for further explanation.

[32:4]  ¹² tn Heb “his [Zedekiah’s] mouth will speak with his [Nebuchadnezzar’s] mouth and his eyes will see his eyes.” The verbs here are an obligatory imperfect and its vav consecutive perfect equivalent. (See IBHS 508-9 §31.4g for discussion and examples of the former and IBHS 528 §32.2.1d, n. 16, for the latter.)

[44:30]  ¹³ tn Heb “Thus says the Lord, ‘Behold I will hand…’” The first person and indirect quote have been chosen because the Lord is already identified as the speaker and the indirect quote eliminates an extra level of embedded quotes.

[44:30]  ¹⁴ sn Hophra ruled over Egypt from 589-570 b.c. He was the Pharaoh who incited Zedekiah to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar and whose army proved ineffective in providing any long-term relief to Jerusalem when it was under siege (see Jer 37 and especially the study note on 37:5). He was assassinated following a power struggle with a court official who had earlier saved him from a rebellion of his own troops and had ruled as co-regent with him.