Jeremiah 21:4-10

21:4 that the Lord, the God of Israel, says, ¹  ‘The forces at your disposal ²  are now outside the walls fighting against King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and the Babylonians ³  who have you under siege. I will gather those forces back inside the city. ⁴  21:5 In anger, in fury, and in wrath I myself will fight against you with my mighty power and great strength! ⁵  21:6 I will kill everything living in Jerusalem, ⁶  people and animals alike! They will die from terrible diseases. 21:7 Then ⁷  I, the Lord, promise that ⁸  I will hand over King Zedekiah of Judah, his officials, and any of the people who survive the war, starvation, and disease. I will hand them over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and to their enemies who want to kill them. He will slaughter them with the sword. He will not show them any mercy, compassion, or pity.’

21:8 “But ⁹  tell the people of Jerusalem ¹⁰  that the Lord says, ‘I will give you a choice between two courses of action. One will result in life; the other will result in death. ¹¹  21:9 Those who stay in this city will die in battle or of starvation or disease. Those who leave the city and surrender to the Babylonians who are besieging it will live. They will escape with their lives. ¹²  21:10 For I, the Lord, say that ¹³  I am determined not to deliver this city but to bring disaster on it. ¹⁴  It will be handed over to the king of Babylon and he will destroy it with fire.’” ¹⁵ 

Jeremiah 32:29

32:29 The Babylonian soldiers ¹⁶  that are attacking this city will break into it and set it on fire. They will burn it down along with the houses where people have made me angry by offering sacrifices to the god Baal and by pouring out drink offerings to other gods on their rooftops. ¹⁷ 

Jeremiah 38:23

38:23 “All your wives and your children will be turned over to the Babylonians. ¹⁸  You yourself will not escape from them but will be captured by the ¹⁹  king of Babylon. This city will be burned down.” ²⁰ 

Jeremiah 39:1-2

39:1 King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon came against Jerusalem with his whole army and laid siege to it. The siege began in the tenth month of the ninth year that Zedekiah ruled over Judah. ²¹  39:2 It lasted until the ninth day of the fourth month of Zedekiah’s eleventh year. ²²  On that day they broke through the city walls.

Jeremiah 39:8

39:8 The Babylonians ²³  burned down the royal palace, the temple of the Lord, and the people’s homes, ²⁴  and they tore down the wall of Jerusalem. ²⁵ 

Jeremiah 52:7

52:7 They broke through the city walls, and all the soldiers tried to escape. They left the city during the night. They went through the gate between the two walls that is near the king’s garden. ²⁶  (The Babylonians had the city surrounded.) Then they headed for the Jordan Valley. ²⁷ 

Jeremiah 52:13

52:13 He burned down the Lord’s temple, the royal palace, and all the houses in Jerusalem, including every large house.

[21:4]  ¹ tn Heb “Tell Zedekiah, ‘Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel.’” Using the indirect quote eliminates one level of embedded quotation and makes it easier for the reader to follow.

[21:4]  ² tn Heb “the weapons which are in your hand.” Weapons stands here by substitution for the soldiers who wield them.

[21:4]  ³ sn The Babylonians (Heb “the Chaldeans”). The Chaldeans were a group of people in the country south of Babylon from which Nebuchadnezzar came. The Chaldean dynasty his father established became the name by which the Babylonians are regularly referred to in the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah’s contemporary Ezekiel uses both terms.

[21:4]  ⁴ tn The structure of the Hebrew sentence of this verse is long and complex and has led to a great deal of confusion and misunderstanding. There are two primary points of confusion: 1) the relation of the phrase “outside the walls,” and 2) the antecedent of “them” in the last clause of the verse that reads in Hebrew: “I will gather them back into the midst of the city.” Most take the phrase “outside the walls” with “the Babylonians….” Some take it with “turn back/bring back” to mean “from outside….” However, the preposition “from” is part of the idiom for “outside….” The phrase goes with “fighting” as J. Bright (Jeremiah [AB], 215) notes and as NJPS suggests. The antecedent of “them” has sometimes been taken mistakenly to refer to the Babylonians. It refers rather to “the forces at your disposal” which is literally “the weapons which are in your hands.” This latter phrase is a figure involving substitution (called metonymy) as Bright also correctly notes. The whole sentence reads in Hebrew: “I will bring back the weapons of war which are in your hand with which you are fighting Nebuchadrezzar the King of Babylon and the Chaldeans who are besieging you outside your wall and I will gather them into the midst of the city.” The sentence has been restructured to better reflect the proper relationships and to make the sentence conform more to contemporary English style.

[21:5]  ⁵ tn Heb “with outstretched hand and with strong arm.” These are, of course, figurative of God’s power and might. He does not literally have hands and arms.

[21:6]  ⁶ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[21:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “And afterward.”

[21:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[21:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “And/But unto this people you shall say…” “But” is suggested here by the unusual word order which offsets what they are to say to Zedekiah (v. 3).

[21:8]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “these people.”

[21:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “Behold I am setting before you the way of life and the way of death.”

[21:9]  ¹² tn Heb “his life will be to him for spoil.”

[21:10]  ¹³ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[21:10]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “I have set my face against this city for evil [i.e., disaster] and not for good [i.e., well-being].” For the use of the idiom “set one’s face against/toward” see, e.g., usage in 1 Kgs 2:15; 2 Kgs 2:17; Jer 42:15, 17 and note the interesting interplay of usage in Jer 44:11-12.

[21:10]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “he will burn it with fire.”

[32:29]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “The Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for further explanation.

[32:29]  ¹⁷ sn Compare Jer 19:13.

[38:23]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for explanation.

[38:23]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “you yourself will not escape from their hand but will be seized by [caught in] the hand of the king of Babylon.” Neither use of “hand” is natural to the English idiom.

[38:23]  ²⁰ tc This translation follows the reading of the Greek version and a few Hebrew mss. The majority of the Hebrew mss read “and you will burn down this city.” This reading is accepted by the majority of modern commentaries and English versions. Few of the commentaries, however, bother to explain the fact that the particle אֶת (’et), which normally marks the accusative object, is functioning here as the subject. For this point of grammar see BDB 85 s.v. I אֵת 1.b. Or this may be another case where אֵת introduces a new subject (see BDB 85 s.v. אֵת 3.α and see usage in 27:8; 36:22).

[39:1]  ²¹ sn 2 Kgs 25:1 and Jer 52:4 give the more precise date of the tenth day of the tenth month of the ninth year which would have been Jan 15, 588 b.c. The reckoning is based on the calendar that begins the year in the spring (Nisan = March/April).

[39:2]  ²² sn According to modern reckoning that would have been July 18, 586 b.c. The siege thus lasted almost a full eighteen months.

[39:8]  ²³ tn Heb “Chaldean.” See the study note on 21:4 for explanation.

[39:8]  ²⁴ tc The reading here is based on an emendation following the parallels in Jer 52:13 and 2 Kgs 25:9. The Hebrew text here does not have “the temple of the Lord” and reads merely “house of the people.” The text here is probably corrupt. It reads וְאֶת־בֵּית הָעָם (vÿ’et-bet ha’am, “and the house of the people”), which many explain as a collective use of בַּיִת (bayit). However, no parallels are cited by any of the commentaries, grammars, or lexicons for such a use. It is more likely that the words יְהוָה וְאֶת־בָּתֵּי (yÿhvah vÿ’et-bate) have fallen out of the text due to similar beginnings. The words וְאֶת־בֵּית יהוה (vÿ’et-bet yhwh) are found in the parallel texts cited in the marginal note. The Greek version is no help here because vv. 4-13 are omitted, probably due to the similarities in ending of vv. 3, 13 (i.e., homoioteleuton of מֶלֶךְ בָּבֶל, melekh bavel).

[39:8]  ²⁵ sn According to the parallels in 2 Kgs 25:8-9; Jer 52:12-13 this occurred almost a month after the wall was breached and Zedekiah’s failed escape. It took place under the direction of Nebuzaradan, the captain of the king’s special guard who is mentioned in the next verse.

[52:7]  ²⁶ sn The king’s garden is mentioned again in Neh 3:15 in conjunction with the pool of Siloam and the stairs that go down from the city of David. This would have been in the southern part of the city near the Tyropean Valley which agrees with the reference to the “two walls” which were probably the walls on the eastern and western hills.

[52:7]  ²⁷ sn Heb “toward the Arabah.” The Arabah was the rift valley north and south of the Dead Sea. Here the intention was undoubtedly to escape across the Jordan to Moab or Ammon. It appears from 40:14; 41:15 that the Ammonites were known to harbor fugitives from the Babylonians.