Jeremiah 28:15-17

28:15 Then the prophet Jeremiah told the prophet Hananiah, “Listen, Hananiah! The Lord did not send you! You are making these people trust in a lie! ¹  28:16 So the Lord says, ‘I will most assuredly remove ²  you from the face of the earth. You will die this very year because you have counseled rebellion against the Lord.’” ³ 

28:17 In the seventh month of that very same year ⁴  the prophet Hananiah died.

Jeremiah 29:21-22

29:21 “The Lord God of Israel who rules over all ⁵  also has something to say about Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, who are prophesying lies to you and claiming my authority to do so. ⁶  ‘I will hand them over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and he will execute them before your very eyes. 29:22 And all the exiles of Judah who are in Babylon will use them as examples when they put a curse on anyone. They will say, “May the Lord treat you like Zedekiah and Ahab whom the king of Babylon roasted to death in the fire!” ⁷ 

Jeremiah 29:32

29:32 Because he has done this,” ⁸  the Lord says, “I will punish Shemaiah the Nehelamite and his whole family. There will not be any of them left to experience the good things that I will do for my people. I, the Lord, affirm it! For he counseled rebellion against the Lord.”’” ⁹ 

Acts 13:8-11

13:8 But the magician Elymas ¹⁰  (for that is the way his name is translated) ¹¹  opposed them, trying to turn the proconsul ¹²  away from the faith. 13:9 But Saul (also known as Paul), ¹³  filled with the Holy Spirit, ¹⁴  stared straight ¹⁵  at him 13:10 and said, “You who are full of all deceit and all wrongdoing, ¹⁶  you son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness – will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord? ¹⁷  13:11 Now ¹⁸  look, the hand of the Lord is against ¹⁹  you, and you will be blind, unable to see the sun for a time!” Immediately mistiness ²⁰  and darkness came over ²¹  him, and he went around seeking people ²²  to lead him by the hand.

[28:15]  ¹ tn Or “You are giving these people false assurances.”

[28:16]  ² sn There is a play on words here in Hebrew between “did not send you” and “will…remove you.” The two verbs are from the same root word in Hebrew. The first is the simple active and the second is the intensive.

[28:16]  ³ sn In giving people false assurances of restoration when the Lord had already told them to submit to Babylon, Hananiah was really counseling rebellion against the Lord. What Hananiah had done was contrary to the law of Deut 13:6 and was punishable by death.

[28:17]  ⁴ sn Comparison with Jer 28:1 shows that this whole incident took place in the space of two months. Hananiah had prophesied that the captivity would be over before two years had past. However, before two months were past, Hananiah himself died in fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy of his death. His death was a validation of Jeremiah as a true prophet. The subsequent events of 588 b.c. would validate Jeremiah’s prophesies and invalidate those of Hananiah.

[29:21]  ⁵ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.”

[29:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “prophesying lies in my name.” For an explanation of this idiom see the study notes on 14:14 and 23:27.

[29:22]  ⁷ sn Being roasted to death in the fire appears to have been a common method of execution in Babylon. See Dan 3:6, 19-21. The famous law code of the Babylonian king Hammurabi also mandated this method of execution for various crimes a thousand years earlier. There is a satirical play on words involving their fate, “roasted them to death” (קָלָם, qalam), and the fact that that fate would become a common topic of curse (קְלָלָה, qÿlalah) pronounced on others in Babylon.

[29:32]  ⁸ tn Heb “Therefore.”

[29:32]  ⁹ sn Compare the same charge against Hananiah in Jer 28:16 and see the note there. In this case, the false prophesy of Shemaiah is not given but it likely had the same tenor since he wants Jeremiah reprimanded for saying that the exile will be long and the people are to settle down in Babylon.

[13:8]  ¹⁰ tn On the debate over what the name “Elymas” means, see BDAG 320 s.v. ᾿Ελύμας. The magician’s behavior is more directly opposed to the faith than Simon Magus’ was.

[13:8]  ¹¹ sn A parenthetical note by the author.

[13:8]  ¹² sn The proconsul was the Roman official who ruled over a province traditionally under the control of the Roman senate.

[13:9]  ¹³ sn A parenthetical note by the author.

[13:9]  ¹⁴ sn This qualifying clause in the narrative indicates who represented God in the dispute.

[13:9]  ¹⁵ tn Or “gazed intently.”

[13:10]  ¹⁶ tn Or “unscrupulousness.”

[13:10]  ¹⁷ sn “You who…paths of the Lord?” This rebuke is like ones from the OT prophets: Jer 5:27; Gen 32:11; Prov 10:7; Hos 14:9. Five separate remarks indicate the magician’s failings. The closing rhetorical question of v. 10 (“will you not stop…?”) shows how opposed he is to the way of God.

[13:11]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “And now.” Because of the difference between Greek style, which often begins sentences or clauses with “and,” and English style, which generally does not, καί (kai) has not been translated here.

[13:11]  ¹⁹ tn Grk “upon,” but in a negative sense.

[13:11]  ²⁰ sn The term translated mistiness here appears in the writings of the physician Galen as a medical technical description of a person who is blind. The picture of judgment to darkness is symbolic as well. Whatever power Elymas had, it represented darkness. Magic will again be an issue in Acts 19:18-19. This judgment is like that of Ananias and his wife in Acts 5:1-11.

[13:11]  ²¹ tn Grk “fell on.”

[13:11]  ²² tn The noun χειραγωγός (ceiragwgo") is plural, so “people” is used rather than singular “someone.”