Jeremiah 29:18

29:18 I will chase after them with war, ¹  starvation, and disease. I will make all the kingdoms of the earth horrified at what happens to them. I will make them examples of those who are cursed, objects of horror, hissing scorn, and ridicule among all the nations where I exile them.

Jeremiah 29:22

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!” ² 

Psalms 109:18-19

109:18 He made cursing a way of life, ³ 

so curses poured into his stomach like water

and seeped into his bones like oil. ⁴ 

109:19 May a curse attach itself to him, like a garment one puts on, ⁵ 

or a belt ⁶  one wears continually!

Isaiah 65:15

65:15 Your names will live on in the curse formulas of my chosen ones. ⁷ 

The sovereign Lord will kill you,

but he will give his servants another name.

[29:18]  ¹ tn Heb “with the sword.”

[29:22]  ² 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.

[109:18]  ³ tn Heb “he put on a curse as [if it were] his garment.”

[109:18]  ⁴ tn Heb “and it came like water into his inner being, and like oil into his bones.” This may refer to this individual’s appetite for cursing. For him cursing was as refreshing as drinking water or massaging oneself with oil. Another option is that the destructive effects of a curse are in view. In this case a destructive curse invades his very being, like water or oil. Some who interpret the verse this way prefer to repoint the vav (ו) on “it came” to a conjunctive vav and interpret the prefixed verb as a jussive, “may it come!”

[109:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “may it be for him like a garment one puts on.”

[109:19]  ⁶ tn The Hebrew noun מֵזַח (mezakh, “belt; waistband”) occurs only here in the OT. The form apparently occurs in Isa 23:10 as well, but an emendation is necessary there.

[65:15]  ⁷ tn Heb “you will leave your name for an oath to my chosen ones.”