Jeremiah 4:19

4:19 I said, ¹ 

“Oh, the feeling in the pit of my stomach! ² 

I writhe in anguish.

Oh, the pain in my heart! ³ 

My heart pounds within me.

I cannot keep silent.

For I hear the sound of the trumpet; ⁴ 

the sound of the battle cry pierces my soul! ⁵ 

Jeremiah 4:21

4:21 “How long must I see the enemy’s battle flags

and hear the military signals of their bugles?” ⁶ 

Exodus 16:3

16:3 The Israelites said to them, “If only we had died ⁷  by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by ⁸  the pots of meat, when we ate bread to the full, ⁹  for you have brought us out into this desert to kill ¹⁰  this whole assembly with hunger!”

Exodus 17:3

17:3 But the people were very thirsty ¹¹  there for water, and they murmured against Moses and said, “Why in the world ¹²  did you bring us up out of Egypt – to kill us and our children and our cattle with thirst?” ¹³ 

Numbers 11:5

11:5 We remember ¹⁴  the fish we used to eat ¹⁵  freely ¹⁶  in Egypt, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic.

Numbers 16:13

16:13 Is it a small thing ¹⁷  that you have brought us up out of the land that flows with milk and honey, ¹⁸  to kill us in the wilderness? Now do you want to make yourself a prince ¹⁹  over us?

[4:19]  ¹ tn The words “I said” are not in the text. They are used to mark the shift from the Lord’s promise of judgment to Jeremiah’s lament concerning it.

[4:19]  ² tn Heb “My bowels! My bowels!”

[4:19]  ³ tn Heb “the walls of my heart!”

[4:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “ram’s horn,” but the modern equivalent is “trumpet” and is more readily understandable.

[4:19]  ⁵ tc The translation reflects a different division of the last two lines than that suggested by the Masoretes. The written text (the Kethib) reads “for the sound of the ram’s horn I have heard [or “you have heard,” if the form is understood as the old second feminine singular perfect] my soul” followed by “the battle cry” in the last line. The translation is based on taking “my soul” with the last line and understanding an elliptical expression “the battle cry [to] my soul.” Such an elliptical expression is in keeping with the elliptical nature of the exclamations at the beginning of the verse (cf. the literal translations of the first two lines of the verse in the notes on the words “stomach” and “heart”).

[4:21]  ⁶ tn Heb “the sound of ram’s horns,” but the modern equivalent is “bugles” and is more readily understandable.

[16:3]  ⁷ tn The text reads: מִי־יִתֵּן מוּתֵנוּ (mi-yitten mutenu, “who will give our dying”) meaning “If only we had died.” מוּתֵנוּ is the Qal infinitive construct with the suffix. This is one way that Hebrew expresses the optative with an infinitive construct. See R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 91-92, §547.

[16:3]  ⁸ tn The form is a Qal infinitive construct used in a temporal clause, and the verb “when we ate” has the same structure.

[16:3]  ⁹ sn That the complaint leading up to the manna is unjustified can be seen from the record itself. They left Egypt with flocks and herds and very much cattle, and about 45 days later they are complaining that they are without food. Moses reminded them later that they lacked nothing (Deut 3:7; for the whole sermon on this passage, see 8:1-20). Moreover, the complaint is absurd because the food of work gangs was far more meager than they recall. The complaint was really against Moses. They crave the eating of meat and of bread and so God will meet that need; he will send bread from heaven and quail as well.

[16:3]  ¹⁰ tn לְהָמִית (lÿhamit) is the Hiphil infinitive construct showing purpose. The people do not trust the intentions or the plan of their leaders and charge Moses with bringing everyone out to kill them.

[17:3]  ¹¹ tn The verbs and the pronouns in this verse are in the singular because “the people” is singular in form.

[17:3]  ¹² tn The demonstrative pronoun is used as the enclitic form for special emphasis in the question; it literally says, “why is this you have brought us up?” (R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 24, §118).

[17:3]  ¹³ sn Their words deny God the credit for bringing them out of Egypt, impugn the integrity of Moses and God by accusing them of bringing the people out here to die, and show a lack of faith in God’s ability to provide for them.

[11:5]  ¹⁴ tn The perfect tense here expresses the experience of a state of mind.

[11:5]  ¹⁵ tn The imperfect tense would here be the customary imperfect, showing continual or incomplete action in past time.

[11:5]  ¹⁶ tn The adverb “freely” is from the word חָנַן (khanan, “to be gracious”), from which is derived the noun “grace.” The word underscores the idea of “free, without cost, for no reason, gratis.” Here the simple sense is “freely,” without any cost. But there may be more significance in the choice of the words in this passage, showing the ingratitude of the Israelites to God for His deliverance from bondage. To them now the bondage is preferable to the salvation – this is what angered the Lord.

[16:13]  ¹⁷ tn The question is rhetorical. It was not a small thing to them – it was a big thing.

[16:13]  ¹⁸ tn The modern scholar who merely sees these words as belonging to an earlier tradition about going up to the land of Canaan that flows with milk and honey misses the irony here. What is happening is that the text is showing how twisted the thinking of the rebels is. They have turned things completely around. Egypt was the land flowing with milk and honey, not Canaan where they will die. The words of rebellion are seldom original, and always twisted.

[16:13]  ¹⁹ tn The verb הִשְׂתָּרֵר (histarer) is the Hitpael infinitive absolute that emphasizes the preceding תִשְׂתָּרֵר (tistarer), the Hitpael imperfect tense (both forms having metathesis). The verb means “to rule; to act like a prince; to make oneself a prince.” This is the only occurrence of the reflexive for this verb. The exact nuance is difficult to translate into English. But they are accusing Moses of seizing princely power for himself, perhaps making a sarcastic reference to his former status in Egypt. The rebels here are telling Moses that they had discerned his scheme, and so he could not “hoodwink” them (cf. NEB).