Jeremiah 40:6

40:6 So Jeremiah went to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah ¹  and lived there with him. He stayed there to live among the people who had been left in the land of Judah. ² 

Jeremiah 50:37

50:37 Destructive forces will come against her horses and her ³  chariots.

Destructive forces will come against all the foreign troops within her; ⁴ 

they will be as frightened as women! ⁵ 

Destructive forces will come against her treasures;

they will be taken away as plunder!

Jeremiah 51:6

51:6 Get out of Babylonia quickly, you foreign people. ⁶ 

Flee to save your lives.

Do not let yourselves be killed because of her sins.

For it is time for the Lord to wreak his revenge.

He will pay Babylonia ⁷  back for what she has done. ⁸ 

Jeremiah 51:47

51:47 “So the time will certainly come ⁹ 

when I will punish the idols of Babylon.

Her whole land will be put to shame.

All her mortally wounded will collapse in her midst. ¹⁰ 

Jeremiah 51:63

51:63 When you finish reading this scroll aloud, tie a stone to it and throw it into the middle of the Euphrates River. ¹¹ 

[40:6]  ¹ sn Mizpah. It is generally agreed that this is the Mizpah that was on the border between Benjamin and Judah. It was located approximately eight miles north of Jerusalem and had been an important military and religious center from the time of the judges on (cf., e.g., Judg 20:1-3; 1 Sam 7:5-14; 1 Sam 10:17; 1 Kgs 15:22). It was not far from Ramah which was approximately four miles north of Jerusalem.

[40:6]  ² tn Heb “So Jeremiah went to Gedaliah…and lived with him among the people who had been left in the land.” The long Hebrew sentence has been divided in two to better conform with contemporary English style.

[50:37]  ³ tn Hebrew has “his” in both cases here whereas the rest of the possessive pronouns throughout vv. 35-37 are “her.” There is no explanation for this switch unless the third masculine singular refers as a distributive singular to the soldiers mentioned in the preceding verse (cf. GKC 464 §145.l). This is probably the case here, but to refer to “their horses and their chariots” in the midst of all the “her…” might create more confusion than what it is worth to be that pedantic.

[50:37]  ⁴ tn Or “in the country,” or “in her armies”; Heb “in her midst.”

[50:37]  ⁵ tn Heb “A sword against his horses and his chariots and against all the mixed company [or mixed multitude] in her midst and they will become like women.” The sentence had to be split up because it is too long and the continuation of the second half with its consequential statement would not fit together with the first half very well. Hence the subject and verb have been repeated. The Hebrew word translated “foreign troops” (עֶרֶב, ’erev) is the same word that is used in 25:20 to refer to the foreign peoples living in Egypt and in Exod 12:38 for the foreign people that accompanied Israel out of Egypt. Here the word is translated contextually to refer to foreign mercenaries, an identification that most of the commentaries and many of the modern English versions accept (see, e.g., J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 355; NRSV; NIV). The significance of the simile “they will become like women” has been spelled out for the sake of clarity.

[51:6]  ⁵ tn The words “you foreign people” are not in the text and many think the referent is the exiles of Judah. While this is clearly the case in v. 45 the referent seems broader here where the context speaks of every man going to his own country (v. 9).

[51:6]  ⁶ tn Heb “her.”

[51:6]  ⁷ tn Heb “paying to her a recompense [i.e., a payment in kind].”

[51:47]  ⁷ tn Heb “That being so, look, days are approaching.” לָכֵן (lakhen) often introduces the effect of an action. That may be the case here, the turmoil outlined in v. 46 serving as the catalyst for the culminating divine judgment described in v. 47. Another possibility is that לָכֵן here has an asseverative force (“certainly”), as in Isa 26:14 and perhaps Jer 5:2 (see the note there). In this case the word almost has the force of “for, since,” because it presents a cause for an accompanying effect. See Judg 8:7 and the discussion of Isa 26:14 in BDB 486-87 s.v. כֵּן 3.d.

[51:47]  ⁸ tn Or “all her slain will fall in her midst.” In other words, her people will be overtaken by judgment and be unable to escape. The dead will lie in heaps in the very heart of the city and land.

[51:63]  ⁹ tn The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied for clarity.