Jeremiah 42:21

42:21 This day ¹  I have told you what he said. ²  But you do not want to obey the Lord by doing what he sent me to tell you. ³ 

Jeremiah 42:8

42:8 So Jeremiah summoned Johanan son of Kareah and all the army officers who were with him and all the people of every class. ⁴ 

Jeremiah 51:24

51:24 “But I will repay Babylon

and all who live in Babylonia

for all the wicked things they did in Zion

right before the eyes of you Judeans,” ⁵ 

says the Lord. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 8:2

8:2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon and the stars. ⁷  These are things they ⁸  adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance, ⁹  from which they sought guidance, and worshiped. The bones of these people ¹⁰  will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground. ¹¹ 

Jeremiah 20:4

20:4 For the Lord says, ‘I will make both you and your friends terrified of what will happen to you. ¹²  You will see all of them die by the swords of their enemies. ¹³  I will hand all the people of Judah over to the king of Babylon. He will carry some of them away into exile in Babylon and he will kill others of them with the sword.

[42:21]  ¹ tn Or “Today.”

[42:21]  ² tn The words “what he said” are not in the text but are implicit and seem necessary for clarity.

[42:21]  ³ tn Heb “But you have not hearkened to the voice of [idiomatic for “obeyed” see BDB 1034 s.v. שָׁמַע Qal.1.m] the Lord your God, namely [cf. BDB 252 s.v. וְ 1.b] with respect [cf. BDB 514 s.v. לְ 5.f(c)] all which he has sent to us.” The verb is translated “don’t seem to want to obey” because they have not yet expressed their refusal or their actual disobedience. Several commentaries sensing this apparent discrepancy suggest that 42:19-22 are to be transposed after 43:1-3 (see, e.g., BHS note 18a, W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah [Hermeneia], 2:275; J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 252, 256, 258). However, there is absolutely no textual evidence for the transposition and little reason to suspect an early scribal error (in spite of Holladay’s suggestion). It is possible that Jeremiah here anticipates this answer in 43:1-3 through the response on their faces (so Bright, 256; F. B. Huey, Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 361). G. L. Keown, P. J. Scalise, and T. G. Smothers (Jeremiah 26-52 [WBC], 249) also call attention to the stated intention in 41:17 and the fact that the strong warning in 42:15-17 seems to imply that a negative response is expected). The use of the perfect here is perhaps to be related to the perfect expressing resolve or determination (see IBHS 489 §30.5.1d). It is also conceivable that these two verses are part of a conditional sentence which has no formal introduction. I.e., “And if you will not obey…then you should know for certain that…” For examples of this kind of conditional clause introduced by two vavs (ו) see Joüon 2:628-29 §167.b, and compare Jer 18:4; Judg 6:13. However, though this interpretation is within the possibilities of Hebrew grammar, I know of no translation or commentary that follows it. So it has not been followed in the translation or given as an alternate translation.

[42:8]  ⁴ tn Or “without distinction,” or “All the people from the least important to the most important”; Heb “from the least to the greatest.” This is a figure of speech that uses polar opposites as an all-inclusive designation of everyone without exception (i.e., it included all the people from the least important or poorest to the most important or richest.)

[51:24]  ⁷ tn Or “Media, you are my war club…I will use you to smash…leaders. So before your very eyes I will repay…for all the wicked things they did in Zion.” For explanation see the translator’s note on v. 20. The position of the phrase “before your eyes” at the end of the verse after “which they did in Zion” and the change in person from second masculine singular in vv. 20b-23 (“I used you to smite”) to second masculine plural in “before your eyes” argue that a change in referent/addressee occurs in this verse. To maintain that the referent in vv. 20-23 is Media/Cyrus requires that this position and change in person be ignored; “before your eyes” then is attached to “I will repay.” The present translation follows J. A. Thompson (Jeremiah [NICOT], 757) and F. B. Huey (Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 423) in seeing the referent as the Judeans who had witnessed the destruction of Zion/Jerusalem. The word “Judean” has been supplied for the sake of identifying the referent for the modern reader.

[51:24]  ⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[8:2]  ¹⁰ tc MT, 4QJer^a and LXX read “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJer^c reads “the sun and all the stars.”

[8:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”

[8:2]  ¹² tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

[8:2]  ¹³ tn Heb “they will not” but the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.

[8:2]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”

[20:4]  ¹³ tn Heb “I will make you an object of terror to both you and your friends.”

[20:4]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “And they will fall by the sword of their enemies and [with] your eyes seeing [it].”