Jeremiah 51:51

51:51 ‘We ¹  are ashamed because we have been insulted. ² 

Our faces show our disgrace. ³ 

For foreigners have invaded

the holy rooms ⁴  in the Lord’s temple.’

Jeremiah 50:5

50:5 They will ask the way to Zion;

they will turn their faces toward it.

They will come ⁵  and bind themselves to the Lord

in a lasting covenant that will never be forgotten. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 5:3

5:3 Lord, I know you look for faithfulness. ⁷ 

But even when you punish these people, they feel no remorse. ⁸ 

Even when you nearly destroy them, they refuse to be corrected.

They have become as hardheaded as a rock. ⁹ 

They refuse to change their ways. ¹⁰ 

Jeremiah 30:6

30:6 Ask yourselves this and consider it carefully: ¹¹ 

Have you ever seen a man give birth to a baby?

Why then do I see all these strong men

grabbing their stomachs in pain like ¹²  a woman giving birth?

And why do their faces

turn so deathly pale?

Jeremiah 32:33

32:33 They have turned away from me instead of turning to me. ¹³  I tried over and over again ¹⁴  to instruct them, but they did not listen and respond to correction. ¹⁵ 

Jeremiah 1:8

1:8 Do not be afraid of those to whom I send you, ¹⁶  for I will be with you to protect ¹⁷  you,” says the Lord.

Jeremiah 1:17

1:17 “But you, Jeremiah, ¹⁸  get yourself ready! ¹⁹  Go and tell these people everything I instruct you to say. Do not be terrified of them, or I will give you good reason to be terrified of them. ²⁰ 

Jeremiah 7:19

7:19 But I am not really the one being troubled!” ²¹  says the Lord. “Rather they are bringing trouble on themselves to their own shame! ²² 

Jeremiah 42:15

42:15 If you people who remain in Judah do that, then listen to what the Lord says. The Lord God of Israel who rules over all ²³  says, ‘If you are so determined ²⁴  to go to Egypt that you go and settle there,

Jeremiah 2:27

2:27 They say to a wooden idol, ²⁵  ‘You are my father.’

They say to a stone image, ‘You gave birth to me.’ ²⁶ 

Yes, they have turned away from me instead of turning to me. ²⁷ 

Yet when they are in trouble, they say, ‘Come and save us!’

Jeremiah 42:17

42:17 All the people who are determined to go and settle in Egypt will die from war, starvation, or disease. No one will survive or escape the disaster I will bring on them.’

Jeremiah 48:6

48:6 They will hear, ‘Run! Save yourselves!

Even if you must be like a lonely shrub in the desert!’ ²⁸ 

Jeremiah 14:4

14:4 They are dismayed because the ground is cracked ²⁹ 

because there has been no rain in the land.

The farmers, too, are dismayed

and bury their faces in their hands.

Jeremiah 44:12

44:12 I will see to it that all the Judean remnant that was determined to go ³⁰  and live in the land of Egypt will be destroyed. Here in the land of Egypt they will fall in battle ³¹  or perish from starvation. People of every class ³²  will die in war or from starvation. They will become an object of horror and ridicule, an example of those who have been cursed and that people use in pronouncing a curse. ³³ 

Jeremiah 2:37

2:37 Moreover, you will come away from Egypt

with your hands covering your faces in sorrow and shame ³⁴ 

because the Lord will not allow your reliance on them to be successful

and you will not gain any help from them. ³⁵ 

Jeremiah 14:3

14:3 The leading men of the cities send their servants for water.

They go to the cisterns, ³⁶  but they do not find any water there.

They return with their containers ³⁷  empty.

Disappointed and dismayed, they bury their faces in their hands. ³⁸ 

Jeremiah 41:5

41:5 eighty men arrived from Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria. ³⁹  They had shaved off their beards, torn their clothes, and cut themselves to show they were mourning. ⁴⁰  They were carrying grain offerings and incense to present at the temple of the Lord in Jerusalem. ⁴¹ 

Jeremiah 31:9

31:9 They will come back shedding tears of contrition.

I will bring them back praying prayers of repentance. ⁴² 

I will lead them besides streams of water,

along smooth paths where they will never stumble. ⁴³ 

I will do this because I am Israel’s father;

Ephraim ⁴⁴  is my firstborn son.’”

[51:51]  ¹ sn The exiles lament the way they have been humiliated.

[51:51]  ² tn Heb “we have heard an insult.”

[51:51]  ³ tn Heb “disgrace covers our face.”

[51:51]  ⁴ tn Or “holy places, sanctuaries.”

[50:5]  ⁵ tc The translation here assumes that the Hebrew בֹּאוּ (bo’u; a Qal imperative masculine plural) should be read בָּאוּ (ba’u; a Qal perfect third plural). This reading is presupposed by the Greek version of Aquila, the Latin version, and the Targum (see BHS note a, which mistakenly assumes that the form must be imperfect).

[50:5]  ⁶ sn See Jer 32:40 and the study note there for the nature of this lasting agreement.

[5:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “O Lord, are your eyes not to faithfulness?” The question is rhetorical and expects a positive answer.

[5:3]  ¹⁰ tn Commentaries and lexicons debate the meaning of the verb here. The MT is pointed as though from a verb meaning “to writhe in anguish or contrition” (חוּל [khul]; see, e.g., BDB 297 s.v. חוּל 2.c), but some commentaries and lexicons repoint the text as though from a verb meaning “to be sick,” thus “to feel pain” (חָלָה [khalah]; see, e.g., HALOT 304 s.v. חָלָה 3). The former appears more appropriate to the context.

[5:3]  ¹¹ tn Heb “They made their faces as hard as a rock.”

[5:3]  ¹² tn Or “to repent”; Heb “to turn back.”

[30:6]  ¹³ tn Heb “Ask and see/consider.”

[30:6]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “with their hands on their loins.” The word rendered “loins” refers to the area between the ribs and the thighs.

[32:33]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “they have turned [their] backs to me, not [their] faces.” Compare the same idiom in 2:27.

[32:33]  ¹⁸ tn For the idiom involved here see the translator’s note on 7:13. The verb that introduces this clause is a Piel infinitive absolute which is functioning in place of the finite verb (see, e.g., GKC 346 §113.ff and compare usage in Jer 8:15; 14:19. This grammatical point means that the versions cited in BHS fn a may not be reading a different text after all, but may merely be interpreting the form as syntactically equivalent to a finite verb as the present translation has done.).

[32:33]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “But they were not listening so as to accept correction.”

[1:8]  ²¹ tn Heb “be afraid of them.” The antecedent is the “whomever” in v. 7.

[1:8]  ²² tn Heb “rescue.”

[1:17]  ²⁵ tn The name “Jeremiah” is not in the text. The use of the personal pronoun followed by the proper name is an attempt to reflect the correlative emphasis between Jeremiah’s responsibility noted here and the Lord’s promise noted in the next verse. The emphasis in the Hebrew text is marked by the presence of the subject pronouns at the beginning of each of the two verses.

[1:17]  ²⁶ tn Heb “gird up your loins.” For the literal use of this idiom to refer to preparation for action see 2 Kgs 4:29; 9:1. For the idiomatic use to refer to spiritual and emotional preparation as here, see Job 38:3, 40:7, and 1 Pet 1:13 in the NT.

[1:17]  ²⁷ tn Heb “I will make you terrified in front of them.” There is a play on words here involving two different forms of the same Hebrew verb and two different but related prepositional phrases, “from before/of,” a preposition introducing the object of a verb of fearing, and “before, in front of,” a preposition introducing a spatial location.

[7:19]  ²⁹ tn Heb “Is it I whom they provoke?” The rhetorical question expects a negative answer which is made explicit in the translation.

[7:19]  ³⁰ tn Heb “Is it not themselves to their own shame?” The rhetorical question expects a positive answer which is made explicit in the translation.

[42:15]  ³³ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.” See the study note on 2:19 for the translation and significance of this title.

[42:15]  ³⁴ tn Heb “set your face to.” See Jer 42:17; 44:11; Dan 11:17; 2 Kgs 12:17 (12:18 HT) for parallel usage.

[2:27]  ³⁷ tn Heb “wood…stone…”

[2:27]  ³⁸ sn The reference to wood and stone is, of course, a pejorative reference to idols made by human hands. See the next verse where reference is made to “the gods you have made.”

[2:27]  ³⁹ tn Heb “they have turned [their] backs to me, not [their] faces.”

[48:6]  ⁴¹ tc The meaning of this line is uncertain. The translation follows one reading of the Hebrew text. The Greek version reads “Be like a wild donkey in the desert!” There are three points of debate in this line: the syntax of the verb form “be” (תִהְיֶינָה, tihyenah) and the text and meaning of the word translated “shrub” in the Hebrew text. This word only occurs with this meaning here and in Jer 17:6. A related word occurs in Ps 102:17 (102:18 HT). Elsewhere this spelling refers to the place name Aroer which was a place in Moab on the edge of the Arnon River. Most commentators do not feel that a reference to that place is appropriate here because it was not in the desert. The Greek version reads “like a wild donkey” (reading כְּעָרוֹד [kÿ’arod] in place of כַּעֲרוֹעֵר [ka’aro’er]). That would make an appropriate simile here because the wild donkey enjoys its freedom and is hard to capture. G. L. Keown, P. J. Scalise, and T. G. Smothers (Jeremiah 26-52 [WBC], 312) explain the simile of the “shrub” as referring to the marginal and rudimentary existence of a displaced person. That may not be as optimistic as the reference to the wild donkey but it does give an appropriate meaning. The third feminine plural has been explained as the singular noun + suffix = “yourselves” (נַפְשְׁכֶם, nafshÿkhem) used as a collective (so S. R. Driver, Jeremiah, 368, with cross reference to GKC 462-63 §145.c). J. Bright (Jeremiah [AB], 314, n. e-e) follows a suggestion of D. N. Freedman in seeing the form (תִהְיֶינָה, tihyenah) as a mistake for the 2nd masculine plural plus energic (תִהְיוּן, tihyun). Given the number of other textual corruptions in this passage, this is possible. The resultant meaning in either case is the same.

[14:4]  ⁴⁵ tn For the use of the verb “is cracked” here see BDB 369 s.v. חָתַת Qal.1 and compare the usage in Jer 51:56 where it refers to broken bows. The form is a relative clause without relative pronoun (cf., GKC 486-87 §155.f). The sentence as a whole is related to the preceding through a particle meaning “because of” or “on account of.” Hence the subject and verb have been repeated to make the connection.

[44:12]  ⁴⁹ tn Heb “they set their face to go.” Compare 44:11 and 42:14 and see the translator’s note at 42:15.

[44:12]  ⁵⁰ tn Heb “fall by the sword.”

[44:12]  ⁵¹ tn Or “All of them without distinction,” or “All of them from the least important to the most important”; Heb “From the least to the greatest.” See the translator’s note on 42:1 for the meaning of this idiom.

[44:12]  ⁵² tn See the study note on 24:9 and the usage in 29:22 for the meaning and significance of this last phrase.

[2:37]  ⁵³ tn Heb “with your hands on your head.” For the picture here see 2 Sam 13:19.

[2:37]  ⁵⁴ tn Heb “The Lord has rejected those you trust in; you will not prosper by/from them.”

[14:3]  ⁵⁷ tn Though the concept of “cisterns” is probably not familiar to some readers, it would be a mistake to translate this word as “well.” Wells have continual sources of water. Cisterns were pits dug in the ground and lined with plaster to hold rain water. The drought had exhausted all the water in the cisterns.

[14:3]  ⁵⁸ tn The word “containers” is a generic word in Hebrew = “vessels.” It would probably in this case involve water “jars” or “jugs.” But since in contemporary English one would normally associate those terms with smaller vessels, “containers” may be safer.

[14:3]  ⁵⁹ tn Heb “they cover their heads.” Some of the English versions have gone wrong here because of the “normal” use of the words translated here “disappointed” and “dismayed.” They are regularly translated “ashamed” and “disgraced, humiliated, dismayed” elsewhere (see e.g., Jer 22:22); they are somewhat synonymous terms which are often parallel or combined. The key here, however, is the expression “they cover their heads” which is used in 2 Sam 15:30 for the expression of grief. Moreover, the word translated here “disappointed” (בּוֹשׁ, bosh) is used that way several times. See for example Jer 12:13 and consult examples in BDB 101 s.v. בּוֹשׁ Qal.2. A very similar context with the same figure is found in Jer 2:36-37.

[41:5]  ⁶¹ sn Shechem, Shiloh, and Samaria were all cities in the northern kingdom of Israel with important religious and political histories. When Israel was destroyed in 722 b.c., some of the Israelites had been left behind and some of the Judeans had taken up residence in these northern cities. People residing there had participated in the reforms of Hezekiah (2 Chr 30:11) and Josiah (2 Chr 34:9) and were evidently still faithfully following the Jewish calendar. They would have been on their way to Jerusalem to celebrate the Jewish New Year and the Feast of Tabernacles (Lev 23:34).

[41:5]  ⁶² tn The words “to show they were mourning” are not in the text but are implicit in the acts. They are supplied in the translation for clarification for readers who may not be familiar with ancient mourning customs.

[41:5]  ⁶³ tn The words “in Jerusalem” are not in the text but are implicit. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[31:9]  ⁶⁵ tn Heb “They will come with weeping; I will bring them with supplication.” The ideas of contrition and repentance are implicit from the context (cf. vv. 18-19) and are supplied for clarity.

[31:9]  ⁶⁶ sn Jer 31:8-9 are reminiscent of the “New Exodus” motif of Isa 40-66 which has already been referred to in Jer 16:14-15; 23:7-8. See especially Isa 35:3-10; 40:3-5, 11; 41:17-20; 42:14-17; 43:16-21; 49:9-13. As there, the New Exodus will so outstrip the old that the old will pale in comparison and be almost forgotten (see Jer 23:7-8).

[31:9]  ⁶⁷ sn Ephraim was the second son of Joseph who was elevated to a place of prominence in the family of Jacob by the patriarch’s special blessing. It was the strongest tribe in northern Israel and Samaria lay in its territory. It is often used as a poetic parallel for Israel as here. The poetry is not speaking of two separate entities here; it is a way of repeating an idea for emphasis. Moreover, there is no intent to show special preference for northern Israel over Judah. All Israel is metaphorically God’s son and the object of his special care and concern (Exod 4:22; Deut 32:6).