Psalms 91:15

91:15 When he calls out to me, I will answer him.

I will be with him when he is in trouble;

I will rescue him and bring him honor.

Psalms 94:12-13

94:12 How blessed is the one ¹  whom you instruct, O Lord,

the one whom you teach from your law,

94:13 in order to protect him from times of trouble, ² 

until the wicked are destroyed. ³ 

Isaiah 26:20-21

26:20 Go, my people! Enter your inner rooms!

Close your doors behind you!

Hide for a little while,

until his angry judgment is over! ⁴ 

26:21 For look, the Lord is coming out of the place where he lives, ⁵ 

to punish the sin of those who live on the earth.

The earth will display the blood shed on it;

it will no longer cover up its slain. ⁶ 

Jeremiah 15:10-11

Jeremiah Complains about His Lot and The Lord Responds

15:10 I said, ⁷ 

“Oh, mother, how I regret ⁸  that you ever gave birth to me!

I am always starting arguments and quarrels with the people of this land. ⁹ 

I have not lent money to anyone and I have not borrowed from anyone.

Yet all of these people are treating me with contempt.” ¹⁰ 

15:11 The Lord said,

“Jerusalem, ¹¹  I will surely send you away for your own good.

I will surely ¹²  bring the enemy upon you in a time of trouble and distress.

Jeremiah 45:3-5

45:3 ‘You have said, “I feel so hopeless! ¹³  For the Lord has added sorrow to my suffering. ¹⁴  I am worn out from groaning. I can’t find any rest.”’”

45:4 The Lord told Jeremiah, ¹⁵  “Tell Baruch, ¹⁶  ‘The Lord says, “I am about to tear down what I have built and to uproot what I have planted. I will do this throughout the whole earth. ¹⁷  45:5 Are you looking for great things for yourself? Do not look for such things. For I, the Lord, affirm ¹⁸  that I am about to bring disaster on all humanity. ¹⁹  But I will allow you to escape with your life ²⁰  wherever you go.”’”

Ezekiel 9:4-6

9:4 The Lord said to him, “Go through the city of Jerusalem ²¹  and put a mark ²²  on the foreheads of the people who moan and groan over all the abominations practiced in it.”

9:5 While I listened, he said to the others, ²³  “Go through the city after him and strike people down; do no let your eye pity nor spare ²⁴  anyone! 9:6 Old men, young men, young women, little children, and women – wipe them out! But do not touch anyone who has the mark. Begin at my sanctuary!” So they began with the elders who were at the front of the temple.

Ezekiel 9:2

9:2 Next, I noticed ²⁵  six men ²⁶  coming from the direction of the upper gate ²⁷  which faces north, each with his war club in his hand. Among them was a man dressed in linen with a writing kit ²⁸  at his side. They came and stood beside the bronze altar.

Ezekiel 1:6-9

1:6 but each had four faces and four wings. 1:7 Their legs were straight, but the soles of their feet were like calves’ feet. They gleamed ²⁹  like polished bronze. 1:8 They had human hands ³⁰  under their wings on their four sides. As for the faces and wings of the four of them, 1:9 their wings touched each other; they did not turn as they moved, but went straight ahead. ³¹ 

[94:12]  ¹ tn Heb “[Oh] the happiness [of] the man.” Hebrew wisdom literature often assumes and reflects the male-oriented perspective of ancient Israelite society. The principle of the psalm is certainly applicable to all people, regardless of their gender or age. To facilitate modern application, we translate the gender and age specific “man” with the more neutral “one.” The generic masculine pronoun is used in v. 2.

[94:13]  ² tn Heb “to give him rest from the days of trouble.”

[94:13]  ³ tn Heb “until a pit is dug for the wicked.”

[26:20]  ⁴ tn Heb “until anger passes by.”

[26:21]  ⁵ tn Heb “out of his place” (so KJV, ASV).

[26:21]  ⁶ sn This implies that rampant bloodshed is one of the reasons for divine judgment. See the note at 24:5.

[15:10]  ⁷ tn The words “I said” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation for clarity to mark a shift in the speaker.

[15:10]  ⁸ tn Heb “Woe to me, my mother.” See the comments on 4:13 and 10:19.

[15:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “A man of strife and a man of contention with all the land.” The “of” relationship (Hebrew and Greek genitive) can convey either subjective or objective relationships, i.e., he instigates strife and contention or he is the object of it. A study of usage elsewhere, e.g., Isa 41:11; Job 31:35; Prov 12:19; 25:24; 26:21; 27:15, is convincing that it is subjective. In his role as God’s covenant messenger charging people with wrong doing he has instigated counterarguments and stirred about strife and contention against him.

[15:10]  ¹⁰ tc The translation follows the almost universally agreed upon correction of the MT. Instead of reading כֻּלֹּה מְקַלְלַונִי (kulloh mÿqallavni, “all of him is cursing me”) as the Masoretes proposed (Qere) one should read קִלְלוּנִי (qilluni) with the written text (Kethib) and redivide and repoint with the suggestion in BHS כֻּלְּהֶם (qullÿhem, “all of them are cursing me”).

[15:11]  ¹¹ tn The word “Jerusalem” is not in the text. It is supplied in the translation for clarity to identify the referent of “you.” A comparison of three or four English versions will show how difficult this verse is to interpret. The primary difficulty is with the meaning of the verb rendered here as “I will surely send you out [שֵׁרִותִךָ, sherivtikha].” The text and the meaning of the word are debated (for a rather full discussion see W. L. Holladay, Jeremiah [Hermeneia], 1:446-47, n. b-b). Tied up with that is the meaning of the verb in the second line and the identification of who the speaker and addressee are. One of two approaches are usually followed. Some follow the Greek version which has Jeremiah speaking and supporting his complaint that he has been faithful. In this case the word “said” is left out, the difficult verb is taken to mean “I have served you” (שֵׁרַתִּיךָ [sheratikha] from שָׁרַת [sharat; BDB 1058 s.v. שָׁרַת]) and the parallel verb means “I have made intercession for my enemies.” The second tack is to suppose that God is speaking and is promising Jeremiah deliverance from his detractors. In this case the troublesome word is taken to mean “deliver” (cf. BDB 1056 s.v. I שָׁרָה), “strengthen” (see BDB’s discussion) or read as a noun “remnant” (שֵׁרִיתְךָ = שְׁאֵרִיתְךָ [sheritekha = shÿ’eritekha]; again see BDB’s discussion). In this case the parallel verb is taken to mean “I will cause your enemies to entreat you,” a meaning it has nowhere else. Both of these approaches are probably wrong. The Greek text is the only evidence for leaving out “said.” The problem with making Jeremiah the addressee is twofold. First, the word “enemy” is never used in the book of Jeremiah’s foes, always of political enemies. Second, and more troublesome, one must assume a shift in the addressee between v. 11 and vv.13-14 or assume that the whole is addressed. The latter would be odd if he is promised deliverance from his detractors only to be delivered to captivity. If, however, one assumes that the whole is addressed to Jerusalem, there is no such problem. A check of earlier chapters will show that the second masculine pronoun is used for Judah/Jerusalem in 2:28-29; 4:1-2; 5:17-18; 11:13. In 2:28-28 and 4:1-2 the same shift from second singular to second plural takes place as does here in vv. 13-14. Moreover, vv. 13-14 continue much of the same vocabulary and is addressed to Jerusalem. The approach followed here is similar to that taken in REB except “for good” is taken in the way it is always used rather to mean “utterly.” The nuance suggested by BDB 1056 s.v. I שָׁרָה is assumed and the meaning of the parallel verb is assumed to be similar to that in Isa 53:6 (see BDB 803 s.v. פָּגַע Hiph.1). The MT is retained with demonstrable meanings. For the concept of “for good” see Jer 24:5-6. This assumes that the ultimate goal of God’s discipline is here announced.

[15:11]  ¹² tn “Surely” represents a construct in Hebrew that indicates a strong oath of affirmation. Cf. BDB 50 s.v. אִם 1.b(2) and compare usage in 2 Kgs 9:26.

[45:3]  ¹³ tn Heb “Woe to me!” See the translator’s note on 4:13 and 10:19 for the rendering of this term.

[45:3]  ¹⁴ sn From the context it appears that Baruch was feeling sorry for himself (v. 5) as well as feeling anguish for the suffering that the nation would need to undergo according to the predictions of Jeremiah that he was writing down.

[45:4]  ¹⁵ tn The words, “The Lord told Jeremiah” are not in the text but are implicit in the address that follows, “Thus you shall say to him.” These words are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[45:4]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Thus you shall say to him [i.e., Baruch].”

[45:4]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “and this is with regard to the whole earth.” The feminine pronoun הִיא (hi’) at the end refers to the verbal concepts just mentioned, i.e., this process (cf. GKC 459 §144.b and compare the use of the feminine singular suffix in the same function GKC 440-41 §135.p). The particle אֶת (’et) is here functioning to introduce emphatically the object of the action (cf. BDB 85 s.v. I אֵת 3.α). There is some debate whether אֶרֶץ (’erets) here applies to the whole land of Israel or to the whole earth. However, the reference to “all mankind” (Heb “all flesh”) in the next verse as well as “anywhere you go” points to “the whole earth” as the referent.

[45:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”

[45:5]  ¹⁹ sn Compare Jer 25:31, 33. The reference here to universal judgment also forms a nice transition to the judgments on the nations that follow in Jer 46-51 which may be another reason for the placement of this chapter here, out of its normal chronological order (see also the study note on v. 1).

[45:5]  ²⁰ tn Heb “I will give you your life for a spoil.” For this idiom see the translator’s note on 21:9 and compare the usage in 21:9; 38:2; 39:18.

[9:4]  ²¹ tn Heb “through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem.”

[9:4]  ²² tn The word translated “mark” is in Hebrew the letter ת (tav). Outside this context the only other occurrence of the word is in Job 31:35. In ancient Hebrew script this letter was written like the letter X.

[9:5]  ²³ tn Heb “to these he said in my ears.”

[9:5]  ²⁴ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term is primarily emotional: “to pity,” which in context implies an action, as in being moved by pity in order to spare them from the horror of their punishment.

[9:2]  ²⁵ tn The word הִנֵּה (hinneh, traditionally “behold”) indicates becoming aware of something and has been translated here as a verb.

[9:2]  ²⁶ sn The six men plus the scribe would equal seven, which was believed by the Babylonians to be the number of planetary deities.

[9:2]  ²⁷ sn The upper gate was built by Jotham (2 Kgs 15:35).

[9:2]  ²⁸ tn Or “a scribe’s inkhorn.” The Hebrew term occurs in the OT only in Ezek 9 and is believed to be an Egyptian loanword.

[1:7]  ²⁹ sn The Hebrew verb translated gleamed occurs only here in the OT.

[1:8]  ³⁰ tc The MT reads “his hand” while many Hebrew mss as well as the Qere read “hands of.” Two similar Hebrew letters, vav and yod, have been confused.

[1:9]  ³¹ tn Heb “They each went in the direction of one of his faces.”