Yeremia 46:9

46:9 Go ahead and ¹  charge into battle, you horsemen!

Drive furiously, you charioteers!

Let the soldiers march out into battle,

those from Ethiopia and Libya who carry shields,

and those from Lydia ²  who are armed with the bow. ³ 

Yeremia 46:16

46:16 I will make many stumble. ⁴ 

They will fall over one another in their hurry to flee. ⁵ 

They will say, ‘Get up!

Let’s go back to our own people.

Let’s go back to our homelands

because the enemy is coming to destroy us.’ ⁶ 

Yeremia 46:2

The Prophecy about Egypt’s Defeat at Carchemish

46:2 He spoke about Egypt and the army of Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt which was encamped along the Euphrates River at Carchemish. Now this was the army that King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon defeated in the fourth year that Jehoiakim son of Josiah was ruling ⁷  over Judah. ⁸ 

1 Samuel 10:6

10:6 Then the spirit of the Lord will rush upon you and you will prophesy with them. You will be changed into a different person.

1 Samuel 10:2

10:2 When you leave me today, you will find two men near Rachel’s tomb at Zelzah on Benjamin’s border. They will say to you, ‘The donkeys you have gone looking for have been found. Your father is no longer concerned about the donkeys but has become anxious about you two! ⁹  He is asking, “What should I do about my son?”’

Kisah Para Rasul 7:6

7:6 But God spoke as follows: ‘Your ¹⁰  descendants will be foreigners ¹¹  in a foreign country, whose citizens will enslave them and mistreat them for four hundred years. ¹² 

Yehezkiel 27:10-11

27:10 Men of Persia, Lud, ¹³  and Put were in your army, men of war.

They hung shield and helmet on you; they gave you your splendor.

27:11 The Arvadites ¹⁴  joined your army on your walls all around,

and the Gammadites ¹⁵  were in your towers.

They hung their quivers ¹⁶  on your walls all around;

they perfected your beauty.

Yehezkiel 30:4-6

30:4 A sword will come against Egypt

and panic will overtake Ethiopia

when the slain fall in Egypt

and they carry away her wealth

and dismantle her foundations.

30:5 Ethiopia, Put, Lud, all the foreigners, ¹⁷  Libya, and the people ¹⁸  of the covenant land ¹⁹  will die by the sword along with them.

30:6 “‘This is what the Lord says:

Egypt’s supporters will fall;

her confident pride will crumble. ²⁰ 

From Migdol to Syene ²¹  they will die by the sword within her,

declares the sovereign Lord.

[46:9]  ¹ tn The words “Go ahead and” are not in the text but are intended to suggest the ironical nature of the commands here. The Lord is again setting them up for a fall (v. 10). See the translator’s note on v. 4.

[46:9]  ² sn The peoples that are referred to here are all known to have been mercenaries in the army of Egypt (see Nah 3:9; Ezek 30:5). The place names in Hebrew are actually Cush, Put, and Lud. “Cush” has already been identified in Jer 13:23 as the region along the Nile south of Egypt most commonly referred to as Ethiopia. The identification of “Put” and “Lud” are both debated though it is generally felt that Put was a part of Libya and Lud is to be identified with Lydia in Asia Minor. For further discussion see M. J. Mellink, “Lud, Ludim” IDB 3:178, and T. O. Lambdin, “Put,” IDB 3:971.

[46:9]  ³ tn Heb “who grasp and bend the bow.”

[46:16]  ⁴ tn Heb “he multiplied the one stumbling.” For the first person reference see the preceding translator’s note.

[46:16]  ⁵ tc The words “in their hurry to flee” are not in the text but appear to be necessary to clarify the point that the stumbling and falling here is not the same as that in vv. 6, 12 where they occur in the context of defeat and destruction. Reference here appears to be to the mercenary soldiers who in their hurried flight to escape stumble over one another and fall. This is fairly clear from the literal translation “he multiplies the stumbling one. Also [= and] a man falls against a man and they say [probably = “saying”; an epexegetical use of the vav (ו) consecutive (IBHS 551 §33.2.2a, and see Exod 2:10 as a parallel)] ‘Get up! Let’s go…’” A reference to the flight of the mercenaries is also seen in v. 21. Many of the modern commentaries and a few of the modern English versions follow the Greek text and read vv. 15a-16 very differently. The Greek reads “Why has Apis fled from you? Your choice calf [i.e., Apis] has not remained. For the Lord has paralyzed him. And your multitudes have fainted and fallen; and each one said to his neighbor…” (reading רֻבְּךָ כָּשַׁל גַּם־נָפַל וַיֹּאמְרוּ אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ instead of כּוֹשֵׁל הִרְבָּה גַּם־נָפַל אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ). One would expect אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ (’ish ’el-re’ehu) to go with וַיֹּאמְרוּ (vayyo’mÿru) because it is idiomatic in this expression (cf., e.g., Gen 11:3; Judg 6:29). However, אִישׁ אֶל־רֵעֵהוּ (’ish ’el-re’ehu) is also found with singular verbs as here in Exod 22:9; 33:11; 1 Sam 10:11. There is no doubt that the Hebrew text is the more difficult and thus probably original. The reading of the Greek version is not supported by any other text or version and looks like an attempt to smooth out a somewhat awkward Hebrew original.

[46:16]  ⁶ tn Heb “to our native lands from before the sword of the oppressor.” The compound preposition “from before” is regularly used in a causal sense (see BDB 818 s.v. פָּנֶה 6.a, b, c). The “sword” is again interpreted as a figure for the destructive power of an enemy army.

[46:2]  ⁷ sn The fourth year of Jehoiakim’s reign proved very significant in the prophecies of Jeremiah. It was in that same year that he issued the prophecies against the foreign nations recorded in Jer 25 (and probably the prophecies recorded here in Jer 46-51) and that he had Baruch record and read to the people gathered in the temple all the prophecies he had uttered against Judah and Jerusalem up to that point in the hopes that they would repent and the nation would be spared. The fourth year of Jehoiakim (605 b.c.) marked a significant shift in the balance of power in Palestine. With the defeat of Necho at Carchemish in that year the area came under the control of Nebuchadnezzar and Judah and the surrounding nations had two options, submit to Babylon and pay tribute or suffer the consequences of death in war or exile in Babylon for failure to submit.

[46:2]  ⁸ tn Heb “Concerning Egypt: Concerning the army of Pharaoh Necho king of Egypt which was beside the Euphrates River at Carchemish which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon defeated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah.” The sentence has been broken up, restructured, and introductory words supplied in the translation to make the sentences better conform with contemporary English style. The dating formula is placed in brackets because the passage is prophetic about the battle, but the bracketed words were superscription or introduction and thus were added after the outcome was known.

[10:2]  ⁹ sn In the Hebrew text the pronoun you is plural, suggesting that Saul’s father was concerned about his son and the servant who accompanied him.

[7:6]  ¹⁰ tn Grk “that his”; the discourse switches from indirect to direct with the following verbs. For consistency the entire quotation is treated as second person direct discourse in the translation.

[7:6]  ¹¹ tn Or “will be strangers,” that is, one who lives as a noncitizen of a foreign country.

[7:6]  ¹² sn A quotation from Gen 15:13. Exod 12:40 specifies the sojourn as 430 years.

[27:10]  ¹³ sn See Gen 10:22.

[27:11]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “sons of Arvad.”

[27:11]  ¹⁵ sn The identity of the Gammadites is uncertain.

[27:11]  ¹⁶ tn See note on “quivers” in Jer 51:11 on the meaning of Hebrew שֶׁלֶט (shelet) and also M. Greenberg, Ezekiel (AB), 2:553.

[30:5]  ¹⁷ tn The same expression appears in Exod 12:38; Jer 25:20; 50:37; Neh 13:3. It may refer to foreign mercenaries serving in the armies of the nations listed here.

[30:5]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “sons.”

[30:5]  ¹⁹ tn The expression “sons of the covenant land” possibly refers to Jews living in Egypt (Jer 44).

[30:6]  ²⁰ tn Heb “come down.”

[30:6]  ²¹ sn Syene is known as Aswan today.