Yeremia 23:20

23:20 The anger of the Lord will not turn back

until he has fully carried out his intended purposes. ¹ 

In days to come ² 

you people will come to understand this clearly. ³ 

Yeremia 25:18

25:18 I made Jerusalem ⁴  and the cities of Judah, its kings and its officials drink it. ⁵  I did it so Judah would become a ruin. I did it so Judah, its kings, and its officials would become an object ⁶  of horror and of hissing scorn, an example used in curses. ⁷  Such is already becoming the case! ⁸ 

[23:20]  ¹ tn Heb “until he has done and until he has carried out the purposes of his heart.”

[23:20]  ² tn Heb “in the latter days.” However, as BDB 31 s.v. אַחֲרִית b suggests, the meaning of this idiom must be determined from the context. Sometimes it has remote, even eschatological, reference and other times it has more immediate reference as it does here and in Jer 30:23 where it refers to the coming days of Babylonian conquest and exile.

[23:20]  ³ tn The translation is intended to reflect a Hebrew construction where a noun functions as the object of a verb from the same root word (the Hebrew cognate accusative).

[25:18]  ⁴ map For location see Map5 B1; Map6 F3; Map7 E2; Map8 F2; Map10 B3; JP1 F4; JP2 F4; JP3 F4; JP4 F4.

[25:18]  ⁵ tn The words “I made” and “drink it” are not in the text. The text from v. 18 to v. 26 contains a list of the nations that Jeremiah “made drink it.” The words are supplied in the translation here and at the beginning of v. 19 for the sake of clarity. See also the note on v. 26.

[25:18]  ⁶ tn Heb “in order to make them a ruin, an object of…” The sentence is broken up and the antecedents are made specific for the sake of clarity and English style.

[25:18]  ⁷ tn See the study note on 24:9 for explanation.

[25:18]  ⁸ tn Heb “as it is today.” This phrase would obviously be more appropriate after all these things had happened as is the case in 44:6, 23 where the verbs referring to these conditions are past. Some see this phrase as a marginal gloss added after the tragedies of 597 b.c. or 586 b.c. However, it may refer here to the beginning stages where Judah has already suffered the loss of Josiah, of its freedom, of some of its temple treasures, and of some of its leaders (Dan 1:1-3. The different date for Jehoiakim there is due to the different method of counting the king’s first year; the third year there is the same as the fourth year in 25:1).