Yeremia 32:4-5

32:4 King Zedekiah of Judah will not escape from the Babylonians. ¹  He will certainly be handed over to the king of Babylon. He must answer personally to the king of Babylon and confront him face to face. ²  32:5 Zedekiah will be carried off to Babylon and will remain there until I have fully dealt with him. ³  I, the Lord, affirm it! ⁴  Even if you ⁵  continue to fight against the Babylonians, ⁶  you cannot win.’”

Yeremia 38:18

38:18 But if you do not surrender to the officers of the king of Babylon, this city will be handed over to the Babylonians ⁷  and they will burn it down. You yourself will not escape from them.’” ⁸ 

Yeremia 38:23

38:23 “All your wives and your children will be turned over to the Babylonians. ⁹  You yourself will not escape from them but will be captured by the ¹⁰  king of Babylon. This city will be burned down.” ¹¹ 

[32:4]  ¹ tn Heb “The Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for further explanation.

[32:4]  ² tn Heb “his [Zedekiah’s] mouth will speak with his [Nebuchadnezzar’s] mouth and his eyes will see his eyes.” The verbs here are an obligatory imperfect and its vav consecutive perfect equivalent. (See IBHS 508-9 §31.4g for discussion and examples of the former and IBHS 528 §32.2.1d, n. 16, for the latter.)

[32:5]  ³ tn This is the verb (פָּקַד, paqad) that has been met with several times in the book of Jeremiah, most often in the ominous sense of “punish” (e.g., 6:15; 11:22; 23:24) but also in the good sense of “resume concern for” (e.g., 27:22; 29:10). Here it is obviously in the ominous sense referring to his imprisonment and ultimate death (52:11).

[32:5]  sn Compare Jer 34:2-3 for this same prophecy. The incident in Jer 34:1-7 appears to be earlier than this one. Here Jeremiah is confined to the courtyard of the guardhouse; there he appears to have freedom of movement.

[32:5]  ⁴ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[32:5]  ⁵ sn The pronouns are plural here, referring to the people of Judah and Jerusalem. Jeremiah had counseled that they surrender (cf. 27:12; 21:8-10) because they couldn’t succeed against the Babylonian army even under the most favorable circumstances (37:3-10).

[32:5]  ⁶ tn Heb “The Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for further explanation.

[38:18]  ⁷ tn Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for explanation.

[38:18]  ⁸ tn Heb “will not escape from their hand.”

[38:18]  sn Zedekiah held out this hope of escape until the end and attempted to do so but was unsuccessful (cf. 39:4-5).

[38:23]  ⁹ tn Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on 21:4 for explanation.

[38:23]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “you yourself will not escape from their hand but will be seized by [caught in] the hand of the king of Babylon.” Neither use of “hand” is natural to the English idiom.

[38:23]  ¹¹ tc This translation follows the reading of the Greek version and a few Hebrew mss. The majority of the Hebrew mss read “and you will burn down this city.” This reading is accepted by the majority of modern commentaries and English versions. Few of the commentaries, however, bother to explain the fact that the particle אֶת (’et), which normally marks the accusative object, is functioning here as the subject. For this point of grammar see BDB 85 s.v. I אֵת 1.b. Or this may be another case where אֵת introduces a new subject (see BDB 85 s.v. אֵת 3.α and see usage in 27:8; 36:22).