Yeremia 8:19

8:19 I hear my dear people ¹  crying out ² 

throughout the length and breadth of the land. ³ 

They are crying, ‘Is the Lord no longer in Zion?

Is her divine King ⁴  no longer there?’”

The Lord answers, ⁵ 

“Why then do they provoke me to anger with their images,

with their worthless foreign idols?” ⁶ 

Yeremia 10:3-5

10:3 For the religion ⁷  of these people is worthless.

They cut down a tree in the forest,

and a craftsman makes it into an idol with his tools. ⁸ 

10:4 He decorates it with overlays of silver and gold.

He uses hammer and nails to fasten it ⁹  together

so that it will not fall over.

10:5 Such idols are like scarecrows in a cucumber field.

They cannot talk.

They must be carried

because they cannot walk.

Do not be afraid of them

because they cannot hurt you.

And they do not have any power to help you.” ¹⁰ 

Yeremia 10:8

10:8 The people of those nations ¹¹  are both stupid and foolish.

Instruction from a wooden idol is worthless! ¹² 

Yeremia 10:14-15

10:14 All these idolaters ¹³  will prove to be stupid and ignorant.

Every goldsmith will be disgraced by the idol he made.

For the image he forges is merely a sham. ¹⁴ 

There is no breath in any of those idols. ¹⁵ 

10:15 They are worthless, mere objects to be mocked. ¹⁶ 

When the time comes to punish them, they will be destroyed.

Yeremia 14:22

14:22 Do any of the worthless idols ¹⁷  of the nations cause rain to fall?

Do the skies themselves send showers?

Is it not you, O Lord our God, who does this? ¹⁸ 

So we put our hopes in you ¹⁹ 

because you alone do all this.”

[8:19]  ¹ tn Heb “daughter of my people.” For the translation given here see 4:11 and the note on the phrase “dear people” there.

[8:19]  ² tn Heb “Behold the voice of the crying of the daughter of my people.”

[8:19]  ³ tn Heb “Land of distances, i.e., of wide extent.” For parallel usage cf. Isa 33:17.

[8:19]  ⁴ tn Heb “her King” but this might be misunderstood by some to refer to the Davidic ruler even with the capitalization.

[8:19]  ⁵ tn The words, “The Lord would answer” are not in the text but are implicit from the words that follow. They are supplied in the translation for clarity. Another option would be to add “And I can just hear the Lord reply.”

[8:19]  ⁶ sn The people’s cry and the Lord’s interruption reflect the same argument that was set forth in the preceding chapter. They have misguided confidence that the Lord is with them regardless of their actions and he responds that their actions have provoked him to the point of judging them. See especially 7:4 and 7:30.

[10:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “statutes.” According to BDB 350 s.v. חֻקָּה 2.b it refers to the firmly established customs or practices of the pagan nations. Compare the usage in Lev 20:23; 2 Kgs 17:8. Here it is essentially equivalent to דֶּרֶךְ (derekh) in v. 1, which has already been translated “religious practices.”

[10:3]  ⁸ sn This passage is dripping with sarcasm. It begins by talking about the “statutes” of the pagan peoples as a “vapor” using a singular copula and singular predicate. Then it suppresses the subject, the idol, as though it were too horrible to mention, using only the predications about it. The last two lines read literally: “[it is] a tree which one cuts down from the forest; the work of the hands of a craftsman with his chisel.”

[10:4]  ⁹ tn The pronoun is plural in Hebrew, referring to the parts.

[10:5]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “And it is not in them to do good either.”

[10:8]  ¹¹ tn Or “Those wise people and kings are…” It is unclear whether the subject is the “they” of the nations in the preceding verse, or the wise people and kings referred to. The text merely has “they.”

[10:8]  ¹² tn Heb “The instruction of vanities [worthless idols] is wood.” The meaning of this line is a little uncertain. Various proposals have been made to make sense, most of which involve radical emendation of the text. For some examples see J. A. Thompson, Jeremiah (NICOT), 323-24, fn 6. However, this is probably a case of the bold predication that discussed in GKC 452 §141.d, some examples of which may be seen in Ps 109:4 “I am prayer,” and Ps 120:7 “I am peace.”

[10:14]  ¹³ tn Heb “Every man.” But in the context this is not a reference to all people without exception but to all idolaters. The referent is made explicit for the sake of clarity.

[10:14]  ¹⁴ tn Or “nothing but a phony god”; Heb “a lie/falsehood.”

[10:14]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “There is no breath in them.” The referent is made explicit so that no one will mistakenly take it to refer to the idolaters or goldsmiths.

[10:15]  ¹⁶ tn Or “objects of mockery.”

[14:22]  ¹⁷ tn The word הֶבֶל (hevel), often translated “vanities”, is a common pejorative epithet for idols or false gods. See already in 8:19 and 10:8.

[14:22]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “Is it not you, O Lord our God?” The words “who does” are supplied in the translation for English style.

[14:22]  ¹⁹ tn The rhetorical negatives are balanced by a rhetorical positive.