Yeremia 26:3

26:3 Maybe they will pay attention and each of them will stop living the evil way they do. ¹  If they do that, then I will forgo destroying them ²  as I had intended to do because of the wicked things they have been doing. ³ 

Yeremia 31:19

31:19 For after we turned away from you we repented.

After we came to our senses ⁴  we beat our breasts in sorrow. ⁵ 

We are ashamed and humiliated

because of the disgraceful things we did previously.’ ⁶ 

Yeremia 44:5

44:5 But the people of Jerusalem and Judah ⁷  would not listen or pay any attention. They would not stop the wickedness they were doing nor quit sacrificing to other gods. ⁸ 

[26:3]  ¹ tn Heb “will turn from his wicked way.”

[26:3]  ² tn For the idiom and translation of terms involved here see 18:8 and the translator’s note there.

[26:3]  sn The Lord is being consistent in the application of the principle laid down in Jer 18:7-8 that reformation of character will result in the withdrawal of the punishment of “uprooting, tearing down, destroying.” His prophecies of doom are conditional threats, open to change with change in behavior.

[26:3]  ³ tn Heb “because of the wickedness of their deeds.”

[31:19]  ⁴ tn For this meaning of the verb see HAL 374 s.v. יָדַע Nif 5 or W. L. Holladay, Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon, 129. REB translates “Now that I am submissive” relating the verb to a second root meaning “be submissive.” (See HALOT 375 s.v. II יָדַע and J. Barr, Comparative Philology and the Text of the Old Testament, 19-21, for evidence for this verb. Other passages cited with this nuance are Judg 8:16; Prov 10:9; Job 20:20.)

[31:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “I struck my thigh.” This was a gesture of grief and anguish (cf. Ezek 21:12 [21:17 HT]). The modern equivalent is “to beat the breast.”

[31:19]  ⁶ tn Heb “because I bear the reproach of my youth.” For the plural referents see the note at the beginning of v. 18.

[31:19]  sn The expression the disgraceful things we did in our earlier history refers to the disgrace that accompanied the sins that Israel did in her earlier years before she learned the painful lesson of submission to the Lord through the discipline of exile. For earlier references to the sins of her youth (i.e., in her earlier years as a nation) see 3:24-25; 22:21 and see also 32:29. At the time that these verses were written, neither northern Israel or Judah had expressed the kind of contrition voiced in vv. 18-19. As one commentator notes, the words here are both prophetic and instructive.

[44:5]  ⁷ tn There appears to be a deliberate shift in the pronouns used in vv. 2-5. “You” refers to the people living in Egypt who are being addressed (v. 2) and to the people of present and past generations to whom the Lord persistently sent the prophets (v. 4). “They” refers to the people of Jerusalem and the towns of Judah who have suffered disaster (v. 2) because of the wickedness of sacrificing to other gods (vv. 3, 5). The referents have been explicitly identified in the translation for the sake of clarity.

[44:5]  ⁸ tn Heb “They did not listen or incline their ear [= pay attention] by turning from their wickedness by not sacrificing to other gods.” The לְ (lamed) + the negative + the infinitive is again epexegetical. The sentence has been restructured and more idiomatic English expressions have been used to better conform with contemporary English style but an attempt has been made to retain the basic relationships of subordination.