Yeremia 3:10

3:10 In spite of all this, ¹  Israel’s sister, unfaithful Judah, has not turned back to me with any sincerity; she has only pretended to do so,” ²  says the Lord.

Yeremia 29:13

29:13 When you seek me in prayer and worship, you will find me available to you. If you seek me with all your heart and soul, ³ 

Yeremia 17:3

17:3 and on the mountains and in the fields. ⁴ 

I will give your wealth and all your treasures away as plunder.

I will give it away as the price ⁵  for the sins you have committed throughout your land.

Yeremia 32:41

32:41 I will take delight in doing good to them. I will faithfully and wholeheartedly plant them ⁶  firmly in the land.’

Yeremia 10:7

10:7 Everyone should revere you, O King of all nations, ⁷ 

because you deserve to be revered. ⁸ 

For there is no one like you

among any of the wise people of the nations nor among any of their kings. ⁹ 

Yeremia 24:9

24:9 I will bring such disaster on them that all the kingdoms of the earth will be horrified. I will make them an object of reproach, a proverbial example of disaster. I will make them an object of ridicule, an example to be used in curses. ¹⁰  That is how they will be remembered wherever I banish them. ¹¹ 

Yeremia 7:23

7:23 I also explicitly commanded them: ¹²  “Obey me. If you do, I ¹³  will be your God and you will be my people. Live exactly the way I tell you ¹⁴  and things will go well with you.”

Yeremia 8:3

8:3 However, I will leave some of these wicked people alive and banish them to other places. But wherever these people who survive may go, they will wish they had died rather than lived,” ¹⁵  says the Lord who rules over all. ¹⁶ 

Yeremia 24:7

24:7 I will give them the desire to acknowledge that I ¹⁷  am the Lord. I will be their God and they will be my people. For they will wholeheartedly ¹⁸  return to me.’

Yeremia 29:18

29:18 I will chase after them with war, ¹⁹  starvation, and disease. I will make all the kingdoms of the earth horrified at what happens to them. I will make them examples of those who are cursed, objects of horror, hissing scorn, and ridicule among all the nations where I exile them.

Yeremia 30:11

30:11 For I, the Lord, affirm ²⁰  that

I will be with you and will rescue you.

I will completely destroy all the nations where I scattered you.

But I will not completely destroy you.

I will indeed discipline you, but only in due measure.

I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished.” ²¹ 

Yeremia 31:37

31:37 The Lord says, “I will not reject all the descendants of Israel

because of all that they have done. ²² 

That could only happen if the heavens above could be measured

or the foundations of the earth below could all be explored,” ²³ 

says the Lord. ²⁴ 

Yeremia 40:11

40:11 Moreover, all the Judeans who were in Moab, Ammon, Edom, and all the other countries heard what had happened. They heard that the king of Babylon had allowed some people to stay in Judah and that he had appointed Gedaliah, the son of Ahikam and grandson of Shaphan, to govern them.

Yeremia 44:8

44:8 That is what will result from your making me angry by what you are doing. ²⁵  You are making me angry by sacrificing to other gods here in the land of Egypt where you live. You will be destroyed for doing that! You will become an example used in curses ²⁶  and an object of ridicule among all the nations of the earth. ²⁷ 

Yeremia 46:28

46:28 I, the Lord, tell ²⁸  you not to be afraid,

you descendants of Jacob, my servant,

for I am with you.

Though I completely destroy all the nations where I scatter you,

I will not completely destroy you.

I will indeed discipline you but only in due measure.

I will not allow you to go entirely unpunished.” ²⁹ 

Yeremia 44:26

44:26 But ³⁰  listen to what the Lord has to say, all you people of Judah who are living in the land of Egypt. The Lord says, ‘I hereby swear by my own great name that none of the people of Judah who are living anywhere in Egypt will ever again invoke my name in their oaths! Never again will any of them use it in an oath saying, “As surely as the Lord God lives….” ³¹ 

[3:10]  ¹ tn Heb “And even in all this.”

[3:10]  ² tn Heb “ has not turned back to me with all her heart but only in falsehood.”

[29:13]  ³ tn Or “If you wholeheartedly seek me”; Heb “You will seek me and find [me] because you will seek me with all your heart.” The translation attempts to reflect the theological nuances of “seeking” and “finding” and the psychological significance of “heart” which refers more to intellectual and volitional concerns in the OT than to emotional ones.

[17:3]  ⁴ tc This reading follows some of the ancient versions. The MT reads, “hills. My mountain in the open field [alluding to Jerusalem] and your wealth…I will give.” The vocalization of the noun plus pronoun and the unusual form of the expression to allude to Jerusalem calls into question the originality of the MT. The MT reads הֲרָרִי (harari) which combines the suffix for a singular noun with a pointing of the noun in the plural, a form which would be without parallel (compare the forms in Ps 30:8 for the singular noun with suffix and Deut 8:9 for the plural noun with suffix). Likewise, Jerusalem was not “in the open field.” For a similar expression compare Jer 13:27.

[17:3]  ⁵ tc Or “I will give away your wealth, all your treasures, and your places of worship…” The translation follows the emendation suggested in the footnote in BHS, reading בִּמְחִיר (bimkhir) in place of בָּמֹתֶיךָ (bamotekha). The forms are graphically very close and one could explain the origin of either from the other. The parallel in 15:13-14 reads לֹא בִּמְחִיר (lo’ bimkhir). The text here may be a deliberate play on that one. The emended text makes decidedly better sense contextually than the MT unless some sardonic reference to their idolatry is intended.

[32:41]  ⁶ tn Heb “will plant them in the land with faithfulness with all my heart and with all my soul.” The latter expressions are, of course, anthropomorphisms (see Deut 6:5).

[10:7]  ⁷ tn Heb “Who should not revere you…?” The question is rhetorical and expects a negative answer.

[10:7]  ⁸ tn Heb “For it is fitting to you.”

[10:7]  ⁹ tn Heb “their royalty/dominion.” This is a case of substitution of the abstract for the concrete “royalty, royal power” for “kings” who exercise it.

[24:9]  ¹⁰ tn Or “an object of reproach in peoples’ proverbs…an object of ridicule in people’s curses.” The alternate translation treats the two pairs which are introduced without vavs (ו) but are joined by vavs as examples of hendiadys. This is very possible here but the chain does not contain this pairing in 25:18; 29:18.

[24:9]  sn For an example of how the “example used in curses” worked, see Jer 29:22. Sodom and Gomorrah evidently function much that same way (see 23:14; 49:18; 50:40; Deut 29:23; Zeph 2:9).

[24:9]  ¹¹ tn Heb “I will make them for a terror for disaster to all the kingdoms of the earth, for a reproach and for a proverb, for a taunt and a curse in all the places which I banish them there.” The complex Hebrew sentence has been broken down into equivalent shorter sentences to conform more with contemporary English style.

[7:23]  ¹² tn Verses 22-23a read in Hebrew, “I did not speak with your ancestors and I did not command them when I brought them out of Egypt about words/matters concerning burnt offering and sacrifice, but I commanded them this word:” Some modern commentators have explained this passage as an evidence for the lateness of the Pentateuchal instruction regarding sacrifice or a denial that sacrifice was practiced during the period of the wilderness wandering. However, it is better explained as an example of what R. de Vaux calls a dialectical negative, i.e., “not so much this as that” or “not this without that” (Ancient Israel, 454-56). For other examples of this same argument see Isa 1:10-17; Hos 6:4-6; Amos 5:21-25.

[7:23]  ¹³ tn Heb “Obey me and I will be.” The translation is equivalent syntactically but brings out the emphasis in the command.

[7:23]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “Walk in all the way that I command you.”

[8:3]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “Death will be chosen rather than life by the remnant who are left from this wicked family in all the places where I have banished them.” The sentence is broken up and restructured to avoid possible confusion because of the complexity of the English to some modern readers. There appears to be an extra “those who are left” that was inadvertently copied from the preceding line. It is missing from one Hebrew ms and from the Greek and Syriac versions and is probably not a part of the original text.

[8:3]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

[8:3]  sn For the significance of this title see the notes at 2:19 and 7:3.

[24:7]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “I will give them a heart to know me that I am the Lord.” For the use of “heart” here referring to “inclinations, resolutions, and determinations of the will” see BDB 525 s.v. לֵב 4 and compare the usage in 2 Chr 12:14. For the use of “know” to mean “acknowledge” see BDB 384 s.v. יָדַע Qal.1.f and compare the usage in Jer 39:4. For the construction “know ‘someone’ that he…” = “know that ‘someone’…” see GKC 365 §117.h and compare the usage in 2 Sam 3:25.

[24:7]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “with all their heart.”

[29:18]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “with the sword.”

[30:11]  ²⁰ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[30:11]  ²¹ tn The translation “entirely unpunished” is intended to reflect the emphatic construction of the infinitive absolute before the finite verb.

[31:37]  ²² sn This answers Jeremiah’s question in 14:19.

[31:37]  ²³ tn Heb “If the heavens above could be measured or the foundations of the earth below be explored, then also I could reject all the seed of Israel for all they have done.”

[31:37]  ²⁴ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

[44:8]  ²⁵ tn Heb “the works of your hands.” Here the phrase is qualified by the epexegetical לְ (lamed) + infinitive, לְקַטֵּר (lÿqatter, “by sacrificing [to other gods]”). For further discussion on the use of this phrase see the translator’s note on 25:6.

[44:8]  ²⁶ tn Heb “a curse.” For the meaning of this phrase see the translator’s note on 24:9 and see the usage in 24:9; 25:18; 26:6; 29:22.

[44:8]  ²⁷ tn Verses 7b-8 are all one long, complex sentence governed by the interrogative “Why.” The Hebrew text reads: “Why are you doing great harm to your souls [= “yourselves” (cf. BDB 660 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ 4.b[6])] so as to cut off [= destroy] from yourselves man and woman, child and baby [the terms are collective singulars and are to be interpreted as plurals] from the midst of Judah so as not to leave to yourselves a remnant by making me angry with the works of your hands by sacrificing to other gods in the land of Egypt where you have come to live so as to cut off [an example of result rather than purpose after the particle לְמַעַן (lÿma’an; see the translator’s note on 25:7)] yourselves and so that you may become a curse and an object of ridicule among all the nations of the earth.” The sentence has been broken down and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style. An attempt has been made to retain an equivalent for all the subordinations and qualifying phrases.

[44:8]  sn What is being threatened is not the total destruction of a remnant of Judah. Jeremiah recognizes those who have been carried off to Babylon as well as other places as seeds for a new beginning (e.g., 24:5-6; 29:14; 30:3). But he denies here that any of those who have gone to Egypt and are continuing to practice idolatry will be among them. All of them will be cut off (i.e., destroyed) from the midst of Judah so that not a remnant of them will be left.

[46:28]  ²⁸ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.” Again the first person is adopted because the Lord is speaking and the indirect quotation is used to avoid an embedded quotation with quotation marks on either side.

[46:28]  ²⁹ tn The translation “entirely unpunished” is intended to reflect the emphatic construction of the infinitive absolute before the finite verb.

[44:26]  ³⁰ tn Heb “Therefore.” This particle quite often introduces the announcement of judgment after an indictment or accusation of a crime. That is its function here after the statement of cause in vv. 24-25. However, it would not sound right after the immediately preceding ironical or sarcastic commands to go ahead and fulfill their vows. “But” is a better transition unless one wants to paraphrase “Therefore, since you are so determined to do that….”

[44:26]  ³¹ tn Heb “Behold I swear by…that my name will no more be pronounced in the mouth of any man of Judah in all the land of Egypt saying, ‘As the Lord Yahweh lives.’” The sentence has been broken up and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style and the significance of pronouncing the name has been interpreted for the sake of readers who might not be familiar with this biblical idiom.

[44:26]  sn They will no longer be able to invoke his name in an oath because they will all be put to death (v. 27; cf. vv. 11-14).