Yeremia 42:7-12

42:7 Ten days later the Lord spoke to Jeremiah. 42:8 So Jeremiah summoned Johanan son of Kareah and all the army officers who were with him and all the people of every class. ¹  42:9 Then Jeremiah said to them, “You sent me to the Lord God of Israel to make your request known to him. Here is what he says to you: ²  42:10 ‘If you will just stay ³  in this land, I will build you up. I will not tear you down. I will firmly plant you. ⁴  I will not uproot you. For I am filled with sorrow because of the disaster that I have brought on you. 42:11 Do not be afraid of the king of Babylon whom you now fear. ⁵  Do not be afraid of him because I will be with you to save you and to rescue you from his power. I, the Lord, affirm it! ⁶  42:12 I will have compassion on you so that he in turn will have mercy on you and allow you to return to your land.’

[42:8]  ¹ tn Or “without distinction,” or “All the people from the least important to the most important”; Heb “from the least to the greatest.” This is a figure of speech that uses polar opposites as an all-inclusive designation of everyone without exception (i.e., it included all the people from the least important or poorest to the most important or richest.)

[42:9]  ² tn Heb “Thus says the Lord God of Israel to whom you sent me to present your petition before him, ‘…’” The sentence has been restructured to cut down on the length of the introduction leading in to the long quote.

[42:9]  sn Their “request” is that Jeremiah would tell them where to go and what to do (v. 3).

[42:10]  ³ tn The word “just” is intended to reflect the infinitive absolute before the finite verb emphasizing here the condition rather than the verb root (see Joüon 2:423 §123.g, and compare the usage in Exod 15:26). The form looks like the infinitive absolute of the verb שׁוּב (shuv), but all the versions interpret it as though it is from יָשַׁב (yashav) which is the root of the verb that follows it. Either this is a textual error of the loss of a י (yod) or this is one of the cases that GKC 69 §19.i list as the possible loss of a weak consonant at the beginning of a word.

[42:10]  ⁴ tn Or “I will firmly plant you in the land,” or “I will establish you.” This is part of the metaphor that has been used of God (re)establishing Israel in the land. See 24:6; 31:28; 32:41.

[42:11]  ⁵ sn See Jer 41:18 for their reason for fear.

[42:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “oracle of the Lord.”