Discovery BoxJeremiah 37:21--38:1 
Context37:21 Then King Zedekiah ordered that Jeremiah be committed to the courtyard of the guardhouse. He also ordered that a loaf of bread 1 be given to him every day from the baker’s street until all the bread in the city was gone. So Jeremiah was kept 2 in the courtyard of the guardhouse.
38:1 Now Shephatiah son of Mattan, Gedaliah son of Pashhur, Jehucal 3 son of Shelemiah, and Pashhur 4 son of Malkijah had heard 5 the things that Jeremiah had been telling the people. They had heard him say,
1 tn Heb “And/Then King Zedekiah ordered and they committed Jeremiah to [or deposited…in] the courtyard of the guardhouse and they gave to him a loaf of bread.” The translation has been structured the way it has to avoid the ambiguous “they” which is the impersonal subject which is sometimes rendered passive in English (cf. GKC 460 §144.d). This text also has another example of the vav (ו) + infinitive absolute continuing a finite verbal form (וְנָתֹן [vÿnaton] = “and they gave”; cf. GKC 345 §113.y and see Jer 32:44; 36:23).
2 tn Heb “Stayed/Remained/ Lived.”
3 tn The name is spelled “Jucal” in the Hebrew text here rather than “Jehucal” as in Jer 37:3. The translation uses the same spelling throughout so that the English reader can identify these as the same individual.
sn Jehucal was a member of the delegation sent to Jeremiah by Zedekiah in Jer 37:3.
4 sn Pashhur was a member of the delegation sent to Jeremiah in 21:2. For the relative sequence of these two delegations see the study note on 21:1.
5 tn J. Bright (Jeremiah [AB], 226, 30) is probably correct in translating the verbs here as pluperfects and in explaining that these words are prophecies that Jeremiah uttered before his arrest not prophecies that were being delivered to the people through intermediaries sent by Jeremiah who was confined in the courtyard of the guardhouse. For the use of the vav consecutive + imperfect to denote the pluperfect see the discussion and examples in IBHS 552-53 §33.2.3a and see the usage in Exod 4:19. The words that are cited in v. 2 are those recorded in 21:9 on the occasion of the first delegation and those in v. 3 are those recorded in 21:10; 34:2; 37:8; 32:28 all except the last delivered before Jeremiah was confined in the courtyard of the guardhouse.
