14:14 Then the Lord said to me, “Those prophets are prophesying lies while claiming my authority! 1 I did not send them. I did not commission them. 2 I did not speak to them. They are prophesying to these people false visions, worthless predictions, 3 and the delusions of their own mind.
16:19 Then I said, 4
“Lord, you give me strength and protect me.
You are the one I can run to for safety when I am in trouble. 5
Nations from all over the earth
will come to you and say,
‘Our ancestors had nothing but false gods –
worthless idols that could not help them at all. 6
23:9 Here is what the Lord says concerning the false prophets: 8
My heart and my mind are deeply disturbed.
I tremble all over. 9
I am like a drunk person,
like a person who has had too much wine, 10
because of the way the Lord
and his holy word are being mistreated. 11
23:16 The Lord who rules over all 12 says to the people of Jerusalem: 13
“Do not listen to what
those prophets are saying to you.
They are filling you with false hopes.
They are reporting visions of their own imaginations,
not something the Lord has given them to say. 14
1 tn Heb “Falsehood those prophets are prophesying in my name.” In the OT, the “name” reflected the person’s character (cf. Gen 27:36; 1 Sam 25:25) or his reputation (Gen 11:4; 2 Sam 8:13). To speak in someone’s name was to act as his representative or carry his authority (1 Sam 25:9; 1 Kgs 21:8).
2 tn Heb “I did not command them.” Compare 1 Chr 22:12 for usage.
3 tn Heb “divination and worthlessness.” The noun “worthlessness” stands as a qualifying “of” phrase (= to an adjective; an attributive genitive in Hebrew) after a noun in Zech 11:17; Job 13:4. This is an example of hendiadys where two nouns are joined by “and” with one serving as the qualifier of the other.
sn The word translated “predictions” here is really the word “divination.” Divination was prohibited in Israel (cf. Deut 18:10, 14). The practice of divination involved various mechanical means to try to predict the future. The word was used here for its negative connotations in a statement that is rhetorically structured to emphasize the falseness of the promises of the false prophets. It would be unnatural to contemporary English style to try to capture this emphasis in English. In the Hebrew text the last sentence reads: “False vision, divination, and worthlessness and the deceitfulness of their heart they are prophesying to them.” For the emphasis in the preceding sentence see the note there.
4 tn The words “Then I said” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation to show the shift from God, who has been speaking to Jeremiah, to Jeremiah, who here addresses God.
sn The shift here is consistent with the interruptions that have taken place in chapters 14 and 15 and in Jeremiah’s response to God’s condemnation of the people of Judah’s idolatry in chapter 10 (note especially vv. 6-16).
5 tn Heb “O
6 tn Once again the translation has sacrificed some of the rhetorical force for the sake of clarity and English style: Heb “Only falsehood did our ancestors possess, vanity and [things in which?] there was no one profiting in them.”
sn This passage offers some rather forceful contrasts. The
7 sn Jeremiah has already had a good deal to say about the false prophets and their fate. See 2:8, 26; 5:13, 31; 14:13-15. Here he parallels the condemnation of the wicked prophets and their fate (23:9-40) with that of the wicked kings (21:11-22:30).
8 tn The word “false” is not in the text, but it is clear from the context that these are whom the sayings are directed against. The words “Here is what the
9 tn Heb “My heart is crushed within me. My bones tremble.” It has already been noted several times that the “heart” in ancient Hebrew psychology was the intellectual and volitional center of the person, the kidneys were the emotional center, and the bones the locus of strength and also the subject of joy, distress, and sorrow. Here Jeremiah is speaking of his distress of heart and mind in modern psychology, a distress that leads him to trembling of body which he compares to that of a drunken person staggering around under the influence of wine.
10 tn Heb “wine has passed over him.”
11 tn Heb “wine because of the
sn The way the
12 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”
sn See the study note on 2:19 for explanation of this title.
13 tn The words “to the people of Jerusalem” are not in the Hebrew text but are supplied in the translation to reflect the masculine plural form of the imperative and the second masculine plural form of the pronoun. These words have been supplied in the translation for clarity.
14 tn Heb “They tell of a vision of their own heart [= mind] not from the mouth of the