Jeremiah 21:9

21:9 Those who stay in this city will die in battle or of starvation or disease. Those who leave the city and surrender to the Babylonians who are besieging it will live. They will escape with their lives. 1 

Jeremiah 38:2

38:2 “The Lord says, ‘Those who stay in this city will die in battle or of starvation or disease. 2  Those who leave the city and surrender to the Babylonians 3  will live. They will escape with their lives.’” 4 

Jeremiah 42:14

42:14 You must not say, ‘No, we will not stay. Instead we will go and live in the land of Egypt where we will not face war, 5  or hear the enemy’s trumpet calls, 6  or starve for lack of food.’ 7 

Jeremiah 43:4

43:4 So Johanan son of Kareah, all the army officers, and all the rest of the people did not obey the Lord’s command to stay in the land.

Jeremiah 47:6

47:6 How long will you cry out, 8  ‘Oh, sword of the Lord,

how long will it be before you stop killing? 9 

Go back into your sheath!

Stay there and rest!’ 10 

1 tn Heb “his life will be to him for spoil.”

sn Spoil was what was carried off by the victor (see, e.g., Judg 5:30). Those who surrendered to the Babylonians would lose their property, their freedom, and their citizenship but would at least escape with their lives. Jeremiah was branded a traitor for this counsel (cf. 38:4) but it was the way of wisdom since the Lord was firmly determined to destroy the city (cf. v. 10).

2 tn Heb “by sword, by starvation, or by disease.”

3 tn Heb “those who go out to the Chaldeans.” For the rendering “Babylonians” for “Chaldeans” see the study note on 21:4.

4 tn Heb “his life will be to him for spoil and he will live.” For the meaning of this idiom see the study note on 21:9. The words and “he will live” have been left out of the translation because they are redundant after “will live” and “they will escape with their lives.”

sn See Jer 21:9 for this prophecy.

5 tn Heb “see [or experience] war.”

6 tn Heb “hear the sound of the trumpet.” The trumpet was used to gather the troops and to sound the alarm for battle.

7 tn Jer 42:13-14 are a long complex condition (protasis) whose consequence (apodosis) does not begin until v. 15. The Hebrew text of vv. 13-14 reads: 42:13 “But if you say [or continue to say (the form is a participle)], ‘We will not stay in this land’ with the result that you do not obey [or “more literally, do not hearken to the voice of] the Lord your God, 42:14 saying, ‘No, but to the land of Egypt we will go where we…and there we will live,’ 42:15 now therefore hear the word of the Lord…” The sentence has been broken up and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style but an attempt has been made to maintain the contingencies and the qualifiers that are in the longer Hebrew original.

8 tn The words “How long will you cry out” are not in the text but some such introduction seems necessary because the rest of the speech assumes a personal subject.

9 tn Heb “before you are quiet/at rest.”

10 sn The passage is highly figurative. The sword of the Lord, which is itself a figure of the destructive agency of the enemy armies, is here addressed as a person and is encouraged in rhetorical questions (the questions are designed to dissuade) to “be quiet,” “be at rest,” “be silent,” all of which is designed to get the Lord to call off the destruction against the Philistines.