Jeremiah 23:28

23:28 Let the prophet who has had a dream go ahead and tell his dream. Let the person who has received my message report that message faithfully. What is like straw cannot compare to what is like grain! 1  I, the Lord, affirm it! 2 

Jeremiah 23:32

23:32 I, the Lord, affirm 3  that I am opposed to those prophets who dream up lies and report them. They are misleading my people with their reckless lies. 4  I did not send them. I did not commission them. They are not helping these people at all. 5  I, the Lord, affirm it!” 6 

1 tn Heb “What to the straw with [in comparison with] the grain?” This idiom represents an emphatic repudiation or denial of relationship. See, for example, the usage in 2 Sam 16:10 and note BDB 553 s.v. מָה 1.d(c).

2 tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

3 tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

4 tn Heb “with their lies and their recklessness.” This is an example of hendiadys where two nouns (in this case a concrete and an abstract one) are joined by “and” but one is intended to be the adjectival modifier of the other.

5 sn In the light of what has been said this is a rhetorical understatement; they are not only “not helping,” they are leading them to their doom (cf. vv. 19-22). This figure of speech is known as litotes.

6 tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”