3:5 You will not always be angry with me, will you?
You will not be mad at me forever, will you?’ 1
That is what you say,
but you continually do all the evil that you can.” 2
7:30 The Lord says, “I have rejected them because 3 the people of Judah have done what I consider evil. 4 They have set up their disgusting idols in the temple 5 which I have claimed for my own 6 and have defiled it.
13:23 But there is little hope for you ever doing good,
you who are so accustomed to doing evil.
Can an Ethiopian 7 change the color of his skin?
Can a leopard remove its spots? 8
18:20 Should good be paid back with evil?
Yet they are virtually digging a pit to kill me. 9
Just remember how I stood before you
pleading on their behalf 10
to keep you from venting your anger on them. 11
23:22 But if they had stood in my inner circle, 12
they would have proclaimed my message to my people.
They would have caused my people to turn from their wicked ways
and stop doing the evil things they are doing.
1 tn Heb “Will he keep angry forever? Will he maintain [it] to the end?” The questions are rhetorical and expect a negative answer. The change to direct address in the English translation is intended to ease the problem of the rapid transition, common in Hebrew style (but not in English), from second person direct address in the preceding lines to third person indirect address in these two lines. See GKC 462 §144.p.
2 tn Heb “You do the evil and you are able.” This is an example of hendiadys, meaning “You do all the evil that you are able to do.”
3 tn The words “I have rejected them” are not in the Hebrew text, which merely says “because.” These words are supplied in the translation to show more clearly the connection to the preceding.
4 tn Heb “have done the evil in my eyes.”
5 sn Compare, e.g., 2 Kgs 21:3, 5, 7; 23:4, 6; Ezek 8:3, 5, 10-12, 16. Manasseh had desecrated the temple by building altars, cult symbols, and idols in it. Josiah had purged the temple of these pagan elements. But it is obvious from both Jeremiah and Ezekiel that they had been replaced shortly after Josiah’s death. They were a primary cause of Judah’s guilt and punishment (see beside this passage, 19:5; 32:34-35).
6 tn Heb “the house which is called by my name.” Cf. 7:10, 11, 14 and see the translator’s note 7:10 for the explanation for this rendering.
7 tn This is a common proverb in English coming from this biblical passage. For cultures where it is not proverbial perhaps it would be better to translate “Can black people change the color of their skin?” Strictly speaking these are “Cushites” inhabitants of a region along the upper Nile south of Egypt. The Greek text is responsible for the identification with Ethiopia. The term in Greek is actually a epithet = “burnt face.”
8 tn Heb “Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots? [Then] you also will be able to do good who are accustomed to do evil.” The English sentence has been restructured and rephrased in an attempt to produce some of the same rhetorical force the Hebrew original has in this context.
9 tn Or “They are plotting to kill me”; Heb “They have dug a pit for my soul.” This is a common metaphor for plotting against someone. See BDB 500 s.v. כָּרָה Qal and for an example see Pss 7:16 (7:15 HT) in its context.
10 tn Heb “to speak good concerning them” going back to the concept of “good” being paid back with evil.
11 tn Heb “to turn back your anger from them.”
sn See Jer 14:7-9, 19-21 and 15:1-4 for the idea.
12 tn Or “had been my confidant.” See the note on v. 18.
13 tn Heb “will turn each one from his wicked way.”
14 tn Heb “For great is the anger and the wrath which the