Jeremiah 37:17-21

37:17 Then King Zedekiah had him brought to the palace. There he questioned him privately and asked him,¹ “Is there any message from the Lord?” Jeremiah answered, “Yes, there is.” Then he announced,² “You will be handed over to the king of Babylon.”³ 37:18 Then Jeremiah asked King Zedekiah, “What crime have I committed against you, or the officials who serve you, or the people of Judah? What have I done to make you people throw me into prison?⁴ 37:19 Where now are the prophets who prophesied to you that⁵ the king of Babylon would not attack you or this land? 37:20 But now please listen, your royal Majesty,⁶ and grant my plea for mercy.⁷ Do not send me back to the house of Jonathan, the royal secretary. If you do, I will die there.”⁸ 37:21 Then King Zedekiah ordered that Jeremiah be committed to the courtyard of the guardhouse. He also ordered that a loaf of bread⁹ be given to him every day from the baker’s street until all the bread in the city was gone. So Jeremiah was kept¹⁰ in the courtyard of the guardhouse.

¹tn Heb “Then King Zedekiah sent and brought him and the king asked him privately [or more literally, in secret] and said.”

²tn Heb “Then he said.”

³sn Jeremiah’s answer even under duress was the same that he had given Zedekiah earlier. (See Jer 34:3 and see the study note on 34:1 for the relative timing of these two incidents.)

⁴tn Heb “What crime have I committed against you, or your servants, or this people that you [masc. pl.] have put me in prison?” Some of the terms have been expanded for clarification and the sentence has been broken in two to better conform with contemporary English style.
The masculine plural is used here because Zedekiah is being addressed as representative of the whole group previously named.

⁵tn Heb “And where are your prophets who prophesied to you, saying, ‘The king of Babylon will not come against you or against this land?’” The indirect quote has been used in the translation because of its simpler, more direct style.

⁶tn Heb “My lord, the king.”

⁷tn Heb “let my plea for mercy fall before you.” I.e., let it come before you and be favorably received (= granted; by metonymical extension).

⁸tn Or “So that I will not die there,” or “or I will die there”; Heb “and I will not die there.” The particle that introduces this clause (וְלֹא) regularly introduces negative purpose clauses after the volitive sequence (אַל [’al] + jussive here) according to GKC 323 §109.g. However, purpose and result clauses in Hebrew (and Greek) are often indistinguishable. Here the clause is more in the nature of a negative result.

⁹tn 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).

¹⁰tn Heb “Stayed/Remained/ Lived.”