4:30 And you, Zion, city doomed to destruction, 1
you accomplish nothing 2 by wearing a beautiful dress, 3
decking yourself out in jewels of gold,
and putting on eye shadow! 4
You are making yourself beautiful for nothing.
Your lovers spurn you.
They want to kill you. 5
9:24 If people want to boast, they should boast about this:
They should boast that they understand and know me.
They should boast that they know and understand
that I, the Lord, act out of faithfulness, fairness, and justice in the earth
and that I desire people to do these things,” 6
says the Lord.
11:20 So I said to the Lord, 7
“O Lord who rules over all, 8 you are a just judge!
You examine people’s hearts and minds. 9
I want to see you pay them back for what they have done
because I trust you to vindicate my cause.” 10
1 tn Heb “And you that are doomed to destruction.” The referent is supplied from the following context and the fact that Zion/Jerusalem represents the leadership which was continually making overtures to foreign nations for help.
2 tn Heb “What are you accomplishing…?” The rhetorical question assumes a negative answer, made clear by the translation in the indicative.
3 tn Heb “clothing yourself in scarlet.”
4 tn Heb “enlarging your eyes with antimony.” Antimony was a black powder used by women as eyeliner to make their eyes look larger.
5 tn Heb “they seek your life.”
6 tn Or “fairness and justice, because these things give me pleasure.” Verse 24 reads in Hebrew, “But let the one who brags brag in this: understanding and knowing me that I, the
7 tn The words “So I said to the
8 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”
sn For the significance of the term see the notes at 2:19 and 7:3.
9 tn Heb “
10 tn Heb “Let me see your retribution [i.e., see you exact retribution] from them because I reveal my cause [i.e., plea for justice] to you.”
11 tn Heb “And afterward.”
12 tn Heb “oracle of the
13 tn Heb “And Zedekiah king of Judah and his officials I will give into the hand of their enemies and into the hand of those who seek their lives and into the hands of the army of the king of Babylon which has gone up from against them.” The last two “and into the hand” phrases are each giving further explication of “their enemies” (the conjunction is explicative [cf. BDB 252 s.v. וְ 1.b]). The sentence has been broken down into shorter English sentences in conformity with contemporary English style.
sn This refers to the relief offered by the withdrawal of the Babylonian troops to fight against the Egyptians which were coming to Zedekiah’s aid (cf. 37:5, 7, 11).
14 tn Heb “So King Zedekiah secretly swore an oath to Jeremiah, saying.”
15 tn Heb “who has made this life/soul/ breath [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh] for us.” The Hebrew term נֶפֶשׁ refers to the living, breathing substance of a person which constitutes his very life (cf. BDB 659 s.v. נֶפֶשׁ 1; 3).
16 tn Heb “who are seeking your life.”