Jeremiah 5:19

5:19 “So then, Jeremiah, ¹  when your people ²  ask, ‘Why has the Lord our God done all this to us?’ tell them, ‘It is because you rejected me and served foreign gods in your own land. So ³  you must serve foreigners ⁴  in a land that does not belong to you.’

Jeremiah 8:2

8:2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon and the stars. ⁵  These are things they ⁶  adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance, ⁷  from which they sought guidance, and worshiped. The bones of these people ⁸  will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground. ⁹ 

Jeremiah 34:14

34:14 “Every seven years each of you must free any fellow Hebrews who have sold themselves to you. After they have served you for six years, you shall set them free.” ¹⁰  But your ancestors did not obey me or pay any attention to me.

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¹ tn The word, “Jeremiah,” is not in the text but the second person address in the second half of the verse is obviously to him. The word is supplied in the translation here for clarity.

² tn The MT reads the second masculine plural; this is probably a case of attraction to the second masculine plural pronoun in the preceding line. An alternative would be to understand a shift from speaking first to the people in the first half of the verse and then speaking to Jeremiah in the second half where the verb is second masculine singular. E.g., “When you [people] say, “Why…?” then you, Jeremiah, tell them…”

³ tn Heb “As you left me and…, so you will….” The translation was chosen so as to break up a rather long and complex sentence.

⁴ sn This is probably a case of deliberate ambiguity (double entendre). The adjective “foreigners” is used for both foreign people (so Jer 30:8; 51:51) and foreign gods (so Jer 2:25; 3:13). See also Jer 16:13 for the idea of having to serve other gods in the lands of exile.

⁵ tc MT, 4QJer^a and LXX read “the sun and the moon and all the host of heaven,” but 4QJer^c reads “the sun and all the stars.”

tn Heb “the host of heaven.”

⁶ tn Heb “the sun, moon, and host of heaven which they…”

⁷ tn Heb “followed after.” See the translator’s note at 2:5 for the idiom.

⁸ tn Heb “they will not” but the referent is far enough removed that it might be ambiguous.

⁹ tn Heb “like dung/manure on the surface of the ground.”

¹⁰ sn Compare Deut 15:12-18 for the complete statement of this law. Here only the first part of it is cited.