Jeremiah 5:4

5:4 I thought, “Surely it is only the ignorant poor who act this way. 1 

They act like fools because they do not know what the Lord demands. 2 

They do not know what their God requires of them. 3 

Jeremiah 11:22

11:22 So the Lord who rules over all 4  said, “I will surely 5  punish them! Their young men will be killed in battle. 6  Their sons and daughters will die of starvation.

Jeremiah 16:14

16:14 Yet 7  I, the Lord, say: 8  “A new time will certainly come. 9  People now affirm their oaths with ‘I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the people of Israel out of Egypt.’

Jeremiah 23:7

23:7 “So I, the Lord, say: 10  ‘A new time will certainly come. 11  People now affirm their oaths with “I swear as surely as the Lord lives who delivered the people of Israel out of Egypt.”

1 tn Heb “Surely they are poor.” The translation is intended to make clear the explicit contrasts and qualifications drawn in this verse and the next.

2 tn Heb “the way of the Lord.”

3 tn Heb “the judgment [or ordinance] of their God.”

4 tn Heb “Yahweh of armies.”

sn For the significance of the term see the notes at 2:19 and 7:3.

5 tn Heb “Behold I will.” For the function of this particle see the translator’s note on 1:6.

6 tn Heb “will die by the sword.” Here “sword” stands contextually for “battle” while “starvation” stands for death by starvation during siege.

7 tn The particle translated here “Yet” (לָכֵן, lakhen) is regularly translated “So” or “Therefore” and introduces a consequence. However, in a few cases it introduces a contrasting set of conditions. Compare its use in Judg 11:8; Jer 48:12; 49:2; 51:52; and Hos 2:14 (2:16 HT).

8 tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.” The Lord has been speaking; the first person has been utilized in translation to avoid a shift which might create confusion.

9 tn Heb “Behold the days are coming.”

10 tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

11 tn Heb “Behold the days are coming.”