Jeremiah 51:12

51:12 Give the signal to attack Babylon’s wall! ¹ 

Bring more guards! ² 

Post them all around the city! ³ 

Put men in ambush! ⁴ 

For the Lord will do what he has planned.

He will do what he said he would do to the people of Babylon. ⁵ 

Jeremiah 51:25

51:25 The Lord says, ⁶  “Beware! I am opposed to you, Babylon! ⁷ 

You are like a destructive mountain that destroys all the earth.

I will unleash my power against you; ⁸ 

I will roll you off the cliffs and make you like a burned-out mountain. ⁹ 

Jeremiah 51:55

51:55 For the Lord is ready to destroy Babylon,

and put an end to her loud noise.

Their waves ¹⁰  will roar like turbulent ¹¹  waters.

They will make a deafening noise. ¹² 

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¹ tn Heb “Raise a banner against the walls of Babylon.”

² tn Heb “Strengthen the watch.”

³ tn Heb “Station the guards.”

⁴ tn Heb “Prepare ambushes.”

sn The commands are here addressed to the kings of the Medes to fully blockade the city by posting watchmen and setting men in ambush to prevent people from escaping from the city (cf. 2 Kgs 25:4).

⁵ tn Heb “For the Lord has both planned and done what he said concerning the people living in Babylon,” i.e., “he has carried out what he planned.” Here is an obvious case where the perfects are to be interpreted as prophetic; the commands imply that the attack is still future.

⁶ tn Heb “Oracle of the Lord.”

⁷ tn The word “Babylon” is not in the text but is universally understood as the referent. It is supplied in the translation here to clarify the referent for the sake of the average reader.

⁸ tn Heb “I will reach out my hand against you.” See the translator’s note on 6:12 for explanation.

⁹ tn Heb “I am against you, oh destroying mountain that destroys all the earth. I will reach out my hand against you and roll you down from the cliffs and make you a mountain of burning.” The interpretation adopted here follows the lines suggested by S. R. Driver, Jeremiah, 318, n. c and reflected also in BDB 977 s.v. שְׂרֵפָה. Babylon is addressed as a destructive mountain because it is being compared to a volcano. The Lord, however, will make it a “burned-out mountain,” i.e., an extinct volcano which is barren and desolate. This interpretation seems to this translator to fit the details of the text more consistently than alternative ones which separate the concept of “destroying/destructive” from “mountain” and explain the figure of the mountain to refer to the dominating political position of Babylon and the reference to a “mountain of burning” to be a “burned [or burned over] mountain.” The use of similes in place of metaphors makes it easier for the modern reader to understand the figures and also more easily incorporates the dissonant figure of “rolling you down from the cliffs” which involves the figure of personification.

sn The figure here involves comparing Babylon to a destructive volcano which the Lord makes burned-out, i.e., he will destroy her power to destroy. The figure of personification is also involved because the Lord is said to roll her off the cliffs; that would not be applicable to a mountain.

¹⁰ tn The antecedent of the third masculine plural pronominal suffix is not entirely clear. It probably refers back to the “destroyers” mentioned in v. 53 as the agents of God’s judgment on Babylon.

¹¹ tn Or “mighty waters.”

¹² tn Heb “and the noise of their sound will be given,”