Discovery BoxJeremiah 18:18 
Context18:18 Then some people 1 said, “Come on! Let us consider how to deal with Jeremiah! 2 There will still be priests to instruct us, wise men to give us advice, and prophets to declare God’s word. 3 Come on! Let’s bring charges against him and get rid of him! 4 Then we will not need to pay attention to anything he says.”
Jeremiah 48:2
Context48:2 People will not praise Moab any more.
The enemy will capture Heshbon 5 and plot 6 how to destroy Moab, 7
saying, ‘Come, let’s put an end to that nation!’
City of Madmen, you will also be destroyed. 8
A destructive army will march against you. 9
Jeremiah 51:9
Context51:9 Foreigners living there will say, 10
‘We tried to heal her, but she could not be healed.
Let’s leave Babylonia 11 and each go back to his own country.
For judgment on her will be vast in its proportions.
It will be like it is piled up to heaven, stacked up into the clouds.’ 12
1 tn Heb “They.” The referent is unidentified; “some people” has been used in the translation.
2 tn Heb “Let us make plans against Jeremiah.” See 18:18 where this has sinister overtones as it does here.
3 tn Heb “Instruction will not perish from priest, counsel from the wise, word from the prophet.”
sn These are the three channels through whom God spoke to his people in the OT. See Jer 8:8-10 and Ezek 7:26.
4 tn Heb “Let us smite him with our tongues.” It is clear from the context that this involved plots to kill him.
5 sn Heshbon was originally a Moabite city but was captured by Sihon king of Og and made his capital (Num 21:26-30). It was captured from Sihon and originally assigned to the tribe of Reuben (Num 32:37; Josh 13:17). Later it was made a Levitical city and was assigned to the tribe of Gad (Josh 21:39). It formed the northern limits of Moab. It was located about eighteen miles east of the northern tip of the Dead Sea.
6 sn There is a wordplay in Hebrew on the word “Heshbon” and the word “plot” (חָשְׁבוּ, khoshvu).
7 tn Heb “In Heshbon they plot evil against her [i.e., Moab].” The “they” is undefined, but it would scarcely be Moabites living in Heshbon. Hence TEV and CEV are probably correct in seeing a reference to the enemy which would imply the conquest of this city which lay on the northern border of Moab.
8 tn The meaning of this line is somewhat uncertain. The translation here follows all the modern English versions and commentaries in reading the place name “Madmen” even though the place is otherwise unknown and the Greek, Syriac, and Latin version all read this word as an emphasizing infinitive absolute of the following verb “will be destroyed,” i.e. דָּמוֹם יִדֹּמּוּ (damom yiddommu). Some see this word as a variant of the name Dimon in Isa 15:9 which in turn is a playful variant of the place name Dibon. There is once again a wordplay on the word “Madmen” and “will be destroyed”: מַדְמֵן (madmen) and יִדֹּמּוּ (yiddommu). For the meaning of the verb = “perish” or “be destroyed” see Jer 8:14; Ps 31:18.
9 tn Heb “A sword will follow after you.” The sword is again figurative of destructive forces, here the army of the Babylonians.
10 tn The words “Foreigners living there will say” are not in the text but are implicit from the third line. These words are generally assumed by the commentaries and are explicitly added in TEV and NCV which are attempting to clarify the text for the average reader.
11 tn Heb “Leave/abandon her.” However, it is smoother in the English translation to make this verb equivalent to the cohortative that follows.
12 tn This is an admittedly very paraphrastic translation that tries to make the figurative nuance of the Hebrew original understandable for the average reader. The Hebrew text reads: “For her judgment [or punishment (cf. BDB 1078 s.v. מִשְׁפָּט 1.f) = ‘execution of judgment’] touches the heavens, and is lifted up as far as the clouds.” The figure of hyperbole or exaggeration is being used here to indicate the vastness of Babylon’s punishment which is the reason to escape (vv. 6, 9c). For this figure see Deut 1:28 in comparison with Num 13:28 and see also Deut 9:1. In both of the passages in Deut it refers to an exaggeration about the height of the walls of fortified cities. The figure also may be a play on Gen 11:4 where the nations gather in Babylon to build a tower that reaches to the skies. The present translation has interpreted the perfects here as prophetic because it has not happened yet or they would not be encouraging one another to leave and escape. For the idea here compare 50:16.
