Discovery BoxJeremiah 2:27 
Context2:27 They say to a wooden idol, 1 ‘You are my father.’
They say to a stone image, ‘You gave birth to me.’ 2
Yes, they have turned away from me instead of turning to me. 3
Yet when they are in trouble, they say, ‘Come and save us!’
Jeremiah 5:5
Context5:5 I will go to the leaders 4
and speak with them.
Surely they know what the Lord demands. 5
Surely they know what their God requires of them.” 6
Yet all of them, too, have rejected his authority
and refuse to submit to him. 7
Jeremiah 15:10
Context“Oh, mother, how I regret 9 that you ever gave birth to me!
I am always starting arguments and quarrels with the people of this land. 10
I have not lent money to anyone and I have not borrowed from anyone.
Yet all of these people are treating me with contempt.” 11
Jeremiah 18:15
Context18:15 Yet my people have forgotten me
and offered sacrifices to worthless idols!
This makes them stumble along in the way they live
and leave the old reliable path of their fathers. 12
They have left them to walk in bypaths,
in roads that are not smooth and level. 13
1 tn Heb “wood…stone…”
2 sn The reference to wood and stone is, of course, a pejorative reference to idols made by human hands. See the next verse where reference is made to “the gods you have made.”
3 tn Heb “they have turned [their] backs to me, not [their] faces.”
4 tn Or “people in power”; Heb “the great ones.”
5 tn Heb “the way of the
6 tn Heb “the judgment [or ordinance] of their God.”
7 tn Heb “have broken the yoke and torn off the yoke ropes.” Compare Jer 2:20 and the note there.
8 tn The words “I said” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation for clarity to mark a shift in the speaker.
9 tn Heb “Woe to me, my mother.” See the comments on 4:13 and 10:19.
10 tn Heb “A man of strife and a man of contention with all the land.” The “of” relationship (Hebrew and Greek genitive) can convey either subjective or objective relationships, i.e., he instigates strife and contention or he is the object of it. A study of usage elsewhere, e.g., Isa 41:11; Job 31:35; Prov 12:19; 25:24; 26:21; 27:15, is convincing that it is subjective. In his role as God’s covenant messenger charging people with wrong doing he has instigated counterarguments and stirred about strife and contention against him.
11 tc The translation follows the almost universally agreed upon correction of the MT. Instead of reading כֻּלֹּה מְקַלְלַונִי (kulloh mÿqallavni, “all of him is cursing me”) as the Masoretes proposed (Qere) one should read קִלְלוּנִי (qilluni) with the written text (Kethib) and redivide and repoint with the suggestion in BHS כֻּלְּהֶם (qullÿhem, “all of them are cursing me”).
12 sn Heb “the ancient path.” This has already been referred to in Jer 6:16. There is another “old way” but it is the path trod by the wicked (cf. Job 22:15).
13 sn Heb “ways that are not built up.” This refers to the built-up highways. See Isa 40:4 for the figure. The terms “way,” “by-paths,” “roads” are, of course, being used here in the sense of moral behavior or action.
