Jeremiah 29:20-22
New English Translation
20 ‘So pay attention to the Lord’s message,[a] all you exiles whom I have sent to Babylon from Jerusalem.’
21 “The Lord of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel,[b] also has something to say about Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, who are prophesying lies to you and claiming my authority to do so.[c] ‘I will hand them over to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon and he will execute them before your very eyes. 22 And all the exiles of Judah who are in Babylon will use them as examples when they put a curse on anyone. They will say, “May the Lord treat you like Zedekiah and Ahab whom the king of Babylon roasted to death in the fire!”[d]
Read full chapterFootnotes
- Jeremiah 29:20 sn The shift from third person to first person is common in Hebrew poetry and prophecy but not in English style. The Lord uses “the Lord’s message” as a technical term, probably to emphasize its authority.
- Jeremiah 29:21 tn Heb “Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel.”sn See study notes on 2:19 and 7:3 for the explanation of this title.
- Jeremiah 29:21 tn Heb “prophesying lies in my name.” For an explanation of this idiom see the study notes on 14:14 and 23:27.
- Jeremiah 29:22 sn Being roasted to death in the fire appears to have been a common method of execution in Babylon. See Dan 3:6, 19-21. The famous law code of the Babylonian king Hammurabi also mandated this method of execution for various crimes a thousand years earlier. There is a satirical play on words involving their fate, “roasted them to death” (קָלָם, qalam), and the fact that that fate would become a common topic of curse (קְלָלָה, qelalah) pronounced on others in Babylon.
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