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Jeremiah 3:2-4
New English Translation
Jeremiah 3:2-4
New English Translation
2 “Look up at the hilltops and consider this.[a]
Where have you not been ravished?[b]
You waited for those gods like a thief lying in wait in the wilderness.[c]
You defiled the land by your wicked prostitution to other gods.[d]
3 That is why the rains have been withheld
and the spring rains have not come.
Yet in spite of this you are obstinate as a prostitute.[e]
You refuse to be ashamed of what you have done.
4 Even now you say to me, ‘You are my father![f]
You have been my faithful companion ever since I was young.
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 3:2 tn Heb “and see.”
- Jeremiah 3:2 sn The rhetorical question expects the answer “nowhere,” which asserts the widespread nature of the nation’s idolatry. The prophets often compare Judah’s religious infidelity, idolatry, to adultery or prostitution. Jeremiah goes a step further in exposing their folly by portraying their willing acts of idolatry as being sexually violated.
- Jeremiah 3:2 tn Heb “You sat for them [the lovers, i.e., the foreign gods] beside the road like an Arab in the desert.”
- Jeremiah 3:2 tn Heb “by your prostitution and your wickedness.” This is probably an example of hendiadys where, when two nouns are joined by “and,” one expresses the main idea and the other qualifies it.
- Jeremiah 3:3 tn Heb “you have the forehead of a prostitute.”
- Jeremiah 3:4 tn Heb “Have you not just now called out to me, ‘[You are] My father!’?” The rhetorical question expects a positive answer.
New English Translation (NET)
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