Jeremiah 5:3-6
New English Translation
3 Lord, I know you look for faithfulness.[a]
But even when you punish these people, they feel no remorse.[b]
Even when you nearly destroy them, they refuse to be corrected.
They have become as hardheaded as a rock.[c]
They refuse to change their ways.[d]
4 I thought, “Surely it is only the ignorant poor who act this way.[e]
They act like fools because they do not know what the Lord demands.[f]
They do not know what their God requires of them.[g]
5 I will go to the leaders[h]
and speak with them.
Surely they know what the Lord demands.[i]
Surely they know what their God requires of them.”[j]
Yet all of them, too, have rejected his authority
and refuse to submit to him.[k]
6 So like a lion from the thicket their enemies will kill them.
Like a wolf from the rift valley they will destroy them.
Like a leopard they will lie in wait outside their cities
and totally destroy anyone who ventures out.[l]
For they have rebelled so much
and done so many unfaithful things.[m]
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 5:3 tn Heb “O Lord, are your eyes not to faithfulness?” The question is rhetorical and expects a positive answer.
- Jeremiah 5:3 tn Commentaries and lexicons debate the meaning of the verb here. The MT is pointed as though from a verb meaning “to writhe in anguish or contrition” (חוּל [khul]; see, e.g., BDB 297 s.v. חוּל 2.c), but some commentaries and lexicons repoint the text as though from a verb meaning “to be sick,” thus “to feel pain” (חָלָה [khalah]; see, e.g., HALOT 304 s.v. חָלָה 3). The former appears more appropriate to the context.
- Jeremiah 5:3 tn Heb “They made their faces as hard as a rock.”
- Jeremiah 5:3 tn Or “to repent”; Heb “to turn back.”
- Jeremiah 5:4 tn Heb “Surely they are poor.” The translation is intended to make clear the explicit contrasts and qualifications drawn in this verse and the next.
- Jeremiah 5:4 tn Heb “the way of the Lord.”
- Jeremiah 5:4 tn Heb “the judgment [or ordinance] of their God.”
- Jeremiah 5:5 tn Or “people in power”; Heb “the great ones.”
- Jeremiah 5:5 tn Heb “the way of the Lord.”
- Jeremiah 5:5 tn Heb “the judgment [or ordinance] of their God.”
- Jeremiah 5:5 tn Heb “have broken the yoke and torn off the yoke ropes.” Cf. Jer 2:20 and the note there.
- Jeremiah 5:6 tn Heb “So a lion from the thicket will kill them. A wolf from the desert will destroy them. A leopard will watch outside their cities. Anyone who goes out from them will be torn in pieces.” However, it is unlikely that, in the context of judgment that Jeremiah has previously been describing, literal lions are meant. The animals are metaphorical for their enemies. Cf. Jer 4:7.
- Jeremiah 5:6 tn Heb “their rebellions are so many, and their unfaithful acts so numerous.”
Jeremiah 5:3-6
Legacy Standard Bible
3 O Yahweh, do not (A)Your eyes look for faithfulness?
You have (B)struck them,
But they did not [a]weaken;
You have consumed them,
But they (C)refused to receive discipline.
They have (D)made their faces stronger than rock;
They have refused to [b]repent.
4 Then I said, “They are only the poor;
They are foolish;
For they (E)do not know the way of Yahweh
Or the legal judgment of their God.
5 Let me go to the great
And let me speak to them,
For (F)they know the way of Yahweh
And the legal judgment of their God.”
But they too, altogether, have (G)broken the yoke
And torn apart the bonds.
6 Therefore (H)a lion from the forest will strike them down;
A (I)wolf of the deserts will devastate them;
A (J)leopard is watching their cities.
Everyone who goes out of them will be torn in pieces
Because their (K)transgressions are many;
Their acts of faithlessness are mighty.
Footnotes
- Jeremiah 5:3 Or become sick
- Jeremiah 5:3 Lit return
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