^38:17Then Jeremiah said to Zedekiah, “The Lord, the God who rules over all, the God of Israel,³⁷ says, ‘You must surrender to the officers of the king of Babylon. If you do, your life will be spared³⁸ and this city will not be burned down. Indeed, you and your whole family will be spared. ^38:18But if you do not surrender to the officers of the king of Babylon, this city will be handed over to the Babylonians³⁹ and they will burn it down. You yourself will not escape from them.’ ”⁴⁰^38:19Then King Zedekiah said to Jeremiah, “I am afraid of the Judeans who have deserted to the Babylonians.⁴¹ The Babylonians might hand me over to them and they will torture me.”⁴²^38:20Then Jeremiah answered, “You will not be handed over to them. Please obey the Lord by doing what I have been telling you.⁴³ Then all will go well with you and your life will be spared.⁴⁴^38:21But if you refuse to surrender, the Lord has shown me a vision of what will happen. Here is what I saw: ^38:22All the women who are left in the royal palace of Judah will be led out to the officers of the king of Babylon. They will taunt you saying,⁴⁵

‘Your trusted friends misled you;

they have gotten the best of you.

Now that your feet are stuck in the mud,

they have turned their backs on you.’⁴⁶

^38:23“All your wives and your children will be turned over to the Babylonians.⁴⁷ You yourself will not escape from them but will be captured by the⁴⁸ king of Babylon. This city will be burned down.”⁴⁹

^38:24Then Zedekiah told Jeremiah, “Do not let anyone know about the conversation we have had.⁵⁰ If you do, you will die.⁵¹^38:25The officials may hear that I have talked with you. They may come to you and say, ‘Tell us what you said to the king and what the king said to you.⁵² Do not hide anything from us. If you do, we will kill you.’⁵³^38:26If they do this, tell⁵⁴ them, ‘I was pleading with the king not to send me back to die in the dungeon of Jonathan’s house.’ ”⁵⁵

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Footnotes

37 Heb “Yahweh, the God of armies, the God of Israel.” Compare 7:3 and 35:17 and see the study note on .
38 Heb “Your life/soul will live.” The quote is a long condition-consequence sentence with compound consequential clauses. It reads, “If you will only go out to the officers of the king of Babylon, your soul [= you yourself; 660 נֶפֶשׁ 4.a] will live and this city will not be burned with fire and you and your household will live.” The sentence has been broken down and restructured to better conform with contemporary English style. The infinitive absolute in the condition emphasizes the one condition, i.e., going out or surrendering (cf. 2: §123.g, and compare usage in Exod 15:26). For the idiom “go out to” = “surrender to” see the full idiom in 21:9 “go out and fall over to” which is condensed in 38:2 to “go out to.” The expression here is the same as in 38:2.
39 Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on for explanation.
40 Heb “will not escape from their hand.” Zedekiah held out this hope of escape until the end and attempted to do so but was unsuccessful (cf. 39:4–5).
41 Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on for explanation.
42 Or “and they will badly abuse me.” For the usage of this verb in the situation presupposed see Judg 19:25 and 1 Sam 31:4.
43 Heb “Please listen to the voice of the Lord with regard to what I have been telling you.” For the idiom “listen to the voice” = “obey” see 1034 שָׁמַע 1.m. Obedience here is expressed by following the advice in the qualifying clause, i.e., what I have been telling you.
44 Heb “your life [or you yourself] will live.” Compare v. 17 and the translator’s note there for the idiom.
45 Heb “And they will say.” The words “taunt you” are supplied in the translation to give the flavor of the words that follow.
46 Heb “The men of your friendship incited you and prevailed over you. Your feet are sunk in the mud. They turned backward.” The term “men of your friendship” (cf. 1023 שָׁלוֹם 5.a) is used to refer to Jeremiah’s “so-called friends” in 20:10, to the trusted friend who deserted the psalmist in Ps 41:10, and to the allies of Edom in Obad 7. According to most commentators it refers here to the false prophets and counselors who urged the king to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar. The verb translated “misled” is a verb that often refers to inciting or instigating someone to do something, often with negative connotations (so 694 סוּת Hiph.2). It is generally translated “deceive” or “mislead” in 2 Kgs 18:32; 2 Chr 32:11, 15. Here it refers to the fact that his pro-Egyptian counselors induced him to rebel. They have proven too powerful for him and prevailed on him (יָכֹל לְ, yakhol lé; see 408 יָכֹל 2.b) to follow a policy which will prove detrimental to him, his family, and the city. The phrase “your feet are sunk in the mud” is figurative for being entangled in great difficulties (so 371 טָבַע Hoph and compare the usage in the highly figurative description of trouble in Ps 69:2 [69:3 ]). The taunt song here refers to the fact that Zedekiah had been incited into rebellion by pro-Egyptian nobles in his court who prevailed on him to seek aid from the new Egyptian Pharaoh in 589 b.c. and withhold tribute from Nebuchadnezzar. This led to the downfall of the city which is depicted in Jeremiah’s vision from the standpoint of its effects on the king himself and his family.
47 Heb “Chaldeans.” See the study note on for explanation.
48 Heb “you yourself will not escape from their hand but will be seized by [caught in] the hand of the king of Babylon.” Neither use of “hand” is natural to the English idiom.
49 This translation follows the reading of the Greek version and a few Hebrew . The majority of the Hebrew read “and you will burn down this city.” This reading is accepted by the majority of modern commentaries and English versions. Few of the commentaries, however, bother to explain the fact that the particle אֶת (’et), which normally marks the accusative object, is functioning here as the subject. For this point of grammar see 85 I אֵת 1.b. Or this may be another case where אֵת introduces a new subject (see 85 אֵת 3.α and see usage in 27:8; 36:22).
50 Heb “about these words.”
51 Or “so that you will not die.” Or “or you will die.” See the similar construction in 37:20 and the translator’s note there. This is probably not a threat that the king himself will kill Jeremiah, but a premonition that if the pro-Egyptian party that was seeking to kill Jeremiah found out about the conversation they would go ahead and kill Jeremiah (cf. 38:2–4).
52 The phrase “and what the king said to you” is actually at the end of the verse, but most commentators see it as also under the governance of “tell us” and many commentaries and English versions move the clause forward for the sake of English style as has been done here.
53 Or “lest we kill you”; Heb “and we will not kill you,” which as stated in the translator’s note on introduces a negative purpose (or result) clause. See 37:20, 38:24 for parallel usage.
54 Verses 25–26 form a long compound, complex conditional sentence. The condition is found in v. 25 and contains a long quote. The consequence is found in v. 26 and contains another long quote. The Hebrew sentence literally reads: “And if the officials hear that I have talked with you and come to you and say to you, ‘Please tell us what you said to the king. Do not hide from us and we will not kill you [so that we will not kill you] and [tell us] what the king said to you,’ then tell them.” The sentence has been broken up to better conform with contemporary English style.
55 Heb “I was causing to fall [= presenting] my petition before the king not to send me back to Jonathan’s house to die there.” The word “dungeon of” is supplied in the translation to help the reader connect this petition with Jeremiah’s earlier place of imprisonment where the officials had put him with every intention of letting him die there (37:15–16, 20). See Jer 37:15–16, 20.