A translation of Jeremiah 7.1-8.3 (testimony, reject, Creator, exodus)

[angellous_evangellous]

Here's something that I've been working on. I have my transaltion of Jeremiah's Temple Sermon. I will be revising it this week and adding a lot more notes. On each verse I have tranlation from the Hebrew first, then below it my translation of the LXX (from Greek) in italics, and then more notes if any. I haven't finished the LXX work but I hope to have it done by Friday.

Have fun,
AE


7.1 The word which came to Jeremiah from YHWH saying, “Stand at a the gate of the house of YHWH and proclaim there this word and say, ‘Hear the word of YHWH, all Judah, the ones who come in these gates to bow yourselves down before YHWH.

It looks to me like 7.1 is missing from the LXX

It begins with 7.2 Hear the word of the Lord, all of Judah

7.3 YHWH of armies, the Elohim of Israel says this, “Make good your ways and practices, and I will establish you [cause you to dwell] in this place.”

Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, “Make straight your ways and practices and I will cause you to live in this place

7.4 Do not trust in the false words saying, “This is the temple of YHWH, the temple of YHWH, the temple of YHWH

Do not trust in false words that are altogether worthless saying “It is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord (two and not three as above)

7.5 For if you completely make good your words and practices, if you completely do justice, [each] person with his companion;

For if you completely make straight your ways and your practices and if you completely do justice with every person and neighbor

Two Hebraisms in the LXX (Greek doesn’t do this - they are modifying Greek grammar to accommodate the Hebrew)

diorqou/ntej diorqw,shte = WbyjiyTe byjeyhe-~ai literally for both “and correcting correct”

poiou/ntej poih,shte = jP'v.mi Wf[]t;


7.6 alien, orphan, and widow [if] you do not abuse, and innocent blood do not shed in this place, and do not walk after other Elohim, to your harm

and proselyte (prosh,lutoj) and orphan and widow

Interesting that both the Greek and Hebrew list the direct object first - and the LXX has prosh,lutoj - and not alien. I suppose that barbarian (exheno) would work, but the LXX translators would know that in the Greek world that would include themselves.

prosh,lutoj is used consistently for “alien” and in Ex 22.20-22 (cf the whole passage to this) it refers to Jews who were prosh,lutoj in Egypt, so it does not carry always religious meaning.

7.7 I will establish you in this land which I gave to your ancestors for ever and ever.

rough: And I will cause you to live in this place, the land which I gave to your fathers for ever and ever

smooth: I will cause you to live in this place for ever and ever, the land which I gave to your fathers

I think that I will keep the gender-specific ‘fathers’ because of the gender-specific sins in this text. It seems to me that there is interdepence of gender in the text, but gender-specific promises, sins, and promises.

Another question I have is this: is the living or the giving forever? It seems to me that in both langauges it can go both ways, and the meaning may not change. But actually living in the land forever may be preferable to having it as a gift forever, because what’s the use of a gift if you’re not alive, at least through ancestors to enjoy it? On the other hand, what is a gift if it is not enjoyed?

7.8 Behold, you trust in false words to no profit

Behold, you trust in false words which are of no profit

pepoi,qate verb indicative perfect active 2nd person plural from pei,qw

xjb verb qal participle masculine plural absolute homonym 1 = be full of confidence

7.9 Will you steal (bnG), murder(xc;r'), and commit adultry (@an), and bear false testimony ([bv), and make sacrifices to Baal, and walk after/behind/towards other (plural) Elohims which you have not known.

You murder, commit adultry, steal, and wickedly bear false witness and sacrificed (or burned incense - the only perfect, all other verbs are present) and followed after other gods which you have not know to your evil (tou/ kakw/j ei=nai u`mi/n)

kai. foneu,ete kai. moica/sqe kai. kle,ptete kai. ovmnu,ete

I think that both the Hebrew and Greek use the same vocabulary as the Decalogue in Exodus

7.10 And [you pl] come and stand before me in this house which is called by my name and and {you} say, “We are delivered (nip)” in order to do all of these abominations.

And then you came and stood before me in the house which is called by my name and say (aorist) “We are delivered!” only to do these abominations

I take the negation as ‘only’ (ou/ mh.)

7.11 [cave for lions] A hideout for robbers is this dwelling place which is called after my name before your eyes? --- In Enligsh --- Has this house which is called by my name become a hideout for robbers to you? Even I myself have seen it, YHWH declares.

[angellous_evangellous]

7.12 Now go to my place which is in Shiloh where I have previously established my name and behold what I have done there because of the wickedness of my people Israel.

7.13 And now because you have done all these things, says YHWH, I spoke to you, rising early in the morning I spoke, but you did not listen, and I called to you did not answer.

7.14 So I will do to the house which is called by my name, in which you trust, and to the place which I gave to you and your ancestors as I did there.

7.15 And I will cast you out of my sight, as I cast out your relatives, all the offspring of Ephraim

7.16 [Jeremiah] Do not pray for this people and do not lift up a cry (hN"rI is used both for thanksgiving and of lamentation, an indiscriminate yell - because of context) or a prayer for their benefit and do not intercede with me because I will not listen to you.

7.17 Do you not see what they are doing in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem?

7.18 Their sons gather wood and their fathers burn with fire and the women knead (participle) dough to make cakes for the queen of heaven and pour out libations to other (plural) Elohim so as to anger me [hiphil].

7.19 “Do they anger me with these things?” (perhaps in the hiphil: to spite), declares YHWH, “But with these things they act in spite to shame themselves.” -- The LXX preserves the Hebraism s ~h,ynEP. tv,Bo = ouvci. e`autou,j o[pwj kataiscunqh/| ta. pro,swpa auvtw/n - the subjunctive aorist passive is enough, but the translator was literal, adding ‘before their faces.’

7.20 Therefore now YHWH Adoni says, “My anger and my rage will be poured out (niphil) on this place upon the people (~d'a'), and upon the animals (hm'heB.), and upon the trees (#[e) of the field, and upon the fruit (yriP.) of the ground (hm'd'a]) and my burning will not be quenched.

7.21 Thus says the YHWH of armies (= LORD of hosts, LORD Almighty, Lord of the Saboth = transliteration), the Elohim of Israel, “Add your burnt offerings to your sacrifices, and eat flesh.” what the hell does this mean? The flesh can be the sacrificial meat from offerings (Jer 11.15; Lev. 7.20)... see more below:

rf'B' (266 ×): cs. rf;B., sf. yrif'B., ^r.f'(B., ^r'(f'B., ~k,r.f;B.; pl. ~yrif'B.: — 1. skin Ps 1026; — 2. flesh of living men Gn 221, of dead men 1S 1744, of cows Gn 412; — 3. meat as food 1S 213•15; — 4. sacrificial meat: b®´ar qœdeš Je 1115, b®´ar mizb¢­µ Lv 720; — 5. flesh as a part of the body: a) ±eƒem & b¹´¹r Gn 223; b) euphem. for pubic region, b®´ar ±orlâ Gn 1711, b®´ar ±erwâ Ex 2842; penis Lv 152f•7; genitals of woman Lv 1519; — 6. body Ps 632; — 7. relationship: b¹´¹r mibb®´¹rî Gn 223; b¹´¹r °eµ¹d 224; °¹µînû b®´¹r¢nû our own brother Gn 3727; — 8. a) living: l¢b b¹´¹r :: l¢b °eben Ez 1119; b) perishable, transitory: minnefeš w®±ad b¹´¹r Is 1018; — 9. kol-b¹´¹r: a) men and beasts Gn 612•17; b) world of men Nu 1622; c) world of beasts Gn 619; d) any man Dt 523; e) every man Is 406. (pg 51)

7.22 For I did not speak to your ancestors nor commanded them in the day that I myself brought them out of the Egyptians concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices

=== ÎyaiyciAhÐ = hiph inf const with 1st sing ¿ayciAhÀ = hiph inf construct ===

7.23 For it was with these words that I commanded them saying, “Obey ([m;v') - translated above as ‘listen’) my voice and I will be your Elohim, and you will be my people, and if you walk in the way in which I will command you, so that it may be well with you.

A vocabulary study with the ‘Shema’ of Deut 6 and the Decalogue in Exodus and Deut. may be fruitful.

7.24 And they did not listen/obey or turn their ears to me but walked according to their own plans and in the stubbornness of their evil will (cf 7.30/ heart) , and were backs [implied: to me] and not faces

7.25 From the day which your ancestors went out from the land of the Egyptians until this day I have sent to you prophets - all of them my servants - rising daily to send them.

7.26 And they did not listen to me, nor did they turn their ears and they stiffened their necks and did more evil than their ancestors

[angellous_evangellous]

7.27 And you will speak to them all these words and they will not listen to you, and you will call to them, and they will not answer you [repeats above]

7.28 And you will say to them, “This people who did not listen to the voice of YHWH Elohim and would not take correction; faithfulness has perished and has been cut off from their mouths.

7.29 Jerusalem: Cut off your hair and throw it away, lift up your bareness for a dirge, because YHWH rejects and forsakes the generation of his wrath

7.30 “Because the sons of Judah have done evil in my sight,” an utterance of YHWH, “they set up detestable things in the house which is called by my name to defile it (= the house or the name?)

7.31 And they built the high places of Topheth to burn their children in the valley of sons of Hinnom, which I did not command and it did not go into my heart

7.32 “Therefore the days are coming,” says YHWH, “when it will no longer be called Topeth or the valley of the sons of Hinnom, but the valley of Slaughter, and they will bury [the dead] in Topeth because there will be no other place

7.33 And the corpses of these people will be food for birds of the heaven and beasts of the land (perhaps a combination related to God as Creator of both) and no one will [be there to] scatter them away

7.34 I will remove from the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem the shout of joy and the shout of gladness and the voice of a bridegroom and the voice of a bride because the land will become desolate.

8.1 “At that time,” says YHWH, “they themselves will bring out the bones of the kings of Judah and the bones of the leaders and the bones of the preists with the bones of the prophets with the bones of the ones who sit in Jerusalem from their graves

a textual variant that mirrors the one above:
=== ÎyaiyciAhÐ = hiph inf const with 1st sing ¿ayciAhÀ = hiph inf construct ===

ÎWayciAyÐ ¿WayciyOw>À they themselves

It looks to me like 8.1 is juxtaposed rhetorically to 7.22. YHWH himself brought the ancestors out of the land of Egypt to obey his words. They did not, so they themselves bring the bones of their kings out of the cities of Judah

8.2 And they will be spread before the sun and moon and all the armies of heaven which they have loved and served [ESV] which they have gone after, and which they have sought and worshiped. And they shall not be gathered or buried. They shall be as dung on the surface of the ground.

[ESV] 8.3 Death shall be preferred to life by all the remnant that remains of this evil family in all the places where I have driven them, declares the LORD of hosts.

[angellous_evangellous]

Wack!

[angellous_evangellous]

Ok I've finished translating the LXX (Greek) version of the text and I have a thought.

In Hebrew, a main objective of the text is to distinguish YHWH the Elohim of Israel from all other Elohim. YHWH says and does things that are to make YHWH distinct from any other God = YHWH brought the people out of Egypt, gave Israel the commandments, and will judge Israel for not following His commands.

Therefore we have "utterance of YHWH" or "thus says YHWH" over and over again, which the LXX usually omits.

Significantly for this theme I think is the difference between the Hebrew and Greek for 7.28.

Hebrew (Masoretic Text):
7.28 And you will say to them, “This people who did not listen to the voice of YHWH their Elohim and would not take correction; faithfulness has perished and has been cut off from their mouths.

Greek (Septuigant = LXX):

7.28 And you will say to them, “This people who did not listen to the voice of the Lord (kurios) and would not take correction; faithfulness has perished and has been cut off from their mouths.

Notice the Greek translators make no attempt at all to show Lord their God, which in Greek would be kurios o theou autws or something like that.

It could be, in my opinion, that the Greek translators reflect a strict monotheism rather than henotheism. That is, the translators reflect a view that there is no other God - there is no God but the Lord, so there is no need to say "the Lord their God." Whereas the Hebrew reflects the possibility of other Elohim that the people follow to their peril.

[angellous_evangellous]

Of course several scholars have noted that the LXX translators were not translating the M text.

However, the text of this passage is usually very close to M in my humble opinion.

[angellous_evangellous]

Also 7.9 is ver interesting to me.

7.9 Will you steal (bnG), murder(xc;r'), and commit adultry (@an), and bear false testimony ([bv), and make sacrifices to Baal, and walk after/behind/towards other (plural) Elohims which you have not known.

You murder, commit adultry, steal, and wickedly bear false witness and sacrificed (or burned incense - the only perfect, all other verbs are present) and followed after other gods which you have not know to your evil (tou/ kakw/j ei=nai u`mi/n)


The Hebrew and Greek words for stealing, murder, and adultry come from the Ten Commandments in Exodus 20, but the "swearing falsely" is not the "bear false witness," but a breaking of the first commandment. It's from Deut 10.20 if I remember correctly, and it means swearing by another god... when one should swear (=make oaths in the name of) by YHWH.

[angellous_evangellous]

I've also been reading archeological reports about Shiloh.

7.12 Now go to my place which is in Shiloh where I have previously established my name and behold what I have done there because of the wickedness of my people Israel.

Many scholars have thought that Jeremiah is referring to a destruction of Shiloh in 1050BCE by the Philistines. If so, Jerm is referring to something that occured 400 years beforehand, which may not make sense. There may be archeological evidence to support this, but it is not conclusive, and that evidence has been revised. The latest report that I have read concludes that Jermiah 7.12 must be referring to the destruction of Shiloh by Nebuchadrezzar sometime around 587BCE. The Temple Sermon dates itself at 609BC, a few years beforehand. Therefore, if it is referring to a later destruction, this portion could have been added to the Sermon at a later date. I do not think that the sermon has a post-exhilic origin - yet.

I am wondering now if Shiloh would have been destroyed before Jerusalem due to geography or Babylonian military strategy.