384 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTSwith approval; however, reconstruction does not appear necessary. Nor is it
necessary to translate the >im clause as a statement and only the maddua'
clause as a question, as the NJV does. The directive to make an investigation
is Jeremianic (2:10: "Cross over to the Greek islands and see ... "; 18:13: "Ask
please (fo>alu-na>) among the nations, who has heard things like these?"), to
which one may add the string of imperatives followed by maddua< in 46:3-5
and 14-15 for comparison. The question about a male bearing a child is
ironic, since it proposes an impossibility. Though the verb yld can also mean
"beget" (16:3; Gen 4:18; 10:8; Prov 23:22), that meaning makes no sense here,
as Calvin rightly points out, for the answer to the question would then be
"yes," and the incongruity essential to the argument would be destroyed. Pre-
cluded similarly is a "yes and no" answer (pace Bozak 1991: 36-37). The state-
ment and rhetorical question mean to set up Jeremiah's preferred question-
i.e., why are soldiers bent over helpless, like women in labor? They are not giv-
ing birth, but they surely look as though they are! On the language of travail
and anguish in Jeremiah, see Muilenburg l 970b: 48-50.
So why do I see every man, his hands on his loins, like a woman in labor?
Compare the "so, why have I seen?" question in 46:5, where Jeremiah registers
astonishment over Egyptian soldiers in defeat. Hebrew geber is a virile man,
here a man fighting in Jerusalem's defense. Ehrlich ( 1912: 317) says geber is
employed because giving birth is a feminine function. The term is used again
ironically in 31 :22b. The dual ~ala?ayim means "loins," the part of the body
between the ribs and the hip bones (KB^3 ). This is the only occurrence of the
word in the book. On the imagery of men behaving like women in labor, see
also Isa 13 j :8 and 21: 3. A curse upon defeated warriors is that they will become
like (weak) women (see Notes on 4:31; 6:24; and 50:37).
like a woman in labor. Hebrew kayyoleda. The LXX lacks the term and many
delete with Duhm. But Giesebrecht retains, noting that the term is present in
Aq, Symm, Theod, the Hexapla, CL, S, T, and Vg and is necessary for under-
standing the portrayal (cf. 6:24; 22:23; 49:24; 50:43).
and all faces turned deadly pale? Hebrew yeraqon is a noun meaning "mil-
dew," the sort that affiicts field crops ( 1 Kgs 8:37; Amos 4:9; Hag 2: 17). On the
rootyrq and its various forms, see Brenner 1982: 100-102. Here the term refers
to yellow-green paleness of face, brought about in Kim}:ii's view from severe
pain. See also A. R. Johnson 1964: 41. It is more the look of death (Moffatt:
"deadly pallor"; NAB and NIV: "deathly pale"; REB: "deadly pale"; NSB:
"dodsbleka"). For other descriptions of faces turning pale due to fright, see Isa
13:8; Nah 2:10; and Joel 2:6. The LXX omits "all" and reads the hoy beginning
v 7 as hayu (metathesis): "Faces are changed; they have become jaundiced (eis
ikteron egenethe)." This yields tolerable sense, and some scholars (Mowinckel
1946: 109 n. 95, appealing to meter; Volz; Rudolph; Weiser; Holladay) adopt
the reading, but MT's hay ("Woe!") is best retained (McKane). It is not incom-
prehensible (pace Becking l 994a: 152). Jerome's Vulgate has Vae! ("Woe!").
- Woe! For great is that day. On the multiple uses of hoy ("Woe!") in Jere-
miah, see Note for 22:13. The "day" referred to here is Yahweh's day of judg-