The word which Jeremiah the prophet commanded is placed at the end of this verse in Good News Translation so as to make a natural transition to verse 60. Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch combines verses 59 and 60 and renders “Jeremiah had written all these messages of doom against Babylonia in a scroll. When Zedekiah, the king of Judah, traveled to Babylonia in the fourth year of his reign, accompanied by his quartermaster Seraiah, a son of Neriah and grandson of Mahseiah, Jeremiah gave Seraiah the scroll together with the following command:….” Both Good News Translation and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch are useful models for translators. Notice that Good News Translation also restructures the verse differently than Revised Standard Version into two sentences, which will help make it more readable.

The word which Jeremiah the prophet commanded is expressed as “I gave him some instructions” by Good News Translation. It is probably unnatural to continue to identify Jeremiah as the prophet.

Son of … son of: See 32.12.

Zedekiah king of Judah … in the fourth year: See 1.3.

The quartermaster is more literally “officer of the resting place,” which suggests that he was in charge of making arrangements for the king’s accommodations when the king traveled. For this reason, Good News Translation renders “King Zedekiah’s personal attendant” and New Jerusalem Bible “lord chamberlain.” Although the meanings of Good News Translation and New Jerusalem Bible are fairly close, many English readers will have difficulty with New Jerusalem Bible‘s technical terminology. If “personal attendant” causes a problem, translators can say, for example, “the one who took care of arrangements for the king.”

Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Jeremiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2003. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .