Deadly diseases is more literally “deaths of diseases.” Elsewhere in Jeremiah the noun diseases is found only in 14.18, where it occurs in the construction “diseases of famine.”

They shall not be lamented, nor shall they be buried may require restructuring as an active expression: “no one will mourn for them or bury them” (Good News Translation). The restructuring of Good News Translation may suggest that people were unwilling to do these things, which is not the intention of the verse. The meaning is “There will be no one there to conduct the mourning rituals for them or to bury them” (Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch) or “There will be no one left alive to….”

They shall be as dung on the surface of the ground: See the comment at 8.2. They is more accurately expressed as “Their bodies” (Good News Translation) or “their corpses” (Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch). Good News Translation is vivid: “Their bodies will lie like piles of manure on the ground.”

Sword … famine: See the comment at 5.12.

Their dead bodies shall be food for the birds of the air and for the beasts of the earth: An active construction may be preferable, as in Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch (“vultures and jackals will eat them”). If translators do not want to identify particular birds and animals by name, they can say “Birds and wild animals will eat them.” For birds of the air, see the comment at 4.25. For beasts of the earth, see 7.33.

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 .