Gedaliah the son of Ahikam: Since verse 5, this is the fourth full identification of Gedaliah. It is doubtful that such repetition would be acceptable for most languages.

The term swore means “gave his word.” For the first part of the verse, translators can either say “Gedaliah gave them his word that they did not need to be afraid to surrender” or, similar to Good News Translation, “Gedaliah said to them, ‘I swear to you that you do not need to be afraid to serve.’ ”

Them and their men are “all the captains of the forces … and their men” referred to in verse 7.

To serve the Chaldeans: In this context the sense is “to surrender to the Babylonians” (Good News Translation). However, later in the sentence, serve the king of Babylon is usually translated literally or as “accept him as ruler.” As elsewhere, the Chaldeans are the Babylonians (see 21.4).

Dwell in the land has the sense of “settle down” or “make your home.”

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 .