The LORD’s reply is intended to be sarcastic: the LORD himself will fill the people with wine and then smash them like jars against one another.

Thus says the LORD: See 2.2.

Behold: See 1.6.

The statement I will fill with drunkenness is sometimes a problem. To translate this as “I will make them drunk” loses the image of being filled like the jars, although some translations have done this. Bible en français courant, for example, has “make completely drunk,” and in some languages the idiomatic way of expressing this is “full drunk.” Good News Translation has a more common rendering: “fill the people … with wine until they are drunk.”

The kings who sit on David’s throne are best understood as “the kings, who are David’s descendants” (Good News Translation). The same expression is found in 17.25; 22.2, 4, 30; 29.16; 33.21; 36.30. Translators need to be careful that the translation does not leave the impression that there are some kings of Judah who are descended from David and others who are not, and here only the first group is in view. The expression means “the kings, all of whom are David’s descendants.” Alternative models for this phrase are “the kings of David’s family” (Contemporary English Version) and “the kings who have succeeded David” (Dutch common language version).

Priests was discussed at 1.1, and prophet at 1.5.

Dash them one against another, fathers and sons together can be “smash them together, fathers and sons against each other.” Dash is a word used to describe smashing things, as with a club, or, as Good News Translation shows, it could describe the act of breaking jars against each other. New Revised Standard Version makes it clear the verse does not refer only to males: “parents and children together.” Good News Translation is similar with “old and young alike.”

For says the LORD, see 1.8.

Will … pity is used elsewhere in 15.5; 21.7; 51.3 (Revised Standard Version “spare”). Will … spare is used elsewhere only in 21.7. For have compassion, see “have mercy” in 6.23. In 21.7 the three verbs are translated by Revised Standard Version in the same way that they are here, though in Hebrew the order of the first two verbs is reversed. This is legitimate inasmuch as the Hebrew author seems not to have distinguished between the meaning of the three verbs. Translators may say something like “I will in no way take pity on them and decide not to kill them [or, change my mind about killing them].”

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 .