Jeremiah 32:4

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

and Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans, but shall surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, and shall speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes shall see his eyes;

World English Bible · Public Domain

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וְצִדְקִיָּ֨הוּ֙

Tsidqîyâh

H6667

“and · Zedekiah”

Conjunction + Noun, Proper

Appears 63× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at 1 Kings 22:11

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H6664 and H3050

TWOT: None

Zedekiah = "Jehovah is righteous" - the last king of Judah renamed from 'Mattaniah' by Nebuchadnezzar; son of Josiah by wife Hamutal; placed on the throne by Nebuchadnezzar when he carried his nephew Jehoiakim in captivity - false prophet at the court of king Ahab of the northern kingdom of Israel - son of Maaseiah, a false prophet in Babylon - son of Hananiah, one of the princes of Judah in the time of Jeremiah - a priest who sealed the covenant with Nehemiah - son of king Jehoiakim of Judah

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

22: words
16: distinct lemmas
Prophets: section

Grammatical profile

5 verbs
12 nouns
1 adjective
1 preposition
1 conjunction
2 particles

Verb forms

יִמָּלֵ֖ט Niphal · Imperfect
הִנָּתֹ֤ן Niphal · Infinitive Absolute
יִנָּתֵן֙ Niphal · Imperfect
וְדִבֶּר Piel · Sequential Perfect
תִּרְאֶֽינָה Qal · Imperfect

Repetition

Words recur within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

וְעֵינָ֖יו eye H5869 ×3
מֶ֣לֶךְ king H4428 ×2
מִיַּ֣ד hand H3027 ×2
הִנָּתֹ֤ן to give H5414 ×2
פִּ֣יו mouth H6310 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In the original languages it is 22 Hebrew tokens and 18 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Jeremiah 32:4 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

2 Kings 25:4–7 Then a breach was made in the city, and all the men of war [fled] by night by the way of the gate between the two walls, which was by the king's garden (now the Chaldeans were against the city round about); and [the king] went by the way of the Arabah.
Jeremiah 37:17 Then Zedekiah the king sent, and fetched him: and the king asked him secretly in his house, and said, Is there any word from Yahweh? Jeremiah said, There is. He said also, You shall be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon.
Jeremiah 38:18 But if you will not go forth to the king of Babylon's princes, then shall this city be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they shall burn it with fire, and you shall not escape out of their hand.
Jeremiah 38:23 They shall bring out all your wives and your children to the Chaldeans; and you shall not escape out of their hand, but shall be taken by the hand of the king of Babylon: and you shall cause this city to be burned with fire.
Jeremiah 39:4–7 It happened that, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, then they fled, and went forth out of the city by night, by the way of the king's garden, through the gate between the two walls; and he went out toward the Arabah.
Jeremiah 52:8–11 But the army of the Chaldeans pursued after the king, and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho; and all his army was scattered from him.
Ezekiel 12:12–13 The prince who is among them shall bear on his shoulder in the dark, and shall go forth: they shall dig through the wall to carry out thereby: he shall cover his face, because he shall not see the land with his eyes.
Ezekiel 17:13–21 and he took of the seed royal, and made a covenant with him; he also brought him under an oath, and took away the mighty of the land;

Ezekiel 21:25–26 You, deadly wounded wicked one, the prince of Israel, whose day is come, in the time of the iniquity of the end,

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Jeremiah 32:4 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וְצִדְקִיָּ֨הוּ֙ מֶ֣לֶךְ יְהוּדָ֔ה לֹ֥א יִמָּלֵ֖ט מִיַּ֣ד הַכַּשְׂדִּ֑ים כִּ֣י הִנָּתֹ֤ן יִנָּתֵן֙ בְּיַ֣ד מֶֽלֶךְ בָּבֶ֔ל וְדִבֶּר פִּ֣יו עִם פִּ֔יו וְעֵינָ֖יו אֶת עינו עֵינָ֥יו תִּרְאֶֽינָה

and Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans, but shall surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, and shall speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes shall see his eyes;

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Structure differs

In the Septuagint, Jeremiah is about an eighth shorter than the Hebrew and arranges its material differently — the Oracles Against the Nations (Hebrew chapters 46–51) appear in the middle of the Greek book, after 25:13. Because the chapter and verse boundaries do not line up, a verse-for-verse comparison with the Hebrew is not shown.

A verse-for-verse comparison isn’t shown here because the chapters and verses don’t line up. Switch to the LXX edition with the MT / LXX toggle above to read the Greek directly.

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from a public-domain English Septuagint. How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

וְצִדְקִיָה מְלַךְ שִׁבְטָא דְבֵית יְהוּדָה לָא יִשְׁתֵּיזֵיב מִידָא דְכַסְדָאֵי אֲרֵי אִתְמְסָרָא יִתְמְסַר בְּיַד מַלְכָּא דְבָבֶל וִימַלֵיל פּוּמֵיהּ עִם פּוּמֵיהּ וְעֵינוֹהִי יַת עֵינוֹהִי יֶחְזְיָן:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Jeremiah 32:4 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown

his eyes shall behold his eyes--that is, only before reaching Babylon, which he was not to see. Jer 39:6-7 harmonizes this prophecy (Jer 32:4) with the seemingly opposite prophecy, Eze 12:13, "He shall not see."

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

Jer 32:4 And Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans, but shall surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon, and shall speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes shall behold his eyes;

Ver. 4. And Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape.] As he hoped to have done, either by his wiles or by his wealth; and accordingly attempted it, but all in vain.

And he shall speak with him mouth to mouth.] This was no small punishment to Zedekiah, that he must look him in the face from whom he had so perfidiously revolted, even against oath; and hear his taunts, before he felt his fingers. How, then, will graceless persons do to stand before the King of kings, whom they have so greatly offended, at that great day? See Rev 9:17.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tyndale Open Study Notes

Tyndale Open Resources

32:4-5 Continuing to resist the Babylonians was hopeless; it would result in disaster for the city and for Zedekiah.

Adam Clarke's Commentary

Verse 4. And shall speak with him mouth to mouth] He shall be reduced to a state of the most abject servitude. The slave was obliged to fix his eyes on every motion of the master whilst giving his orders, who often condescended to give them only by dumb signs.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

John Calvin's Commentaries

When, therefore, the king saw that he would not be exempt from the common judgment, he was especially displeased with Jeremiah; for kings seek to be exempt from all laws, and when they allow the people to be reproved, they yet wish themselves to be deemed sacred. As then Jeremiah classed the king Zedekiah with all the common people, it was a thing not to be endured by a proud king. Hence his indignation was such, that he shut up Jeremiah in prison; and he became implacable, even when God’s hand pressed hard on him. It afterwards follows, —

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

4. This v. occurs again in almost the same words at ch. Jer_34:3, where see note.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

And Zedekiah king of Judah shall not escape out of the hand of the Chaldeans,.... This is a continuation of the prophecy of Jeremiah, repeated by the king to him, and which concerns himself more especially; who, upon the taking of the city, would endeavour to make his escape, as he did; but should not be able, Jer 52:8;

but shall surely be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon; not only into the hands of his army, and of his generals, but into his own hand personally; since it follows:

and shall speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes shall behold his eyes; converse together face to face, eye to eye; but no doubt with different tones and looks; the king of Babylon upbraiding the king of Judah with perjury and ingratitude, and looking upon him with indignation and contempt; the other speaking faintly, and looking down with grief, shame, and confusion; moreover, the eyes of the king of Babylon beheld the eyes of Zedekiah, and ordered them to be put out, as they were, Kg2 25:7.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

Eyes. They were afterwards put out at Reblatha, (Haydock) so that he could not see Babylon, Ezechiel xii. 13. (Worthington) --- Sedecias was imprisoned, and buried there by the Jews, chap. xxxiv. 5, 12.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Jeremiah, in the Prophets, opens this verse with 22 words (16 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is Tsidqîyâh (“Zedekiah”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

What does “Zedekiah” (Tsidqîyâh) contribute to the verse as a whole?
2 Kings 25:4–7 shares this passage’s theme. How do the two illuminate each other?
“eye” occurs 3× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «יִמָּלֵ֖ט» is Niphal Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Jamieson, Fausset & Brown and Trapp's Complete Commentary read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 22 Hebrew ↔ 18 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 11 words in this verse.
“eye” occurs 3× in this single verse.
16 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 22 words in this verse.