What will you say when He punishes you? For you have taught them To be chieftains, to be head over you. Will not pangs seize you, Like a woman in labor?
Parallel translations
- WEB What will you say, when he shall set over you as head those whom you have yourself taught to be friends to you? Shall not sorrows take hold of you, as of a woman in travail?
- KJV What wilt thou say when he shall punish thee? for thou hast taught them to be captains, and as chief over thee: shall not sorrows take thee, as a woman in travail?
- BSB What will you say when He sets over you close allies whom you yourself trained? Will not pangs of anguish grip you, as they do a woman in labor?
- NASB “What will you say when He appoints over you— And you yourself had taught them— Former companions to be head over you? Will sharp pains not take hold of you Like a woman in childbirth?
- NLT What will you say when the Lord takes the allies you have cultivated and appoints them as your rulers? Pangs of anguish will grip you, like those of a woman in labor!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Judah will be horrified when her former allies are set as rulers over her, with pain like a woman in labor.
Overview
The very nations Judah courted as friends will become her masters and oppressors. The pain of childbirth pictures the inescapable anguish of this judgment. Misplaced trust in foreign alliances, rather than in God, brings bitter consequences.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 14
- Isa 13:8They will be dismayed. Pangs and sorrows will seize them. They will be in pain like a woman in labor. They will look in amazement one at another. Their faces will be faces of flame.
- Jer 4:31For I have heard a voice as of a woman in travail, the anguish as of her who gives birth to her first child, the voice of the daughter of Zion, who gasps for breath, who spreads her hands, saying, “Woe is me now! For my soul faints before the murderers.”
- Jer 5:31The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule by their own authority; and my people love to have it so. What will you do in the end of it?
- Jer 38:22‘Behold, all the women who are left in the king of Judah’s house will be brought out to the king of Babylon’s princes, and those women will say, “Your familiar friends have turned on you, and have prevailed over you. Your feet are sunk in the mire, they have turned away from you.”
- Isa 39:2–4Hezekiah was pleased with them, and showed them the house of his precious things, the silver, and the gold, the spices, and the precious oil, and all the house of his armor, and all that was found in his treasures. There was nothing in his house, nor in all his dominion, that Hezekiah didn’t show them.
- Isa 10:3What will you do in the day of visitation, and in the desolation which will come from afar? To whom will you flee for help? Where will you leave your wealth?
- Ezek 28:9Will you yet say before him who kills you, I am God? but you are man, and not God, in the hand of him who wounds you.
- 1 Th 5:3For when they are saying, “Peace and safety,” then sudden destruction will come on them, like birth pains on a pregnant woman; and they will in no way escape.
- Isa 21:3Therefore my thighs are filled with anguish. Pains have taken hold on me, like the pains of a woman in labor. I am in so much pain that I can’t hear. I so am dismayed that I can’t see.
- Jer 22:23Inhabitant of Lebanon, who makes your nest in the cedars, how greatly to be pitied you will be when pangs come on you, the pain as of a woman in travail!
- Jer 6:24We have heard its report; our hands become feeble: anguish has taken hold of us, and pains as of a woman in labor.
- Jer 30:6Ask now, and see whether a man travails with child. Why do I see every man with his hands on his waist, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned pale?
- Jer 48:41Kerioth is taken, and the strongholds are seized. The heart of the mighty men of Moab at that day shall be as the heart of a woman in her pangs.
- 2 Kgs 16:7So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglath Pileser king of Assyria, saying, “I am your servant and your son. Come up and save me out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, who rise up against me.”
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Christ at the center
Against the failure of false shepherds Jeremiah promises the Righteous Branch, 'The LORD our righteousness,' and the new covenant written on the heart and sealed in the blood of Christ.
How Jeremiah 13:21 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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