Set up the standard toward Zion: retire, stay not: for I will bring evil from the north, and a great destruction.
Parallel translations
- WEB Set up a standard toward Zion. Flee for safety! Don’t wait; for I will bring evil from the north, and a great destruction.”
- BSB Raise a signal flag toward Zion. Seek refuge! Do not delay! For I am bringing disaster from the north, and terrible destruction.
- NKJV Set up the standard toward Zion. Take refuge! Do not delay! For I will bring disaster from the north, And great destruction.”
- NASB “Raise a flag toward Zion! Take refuge, do not stand still, For I am bringing evil from the north, And great destruction.
- NLT Raise a signal flag as a warning for Jerusalem: ‘Flee now! Do not delay!’ For I am bringing terrible destruction upon you from the north.”
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
Gaining entry on the pretext of fetching wheat, the brothers stab Ishbosheth and escape. They use deception to reach their defenseless victim.
Overview
Pretending to collect wheat, Rechab and Baanah enter the inner house and strike Ishbosheth in the abdomen, then slip away. Their ruse exposes the calculated treachery of the deed. The murder of a sleeping, helpless man marks them as wicked men, as David will soon declare.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Jer 50:2Declare ye among the nations, and publish, and set up a standard; publish, and conceal not: say, Babylon is taken, Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in pieces; her idols are confounded, her images are broken in pieces.
- Jer 1:13–15And the word of the LORD came unto me the second time, saying, What seest thou? And I said, I see a seething pot; and the face thereof is toward the north.
- Jer 51:27Set ye up a standard in the land, blow the trumpet among the nations, prepare the nations against her, call together against her the kingdoms of Ararat, Minni, and Ashchenaz; appoint a captain against her; cause the horses to come up as the rough caterpillers.
- Isa 62:10Go through, go through the gates; prepare ye the way of the people; cast up, cast up the highway; gather out the stones; lift up a standard for the people.
- Jer 6:1O ye children of Benjamin, gather yourselves to flee out of the midst of Jerusalem, and blow the trumpet in Tekoa, and set up a sign of fire in Bethhaccerem: for evil appeareth out of the north, and great destruction.
- Jer 51:12Set up the standard upon the walls of Babylon, make the watch strong, set up the watchmen, prepare the ambushes: for the LORD hath both devised and done that which he spake against the inhabitants of Babylon.
- Jer 6:22Thus saith the LORD, Behold, a people cometh from the north country, and a great nation shall be raised from the sides of the earth.
- Jer 4:21How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet?
- Jer 25:9Behold, I will send and take all the families of the north, saith the LORD, and Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will bring them against this land, and against the inhabitants thereof, and against all these nations round about, and will utterly destroy them, and make them an astonishment, and an hissing, and perpetual desolations.
- Jer 21:7And afterward, saith the LORD, I will deliver Zedekiah king of Judah, and his servants, and the people, and such as are left in this city from the pestilence, from the sword, and from the famine, into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of their enemies, and into the hand of those that seek their life: and he shall smite them with the edge of the sword; he shall not spare them, neither have pity, nor have mercy.
- Jer 51:54A sound of a cry cometh from Babylon, and great destruction from the land of the Chaldeans:
- Jer 50:22A sound of battle is in the land, and of great destruction.
- Zeph 1:10And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the LORD, that there shall be the noise of a cry from the fish gate, and an howling from the second, and a great crashing from the hills.
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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 4:6 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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