Jeremiah 45
# Jeremiah 45

Jeremiah 45 is the forty-fifth chapter of the Book of Jeremiah in the Hebrew Bible or the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. This book contains prophecies attributed to the prophet Jeremiah, and is one of the Books of the Prophets. This chapter closes the section comprising chapters 26–44 with the message that the prophetic word will survive through Baruch. In the New Revised Standard Version, this chapter is described as "a word of comfort to Baruch". Biblical commentator A. W. Streane calls it "a rebuke and a promise to Baruch".

## Text

The original text was written in Hebrew. This chapter, the shortest in the Book of Jeremiah, is divided into 5 verses.

### Textual witnesses

Some early manuscripts containing the text of this chapter in Hebrew are of the Masoretic Text tradition, which includes the Codex Cairensis (895), the Petersburg Codex of the Prophets (916), Aleppo Codex (10th century), Codex Leningradensis (1008).

There is also a translation into Koine Greek known as the Septuagint (with a different chapter and verse numbering), made in the last few centuries BCE. Extant ancient manuscripts of the Septuagint version include Codex Vaticanus (B; ${\mathfrak {G}}$$^B;$ 4th century), Codex Sinaiticus (S; BHK: ${\mathfrak {G}}$$^S;$ 4th century), Codex Alexandrinus (A; ${\mathfrak {G}}$$^A;$ 5th century) and Codex Marchalianus (Q; ${\mathfrak {G}}$$^Q;$ 6th century).

## Parashot

The parashah sections listed here are based on the Aleppo Codex. Jeremiah 45 is a part of the "Sixteenth prophecy (Jeremiah 40-45)" in the section of Prophecies interwoven with narratives about the prophet's life (Jeremiah 26-45). {P}: open parashah; {S}: closed parashah.

    {S} 45:1-5 {P}

## Verse numbering

The order of chapters and verses of the Book of Jeremiah in the English Bibles, Masoretic Text (Hebrew), and Vulgate (Latin), in some places differs from that in the Septuagint (LXX, the Greek Bible used in the Eastern Orthodox Church and others) according to Rahlfs or Brenton. The following table is taken with minor adjustments from Brenton's Septuagint, page 971.

The order of Computer Assisted Tools for Septuagint/Scriptural Study (CATSS) based on Alfred Rahlfs' Septuaginta (1935) differs in some details from Joseph Ziegler's critical edition (1957) in Göttingen LXX. Swete's Introduction mostly agrees with Rahlfs' edition (=CATSS).

| Hebrew, Vulgate, English | Rahlfs' LXX (CATSS) |
| - | - |
| 45:1-5 | 51:31-35 |
| 38:1-28 | 45:1-28 |

## Verse 1

    The word that Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Baruch the son of Neriah, when he had written these words in a book at the instruction of Jeremiah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, saying, (NKJV)

"The fourth year of Jehoiakim" is 605 BCE. This part should have followed chapter 36. Volz found the trace of Baruch's involvement in forming chapter 1-45 from three major sections: 1-25, 26–36, and 37–45, as each section concludes with "a reference to the dictation of a scroll" (25:1–14; chapter 36; chapter 45).

## Verse 5

New King James Version:

    I will give your life to you as a prize in all places, wherever you go.

The New International Version offers, as a more manageable translation:

    Wherever you go I will let you escape with your life.

Streane suggests that "the age is one in which [Baruch] must not expect great things for himself, but must be content if he escapes with his bare life."

