Jeremiah 38:5

5 “He is in your hands,” King Zedekiah answered. “The king can do nothing to oppose you.”

Jeremiah 38:5 in Other Translations

KJV
5 Then Zedekiah the king said, Behold, he is in your hand: for the king is not he that can do any thing against you.
ESV
5 King Zedekiah said, "Behold, he is in your hands, for the king can do nothing against you."
NLT
5 King Zedekiah agreed. “All right,” he said. “Do as you like. I can’t stop you.”
MSG
5 King Zedekiah caved in: "If you say so. Go ahead, handle it your way. You're too much for me."
CSB
5 King Zedekiah said, "Here he is; he's in your hands since the king can't do anything against you."

Jeremiah 38:5 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 38:5

Then Zedekiah the king said, behold, he [is] in your hand
In your power, to do with him as you please. This is either a grant of the king, allowing them to do as they thought fit; or a declaration of their power, supposing them to be the princes of the sanhedrim, as Grotius thinks, to judge of a false prophet, and condemn him; but that they were such does not appear; nor does their charge of the prophet, or their procedure against him, confirm it. The former sense seems best: for the king [is] not [he that] can do [any] thing against you;
which is said either in a flattering way, that such was their interest in him, and so great his regard for them, that he could not deny them any thing. So it is in the old translations, "for the king may deny you nothing"; and, "the king can deny you nothing": or else in a complaining way, suggesting that, he was a king, and no king; that he had no power to oppose them; they would do as they pleased; and therefore it signified nothing applying to him; he should not say any thing against it; he would have no concern in it; they might do as they pleased, since he knew they would.

Jeremiah 38:5 In-Context

3 And this is what the LORD says: ‘This city will certainly be given into the hands of the army of the king of Babylon, who will capture it.’ ”
4 Then the officials said to the king, “This man should be put to death. He is discouraging the soldiers who are left in this city, as well as all the people, by the things he is saying to them. This man is not seeking the good of these people but their ruin.”
5 “He is in your hands,” King Zedekiah answered. “The king can do nothing to oppose you.”
6 So they took Jeremiah and put him into the cistern of Malkijah, the king’s son, which was in the courtyard of the guard. They lowered Jeremiah by ropes into the cistern; it had no water in it, only mud, and Jeremiah sank down into the mud.
7 But Ebed-Melek, a Cushite, an official in the royal palace, heard that they had put Jeremiah into the cistern. While the king was sitting in the Benjamin Gate,

Cross References 2

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