Jeremiah 47:5

5 Gaza will shave her head in mourning; Ashkelon will be silenced. You remnant on the plain, how long will you cut yourselves?

Jeremiah 47:5 in Other Translations

King James Version (KJV)
5 Baldness is come upon Gaza; Ashkelon is cut off with the remnant of their valley: how long wilt thou cut thyself?
English Standard Version (ESV)
5 Baldness has come upon Gaza; Ashkelon has perished. O remnant of their valley, how long will you gash yourselves?
New Living Translation (NLT)
5 Gaza will be humiliated, its head shaved bald; Ashkelon will lie silent. You remnant from the Mediterranean coast, how long will you cut yourselves in mourning?
The Message Bible (MSG)
5 Gaza will be shaved bald as an egg, Ashkelon struck dumb as a post. You're on your last legs. How long will you keep flailing?
American Standard Version (ASV)
5 Baldness is come upon Gaza; Ashkelon is brought to nought, the remnant of their valley: how long wilt thou cut thyself?
GOD'S WORD Translation (GW)
5 Gaza will shave its head in mourning. Ashkelon will be destroyed. How long will you cut yourselves, you people left on the plains?
Holman Christian Standard Bible (CSB)
5 Baldness is coming to Gaza. Ashkelon will become silent, a remnant of their valley. How long will you gash yourself?
New International Reader's Version (NIRV)
5 The people of Gaza will be so sad they will shave their heads. And Ashkelon's people will be silent. You who remain on the flatlands, how long will you cut yourselves?

Jeremiah 47:5 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 47:5

Baldness is come upon Gaza
The Targum is,

``vengeance is come to the inhabitants of Gaza.''
It is become like a man whose hair is fallen from his head, or is clean shaved off; its houses were demolished; its inhabitants slain, and their wealth plundered; a pillaged and depopulated place. Some understand this of shaving or tearing off the hair for grief, and mourning because of their calamities; which agrees with the latter clause of the verse: Ashkelon is cut off [with] the remnant of their valley;
this was one of the live cities of the Philistines; it lay north of Gaza. Herodotus F24 calls Ashkelon a city of Syria, in which was the temple of Urania Venus, destroyed by the Scythians; said to be built by Lydus Ascalus, and called so after his name F25. Of this city was Herod the king, and therefore called an Ashkelonite; it was now destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, but afterwards rebuilt and inhabited; and with it were destroyed the remainder of the cities, towns, and villages, in the valley, adjoining to that and Gaza; or Ashkelon and Gaza, now destroyed, were all that remained of the cities of the valley, and shared the same fate with them. The Targum is,
``the remnant of their strength;''
so Kimchi, who interprets it of the multitude of their wealth and power; how long wilt thou cut thyself?
their faces, arms, and other parts of their body, mourning and lamenting their sad condition; the words of the prophet signifying hereby the dreadfulness of it, and its long continuance.
FOOTNOTES:

F24 Clio, sive l. 1. c. 105.
F25 Vid. Bochart. Phaleg l. 2. c. 12. p. 88.

Jeremiah 47:5 In-Context

3 at the sound of the hooves of galloping steeds, at the noise of enemy chariots and the rumble of their wheels. Parents will not turn to help their children; their hands will hang limp.
4 For the day has come to destroy all the Philistines and to remove all survivors who could help Tyre and Sidon. The LORD is about to destroy the Philistines, the remnant from the coasts of Caphtor.
5 Gaza will shave her head in mourning; Ashkelon will be silenced. You remnant on the plain, how long will you cut yourselves?
6 “ ‘Alas, sword of the LORD, how long till you rest? Return to your sheath; cease and be still.’
7 But how can it rest when the LORD has commanded it, when he has ordered it to attack Ashkelon and the coast?”

Cross References 3

  • 1. S Jeremiah 41:5; Micah 1:16
  • 2. S Jeremiah 25:20
  • 3. S Leviticus 19:28
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