While they are inflamed: The meaning of this expression is in question. However, most translations make it refer to the greedy, inflamed appetites of the Babylonians. Good News Translation uses a rhetorical question: “Are they greedy?” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch renders “for their ravenous appetite,” while Bible en français courant has “While their desire is heated” and New International Version “But while they are aroused.” Others limit the idea to thirst in connection with what follows: “When they are parched, I will set a drink before them” (New American Bible). The reason for the differences lies in the word translated feast, which may mean merely “drinks [for a feast]” or “feast [including drinks].” In short, translators have two basic ways to render the first part of the verse: “While they are dying of thirst, I will place before them drinks, and make them drunk…” or “While they are ravenously hungry, I will make a feast for them, and get them drunk….”
Swoon away is, as the Revised Standard Version note indicates, the translation of the Septuagint and the Vulgate; the standard Hebrew text has “rejoice.” Hebrew Old Testament Text Project suggests following the Hebrew and rendering either: (1) “until they rejoice” (expressing irony) or (2) “until they are overcome with agony” (giving the verb its opposite meaning). Good News Translation follows the first of these suggestions, by translating “happy.” Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch is similar: “They will become happy.” In English some translators have used a word like “tipsy” to express drunken joviality.
Sleep a perpetual sleep and not wake; that is, “they will go into a sleep from which they will never waken” or “go to sleep and never wake up.”
Says the LORD: See 1.8. Since the section ends at verse 40, Good News Translation places this formula at the end of verse 40, where it is felt to be more natural for English speakers.
Quoted with permission from Newman, Barclay M. and Stine, Philip C. A Handbook on Jeremiah. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2003. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .