The three verbs wail … cry out … mourn have essentially the same meaning, and so Good News Translation uses only one verb: “And so I will weep for everyone in Moab and for the people of Kir Heres.” Of course, translators may use three terms if they wish to retain the parallelism; for example, “Therefore I weep for Moab; yes, I cry loudly for the whole country; I mourn for the people of Kir Heres.”

For wail see 4.8.

Men, as in Good News Translation, probably refers to “the people.”

Kir-heres was an ancient capital of Moab, about 18 kilometers (11 miles) east of the Dead Sea.

In Hebrew I mourn (first person) is actually “he mourns” (third person), which Hebrew Old Testament Text Project understands in an impersonal sense “one muses.” Then translators could have “people reflect on the citizens of Kir Heres.” However, most translations use the first person with the idea of mourning throughout the verse without noting this problem.

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 .