hand and outstretched arm, and by great terror, 22. and didst give them this land which thou didst swear to give to their fathers, a land flowing with milk and honey. 23. And they came and took it in possession, but they hearkened not to thy voice, and they walked not in thy law; then thou broughtest all this evil upon them. 24. Behold, the mounds have come up to the city to conquer it, and the city is given up into the hand of the Chaldæans, who fight against it, because of the sword and famine and pestilence, and what thou saidst has come to pass, and behold thou seest it; 25. and yet thou hast said to me, O Lord, Yahveh: Buy thee the field for silver and take witnesses, whereas the city is given up into the hand of the Chaldæans.

26. Then the word of Yahveh came to Jeremiah as follows: 27. Behold, I am Yahveh, the God of all flesh; can anything be too wonderful for me? 28. Therefore thus said Yahveh: Behold, I deliver this city into the hand of the Chaldæans, and into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, that he make take it. 29. And the Chaldæans, who fight against this city, shall come in, and set this city on fire and burn it along with the houses, on whose roofs they burned incense. to Baal and offered libations to foreign gods, to provoke me. 30. For the children of Israel and the children of Judah used to do only evil in mine eyes from their youth; for the children of Israel only provoked me with the work of their hands, is Yahveh's oracle. 31. For this city has been cause of wrath and fury to me from the day when it was built

,קרא

Deut. xi. 25. Ver. 22. Cf. xi. 5. Ver. 23. Respecting Kethib 7, see on ii. 25. According to ii. 8, the priests did not rightly handle the law, did not rightly instruct the people, and the latter did not practise the instruction given. cf. xiii. 22. Ver. 24. The embankments, see on vi. 6. Ver. 27. Cf. ver. 17. Ver. 29. Cf. vii. 18, xix. 13. D' refers not, as in i. 16, to concrete idols, which, of course, could only cause the Lord anger, but to the whole work of their hands, which was utterly heathenish, and therefore highly offensive to the Lord.

מעשה .30 .Ver

is a climax after מכעסים

yn by. What they did was not merely wicked in God's sight, but the boldest provocation of His anger. Ver. 31 enhances the climax. by, as in Isa. lx. 7, Isa. lvi. 7.

unto this day, to remove it from my sight, 32. because of all the evil of the children of Israel and the children of Judah, which they did to provoke me, they, their kings, their princes, their priests and their prophets, the men of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 33. And they turned their back to me and not their face, and though they were taught ever so early and unweariedly, they hearkened not to receive correction. 34. And they put their abominations in the house over which my name was proclaimed, to defile it. 35. And they build the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of Ben Hinnom, to devote their sons and their daughters to Moloch, which I commanded them not, nor did it come into my mind to do this abomination, in order to make Judah to sin.

36. And therefore now thus says Yahveh, the God of Israel, concerning this city, of which you say: It is given into the hand of the king of Babylon by sword and famine and pestilence: 37. Behold, I will gather them from all lands whither I have driven them in my wrath and my fury and great indignation, and will bring them again to this people and make them dwell in safety, 38. and they shall be my people, and I will be their God. 39. And I will give them one heart and one way to fear me, always for their good and their children's (good) after them. 40. And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, so that I will never turn away from them to do them good. And I will put my fear in their heart, so that they shall not depart from me. 41. And I will take delight in them to do them good, and

, so that I intended removing them. Ver. 33. Cf. ii. 27, xviii. 17. 7, infin. abs., "and though one, or though I, teach ever so much." Ver. 34 f. Almost like vii. 30 f. Ver. 35 f. See on vii. 31. ayn, sc. g (2 Kings xxiii. 10; Ezek. xx. 31), to cause to pass through fire in honour of Moloch, LXX and the Rabbins explain not of actual burning, but of a symbolic act of consecration; but the meaning is scarcely different from what it is in vii. 31, xix. 5, where the phrases are unmistakeable. "In order to make Judah sin" depends on 12. In л, is wanting, see on xix. 15. Ver. 38 f. See on vii. 23; is constantly repeated in these promises. Ver. 39. л, infin., Ges. § 45. 16. Ver. 41. л refers to the spirit in which the Lord plants them; this is done in a sincere, faithful spirit,

will plant them in this land in faithfulness with my whole heart and my whole soul. 42. For thus says Yahveh: Like as I brought all this great evil upon this people, so will I bring upon them all the good which I speak concerning them. 43. And thus men shall buy fields in this land, of which you say: It is a desert, where there are neither men nor cattle; it is given into the hand of the Chaldæans. 44. They shall buy pieces of ground for money, and draw up deeds and seal them, and appoint witnesses in the land of Benjamin, and in the surroundings of Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, and in the cities of the highland, and in the cities of the lowland, and in the cities of the south; for I will bring back their captivity, is Yahveh's oracle.

which ensures permanence to the new settlement in the land. The Lord now rejoices with undivided heart to do them good. Ver. 42. Cf. xxxi. 28. Ver. 44. an, infin. abs. after finite verb in enumerating actions following one another, Ges. § 131. 4a; Eng. § 128. Respecting the divisions of the land of Judah, see on xvii. 26.

EXPOSITION.

The sayings of the Book of Consolation (chs. xxx., xxxi.) are followed by two further sections by way of supplement. In ch. xxxii. we have a symbolic action, by which a prosperous future is divinely ensured to the land: the purchase of a field at Anathoth. First of all-a. the act itself is related, vv. 1-15; then follows, b. a Prayer for Enlightenment, vv. 16-25; then, c. the Divine Explanation, vv. 26-44. The whole belongs to the tenth year of Zedekiah.

At the time of Jerusalem's greatest distress, when there could no longer be any doubt that the Chaldæans would energetically resume the siege and carry it to a successful end, an offer was made to the prophet, then in easy imprisonment, by a relative to buy a field in the neighbourhood of his native place, and the Lord instructed him to conclude the purchase. In the "guard-court" of the royal palace this act was transacted with every form of legal arrangement. Jeremiah gave

orders for the double purchase-deed to be carefully preserved. Was he under illusion as to the fate of the city and its surroundings? By no means. On the contrary, in the prayer offered to God after this transaction (vv. 16-25) he declares that the judgment, as he knows well and has been taught by God Himself, must come and is immediately impending; why then does God command him to purchase a field, when general captivity and desolation are at hand? To this the voice of the Lord gives answer, ver. 26 up to the conclusion. It reasserts that the city will fall into the hands of the conquerors, and recalls in detail the reasons of this judgment (vv. 29–35). But just when God's threefold scourge (ver. 36) and the approaching end of the resistance of the defenders are certain to every one, the Lord announces unexpected news with perfect certainty: the gathering of the exiles and the restoring of the covenant - relation between. God and His people in a purity and perfection not yet seen. Ver. 39 f. beautifully completes what was foretold in xxxi. 31 ff., showing more particularly what that writing in the heart meant God will give them one way and one heart, so that they will always fear Him and turn no more from Him, and will thus inspire them all with obedience of heart and life. In this way the permanence of the covenant and the constant well-being of the land will be ensured (ver. 40). God will be able to confer blessings and benefits on a people entirely sanctified by Himself with perfect delight and love. This is the meaning of the purchase of a field by His prophet. As the Romans, when Hannibal lay before their capital, showed their confidence in their own valour by raising the ground, where the enemy stood, to its full value, so the prophet, by acquiring possession of a field with every legal form, certifies that the land has still a bright future of glorious prosperity to expect from its God, after the cup of suffering is exhausted. It is not too sanguine hope, nor trust in his people's strength, which encourages and impels to

this faith, but the Lord's unfailing word; and the same word exhibits that future not merely as a restoring of former success, but as a time of unexampled salvation and blessing from God.

III. SECOND SERIES OF COMFORTING ORACLES FOR THE
CAPTIVES, CH. XXXIII.

1. And the word of Yahveh came to Jeremiah the second time, while he was yet in confinement in the guard-court, as follows: 2. Thus says Yahveh, who also performs, Yahveh, who plans that he may also bring to pass, Yahveh is his name: 3. Call on me, and I will answer thee and tell thee great and unsearchable things which thou knowest not. 4. For thus says Yahveh, the God of Israel, respecting the houses of this city and respecting the houses of the kings of Judah, which are cast down, (and respecting them who) come to the walls and to the sword, 5. to fight with the Chaldæans, and to fill them with the corpses of the men whom I slew in my wrath and my fury, and for whose wickedness I hid my face from this city: 6. Behold, I make healing and health

באים joined with

CHAPTER XXXIII.

Ver. 1 refers back to xxxii. 1 f. Ver. 2. 7, cf. xviii. 11. Ver. 3. л, properly, cut off, inaccessible, which man cannot find of himself. The reference is to the blessed future of God's people, so opposite to the unhappy present, and therefore so difficult to conceive. Ver. 4 f. The words are very differently combined, explained, and emended. The divine message introduced in 4a follows in ver. 6; the previous clauses point out the comfortless state of those referred to. The double, as the text now runs, despite the division of the verses, to be But some words have probably dropped out after ann (torn down, battered by the shots of the besiegers), perhaps and respecting their inhabitants, who hasten (D, synonymous with the word given above) to the mounds of the besiegers and the conflict with swords, coming to fight with the Chaldæans; but the only result is that they fill them (the Chaldæans, or their swords) with corpses. Here as in xxv. 15 it is really the Lord who slays by His wrath, having withdrawn from them His gracious help. Ver. 6. See on viii. 22. applies to the ill-used city, D to its inhabitants.