Jeremiah 10:17-25

The Departure into Exile. The personified community is told to pick up its bundle (mg.), and prepare for the inevitable exile. She bewails her hurt and her spoilt dwelling. These troubles, says the prophet, come from her unwise rulers (shepherds), and already are upon her. Identifying himself with the people, he pleads with Yahweh for mercy in judgment, on the ground of man's weakness. (Jeremiah 10:23 should be repointed and rendered, Not for man is it to walk and direct his steps.) Jeremiah 10:25 can hardly be Jeremiah's; its cry for vengeance on the heathen contradicts his attitude towards the nations as the Divinely commissioned instruments of Yahweh's wrath against His people's sin. (Omit yea, they have devoured him, with LXX, and with the parallel cited in mg.)