Jeremiah 29:8-10

3. A warning to the captives (Jeremiah 29:8-10)

TRANSLATION

(8) For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Let not the prophets that are in your midst, and your diviners as well, deceive you, and do not hearken to your dreams which you cause to be dreamed. (9) For they are prophesying to you falsely in My name; I have not sent them (oracle of the LORD). (10) For thus says the LORD: When seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and I will fulfill for you My good word to bring you back unto this place.

COMMENTS

In Jeremiah 29:8-9 Jeremiah points to three agents likely to lead the captives astrayprophets, diviners and dreams. False prophets promising a speedy deliverance had arisen in Babylon as well as in Jerusalem. Their object was to lead the people to dissatisfaction and revolt. The diviners were echoing the same optimistic prognostications as the prophets. Diviners are those who use external objects to discover what the future holds. Several different forms of definition are mentioned in and condemned by the Old Testament.[241] It is therefore impossible to determine what particular form of the occult art had been appropriated by the Jewish diviners in Babylon. Dreams of early emancipation were also dangerous to the captives. The unusual phrase dreams which you caused to be dreamed indicates that the supply was created by a demand for dreams of this nature.[242] The people wished to be deceived; they preferred darkness to light. So they caused or made the prophets to tell them encouraging dreams.

[241] E.g., rhabdomancy, the use of sticks and arrows, and hepatascopy, examination of the liver of animals, are mentioned in Ezekiel 21:21. Astrology is also a form of divination.

[242] E. H. Plumptre, Jeremiah, AIL Old Testament Commentary for English Readers, Charles John Ellicott, editor (New York: Cassell, 1901), V, 98.

Jeremiah agreed with the prophets and diviners that the Lord would eventually visit His people and deliver them from bondage. But in the view of Jeremiah this deliverance would come only after the seventy years which God had prescribed for the duration of the Babylonian world empire. For the exiles to continue to believe in the delusion of speedy return from Babylon would have defeated the disciplinary objective of the captivity. Therefore Jeremiah insists that a full seventy years must run their course before God intervenes on behalf of His people (Jeremiah 29:10).