XIII. The prophecies of Jeremiah are arranged, it must be remembered, in an order which is not chronological, and that which we have now reached belongs to a later date than many that follow. Comparing the notes of time in the writings of the prophet with those in the history, we get the following a... [ Continue Reading ]
A LINEN GIRDLE. — The point of comparison is given in Jeremiah 13:11. Of all garments worn by man the girdle was that most identified with the man’s activity, nearest to his person. The “linen girdle” was part of Jeremiah’s priestly dress (Exodus 28:40; Leviticus 16:4), and this also was significant... [ Continue Reading ]
THE SECOND TIME. — No dates are given, but the implied interval must have been long enough for the girdle to become foul, while the prophet apparently waited for an explanation of the strange command.... [ Continue Reading ]
GO TO EUPHRATES. — The Hebrew word _Phrath_ is the same as that which, everywhere else in the O.T., is rendered by the Greek name for the river, Euphrates. It has been suggested (1) that the word means “river” generally, or “rushing water,” applied by way of pre-eminence to the “great river” and the... [ Continue Reading ]
AFTER MANY DAYS. — Here again the interval is undefined, but it must have been long enough (we may conjecture, perhaps, seventy days) to be an adequate symbol of the seventy years’ exile which the act of placing the girdle by Euphrates represented. So in Hosea 3:3 we have “many days” for the undefin... [ Continue Reading ]
THE GIRDLE WAS MARRED. — The symbolism is explained in Jeremiah 13:9. The girdle stained, decayed, worthless, was a parable of the state of Judah after the exile, stripped of all its outward greatness, losing the place which it had once occupied among the nations of the earth.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE PRIDE OF JUDAH. — As the girdle was the part of the dress on which most ornamental work was commonly lavished, so that it was a common gift among princes and men of wealth (1 Samuel 18:4; 2 Samuel 18:11), it was the natural symbol of the outward glory of a kingdom. As Jeremiah was a priest, we m... [ Continue Reading ]
IMAGINATION. — Better, as before, _stubbornness._ SHALL EVEN BE AS THIS GIRDLE. — The same thought is reproduced in the imagery of the potter’s vessel in Jeremiah 18:4. On the other hand there is a partial reversal of the sentence in Jeremiah 24:5, where the “good figs” represent the exiles who lea... [ Continue Reading ]
THE WHOLE HOUSE OF ISRAEL. — The acted parable takes in not only, as in Jeremiah 13:9, Judah, to whom the warning was specially addressed, but the other great division of the people. The sense of national unity is still strong in the prophet’s mind. Not Judah only, but the whole collective Israel ha... [ Continue Reading ]
EVERY BOTTLE SHALL BE FILLED WITH WINE. — Another parable follows on that of the girdle. The germ is found in the phrase “drunken, but not with wine” (Isaiah 29:9), and the thought rising out of that germ that the effect of the wrath of Jehovah is to cause an impotence and confusion like that of dru... [ Continue Reading ]
THE KINGS THAT SIT UPON DAVID’S THRONE. — Literally, _that sit for David_ (_i.e.,_ as his successors and representatives) _on his throne._ The plural is probably used in pointing to the four — Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, Jehoiachin, and Zedekiah — who were all of them involved in the sufferings that fell o... [ Continue Reading ]
ONE AGAINST ANOTHER. — The rendering answers to the Hebrew idiom, but that idiom, as in the margin, _a man against his brother,_ has a force which is lacking in the English, and forms a transition from the symbol to the reality. The words point to what we should call the “crash” of a falling kingdom... [ Continue Reading ]
BE NOT PROUD. — With special reference to the besetting sin of Judah, as described in Jeremiah 13:9; perhaps also to the character of the symbols applied — the marred girdle and the broken jar — as being in themselves humiliating, and therefore a trial to their pride.... [ Continue Reading ]
GIVE GLORY TO THE LORD YOUR GOD. — Probably in the same sense as in Joshua 7:19 and John 9:24, perhaps also in Malachi 2:2, “give glory by confessing the truth, even though that truth be a sin that involves punishment.” “Confess your guilt ere it be too late for pardon.” This fits in better with the... [ Continue Reading ]
MY SOUL SHALL WEEP IN SECRET PLACES FOR YOUR PRIDE. — The words present no difficulty that requires explanation, but deserve to be noted in their exquisite tenderness as characteristic of the prophet’s temperament (comp. Lamentations 1:16), reminding us of the tears shed over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41)... [ Continue Reading ]
THE QUEEN. — Not the usual word, the Hebrew feminine of king, but literally “the great lady” (“_dominatrix_” Vulg.), the title of a queen-mother (in this case, probably, of Nehushta, the mother of Jehoiachin, 2 Kings 24:8), sharing the throne during her son’s minority. The same word is used of Maach... [ Continue Reading ]
THE CITIES OF THE SOUTH. — The term thus rendered (the _Negeb_) is throughout the Old Testament used for a definite district, stretching from Mount Halak northward to a line south of Engedi and Hebron. The strategy of Nebuchadnezzar’s attack (as it had been of Sennacherib’s, 2 Kings 18:13) was to bl... [ Continue Reading ]
LIFT UP YOUR EYES. — The Hebrew verb is feminine and singular, the possessive pronoun masculine and plural. Assuming the reading to be correct, the irregularity may have been intended to combine the ideal personification of Jerusalem, the daughter of Zion, as the natural protectress of the other cit... [ Continue Reading ]
WHAT WILT THOU SAY? — The verse is difficult, and requires an entire retranslation. _What wilt thou_ (the daughter of Zion) _say? for He_ (Jehovah) _shall set over thee as head those whom thou taughtest_ (=tried to teach) _to be thy familiar friends._ This was to be the end of the alliance in which... [ Continue Reading ]
ARE THY SKIRTS DISCOVERED. — The “skirts,” or flowing train, worn by women of rank, the removal of which was the sign of extremest degradation (Isaiah 20:4; Isaiah 47:2; Ezekiel 23:29; Hosea 2:3; Nahum 3:5). THY HEELS MADE BARE. — Better, _outraged,_ or _disgraced,_ made to walk barefoot, like meni... [ Continue Reading ]
CAN THE ETHIOPIAN...? — Literally, _the Cushite._ The meaning of the question is obvious. The evil of Judah was too deep-ingrained to be capable of spontaneous reformation. There remained nothing but the sharp discipline of the exile. The invasion of Tirhakah and Pharaoh-nechoh, the presence of Ethi... [ Continue Reading ]
STUBBLE. — Our English word means the “stalks of the corn left in the field by the reaper” (Johnson). The Hebrew word is applied to the broken straw left on the threshing-floor after the oxen had been driven over the corn, which was liable to be carried away by the first gale (Isaiah 40:24; Isaiah 4... [ Continue Reading ]
THE PORTION OF THY MEASURES. — The meaning of the latter word is doubtful, but it is probably used, as in 1 Samuel 4:12; Leviticus 6:11; 2 Samuel 20:8; Ruth 3:15, for the “upper garment” or “lap” of the dress. In this sense the phrase is connected with those which speak of reward or punishment being... [ Continue Reading ]
THEREFORE WILL I DISCOVER... — The threat is substantially the same as that in Jeremiah 13:22. The form is verbally identical with that of Nahum 3:5.... [ Continue Reading ]
THINE ADULTERIES. — The words refer primarily to the spiritual adultery of the idolatries of Judah. The “neighings,” as in Jeremiah 2:24; Jeremiah 5:8, express the unbridled eagerness of animal passion transferred in this passage to the spiritual sin. The “abominations on the hills” are the orgiasti... [ Continue Reading ]