Chs. Jeremiah 16:1 to Jeremiah 17:18. Further prophecies of disaster, with passages of comfort interspersed

This section, though Jeremianic in its general character, owes to editorship such unity as it possesses, while certain passages in it (see on Jeremiah 16:14 f. repeated in Jeremiah 23:7 f.) are clearly out of place. It may be subdivided as follows.

(i) Jeremiah 16:1-9. The prophet must abstain from all domestic ties. Death and ignominy shall soon be the portion of every family of Judah. Neither must he share in the joys of others, nor in mourning rites, which shall shortly be compelled to cease in the presence of universal calamity. (ii) Jeremiah 16:10-13. When the people ask, What is our sin, that we are served thus? the answer is to be, that they have embraced idolatrous rites and forsaken Jehovah. Therefore shall exile be their portion, and therein they shall have opportunity to put to the test the efficacy of the service which they have paid to the gods of strange lands. (iii) Jeremiah 16:14-15. Yet deliverance shall come, so signal that it shall even suffice to eclipse the memory of the deliverance from Egyptian thraldom. (iv) Jeremiah 16:16-18. As fishes are netted in shoals, and wild animals in their scattered hiding places by huntsmen, so shall the dwellers in crowded cities and sparsely populated country parts alike be captured. The polluting rites, laid bare to God’s searching gaze, shall receive a double punishment. (v) Jeremiah 16:19-21. Jehovah, the prophet’s one hope, shall yet be sought by the nations, confessing that the gods they have hitherto served, are vain and profitless. At length they shall acknowledge fully His might. (vi) 17. Jeremiah 16:1-4. The sin of Judah is both ingrained and patent to all. Her cherished possessions and the seats of her idol worship shall be laid waste. She shall be driven forth from the covenant-land to a foreign soil. Jehovah’s wrath is unquenchable. (vii) Jeremiah 16:5-8. He who relies on mere human aid shall lead a stunted life, like the juniper tree in the desert; but he who trusts in the Lord shall be as the riverside tree, vigorous and abundant in foliage. (viii) Jeremiah 16:9-13. The Lord’s searchlight reveals unsuspected evils in the heart. As the brood which are not the partridge’s own, and which soon forsake her, so shall it be with unlawfully acquired riches. Jerusalem is of old Jehovah’s seat. They that forsake Him shall soon be blotted out. (ix) Jeremiah 16:14-18. Jeremiah appeals for deliverance from the evil thoughts towards God with which the taunts of his enemies have to his horror inspired him. He pleads that through all he has been a faithful prophet, and prays that evil may fall on his foes, not on him.

2. Thou shall not take thee a wife] Marriage was a state of life in special favour with the Jews. By his act of self-denial therefore Jeremiah was to shew his full submission to the will of God, while it would at the same time be a forcible mode of conveying the message of coming woes which he was charged to deliver to the people.

3. and concerning their mothers … this land] Possibly these words are a gloss, as being apparently irrelevant, but not (as Co.) the whole v., for then we should have no fitting reference for “they” of Jeremiah 16:4.

4. grievous deaths] lit. as mg. deaths of sicknesses.

they shall not be lamented, neither shall they be buried] We may compare the condition of things in the plague at Athens b.c. 430: “Such was the state of dismay and sorrow, that even the nearest relatives neglected the sepulchral duties … the dead and dying lay piled upon one another not merely in the public roads, but even in the temples.… Those bodies which escaped entire neglect were burnt or buried without the customary mourning and with unseemly carelessness.” Grote’s Hist. of Greece, ch. 49. See Thucyd. II. 52.

5. Enter not …] The prophet’s abstinence from the accustomed marks of respect to the dead and sympathy with the relatives is to be a forecast of the time when such abstinence shall become general on account of the universal prevalence of suffering and death.

mourning] lit. a cry, found elsewhere only Amos 6:7 “revelry,” in which sense Du. and Co. (who strike out Jeremiah 16:8) understand it here. If so, the v. will mean, Neither rejoice with them that rejoice, nor weep with them that weep.

6. nor cut themselves, nor make themselves bald] practices common among semi-civilized races. For both together, as here, cp. Jeremiah 47:5; for the former, Jeremiah 41:5, and perhaps (see C.B.) Hosea 7:14; for the latter, Isaiah 3:24; Isaiah 15:2; Isaiah 22:12; Ezekiel 7:18; Amos 8:10; Micah 1:16. They are forbidden Leviticus 19:28; Leviticus 21:5; Deuteronomy 14:1. The former of these practices represented the custom of human sacrifices as a propitiation to the spirit of the departed. Herodotus (IV. 71) describes the funeral rites of a Scythian king as requiring no less than six human victims.

7. break bread for them] The same verb as in Isaiah 58:7 (“deal”). There the word for bread (leḥem) stands in MT., and a very slight change here would convert “for them” (Heb. lahem) into the same word. If on the other hand we keep lahem, leḥem must have dropped out after it. The reference is to the custom for mourners to fast (cp. 2 Samuel 3:35), whereupon their sympathetic friends brought them bread and wine to console them.

the cup of consolation] on the principle stated Proverbs 31:6.

8. Co. omits the v., but on inadequate grounds.

9. Cp. Jeremiah 7:34.

9–21. Du. rejects all these vv. Co. omits 9–13, suspects the genuineness of 14, 15 both here and in Jeremiah 23:7 f., and rejects 16, as well as portions of 17–21. Gi. retains of the whole series only Jeremiah 16:19, while admitting (Metrik) that 20, 21 may be genuine. Schmidt denies the genuineness of 14–21. There is thus a considerable consensus of authorities against the passage, but their arguments do not appear conclusive except as to 14, 15. See further in individual notes. According to Gi. (Metrik) metre is doubtful or non-existent, except in 7, 8, 19–21.

10. Cp. Jeremiah 5:19, Jeremiah 13:22.

10–13. See introd. summary to section.

12. stubbornness] Cp. ch. Jeremiah 3:17.

13. there shall ye serve other gods] The original thought of Jehovah as a national Deity led to the feeling that change of country involved a loss of His protection. Cp. Jdg 11:24; 1 Samuel 26:19. “Large numbers of the exiles probably felt that the destruction of the State had snapped the tie which bound them to Yahweh.” Pe.

for] perhaps as mg. where.

14, 15. See introd. summary to section. These two verses, recurring as they do in a suitable context as Jeremiah 23:7 f., must be considered to be here, at all events, an importation. “The context on both sides relates to Judah’s approaching exile, and Jeremiah 16:16-18 continue the line of thought of Jeremiah 16:10-13.” Dr. In LXX they are found, quite incongruously, after Jeremiah 23:40 instead of in the earlier position in that ch.

16. For the metaphor from fishing cp. Ezekiel 12:13; Ezekiel 29:4 f.; Amos 4:2; Habakkuk 1:14 ff.

rocks] See on Jeremiah 4:29.

16–18. See introd. summary to section.

18. first] The word (rî’shônah) is not found in LXX, and was probably inserted after Jeremiah 16:14 f. had been introduced into the text. Co. however thinks it is a corruption of the frequent expression (e.g. Jdg 9:57) ‘al ro’shâm, upon their head.

double] Cp. Isaiah 40:2.

because they have polluted] The mg. is more strictly in accordance with the Hebrew.

the carcases, etc.] the idols themselves, called carcases as being in their nature polluting to the touch like a dead body.

The whole of Jeremiah 16:18 is unmetrical, and Co. rejects the second part (from “because”), as containing language belonging to later times, e.g. “carcases” in connexion with idols, as in Ezekiel 6 (specially in Jeremiah 16:5; Jeremiah 16:13) and Leviticus 26:30.

19. my strength, and my strong hold] The two Hebrew substantives are derivatives of the same root.

vanity … no profit] See on Jeremiah 2:5; Jeremiah 2:8.

19–21. See introd. summary to section. For the thought in Jeremiah 16:19 cp. Jeremiah 12:15 f. and for the interest felt by Jeremiah in the religious life of the heathen, Jeremiah 2:11 a. Hence Co. with Gi. accepts the v. as genuine.

21. Gi. considers this v. to be late, as being in the style of the second Is. (cp. Isaiah 42:6) and Ezek. (Ezekiel 36:23).