Jeremiah 49:11

Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust in me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(11) Leave thy fatherless children . . .—Were the words uttered in the stern irony of one who veils & threat in the form of a promise, as some have thought, or was there even in the case of Edom a mingling of pity for the helpless? The latter view seems truer to the prophet’s character (Jeremiah 48:36). If the sentence was passed which left the wives of Edom widows, and their children orphans, yet God had not forgotten that He was the God of the widow and the fatherless.

Benson Commentary

Jeremiah 49:11. Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them, &c. — The Chaldee paraphrast understands this of the Jews, to whom the following words do certainly belong, as if it contained God’s promise to take care of their families, in that distressed and forlorn state to which the captivity had reduced them. Some, who apply it to the Edomites, understand it as spoken by way of irony, in which light they understand Isaiah 16:4. “But there is nothing in the context,” says Houbigant, “which can lead to this interpretation. I rather understand it as a prophecy; nor was it any thing wonderful that the conquerors should spare the little children and widows, from whom they had nothing to fear; nor that the Edomites should forsake both the one and the other, when compelled to a precipitate flight.” Or, it is a promise that God would not wholly destroy the race of Esau, but protect and preserve a remnant of them; and that, at the time when he sent these his judgments on the proud and self-confident, and all their boasted strength was cast down, the weak and helpless should be remembered by him, the Father of mercies.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

49:7-22 The Edomites were old enemies to the Israel of God. But their day is now at hand; it is foretold, not only to warn them, but for the sake of the Israel of God, whose afflictions were aggravated by them. Thus Divine judgments go round from nation to nation; the earth is full of commotion, and nothing can escape the ministers of Divine vengeance. The righteousness of God is to be observed amidst the violence of men.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Jeremiah 49:11As with Moab Jeremiah 48:47, and Ammon Jeremiah 49:6, so there is mercy for Edom. The widows shall be protected, and in the orphans of Edom the nation shall once again revive.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

11. Thy fatherless and widows must rest their hope in God alone, as none of the adult males shall be left alive, so desperate will be the affairs of Edom. The verse also, besides this threat, implies a promise of mercy to Esau in God's good time, as there was to Moab and Ammon (Jer 49:6; Jer 48:47); the extinction of the adult males is the prominent idea (compare Jer 49:12).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The only question upon this verse is, whether, in the whole of it, it be a promise or a threatening: if it be a promise, the sense is, that though this great destruction should come upon the body of the Edomites, yet God would take care of some of their

fatherless children, whose parents being carried into captivity, they had none to provide for them: if it be taken as an ironical threatening, it soundeth ruin to those as well as the rest, and

I will is as much as I will not. But others think that these are rather to be understood with the supply of some other words, There is not, or there shall be none to say, Leave thy fatherless children, &c.; and whoso considereth those words in the tenth verse, his seed shall be spoiled, will see reason to judge it rather a threatening (whether by way of irony or no) than a promise.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Leave thy fatherless children, I will preserve them alive,.... Leave them with me; commit them to my care; I will provide for them; they shall have food and raiment, and want nothing to make them comfortable: to have such a friend or friends, promising such things to a man, when he is obliged to flee and leave his family, or is at the point of death, serves to make him easy; but there would be none left of the Edomites to say such kind words, or do such a friendly part. Some think they are the words of God, either spoken ironically or seriously; suggesting that they should have no children or widows to leave, all should be destroyed; or, if any left, they could not expect that he would take care of them, whom they had so provoked; or that such would be their miserable case, unless he had mercy on them, and took care of their fatherless children, there would be none to do it. Others think it respects a remnant of the Edomites that should be preserved, and be converted to Christ in Gospel times. The Targum takes them to be an address to the people of Israel, paraphrasing them thus:

"you, O house of Israel, your orphans shall not be left, I will sustain them, and your widows shall trust in my word:''

which last clause we render,

let your widows trust in me; which, could they be considered as the words of God, agree well with him, who is the Father of the fatherless, and Judge of the widows, Psalm 68:5; and a great encouragement to persons, in such circumstances, to place their confidence in him; and it must be right so to do.

Geneva Study Bible

Leave thy {m} fatherless children, I will preserve them alive; and let thy widows trust in me.

(m) The destruction will be so great that there will be none left to take care of the widows and the fatherless.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

11. A remarkable v. and decidedly Jeremianic in character, as compared with the attitude which later days would have assumed towards an enemy so bitterly hated. On the other hand, it is extremely abrupt in the midst of denunciation. We may take it as meaning, Fathers and husbands are dead, but Jehovah will protect children and widows.

Pulpit Commentary

Verses 11-13. - A merciful mitigation of the prophet's stern threat. The true God will provide for the widows and orphans, if Edom will but commit them to him. And let not Edom think it strange that he is punished; for even Israel, the chosen people, has drunk of the bitter cup. Yea, Jehovah has sworn "by himself" that all Edom's cities shall be laid waste. Verse 11. - Leave thy fatherless children, etc. The invitation means more than might be supposed. It is equivalent to a promise of the revival of the Edomitish people (comp. on Jeremiah 46:26; 48:47). Jeremiah 49:11

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Jeremiah 49:9 is a reproduction of Obadiah 1:5, but in such a way that what Obadiah brings forward as a comparison is directly applied by Jeremiah to the enemy: our prophet represents the enemy as grape-gatherers who leave nothing to glean, and as nocturnal thieves who destroy what is sufficient for them, i.e., destroy till they have enough, drag away and destroy as much as they can. The after-clauses, "they will not leave," etc., "they destroy," etc., are thus not to be taken as questions. The reference to Obadiah does not entitle us to supply הלוא from that passage. The connection here is somewhat different. The following verse is joined by means of כּי, "for;" and the thought, "for I have stripped Esau, I have discovered his secret places," shows that the enemy is to be understood by the grape-gatherers and nocturnal thieves: he will leave nothing to glean - will plunder all the goods and treasures of Edom, even those that have been hidden. On this subject, cf. Obadiah 1:6. חשׂף, "to strip off leaves, make bare" (Jeremiah 13:26), has been chosen with a regard to נחפּשׂוּ in Obadiah. ונחבּה לא יוּכל, lit., "and he hides himself, he will not be able to do it;" i.e., Esau (Edom) tries to hide himself; he will not be able to do it - he will not remain concealed from the enemy. There are not sufficient grounds for changing the perf. נחבּה equals נחבּא into the inf. abs. נחבּה, as Ewald and Graf do. "His seed is destroyed," i.e., his family, the posterity of Esau, the Edomites, his brethren," the descendants of nations related to the family, and of others similar who had intermingled with them, as the Amalekites, Genesis 36:12, Horites, Genesis 36:20., Simeonites, 1 Chronicles 4:42, "and his neighbours," the neighbouring tribes, as Dedan, Jeremiah 49:8, Thema and Buz, Jeremiah 25:23. "And he is not" is added to give intensity, as in Isaiah 19:7; cf. Jeremiah 31:15. The last idea is made more intensive by Jeremiah 49:11, "Leave your orphans and widows." Edom is addressed, and the imperative expresses what must happen. The men of Edom will be obliged to leave their wives and children, and these will be left behind as widows and orphans, because the men fall in battle. Yet the Lord will care for them, so that they shall not perish. In this comfort there is contained a very bitter truth for the Edomites who hated Jahveh. עזבה is the imperative (Ewald, 228, a), not infinitive (Hitzig); and תּבטחוּ is a rare form of the jussive for תּבטחנה, as in Ezekiel 37:7; cf. Ewald, 191, b. Reasons are given for these threats in Jeremiah 49:12 and Jeremiah 49:13, first in the thought that Edom cannot continue to be the only one unpunished, then in the bringing forward of the solemnly uttered purpose of God. "Those who should not be compelled to drink." Those meant are the Israelites, who, as the people of God, ought to have been free from the penal judgment with which the Lord visits the nations. If, now, these are not left (spared such an infliction), still less can Edom, as a heathen nation, lay claim to exemption. By this Jeremiah does not mean to say that nay injustice befalls the Jews if they are obliged to drink the cup of the wrath of God, but merely that their having been chosen to be the people of God does not give them any right to exemption from the judgments of God on the world, i.e., if they make themselves like the heathen through their sins and vices. The inf. abs. שׁתו for שׁתה intensifies: "ye shall (must) drink." The idea is founded on that pervading Jeremiah 25, and there is use made of the words in Jeremiah 25:29. The כּי in Jeremiah 49:13 is mainly dependent on the clause immediately preceding: "thou shalt certainly drink." On "by myself have I sworn" cf. Jeremiah 22:5. In the threat that Edom shall be laid waste there is an accumulation of words corresponding to the excitement of feeling accompanying an utterance under solemn oath. חרב is used instead of the more common חרבּה; cf. Jeremiah 25:18; Jeremiah 44:22, etc. חרבות עולם, as in Jeremiah 25:9. Bozrah was at that time the capital of the Edomites (cf. Jeremiah 49:22); it lay south from the Dead Sea, on the site of the village Buseireh (Little Bozrah), in Jebal, which is still surrounded by a castle and with ruins of considerable extent, and is situated on an eminence; see on Amos 1:12 and Genesis 36:33. "And all its cities," i.e., the rest of the cities of Idumea; cf. וּבנותיה, Jeremiah 49:2.