Notes

1. For additional details see the discussions of E. Tov, “The Literary History of the Book of Jeremiah in the Light of Its Textual History,” in Empirical Models for Biblical Criticism, ed. J. Tigay (Philadelphia: Univ. of Pennsylvania Press, 1985), 211–37; idem, “Some Sequence Differences Between the MT and LXX and Their Ramifications for the Literary Criticism of the Bible,” JNSL 13 (1987): 151–60; and W. Holladay, Jeremiah (2 vols.; Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 2:1–8.

2. N. Avigad, “Baruch the Scribe and Jerahmeel the King’s Son,” IEJ 28 (1978): 52–56; idem, “The Seal of Seraiah (Son of) Neriah,” Eretz Israel 14 (1978): 86–87 [in Hebrew]; J. R. Lundbom, “Baruch, Seraiah, and Expanded Colophons in the Book of Jeremiah,” JSOT 36 (1986): 89–114; J. Andrew Dearman, “My Servants the Scribes: Composition and Context in Jeremiah 36,” JBL 109 (1990): 403–21.

3. The discovery of fragments of Jeremiah at Qumran have made the textual history of Jeremiah even more intriguing and difficult to reconstruct. Included in the Hebrew fragments are texts in Hebrew that are closer to the Greek versions than the Masoretic Text. See the discussion of E. Tov, “The Jeremiah Scrolls from Cave 4,” RevQ 2 1989): 189–206.

4. In his commentary W. McKane describes the compilation of the book of Jeremiah as a “rolling corpus” (A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Jeremiah (2 vols.; ICC; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1986), l–lxxxiii.

5. One of the striking things about the book of Jeremiah is the number of doublets and repeated phrases and allusions. This phenomenon seems to reflect a goal of presenting, and even re-presenting, a full measure of Jeremiah’s public prophecies. See the analysis of G. H. Parke-Taylor, The Formation of the Book of Jeremiah: Doublets and Recurring Phrases (Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2000).

6. For sequential readers, a description of Jerusalem’s fall (and thus the end of the kingdom of Judah) is given in Jer. 39. Chapter 52 is anticlimactic in several ways. Apparently the account of Judah’s fall was attached to the prophet’s oracles against other nations as another indication of his prophetic work.

7. Associated with the theme of God’s lordship over the nations is the announcement initially revealed in Jeremiah’s call that God watches over his word to pluck up and to tear down, to build and to plant (1:10). These words and their elaboration run like a thread through various parts of the book.

8. S. Mowinckel, Zur Komposition des Buches Jeremia (Oslo: Dybwad, 1914). Chapter 2 is an example of a collection of poetic oracles; ch. 36 is an example of biographical prose; and ch. 7 is an example of a prose sermon.

9. E. Nicholson, Preaching to the Exiles: A Study of the Prose Tradition in the Book of Jeremiah (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1970); W. Thiel, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 1–25 (WMANT 41; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1973); idem, Die deuteronomistische Redaktion von Jeremia 26–52 (WMANT 52; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1981).

10. H. Weippert, Die Prosareden des Jeremiabuches (BZAW; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1973). The two-volume Hermeneia commentary by Holladay represents this viewpoint.

11. The bibliography on Jeremiah’s “confessions” is large; see M. S. Smith, The Laments of Jeremiah and Their Contexts: A Literary and Redactional Study of Jer 11–20 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990), and the comments in the commentary on Jer. 11:18–12:17.

12. See further A. H. W. Curtis and T. Römer, The Book of Jeremiah and Its Reception (Leuven: Leuven Univ. Press, 1997); and A. Siedlecki, “Jeremiah, Book of (Interpretation Through the 19th-Century),” in Dictionary of Biblical Interpretation, ed. J. H. Hayes (2 vols.; Nashville: Abingdon, 1999), 1:564–70.

13. Jeremiah is mentioned in 2 Chron. 35:25 and 36:21, and his oracles influenced a variety of postexilic biblical texts, noncanonical literature, and the New Testament. See Holladay, Jeremiah 2:85–93. For more details, see C. Wolff, Jeremia im Frühjudentum und Urchristentum (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 1976).

14. One may find introductions to and descriptions of these works in volumes of the Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. D. N. Freedman (New York: Doubleday, 1992). See the various entries under “Baruch,” “Jeremiah (Additions to),” and “Jeremiah, Epistle of.”

15. See M. Knowles, Jeremiah in Matthew’s Gospel: The Rejected Prophet Motif in Matthean Redaction (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993).

16. Perusing the catalog of a theological library will amply confirm that reflection on the Trinity has made a remarkable resurgence. Good sources for further thought are: M. Erickson, God in Three Persons: A Contemporary Interpretation of the Trinity (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1995); T. F. Torrance, The Christian Doctrine of God: One Being in Three Persons (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1996); and P. Toon, Our Triune God: A Biblical Portrayal of the Trinity (Wheaton: Victor, 1996).

17. Christ as the scope of Scripture is a favorite theme of the church fathers. Although some of their exegetical methods appear arbitrary, the substance of their claim is still valid. See the essays on patristic biblical interpretation in P. Blowers, ed., The Bible in Greek Christian Antiquity (Notre Dame, Ind.: Univ. of Notre Dame Press, 1997). Three modern biblical scholars whose work presupposes Trinitarian doctrine with a Christological center are: B. Childs, Biblical Theology of the Old and New Testaments (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993); F. Watson, Text and Truth: Redefining Biblical Theology (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997); and C. Seitz, Word Without End: The Old Testament As Abiding Theological Witness (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998).

18. For a treatment of the threefold office in both historical and contemporary theology, see G. Wainwright, For Our Salvation: Two Approaches to the Work of Christ (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1997), 99–186. One may interpret Christ as the culmination of prophecy, priesthood, and royalty whether beginning with a historical-critical analysis or typological, intertextual, and even sociological readings.

19. There is future hope for Israel in the New Testament (cf. Rom. 11:25–36). I do not think it wise to give priority to a literal reading of Old Testament prophecies concerning the future of Israel when the New Testament does not do so.

20. Some examples would be J. Bright, The Kingdom of God (Nashville: Abingdon, 1953); P. E. Hughes, Interpreting Prophecy (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976); H. LaRondelle, The Israel of God in Prophecy (Berrien Springs, Mich.: Andrews Univ. Press, 1983); W. VanGemeren, The Story of Salvation: The Story of Salvation from Creation to the New Jerusalem (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1988); idem, Interpreting the Prophetic Word (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1990).

21. See further, D. L. Baker, Two Testaments, One Bible, 2d ed. (Downer’s Grove: InterVarsity, 1992). His discussions of typology and promise and fulfillment are especially helpful.

22. Two excellent discussions of hermeneutics, dispensational and otherwise, are J. S. Feinberg, ed., Continuity and Discontinuity: Perspectives on the Relationship Between the Old and New Testaments: Essays in Honor of S. Lewis Johnson, Jr. (Westchester, Ill.: Crossway, 1988); C. A. Blaising and D. L. Bock, ed., Dispensationalism, Israel, and the Church: The Search for Definition (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1992).

23. For discussion of a difficult subject, see E. R. Thiele, The Mysterious Numbers of the Hebrew Kings (3d ed.; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1983); more briefly, M. Cogan, “Chronology (Hebrew Bible),” in ABD, 1:1005–11; and G. Galil, The Chronology of the Kings of Israel and Judah (Leiden: Brill, 1996). Each work takes the scriptural texts seriously in an attempt to present an absolute chronology where possible. The fact that each presents a different chronology in places (and the fact that there are still other competing schemes) urges caution upon the interpreter. For Babylonian and Egyptian dates see D. J. Wiseman, Chronicles of Chaldean Kings (626–556 B.C.) in the British Museum (London: British Museum, 1956); A. Spalinger, “Egypt and Babylon: A Survey (620–550 BC),” Studien zur altägyptische Kultur 5 (1977): 228–44.

24. The two-volume commentary on Jeremiah by William Holladay is based on a reconstruction of Jeremiah’s career that assumes the thirteenth year of Josiah (ca. 627 B.C.) as the prophet’s birth. Holladay provides a full bibliography of others, pro and con, who discuss the date of the prophet’s birth and the commencement of his public ministry.

25. For a defense of the thirteenth year as the beginning of Jeremiah’s prophetic career, assuming a date for his birth ca. 640 B.C. or earlier, see J. R. Lundbom, The Early Career of the Prophet Jeremiah (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen, 1993). Lundbom proposes that Jeremiah was called, as a teenager, in Josiah’s thirteenth year, but that he did not commence his public prophecy until a few years later, prompted by the discovery of the book of the Torah in Josiah’s eighteenth year (622 B.C.).

26. It is also possible that some of the oracles in Jer. 30–31, concerned with the reconstitution of Israel (i.e., the northern kingdom), come from the early period of Jeremiah’s ministry. According to 2 Kings 23, Josiah’s reforming measures included parts of the former northern kingdom (= Israel), and Jeremiah may have supported these efforts with prophecies about the restoration of Israel. If so, the oracles in Jer. 30–31 have been updated and are placed in a context where they point to a new future for all of God’s people.

27. See Cogan, “Chronology,” 1:1006, for brief explanations of these terms.

28. See briefly ibid., 1:1008; Galil, Chronology of the Kings, 108–18.

29. See the two articles by A. Malamat, “The Last Kings of Judah and the Fall of Jerusalem: An Historical-Chronological Study,” IEJ 18 (1968): 137–56; “The Twilight of Judah: In the Egyptian-Babylonian Maelstrom,” VT 25 (1975): 123–45; also Galil, Chronology of the Kings, 108–18.

30. Apparently the Egyptians stood to inherit Assyrian title to the region of Syria-Palestine if they supported the Assyrians in their struggle with the Babylonian rebels (see Malamat, “The Twilight of Judah,” 124–29).

31. According to 2 Chron. 34:3–4, Josiah’s physical maturation also resulted in a spiritual maturation. In the eighth year of his reign (632 B.C.) he began to seek the Lord in earnest fashion, and in his twelfth year (628 B.C.) he began a religious reform in Judah and Jerusalem.

32. According to 2 Chron. 35:25, Jeremiah offered a lament for Josiah upon his death.

33. Jehoahaz is also called Shallum in Jer. 22:11–12.

34. According to Dan. 1:1 Nebuchadnezzar also moved against Jehoiakim in the latter’s third year and took some Judeans into exile (e.g., Daniel and his friends). Nothing about this action is recorded elsewhere in the Bible or in the Babylonian Chronicles. It may be, however, that the notice in Daniel follows an accession-year form of reckoning. See M. K. Mercer, “Daniel 1:1 and Jehoiakim’s Three Years of Servitude,” AUSS 27 (1989): 179–92; T. Longman, Daniel (NIVAC; Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1999), 43–45. If so, then the third year of Jehoiakim in Dan. 1:1 in an accession-year dating scheme would be 605 B.C. According to Jer. 46:2, the battle against the Egyptians (605) was in Jehoiakim’s fourth year. The fourth year would be reckoned on a nonaccession-year scheme. Nebuchadnezzar was made king soon after the battle, and the campaign of the Babylonians in the region continued through the year. Thus the reference in Dan. 1:1 likely refers to Babylonian activity that took place sometime not long after the summer of 605.

35. Wiseman, Chronicles of Chaldean Kings, 69.

36. According to 2 Chron. 36:6 Jehoiakim was in the custody of Nebuchadnezzar. The various biblical references do not provide details of his mysterious death. See A. R. Green, “The Fate of Jehoiakim,” AUSS 20 (1982): 103–9.

37. Jeremiah calls him Coniah (Jer. 22:24) and Jeconiah (24:1).

38. The date is calculated from Babylonian records. See Wiseman, Chronicles of Chaldean Kings, 72–73. Among the Judeans taken into exile at this time was Ezekiel.

39. In an astounding coincidence, archaeologists discovered ration tablets from the Babylonian administration that mention Jehoiachin and his five sons; see W. F. Albright, “King Jehoiachin in Exile,” BA 5 (1942): 49–55.

40. There are two clay bullae from the time period that likely refer to this Gedaliah. The first is from Lachish and reads, “Belonging to Gedaliah [w]ho is over the house.” The provenance of the second is not known; it reads, “Belonging to Gedaliah, servant of the king.” For bibliography see N. Avigad, Hebrew Bullae from the Time of Jeremiah: Remnants of a Burnt Archive (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1986), 25.

41. Because of the constraints of geography, an attacking army would often approach Israel or Judah from the north. Thus it is possible that Jeremiah intentionally did not name the northern threat, but simply emphasized its menacing profile and left its identity to the startled imagination of his hearers. Since Babylonian resurgence had not begun in 627 B.C.—the traditional or early date for the prophet’s call—those who look for a likely foe at this time have suggested either the Scythians or the Assyrians. For the discussion see H. Cazelles, “Zephaniah, Jeremiah, and the Scythians in Palestine,” in A Prophet to the Nations: Essays in Jeremiah Studies, ed. L. Perdue and B. Novacs (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1984), 129–49. Some scholars have even concluded that Jeremiah wrongly threatened Judah with invading hordes of Scythians or Assyrians in 627 and that later his editors used the prophecies as indications of the coming Babylonian threat.

42. In addition to the brief sketch of Jeremiah’s theology provided in the introductory sections of this commentary, one may consult the detailed study of M. Schulz-Rauch, Hosea und Jeremia: Zur Wirkungsgeschichte des Hoseabuches (Stuttgart: Calwer Verlag, 1996).

43. Jer. 36:9. As noted above, Nebuchadnezzar’s army campaigned in the region during this year, destroying Ashkelon in the winter of 604. As an Egyptian appointee, Jehoiakim’s future and perhaps that of Judah hung in the balance.

44. There are a number of accounts in the book concerned with Jeremiah’s persecution at the hands of Judeans. They range from laments about his circumstances (e.g., 15:10–21) to accounts of beatings and imprisonments (e.g., 37:14–15).

45. In his oracles against Moab and Ammon (48:1–49:6), Jeremiah may reflect knowledge of Babylonian campaigns in Transjordan after the fall of Jerusalem and his forced relocation to Egypt. Josephus records that Babylon campaigned in Ammon as a reprisal for the murder of Gedaliah (Ant. 10.9.7). This campaign may be the setting for a 3d group of Judean exiles taken to Babylon in Nebuchadnezzar’s 23d year (Jer. 52:30).

46. A perceptive sketch of elements of Jeremiah’s theology is in Appendix A of D. Kidner’s The Message of Jeremiah (Downers Grove, Ill.: InterVarsity, 1987), 163–72. This appendix is entitled “Sin, Judgment, Repentance, Grace and Salvation in the Preaching of Jeremiah.” See also L. Perdue, “The Book of Jeremiah in Old Testament Theology,” Troubling Jeremiah, ed. A. R. Pete Diamond et al. (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 320–38.

47. See further R. Simkins, Creator and Creation: Nature in the Worldview of Ancient Israel (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1994).

48. Jeremiah’s convictions on this matter are similar to those of Hosea and Deuteronomy.

49. Jer. 2:11, 32; 4:22; 5:26, 31; 7:12; 8:7; 12:14, 16; 15:7; 23:13, 22, 27, 32; 29:32; 30:3, 22; 33:24; 50:6; 51:45.

50. Cf. 2 Sam. 7.

51. Christ embodies the hopes of Israel in his “threefold office” as prophet, priest, and king. See the introductory comments on interpreting the book of Jeremiah.

52. Jer. 3:14; 6:2, 23; 8:19; 9:19; 14:19; 26:18; 30:17; 31:6, 12; 50:5, 28; 51:10, 35. Cities are personified as feminine in the Old Testament. Jeremiah also uses the phrase “my daughter people” in 6:26; 8:11, 19–22; 9:1, 7; and the phrase “virgin daughter people” in 14:17. It is not clear whether the people as a whole are personified as God’s daughter or just the people of Jerusalem are thus personified.

53. Cf. Jer. 7:2; 19:14; 20:1–2; 26:2; 28:1; 35:4; the phrase “which bears my Name” occurs in 7:11.

54. Jeremiah’s assessments of polytheism and syncretism are similar to those of Zephaniah and Ezekiel.

55. The Hebrew word ba’al means master, owner, and even husband. It is a not a proper name but a title or appellative for a deity who may also have a personal name. In addition to Bible dictionary and encyclopedia entries on Baal, cf. also J. A. Dearman, “Baal in Israel: The Contribution of Some Place Names and Personal Names to an Understanding of Early Israelite Religion,” in History and Interpretation: Essays in Honour of John H. Hayes, ed. M. P. Graham et al. (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1993), 173–91.

56. Baal in the singular is in Jer. 2:8; 7:9; 11:13, 17; 12:16; 19:5; 23:13, 27; 32:29, 35; in the plural, 2:23; 9:14 (cf. Hos. 2:15 [13], 19 [17]; 11:2); for Baal as “shame” and “worthless,” see Hos. 9:10; Jer. 2:8.

57. The verb “to rule, be king” in Hebrew is malak. A noun derived from the verb, meaning “king,” is melek. Molech is from the same word and indicates a (divine) monarch or ruler. See the commentary discussion on chs. 7, 19, and 32 for additional details on this cult.

58. Egyptian deities: 43:12; 46:25; Moabite deity: 48:13, 46; Ammonite deity: 49:3; Babylonian deities: 50:2.

1. See the comments on chronology and difficulties in reckoning chronology in the introduction on the life and times of Jeremiah.

2. For discussion of the location of biblical Anathoth near the modern Arabic village of Anata, see J. L. Peterson, “Anathoth,” ABD, 1:227–28.

1. W. Holladay points out (Jeremiah, 1:26–31) that the call of Jeremiah is close in form to that of Moses in Ex. 3:1–15; furthermore, Jeremiah may be a “prophet like [Moses]” (Deut. 18:18) for Judah and Jerusalem.

1. Jer. 2:23 refers to the Baals in the plural. Cf. also the references to multiple deities in 2:25, 28.

2. A form of the same Hebrew word (qodeš) is used to describe God’s setting Jeremiah apart for service in 1:5.

1. There is a reference in 3:6 to prophecy during the days of Josiah. Some material in this section, therefore, may reflect Jeremiah’s earliest public preaching.

2. Ezekiel 23:1–49 is an extended treatment of the two-sisters metaphor. It is so long and developed that it presupposes a narrative form and so functions like a parable.

3. Jeremiah Unterman has proposed that Jer. 3:6–13 and 3:19–4:2 fit best in the days of Josiah’s reforming efforts, when the prophet Jeremiah thought that wholehearted repentance might effect real change in Judah’s national life. See his From Repentance to Redemption: Jeremiah’s Thought in Transition (JSOTSup 54; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987), esp. 23–38, 176–79.

1. See the discussion of the “foe from the north” in the introduction (“Jeremiah’s Place in the Last Years of the Judean State and Its Destruction”).

2. In this context one should compare also Ezekiel’s prophecy that God will remove the heart of stone from his people and replace it with a heart of flesh (Ezek. 11:18–21). Stone is inanimate and incapable of yielding or responding, but flesh is alive and responsive. When put in the context of the “new spirit” that God will give them (11:19), a fleshly heart is then ready to respond to God.

3. This same motif is found in Hos. 4:3 and Joel 1:10 (see text note).

4. Lit., “without heart” (cf. Jer. 4:22 on foolishness). Jer. 5:23 describes the heart of the people as “stubborn and rebellious.”

5. Cf. Matt. 13:1–17.

6. Repentance and renewal are goals of the book for readers.

7. Perhaps the modern reader will recall that the second law of thermodynamics or entropy holds that matter tends to a state of progressive disorder without the influence of mitigating factors. For example, a plant that no longer translates sunlight and water into usable energy will die; when dead, the plant will decompose.

1. See the treatment of the historical background in the introduction.

2. Although the accounts in 1 Sam. 1–4 do not record a destruction of Shiloh’s worship center by the Philistines when they defeated Israel, Jeremiah’s words imply such destruction. Also, interpreters often suggest that the memory of God’s deliverance of Jerusalem during the time of Sennacherib’s assault (2 Kings 18–19; 2 Chron. 32; Isa. 36–39) lies behind the Judean belief during Jeremiah’s day that God would act similarly when Jerusalem was threatened by Egypt or Babylon. This is certainly possible, if not probable, but Jeremiah does not cite that deliverance. The biblical accounts indicate that the Lord answered the intercessions of Hezekiah and Isaiah by sending his angel to destroy the Assyrian army. God’s command to Jeremiah that the prophet not intercede for the people indicates that this time (cf. Isa. 37:33–35) God will not protect the city or the temple.

3. See comments on Jer. 44 for discussion of the Queen of Heaven.

4. Some interpreters have concluded that Jer. 7:21–23 represents a tradition of the people’s desert wandering, which did not include a sacrificial system, implying that sacrifices were not a divine mandate but a human convention. Since the pentateuchal storyline describes sacrificial worship in the desert as God’s mandate, this conclusion is not likely. More probably the force of v. 22 is hyperbolic: To deny one thing is to emphasize the importance of the other. Sacrifice and offerings are the fruit of the covenant relationship, not a substitute for it.

5. For further details on topheths and their associations with Baal and Molech, see J. A. Dearman, “The Topheth in Jerusalem: Archaeology and Cultural Profile,” JNSL 22 (1996): 59–71. See also comments on ch. 19.

1. The Hebrew word mišpaṭ, used here, is singular, so that the phrase could be translated that the people “do not know the justice [or justness] of the LORD.”

2. Verse 8 refers to the lying pen of the scribes. Scribes comprised a professional class of people employed for their abilities in reading and writing. Those who dealt with the interpretation of Torah were most likely priests (who could read and write) because knowledge of priestly duties was necessary in interpreting such matters as sacrificial ritual and distinguishing between clean and unclean items.

3. In all three instances, the NIV translates the literal phrase “daughter of my people” simply as “my people,” assuming it refers to God’s people. This is likely correct, although the literal translation could refer to Jerusalem. Contextually it seems more likely that the people themselves are being addressed as the vulnerable daughter of a heartsick Father. One should compare this phrase with the similar “Daughter Jerusalem” or “Daughter Zion.” Both of these phrases refer to the city itself, not to one of its offspring.

4. Cf. 2:23 for the other reference to Baal in the plural.

5. The noun qina is used in 9:20 (9:19 in Heb.), where the NIV translates it as “a lament.” For funeral rituals and poetry associated with them, see the introduction to the book of Lamentations.

6. Cf. Isa. 44:9–20 for another extended diatribe against idolatry.

7. The NIV uses uppercase letters because the translators understand the phrase to be a title for God.

8. Among mainline Protestant churches in North America, the movements associated with goddess spirituality or New Age philosophy may be tantamount to polytheism. Among conservative and evangelical churches, defense of the American way, wooden pride in orthodoxy, and preoccupation with success may be tantamount to idolatry. Among some non-Western churches, overt polytheism may be a serious issue to confront.

1. See the introduction to the book for further discussion on the prose materials in Jeremiah and the composition of the book.

2. For a lucid discussion of the term covenant and for further bibliography on the significance of the word, see J. H. Walton, Covenant: God’s Purpose, God’s Plan (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994).

3. It is not clear from the context in ch. 11 whether the oath sworn to the forefathers refers to the promise of land made to Abraham and his descendants in Canaan (e.g., Gen. 12:1–7; 28:10–15) or to this same promise as it was renewed with the generation in Egyptian slavery. Stated differently, it is not clear whether the “forefathers” of 11:5 are the ancestors in Egyptian slavery or those named in Genesis 12–50.

4. For additional study on the vocabulary of God’s choosing Israel, with attention to the covenant and marriage formulae, see T. S. Sohn, The Divine Election of Israel (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991).

5. For lists of blessings and curses contained in God’s covenant with Israel, see Lev. 26 and Deut. 27–30. For the covenant-ratification ceremony at Sinai see Ex. 24:3–8. The people promised obedience to the Lord’s covenant, and the covenant with him was sealed in blood.

6. See the treatment of the historical setting for the book in the introduction.

7. In his two-volume commentary Jeremiah, W. Holladay proposes that several passages in Jeremiah are “counter-proclamation” to the seven-year cycle of the public reading of Deuteronomy. The years of reading would be 622, 615, 608, 601, and 594 B.C. According to Holladay, Jer. 11:1–17 is one of those counter-proclamations. See also Holladay’s “A Proposal for Reflections in the Book of Jeremiah of the Seven-Year Recitation of the Law in Deuteronomy (Deut 31:10–13),” in Deuteronomium, Entstehung, Gestalt und Botschaft, ed. N. Lohfink (Leuven: Leuven Univ. Press, 1985), 326–28. One need not accept everything about Holladay’s theory to see the possibilities of influence from Josiah and Deuteronomy on the work of Jeremiah.

8. In Rom. 9:4 Paul refers to the Israelites as recipients of “covenants.” Probably what the apostle has in mind is the covenant with creation (Gen. 9:8–17), the Sinai covenant (Ex. 19:3–6), the covenant with David (2 Sam. 7; cf. Isa. 55:1–3), and the eschatological promise of an everlasting covenant with Israel in Ezekiel (e.g., Ezek. 16:60–63; cf. Hos. 2:18–20), interpreted as a complementary way to refer to the eschatological “new covenant” (Jer. 31:31–34) predicted by Jeremiah. Each of these affects Israel differently.

9. In first-person speech the covenant is called by God “my covenant” (e.g., Ex. 19:5); in third-person speech it is described as “his covenant” (e.g., Deut. 4:13).

1. There is a large bibliography on these texts. To cite only recent studies in English, see M. S. Smith, The Laments of Jeremiah and Their Contexts: A Literary and Redactional Study of Jer 11–20 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990); K. O’Connor, The Confessions of Jeremiah: Their Interpretation and Role in Chapters 1–25 (SBLDS 94; Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988); A. R. Diamond, The Confessions of Jeremiah in Context: Scenes of Prophetic Drama (JSOTSup 45; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1987). These titles demonstrate that the terminology varies concerning the proper term for Jeremiah’s prayers. Lament is an English term used to describe a type of prayer in the Old Testament that comes in the context of death or tragedy as well as those that are a response to mistreatment and persecution. Some interpreters would distinguish between these two aspects and call the latter a complaint. Others call Jeremiah’s prayers “confessions.” Whichever term is preferred, this basic type occurs frequently in the Psalms, and Lamentations is the title to the little book of prayers that follows Jeremiah in English versions of the Bible (see introduction to Lamentations).

2. The NIV translation “let me see your vengeance upon them” can also be rendered “let me see your vindication upon them.” The Heb. word in question is neqama. It does indeed have the element of retribution or vengeance, but also that of vindicating the innocent or oppressed through judgment.

3. The NIV correctly renders the verb rib as “bring a case.” It is typically used for judicial affairs and matters of dispute needing judgment or arbitration.

4. See the remarks in the introduction about Jesus as the fulfillment of the offices of prophet, priest, and king in the Old Testament.

1. W. D. Stacey, Prophetic Drama in the Old Testament (London: Epworth, 1990); K. Freibel, Jeremiah’s and Ezekiel’s Sign-Acts: Rhetorical Nonverbal Communication (JSOTSup 283; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999).

1. The Hebrew text of Jer. 14:1 actually reads “droughts,” an odd term that some commentators have wanted to vocalize differently. In context, however, the basic meaning is clear: There has been no rain (14:3–4).

2. See comments on ch. 36 for additional discussion of the date and context given in 36:9. The Greek version (LXX) reads “eighth year” instead of “fifth year.”

3. The word translated as “backsliding” is mešubot. It is a plural term. In singular form it is the same word used to describe “faithless” Israel in 3:6–13.

4. The reign of the wicked Manasseh is also narrated in 2 Chron. 33:1–20. As with the account in Kings, the sins of Manasseh are described; in addition, however, his eventual repentance is also noted (33:12–16). The references in 2 Kings and Jeremiah are concerned with the continuing influence of Manasseh’s apostasy on a subsequent generation.

5. Calvin, in preaching on Jeremiah 14, said: “It is not that God does not hear the prayers of His people, for He always accepts them, but most often He does not fulfill them in the way they have requested. Their prayers are answered, but not according to their desires”; quoted from Sermons on Jeremiah by Jean Calvin, trans. Blair Reynolds (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen, 1990), 1.

1. One may consult Holladay, Jeremiah, 1:447–55, for some of the lexical and interpretational difficulties. The NIV interprets Jer. 15:12–14 as a continuation of the Lord’s first reply to Jeremiah, which begins in 15:11.

2. See comments on Jeremiah’s laments in 11:18–12:17. Much of the lament in Job 3:1–26 concerns the claim that it would have been better for Job not to have been born.

3. There are several other places in the Old Testament where a similar concept is expressed, using the Niphal (passive) form of the verb maṣa’ (2 Kings 22:13; 23:2; 2 Chron. 34:21, 30), all of which refer to the finding of the book of the covenant during the reign of King Josiah. Ezekiel is asked to eat a scroll as part of his prophetic call (Ezek. 2:9–3:15).

4. See comments on this verb in Jer. 3.

5. In 15:19 Jeremiah is told literally that he will become as God’s mouth.

1. One should compare Deut. 4:25–31, which also assumes that the worship of other gods in exile is a judgment that comes on Israel as a result of similar activity in the Promised Land.

2. The NIV typically renders the personal name of God as “LORD.” This is a tradition reaching back into the biblical period itself.

3. Calvin, Sermons on Jeremiah, 140.

1. See comments on Jer. 4:4.

2. J. Day, “Asherah,” ABD, 1:483–87.

3. On the Lord’s inheritance, see 2:7; 3:19; 10:16; and the Lord’s plaintive lament in 12:7–9.

4. The word for “blessed” in Ps. 1:1 is ʾašre, not a form of the verb barak as in Jer. 17:7. The former is used more often in wisdom literature.

5. Refuge (maḥseh) is used primarily in Psalms to describe the person and work of God (cf. Ps. 62:7; 71:7; 73:28; 91:2, 9; 94:22; 142:5).

6. This is particularly true of Paul (see below).

7. R. Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics (New York: Scribner’s, 1932). Niebuhr claims that regardless of the personal commitments of people, their participation in public life and society’s institutions involves them in collective failures. His modern analysis of “society” is a good way to understand how an Old Testament view of corporate personality and identity can be translated (in modified form) into concepts that modern people will recognize as influential on themselves.

1. See the discussion of symbolic acts in the comments on Jer. 13.

2. The common English term for forming the clay is actually “to throw” a pot.

3. See the comments about the call for repentance in ch. 3.

4. The comment is similar to 2:27, where God charges the people with turning their back (’orep) to him, yet in the day of trouble they turn and seek his deliverance.

5. Ch. 20 will show what kind of judgment and humiliation Jeremiah’s opponents have in mind for him.

6. The term for pit in 18:20, 22 is used in Prov. 22:14 and 23:27 to describe the seductive trap of a prostitute. Cf. Ps. 35:7, where the psalmist laments the fact that his enemies have “without cause dug a pit for me.” A similar term is used in Prov. 26:27: “If a man digs a pit, he will fall into it.” This is an affirmation about act and consequence.

7. See comments on Jer. 7.

1. The name is known from extrabiblical inscriptions from the period of Jeremiah, including a reference in the Arad inscriptions. Since there was a sacrificial shrine at Arad (near where the ostraca were discovered), it may be that the Pashhur of Arad was also a priest. See Y. Aharoni, Arad Inscriptions (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1981), inscrip. #54.

2. The word translated by the NIV as “stocks” is rather obscure. It may refer to some form of restraining device like a collar or to something like the stocks known from Europe and colonial America, where one is forced to sit, bound by fetters, in an unnatural and painful position.

3. For an introduction to Jeremiah’s laments/complaints, see comments on 11:18–12:17.

4. The same verb (pth) is used in Ex. 22:16[15] to describe the seduction of a young woman. It can also describe the actions of a suitor or someone who courts (“allures”) a female with the prospects of marriage (Hos. 2:14[16]).

5. The phrase indicates “the sorrowful way of the cross.”

1. The Heb. phrase is an idiom that describes the gift of life as a “prize of war” or “booty.” Cf. the similar statement in Jer. 38:2; 39:18; 45:5.

2. For further elaboration on this theme, see T. Longman and D. Reid, God Is a Warrior (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995).

1. See 2 Kings 23:31–34. After a brief reign of three months following Josiah’s death, Jehoahaz was removed by Pharaoh Neco; he died in exile in Egypt.

2. See 2 Kings 23:34–24:6. His name was Eliakim, but it was changed to Jehoiakim by Pharaoh Neco, who placed him on the throne after removing Jehoahaz. His reign lasted from 609–598 B.C. 2 Kings 24:6 simply notes that he died, while 2 Chron. 36:6 records that Nebuchadnezzar bound him in chains to take him to Babylon.

3. See 2 Kings 24:6–16; 25:27–30. He reigned only three months before being led into exile by Nebuchadnezzar. According to 2 Kings 25:27–30/Jer. 52:31–34 he survived at least thirty-seven years in Babylon.

4. See 2 Kings 24:17–25:7. He reigned approximately eleven years, from 597–587/586 B.C. The fall of Jerusalem and its destruction by the Babylonians took place at the end of his reign.

5. The list of social crimes in Jer. 22:3 is similar to that in 7:6.

6. For further comments on the cultural setting of social justice themes, see M. Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and in the Ancient Near East (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995). Ps. 72, for example, presupposes that the king in Jerusalem is to defend the weak and to guard justice and righteousness in the land as his God-given duties.

7. “Righteous” (ṣaddiq) is also the term used for someone who is “innocent” of a legal charge.

8. Jer. 21:12 addresses the house of David; 22:2 speaks generally of the king of Judah who sits on David’s throne, along with his “servants” and “people.” Both Jer. 21:12 and 22:3 contain the injunction to “rescue from the hand of his oppressor the one who has been robbed.”

9. One should compare the instructions in Deut. 21:1–9, which are designed for a community to purge itself of any guilt for “innocent blood” that may derive from an unsolved murder.

10. The NIV translates Jer. 36:22 as “winter apartment.” This is possible, but the Heb. term at issue, bet, ordinarily means house. According to Mic. 3:9–10, leaders in Jerusalem had earlier built Jerusalem with bloodshed and wickedness.

11. See 1 Chron. 3:17–18, which lists Jehoiachin’s sons. Five of his sons are mentioned in Babylonian administrative documents that detail the rations given to Jehoiachin while a prisoner in Babylon. See W. F. Albright, “King Jehoiachin in Exile,” BA 5 (1942): 49–55.

12. H. Gossai, Justice, Righteousness and the Social Critique of the Eighth-Century Prophets (Bern: P. Lang, 1993).

13. Compare also Isa. 1:16–17; 3:13–15; 10:1–2; Mic. 2:1–5; 3:1–12; Zeph. 3:1–5.

14. One might compare the ethics of the letter of James or the spiritual requirements of church leaders in the Pastoral Letters (1–2 Timothy, Titus).

15. See comments in the introduction concerning Christ as the fulfillment of the prophetic, priestly, and royal (Davidic) offices.

1. Jeremiah’s younger contemporary Ezekiel describes the kings as shepherds (Ezek. 34). There are several similarities between this chapter and Ezek. 34.

2. Jer. 23:5–6 is repeated in 33:14–16.

3. The verb is a passive form of yš’. Names such as Joshua, Isaiah, Hosea, and Jesus (Matt. 1:21) are based on this word.

4. The “you” of Jer. 23:16 is second-person plural.

5. The council is the assembly of the heavenly host (cf. 1 Kings 22:19–22), where the Lord, the cosmic King, holds court and sends appointed messengers to announce his word.

6. Prophetic activity is known in the New Testament churches (1 Cor. 12–14; Eph. 4:11), both for good and for ill (cf. Rev. 2:20).

1. According to Jer. 52:31–34 Jehoiachin was kept under house arrest for thirty-seven years before being granted some additional freedom in Babylon. In 24:1 Jeconiah, an alternate form of his name, is used in the Hebrew text.

2. Amos had a vision of a basket of fruit (at a temple?), which became the occasion for a prophetic announcement of judgment on Israel (Amos 8:1–4).

3. Readers will note the correspondence in vocabulary between the call of Jeremiah (Jer. 1:10) and the (re)building and (re)planting of the exilic community.

4. This formula is the shorthand version of the covenant relationship established by God with Israel at Mount Sinai/Horeb. Cf. Jer. 31:33 (and reference to heart); also Ex. 6:7; Lev. 26:12; Ezek. 11:20; 36:28; Zech. 8:8. Deut. 26:16–19 has the formula in somewhat expanded form.

5. See comments on the heart at Jer. 4:4 and 17:9.

1. That is, 605 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar had been active previously as crown prince and head of the army before assuming the throne at his father’s death. With the defeat of Egypt at Carchemish in the summer of 605, the Babylonians assumed political hegemony over Syria-Palestine.

2. In the Heb. text these oracles are located in chs. 46–51. Not only does the Greek version of Jeremiah include them here after v. 13, but the order of the oracles differs in the Greek version from that of the Hebrew chs. 46–51. The transmission of this oracular material is a complicated issue. In addition to the detailed commentaries see G. Fischer, “Jer 25 und die Fremdvolkerspruche: Unterschiede zwischen hebraischem und griechischem Text,” Bib 72 (1991): 474–99.

3. C. F. Whitely, “The Seventy Years Desolation: A Rejoinder,” VT 7 (1957): 416–18.

4. Dan. 9:24–25 employs the seventy years as a means to project a broader scale of God’s providence.

5. See further J. Hill, Friend or Foe? The Figure of Babylon in the Book of Jeremiah MT (Leiden: Brill, 1999).

6. See also Isa. 51:17–23; Jer. 49:12; Lam. 4:21; Ezek. 23:31–34; Hab. 2:16.

1. Note that Jer. 7 does not contain a reference to the date or reign of a king.

2. The NIV translates the Heb. word tora as “law.” The choice for an English equivalent is difficult. It is not clear if the tora of 26:4 refers to a state-mandated code or the Sinai covenant code, since we do not know what was the state-mandated religious code under Jehoiakim. If 26:4 assumes the Sinai covenant code, then its authoritative nature as divine instruction should be recognized in the temple above all places. It may not have been the “law of the land.”

3. See the reference to “his servants the prophets” in 25:4.

4. See the comments about Shiloh in the interpretation of ch. 7.

5. Shaphan was an important official under Josiah and instrumental in the finding and interpreting of the book of the torah discovered during Josiah’s reign (2 Kings 22). Ahikam too was part of the committee sent to consult with the prophet Huldah about the book (22:12). He was the father of Gedaliah (2 Kings 25:22; Jer. 39:14). On the influence of this scribal family, see J. A. Dearman, “My Servants the Scribes: Composition and Context in Jeremiah 36,” JBL 109 (1990): 408–17.

6. Chapter 36 records the arrogant rejection of Jeremiah’s words by Jehoiakim.

7. See also the comments on ch. 7.

8. Wendy M. Zoba, “‘Do You Believe in God?’ Columbine and the Stirring of America’s Soul,” Christianity Today (October 4, 1999), 33–40.

1. For a more complete explanation of the textual problems, see W. Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:112, 115.

2. The NIV translation assumes that “in the beginning” can qualify the fourth year of Zedekiah. If the phrase refers to the accession year of Zedekiah as proposed by most commentators, then the translation is incorrect.

3. This requires seeing the events of ch. 27 as occurring in the beginning of Zedekiah’s reign (597/596 B.C.), while those of ch. 28 in his fourth year. The more natural reading of the narratives is to see both ch. 27 and ch. 28 as recounting events in the fourth year (594/593) of Zedekiah.

4. Jer. 27:22 concerns the restoration of the temple vessels taken by Nebuchadnezzar, but the restoration of the people is probably assumed (cf. 28:3–4). In any case, it is stated elsewhere that God will restore the exilic people to their land (e.g., 24:5–7).

5. Balaam was paid the diviner’s fee in Num. 22:7. For a discussion of the terms listed in Jer. 27:9 in the context of divination in the ancient world, see M. S. Moore, The Balaam Traditions: Their Character and Development (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990).

6. See comments on prophet symbolic acts in Jer. 13.

1. On the translation of 28:1 and the interpretation of the phrase “early in the reign,” see the introductory comments in the commentary on Jer. 27.

2. Some English translations give the name as Jeconiah, which approximates the Hebrew name in 28:4. The name is an alternative to the better-known name Jehoiachin. For consistency, the NIV uses Jehoiachin.

3. In 28:8 Jeremiah makes a reference to the prophets “who preceded you and me.” The “you” is masculine singular and likely refers to Hananiah. Thus Jeremiah too included Hananiah in the category of a Yahwistic prophet.

4. This word is used in the Decalogue (Ex. 20:16): “You shall not give false testimony against your neighbor.” Jeremiah uses it on various occasions (Jer. 3:10, 23; 5:2, 31; 6:13; 7:4, 8–9; 8:10; 9:3, 5; 13:25; 14:14; 16:19; 20:6; 23:14, 25–26, 32; 37:14). In the context of prophets speaking deception or falsehood, it occurs in 27:10, 14–16; 28:15; 29:9, 21, 23, 31.

1. Some English translations give the name as Jeconiah, which approximates the Hebrew name in Jer. 29:2. The name is an alternative to the better known name Jehoiachin. For consistency, the NIV uses Jehoiachin.

2. Cf. comments in 26:24 about the family of Shaphan.

3. The NIV translators have interpreted the Hebrew term šalom, traditionally rendered as “peace,” as expressive of more than the absence of conflict and the presence of security; it is expressive also of material well-being (“prosperity,” “prosper”).

4. See the references to the Heb. term šeqer (lie, deception) in the comments of the previous chapter.

5. The Hebrew word in 28:16 and 29:32 is sara. It reflects a conscious turning away from something, an overt rejection of someone.

6. 6. See, e.g., Phil. 3:7–21; Heb. 11:1–40.

1. There is a reference to a book (scroll) in Jer. 30:2. Cf. 25:13; 36:4, 28, 32. See further B. Bozak, Life Anew: A Literary-Theological Study of Jer. 30–31 (Roma: Editrice pontificio instituto, 1991).

2. See the relevant sections in R. P. Carroll, Jeremiah: A Commentary (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1986). A reasonable and theologically sensitive representative of a related view may be found in W. Brueggemann, Jeremiah 26–52: Exile and Homecoming (ITC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), 39–47. Brueggemann is reticent about the precise historical origin of much of the material in chs. 30–31. He is more concerned to interpret the voice of God within these texts, which give hope to the hopeless.

3. An influential article representing this view is by N. Lohfink, “Der junge Jeremia als Propagandist und Poet: Zum Grundstock von Jer 30–31,” Le livre de Jérémie, ed. P. M. Bogaert (Leuven: Leuven Univ. Press, 1981), 351–68. W. Holladay, Jeremiah 2 (Hermenia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 155–67, reconstructs earlier recensions of chs. 30–31, directed first to Israel and then to Judah. Most recent commentators who hold to a traditional dating for Jeremiah’s public ministry do associate some of these prophecies with his preaching during the period of Josiah’s reform. Obviously those who believe that Jeremiah began his prophetic ministry in 609 or later do not equate any of the texts in chs. 30–31 with the period of Josiah’s reforms.

4. See comments on “faithless Israel” in ch. 3.

5. These chapters have a complicated textual history, perhaps suggesting a lengthy process of preservation. In addition to the study of Bozak cited above, see B. Becking, “Jeremiah’s Book of Consolation: A Textual Comparison: Notes on the Masoretic Text and the Old Greek Version of Jer 30–31,” VT 44 (1994): 145–69.

6. Cf. 30:21; 33:17; also 23:5–6. In 30:9 “David” stands symbolically for someone from David’s dynasty. Jeremiah stands in line with several of the prophets who predict that God’s promises to the Davidic house have not failed, regardless of the quality of the current ruler or even if no descendant currently serves as king. Cf. Isa. 9:1–7; 11:1–9; Ezek. 34:23; 37:24; Hos. 3:5; Amos 9:11–12.

7. See the texts listed in the footnote above and the comments on Jer. 23:5–6.

8. One might compare the concluding words to the book of Ecclesiastes: “Fear God and keep his commandments, for this is the whole duty of man. For God will bring every deed into judgment, including every hidden thing, whether it is good or evil” (Eccl. 12:13b–14). The point of intersection with this passage in Jeremiah comes in the claim that the future will cast a different light on matters now hidden or misunderstood.

9. Jer. 31:1 is likely a summary heading for the prophecies contained in ch. 31. The introductory formula that begins verse 2 (“This is what the LORD says”) is for a particular oracle (cf. also 31:7, 15, 23; footnote 11 below).

10. Israel is but one of several terms used to signify the people of God. It is used several times (e.g., 31:1–2, 4, 10, 21, 23, 27, 31, 36–37) as are the terms virgin (31:4, 21), Judah (31:23, 27, 31), Jacob (31:7, 11), Ephraim (31:6, 18, 20), and Rachel (31:15). Zion (31:6, 12; cf. 38–40) and even Samaria (31:5) are also employed to refer to the people in their various political and geographical forms.

11. See “This is what the LORD says” in 2, 7, 15, 35; “declares the LORD” in 1, 27, 31, 38; “hear the word of the LORD” in 10. It must be admitted that there is still ambiguity where some units of speech end and others begin. One can, for example, read 31:15–22 as one poetic unit, and see 31:23–26 as a separate prose unit.

12. The term is female and can refer to the capital city as indicative of the people. Since “Virgin Israel” will plant vineyards on the hills of Samaria (v. 5), it is unlikely that this reference is a metaphor for Samaria.

13. Note, e.g., Deut. 7:8, which uses the verb to describe God’s redeeming Israel from slavery in Egypt.

14. The acts of Boaz in redeeming family property, marrying Ruth, and providing an heir to the family line of Elimelech are the acts of a family or kinsman-redeemer. In Heb. such a one is called a go’el, lit., “one who redeems.” The verb ga’al is also used to describe God’s liberation of his people from slavery in Egypt (Ex. 6:6; 15:13).

15. Jer. 31:15 is quoted in Matt. 2:17–18. Herod the Great’s slaughter of the young boys in Bethlehem provoked lamentation among the bereaved. Matthew reminds readers of his Gospel that this is not the first time that children among God’s people have been killed. The dastardly work of Herod and the sorrows it produced are part of a larger scriptural pattern already adumbrated in Rachel’s weeping. See the study by M. J. J. Menken, “The Quotation from Jeremiah 31(38).15 in Matthew 2.18: A Study of Matthew’s Scriptural Text,” in The Old Testament in the New Testament: Essays in Honour of J. L. North, ed. S. Moyise (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2000), 106–25. Menken notes a quote from a rabbi preserved in Genesis Rabbah 82:10: “We find Israel called after Rachel, as it says, ‘Rachel weeping for her children.’” The location of Rachel’s tomb is thought to be near Bethlehem (cf. Gen. 35:19–20; 48:7), and this may also have given Matthew reason to see significance in the Jeremiah quote for the sad event in Bethlehem during Herod’s reign.

16. See the survey in W. Holladay, “Jer. xxxi 22b Reconsidered: ‘The Woman Encompasses the Man,’” VT 16 (1966): 236–39, and his further elaborations in his Jeremiah, 2:192–95.

17. God is the subject of the verb when used in the simple (Qal) and Niphal stems. This is not the case in Piel and Hiphil.

18. The same proverb is quoted in Ezek. 18:2 as part of an extended discussion on the nature of corporate judgment and individual responsibility. J. S. Kaminsky, Corporate Responsibility in the Hebrew Bible (JSOTSup 196; Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1995), 139–78.

19. One should compare also the use of the term ba’al in Jer. 3:14.

20. One cannot determine who was the first early Christian to equate the gospel message of new life in Christ with the phrase “the new covenant.” Melito, bishop of Sardis in western Turkey from ca. A.D. 170–90, made a list of books that he placed under the category of “the old covenant,” implying that the Christian faith could be placed in the category of “new covenant.” The reference to his list comes from Eusebius’s Ecclesiastical History (4.26.14). Clement of Alexandria used “new covenant” to refer to Christian faith, and the term became more widespread in the third and fourth centuries. See further, H. von Campenhausen, The Formation of the Christian Bible (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1972), 262–68.

21. On matters related to writing and transfer of property, see P. King, Jeremiah: An Archaeological Companion (Louisville: Westminster-JohnKnox, 1993), 85–91. King specifically treats Jeremiah’s purchase as part of this section of the book.

22. Most English readers will recognize the construct form (= “house of”) of the word bayit in the more familiar term bet. Bethlehem, e.g., means “house of bread.”

23. Cf. Lev. 25:25–28 on the significance of a family’s inheritance.

24. The word for redemption is ge’ulla, derived from the verb ga’al, to redeem. A kinsman-redeemer was called a go’el, someone who could buy back or acquire family property or even family members who had been acquired by someone else (cf. comments on 31:11).

25. Two clay bullae (lumps of clay impressed with a seal) have been discovered in the vicinity of Jerusalem that preserve a reference to Baruch the scribe (see comments on Jer. 36). Apparently Baruch had a brother who was a government official (51:59): Seraiah, the son of Neriah, the son of Mahseiah had duties that most likely required literacy. Scribal activity may have been a family trait. Seraiah too worked in conjunction with Jeremiah.

26. Isaiah sealed up his testimony (Isa. 8:16), apparently so that it might be consulted in the future. Daniel’s vision also is sealed for the future (Dan. 12:4), perhaps for the same reason: At the end of days it will verify his prophetic word.

27. Cf. Jer. 33:20–26; Ezek. 16:60–62; 37.

28. This Hebrew phrase uses the verb šub (turn, return) with a cognate accusative—more literally translated, “to turn the turning.” It is a common phrase for corporate restoration and renewal (e.g., Deut. 30:3; Ps. 14:7; 53:6; 85:1; Amos 9:14; Zeph. 2:7), although it can be used for an individual (cf. Job 42:10). In addition to Jer. 33, the phrase also occurs in 29:14; 30:3, 18; 31:23; 32:44; 48:47; 49:6; 49:39. Ezekiel likewise uses the phrase (Ezek. 16:53; 29:14; 39:25).

29. In Jer. 33:6 the lexeme rp’ (“heal”) occurs in both noun and verb form.

30. In 23:6 the future Ruler from David’s line bears the (symbolic) name “The LORD our Righteousness.” The NIV translates 33:16 as “the name by which it will be called,” with a note that indicates “it” can also be “he” (i.e., the future ruler). Although there are variant readings among early manuscripts, the MT preserves the rendering “the name by which she [i.e., the city] will be called.” Jeremiah’s contemporaries will hear the name for either ruler or city as a play on the name of Zedekiah, the last Judean king, which means “The Lord is righteous.” The prophecy does not indicate a saving role for Zedekiah (whom Jeremiah and Ezekiel criticize severely); instead, his name is used to declare that its unrealized promise will be fulfilled by different means and by someone else from his family.

31. One should compare the promise to the Levitical priesthood with the judgment speech against Eli and his priestly house at Shiloh (1 Sam. 2:27–35). Note esp. the statement in Jer. 33:35 that the faithful priest whom God will raise up is to serve with God’s “anointed.”

32. Cf. Gen. 8:22 in the context of the Noachic covenant in Gen. 9:1–17.

33. See comments about interpreting prophecy in the introductory section to Jer. 30–33.

34. See comments on 23:5–6.

35. See esp. the New Testament letter to the Hebrews. In Rom. 8:34 the risen Christ is depicted as standing at God’s right hand and interceding for his people.

36. Karla Faye Tucker is not as well known as the others listed here. In 1999 she was executed by the state of Texas for a murder she committed as a young woman under the influence of drugs and alcohol. She underwent a conversion experience in prison and served Christ faithfully for years while there. She was a model of Christian fortitude in the weeks before her execution. Her case was much discussed in the national media, raising questions about the necessity of carrying out her sentence when it was obvious to all that God had changed her life.

37. The Commission is chaired by Desmond Tutu, retired archbishop and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize.

1. For bibliography and details, see King, Jeremiah: An Archaeological Companion, 78–84. Letter 4 contains the information that the writer has been watching for the fire signals of Azekah and Lachish, and that the signal from Azekah is no longer visible. This last comment may indicate that the letter to the garrison at Lachish was written toward the end of the Babylonian campaign, when Azekah had finally fallen to the siege and only Lachish remained untaken.

2. Cf. Jer. 34:14 with Deut. 15:12–18 and Ex. 21:1–6. Deut. 15:12 begins with the circumstance (“If a fellow Hebrew, a man or a woman, sells himself to you …”) and concludes with the sabbatical stipulation that he or she shall go forth “free” in the seventh year. Moreover, the slave shall not be sent forth without provisions (15:13–14).

3. The Hebrew word deror (release, liberty, freedom) is used in Jer. 34:8, 15, 17. Elsewhere it is used in Lev. 25:10 as a designation of the Jubilee release of land sold for debts, in Isa. 61:1 as a description of the freedom announced by God’s messenger, and as a reference in Ezek. 46:17 to a “year of release” when parts of a royal inheritance are to return to the owner. The Heb. word is cognate to an Akkadian term used in periodic royal proclamations of debt annulments and slave manumission. See J. Lewy, “The Biblical Institution of deror in the Light of Akkadian Documents,” Eretz-Israel 5 (1958): 21–31.

4. Cf. discussion and bibliography in Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:236–43.

5. Readers should note that in the Gen. 15 ceremony God is represented by the smoking torch that passes between the divided carcasses. This symbolizes God’s self-binding oath to fulfill his word to Abram. The latter is in a deep sleep and unable to participate in the ceremony other than to witness the passing of the torch and to receive the freely given promise made by God.

6. Kidnapping and then selling a person was a capital crime (Ex. 21:16).

7. The distinction between slave (a person owned by another) and servant (a person socially or institutionally obligated to another—e.g., an indentured servant) cannot be gained from the Heb. term ʾebed, which is used for both categories.

1. F. Frick, “The Rechabites Reconsidered,” JBL 90 (1971): 279–87; W. McKane, “Jeremiah and the Rechabites,” ZAW 100 (1988): 106–23. Jonadab, the founder of the Recabites, assisted Jehu in his overthrow of the Omrides (2 Kings 10:15–28). The Recabites are named as descendants of the Kenites in 1 Chron. 2:55.

2. So NIV. The Heb. term is the familiar one for a family—bayit, lit., “house, household.”

3. The word ʾab can refer to someone in authority over a group and not simply the biological head of a family (cf. 2 Kings 2:12; 5:13; 6:21).

4. The promise is similar to those given to the Levites in Jer. 33:18. It is not a promise that the Recabite community will continue on indefinitely; it is a promise that some representative of that community will always “stand” (lit.) before the Lord.

5. H. Richard Niebuhr, Christ and Culture (New York: Harper & Row, 1951).

6. Koresh is the Hebrew pronunciation of Cyrus. The leader of the Branch Davidians took his name from a twisted reading of Isa. 45:1, where Cyrus (i.e., Koresh) is called God’s anointed one and is taken by the right hand.

1. On the officials named, their context in Judean history, and their portrayal of scribal activity in interpreting documents, see J. Andrew Dearman, “My Servants the Scribes: Composition and Context in Jeremiah 36,” JBL 109 (1990): 403–21.

2. For additional details, see comments on Jer. 1:1–3.

3. An impression in fired clay (a “bulla”) of a seal with the reading “belonging to Berekyahu son of Neriyahu, the scribe,” has been published by N. Avigad, Hebrew Bullae from the Time of Jeremiah (Jerusalem: Israel Exploration Society, 1986), #9 (pp. 28–29). A second bulla of the seal is in the possession of an antiquities dealer; see H. Shanks, “Fingerprints of Jeremiah’s Scribe,” BAR 22.2 (1996): 36–38. Baruch is a short form of the name Berekyahu, like Will for William or Andy for Andrew. The Heb. word brk means “to bless,” and the name Baruch (modern English spelling) means “blessed.” Most probably the two seal impressions were attached in ancient times to papyrus or animal skin documents prepared by Baruch, Jeremiah’s companion. For additional references to scribal figures, such as Gemariah the son of Shaphan, whose bullae have come to light in modern times, see Dearman, “My Servants the Scribes.”

4. The LXX reads eighth year rather than fifth. See Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:255–56, for reasons why he prefers this reading to that of the Heb. text. Although one cannot be dogmatic, it seems to me that the MT should be preferred on this point. The fifth-year date illumines the historical context, and the Greek text can be explained plausibly as a copy error.

5. Jeremiah 14 is a series of oracles related to the effects of drought. Verses 7–9 are a repentance liturgy and the kind of confessional prayer that would be enjoined in a “time of fasting.”

6. No details are given about the hiding of Jeremiah and Baruch. Almost certainly, however, it took cooperation from others to keep the two hid successfully. The comment of the narrator is a theological one. God willed their survival. In this context it is interesting to note the account of the Lord’s prophets being hidden during the time of Ahab and Jezebel. According to 1 Kings 18:3–4, Obadiah, the official in charge of the royal palace, had hidden two groups of prophets in caves and provided them with sustenance.

1. Jeremiah 45 fits thematically with the accounts of the fall of Jerusalem and its aftermath, but it is out of place chronologically with the previous chapters (see comments on ch. 45). Chapter 39 has verbal parallels with ch. 52 and 2 Kings 25. It seems that accounts of the fall of the city have been refracted in several literary settings.

2. See G. von Rad, Old Testament Theology (2 vols.; New York: Harper & Row, 1965), 2:206–10, and references there.

3. See the discussion of this period from the perspective of international history in A. Malamat, “Twilight of Judah,” VT 25 (1974): 123–45.

4. One should compare these words with Jer. 21 and 27; 38:2 and 21:9 are essentially the same quotation.

5. The only other occurrence of the phrase (the verb used is rph in Piel) in the Old Testament is Ezra 4:4. The phrase occurs in Lachish letter 6:6.

6. The palace official is called Ebed-Melech, which means “servant of the king” in Hebrew. The “name” may be nothing more than his title. Jer. 38:7 describes him as a man from Cush and a saris. Cush is the biblical term for the territory associated with Egypt and descended from Ham (Gen. 10:6–7). The LXX sometimes translates Cush as “Ethiopia.” The Hebrew term saris likely means that the African man was castrated (i.e., a eunuch). The NIV translates the term as “official,” which is accurate, but provides the alternative “eunuch” in a footnote.

7. The word of grace to Baruch in Jer. 45:5 uses the same image as 39:18 (cf. also 21:9). Even though Jerusalem would fall to the Babylonians (and thus suffer defeat), both Ebed-Melech and Baruch would survive. Their life would be like the gift that comes from military victory.

8. At some point after the destruction of the city, Jews began a public ceremony of lamentation to recall its fall. That ceremony now takes place on the ninth of Ab (which falls in August). See the introduction to the book of Lamentations.

9. Chapter 39 names several Babylonian officials. For a treatment of their names and titles, see Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:291.

10. See comments on Jer. 26:24 and ch. 36.

11. See also comments on chs. 40–41.

12. The Heb. idiom states that his life is granted as a prize of war. It is the same phrase used in 21:9; 38:2; and 45:5.

13. It will be recalled that prophets like Amos and Hosea devoted much of their public prophetic work to announcing the fall of Israel and Samaria. Moreover, the majority of 2 Kings 17 is devoted to a polemic against Samaria and its inhabitants. Perhaps the reason that Jer. 39 and 2 Kings 17 give such a brief narration of the actual event of the fall of the cities is that they paraphrase official notices preserved in royal or state annals.

14. One might compare in this context the speech of President Lincoln that a “house divided cannot stand,” in which he reflects also on the fact of divine judgment in history. The ripple effects of the Civil War are still working themselves out in the history of North America.

15. The narrator’s report in 39:14 about Jeremiah’s release into the hands of Gedaliah is likely proleptic, i.e., it anticipates the conversation between Jeremiah and Nebuzaradan in 40:1–6. With respect to the identity of Gedaliah, it is probable that two Iron Age seal impressions that name a certain Gedaliah as “over the house” (from Lachish) and “servant of the king” (origin unknown) refer to this Gedaliah, who was appointed governor by the Babylonians. Both phrases from the seals are titles for officials in a state administration. Given the roles of his father and grandfather, it is understandable that Gedaliah had such titles before his appointment by the Babylonians. For references to the Iron Age inscriptions and brief discussion, see Dearman, “My Servants the Scribes,” 412–14. A more cautionary note regarding the equation of Gedaliah, governor of Judah, with the Gedaliah of the two inscriptions is given by B. Becking, “Inscribed Seals As Evidence for Biblical Israel? Jeremiah 40:7–41:15 par example,” in Can a ‘History of Israel’ Be Written? ed. L. L. Grabbe (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1997), 75–78. Becking also evaluates the possibility of identifying Ishmael and Baalis from extrabiblical inscriptions, 78–83.

16. Readers should compare this communication of Nebuzaradan with that of the Assyrian Rabshakeh to Jerusalem in 2 Kings 18:19–25, 28–35.

17. For the possibilities of its identification, see P. Arnold, “Mizpah,” ABD, 4:879–81. Two sites are commonly suggested: Nebi Samwil or Tell en-Nasbeh.

18. An Ammonite seal bearing the Semitic equivalent of the name Baalis was discovered in an excavation south of Amman. See L. G. Herr, “The Servant of Baalis,” BA 48 (1985): 169–72. The biblical text provides no reasons behind the nefarious plot of Baalis and Ishmael. Perhaps the Ammonite king saw an opportunity to expand his influence in the region now that the Judean government had been overthrown. For his part, Ishmael may have seen in Baalis the kind of support he needed to carve out his own sphere of influence once the main body of the Babylonian army left the region. He was, after all, a member of the Judean royal family. Zedekiah and his sons were gone, so perhaps Ishmael intended to play on his Davidic heritage in a bid for power.

19. The Marshall Plan instituted by the United States after World War II did not get derailed and illustrates how a positive policy after war and tragedy can have repercussions for stability that continue to have influence in current times.

20. This is the only reference to Geruth Kimham in the Old Testament; nothing else is known about it. Possibly Jeremiah and Baruch went to the prophet’s family property (cf. Jer. 32:1–15; 37:12). Another possibility is that Jeremiah and Baruch were living on property belonging to Baruch. Baruch came from a prominent scribal family. One supposes the family had significant property holdings.

21. In his thirty-seventh year as king (567) Nebuchadnezzar did conduct a successful campaign against Pharaoh Ahmosis II.

22. The places named in 44:1 are in different parts of Egyptian territory, indicating a comprehensive address to the Judeans in Egypt.

23. Queen of Heaven is a title for a goddess. She is mentioned in 7:18 as a deity worshiped in Jerusalem. Just which goddess is a disputed question. The three primary candidates are Anat, Astarte, or Asherah—to cite Canaanite deities—or possibly Ishtar, the east Semitic goddess who was popular among the Assyrians and the whole region annexed by Babylon. To make matters even more complicated, it is possible that there was some fusion between Ishtar and Astarte (the names are similar in Semitic) or some fusion between the different Canaanite goddesses. The practices of baking cakes for a goddess has been identified in the worship of Ishtar. For further discussion, see M. Smith, The Early History of God (New York: Harper & Row, 1990), 88–94, 145.

24. Note the reference in v. 19 to making cakes in the image of the Queen of Heaven.

25. Weston previously had been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic.

26. The promise in 45:5 that Baruch will have his life as a prize of war is an idiom used for Ebed-Melech in 39:18. God the warrior (against his sinful people) is also the gracious deliverer of his servants.

27. The Coptic Church traces its heritage to St. Mark (the Gospel writer), who (according to tradition) came to Egypt in A.D. 45. Currently the Coptic Church is the largest group of Christians in Egypt, and they follow the monophysite wing of the church, dating from its earliest centuries. Monophysites are those Christians who believe that the earthly Jesus had but one nature (divine). As a minority group, Coptic Christians suffer periodic persecutions in Egypt and daily pressures of various kinds from their neighbors.

1. See, e.g., Isa. 13–23; Ezek. 25–32; Amos 1–2.

2. Readers should consult Jer. 25 for additional comments on the oracles against the nations.

3. See the first part of the introduction to Jeremiah, where there is additional discussion of the textual history of this book.

4. See R. E. Clements, Prophecy and Tradition (Atlanta: John Knox, 1975), 58–72, for a judicious discussion of the prophets and the nations. On Jeremiah’s oracles about the nations in chs. 46–51, see D. Christensen, Transformations of the War Oracles in Old Testament Prophecy: Studies in the Oracles Against the Nations (Missoula, Mont.: Scholars, 1975), 183–280.

5. Some examples of introductory formulae for reading include Jer. 46:2, 13; 47:1; and 49:34. The combination of poetry and prose and the length of the prophecies against Egypt and Moab suggest the editing of oral presentations. The oracles against Babylon in chs. 50–51 may have circulated separately (even in written form) before being joined with the others in chs. 46–49. There are also quotations or “echoes” of earlier prophetic material (cf. 49:18 with Zeph. 2:8–9; Jer. 49:27 with Amos 1:3–5).

6. There are references to “the sword” (e.g. Jer. 46:10; 47:6), bows and arrows (50:14), the war club (51:20), God’s “arsenal” (50:25), and the proverbial “cup” of wrath (49:12).

7. For information on the Egyptians, Philistines, Transjordanian states (Ammon, Moab, Edom), Damascus, Arabs (Kedar was an oasis where some Arabs had settlements), Elam, and Babylon, see A. J. Hoerth et al., ed., Peoples of the Old Testament World (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1994). Also helpful is King, Jeremiah: An Archaeological Companion, 45–63.

8. Cf. Acts 3:24–26; 13:47–48; Gal. 3:8.

9. See the introduction to Jeremiah for discussion of historical references. A thorough treatment of the oracles in Jer. 46–49 can be found in B. Huwyler, Jeremia und die Völker: Untersuchungen zu den Völkerrsprüchen in Jeremia 46–49 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 1997).

10. Cf. Isa. 19:1–25; Ezek. 29–30, 32.

11. In Jer. 46:24 the NIV translates the Hebrew idiom as “Daughter of Egypt.” Although this is grammatically permissible, it seems more likely that Egypt itself is being personified, rather than something (e.g., a city) about the nation.

12. 12. Cf. Ezek. 25:15–17; Amos 1:6–8.

13. Cf. Isa. 15–16; Ezek. 25:8–11; Amos 2:1–3; Zeph. 2:8–11; and B. Jones, Howling Over Moab: Irony and Rhetoric in Isaiah 15–16 (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1996).

14. Lot is the nephew of Abraham. The strange episode of Gen. 19:30–38 comes in the aftermath of God’s destruction of Sodom (where Lot and his family were living) and the death of Lot’s wife. His daughters were motivated by concern for the continuation of the family and used the occasion of their father’s drunkenness to become pregnant.

15. For convenient references to texts, see the discussion in Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:358; and W. Röllig, “Bethel,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, ed. K. van der Toorn (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 173–75.

16. Deut. 30:3; Jer. 29:14; 30:18; 31:23; 32:44; 33:7. It is also used to describe the restoration of Ammon in Jer. 49:6.

17. Cf. Ezek. 25:1–7; Amos 1:13–15; Zeph. 2:8–11.

18. The first-century Jewish historian Josephus (Ant. 10.9.7) preserves an account that has the Babylonians campaigning in Transjordan after the defeat of Judah in 582 B.C. Perhaps this campaign is also the occasion for a third group of exiles taken to Babylon (cf. Jer. 52:28–30). Most certainly the Ammonites should expect reprisals for their role in the murder of Gedaliah.

19. For further discussion see E. Puech, “Milcom,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 575–76; also G. Heider, “Molech,” in Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, 581–85.

20. Relationships between Israel/Judah and their eastern “cousins” were rocky at times. According to 2 Kings 24:2, both Ammon and Moab raided Judean territory in the last days of the Judean state.

21. Cf. Isa. 21:11–12; Ezek. 25:12–14; 35:1–15; Amos 1:11–12.

22. Nevertheless, in Amos 9:11–12 Edom is named as a nation that bears God’s name and that will be incorporated into the renewed kingdom of David’s descendant. One should see also the citation of this text (via the LXX) in Acts 15:12–21.

23. See comments on the “cup of wrath” in Jer. 49:25.

24. Cf. Isa. 17:1–14; Amos 1:3–5.

25. Cf. Isa. 21:13–17.

26. See the discussion in Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:382–84.

27. Wiseman, Chronicles of Chaldean Kings, 72–73.

28. See I. Ephal, The Ancient Arabs: Nomads on the Border of the Fertile Crescent, 9th–5th Centuries B.C. (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1982).

29. Elam is the southern part of Iran. Its capital was at Susa.

30. See introductory section to Jer. 46–51.

31. K. T. Aitken, “The Oracles Against Babylon in Jeremiah 50–51: Structures and Perspectives,” TynBul 35 (1984): 25–63; D. J. Reimer, The Oracles Against Babylon in Jeremiah 50–51: A Horror Among the Nations (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen, 1992); J. Hill, Friend or Foe? The Figure of Babylon in the Book of Jeremiah MT (Leiden: Brill, 1999). The city of Babylon is personified as a female in several of the poetic oracles (cf. “Daughter [of] Babylon” in 51:33).

32. Jer. 25:12–14 announces that God will judge the Babylonians after the period of Babylonian hegemony is complete. Chapter 25 dates to the fourth year of Jehoiakim/first year of Nebuchadnezzar (i.e., 605 B.C.).

33. Holladay, Jeremiah, 2:401–15, has a lengthy discussion on the form, authenticity, and setting of these two chapters.

34. Another name for Babylon is Chaldea. Inhabitants of Babylonia are sometimes called Chaldeans.

35. In 51:41 the name Sheshach for Babylon is another wordplay. It is used also in 25:26.

36. Verses 21, 26.

37. The Heb. term is rib, a legal term. God will act to defend a proper cause.

38. See comments on the image of the cup in 25:15–29. The “cup” becomes something of a proverbial symbol in the New Testament (cf. Mark 10:35–40). In Rev. 18:6 Babylon, the harlot, is to drink from the “cup” of judgment. The symbolism in Rev. 18 draws heavily on Jer. 51.

39. For background information, see entries on these names in the Anchor Bible Dictionary.

40. N. Avigad, “The Seal of Seraiah (Son of) Neriah,” Eretz Israel 14 (1978): 86–87 [in Hebrew]; and J. R. Lundbom, “Baruch, Seraiah, and Expanded Colophons in the Book of Jeremiah,” JSOT 36 (1986): 89–114.

1. See comments in the introduction to Jeremiah.

2. The numbers given in 2 Kings 24:13–16 for the deportation at the time of Jehoiachin (the seventh year of Nebuchadnezzar) are higher than those cited in Jer. 52:28. The smaller number given in Jeremiah may include only males.

3. As noted in the introduction, Josephus records that the Babylonian army campaigned in Ammon as punishment for the murder of Gedaliah (Ant. 10.9.7). Perhaps this campaign is linked to the deportation noted in 52:30. The problem is that we do not have a firm date for the death of Gedaliah. It may have come shortly after the fall of the city in 586 B.C.

4. According to 2 Kings 24:8, he was eighteen years old when he became king in Judah. He was exiled to Babylon in 597 B.C. after a reign of only three months. As noted in the introduction, archaeologists excavating the ruins of Babylon discovered ration tablets that mention the name of Jehoiachin and his five sons. See W. F. Albright, “King Jehoiachin in Exile,” BA 5 (1942): 49–55.

5. See the discussion of chronology in the introduction.

1. For the events leading up to the Babylonian capture and destruction of Jerusalem, see the introduction to the book of Jeremiah.

2. That the Hebrew poetry of Lamentations 1–4 contains an uneven poetic meter, defined as couplets with uneven lengths of line, was first proposed by K. Budde, “Das Hebraische Klagelied,” ZAW 2 (1882): 1–22. He described it as the qinah meter, based on the Hebrew noun for lament/lamentation, and suggested that it can be seen in some other biblical laments where the imagery of a funeral is carried by the meter. See also W. R. Garr, “The Qinah: A Study of Poetic Meter, Syntax and Style,” ZAW 95 (1983): 54–75. Current scholarship, however, uses the term meter less frequently and talks more about rhythm.

3. See further W. F. Lanahan, “The Speaking Voice in the Book of Lamentations,” JBL 93 (1974): 41–49. The voices are that of the poet, personified Jerusalem, an unidentified man in ch. 3 (who may or may not be the poet personified), and the communal voice of Jerusalem’s inhabitants.

4. Lam. 1:1 in the LXX begins as follows: “After the captivity of Israel and the destruction of Jerusalem, Jeremiah sat weeping and composed this lament, saying.…” The Babylonian Talmud tractate B. Batra 15a holds that Jeremiah wrote his book, that of Kings, and Qinot. Qinot is the plural form of qina and refers to the book of Lamentations. See note 2 above.

5. For Jeremiah’s personal laments, see Jer. 11:18–12:6; 15:10–21; 17:14–18; 18:18–23; 20:7–13; 20:14–18. During a devastating drought Jeremiah takes up the people’s lament in 14:1–9. In 8:18–9:3 Jeremiah expresses deep grief and weeps over the fate of the people. The way that he expresses himself seems also to present God’s tearful grief over the people’s fate (note the first-person complaint by God in 9:3). God laments the loss of “his house” in 12:7–13.

6. For a judicious assessment of the book’s authorship and date, see the discussion by D. Hillers, “Lamentations, Book of,” ABD, 4:138–39, and his commentary on Lamentations (AB; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1992), 9–15. The haunting recollection of Zedekiah, Judah’s last king, in 4:20 is far different from Jeremiah’s sad but harsh denunciation of him. Similarly, Jeremiah’s criticism of the temple and prediction of its demise are different from the plaintive comment in 1:10. In ch. 3 the poet is quite aware of his complicity in the failures of Zion. One scholar has gone so far as to suggest that parts of Lamentations are written to counteract some of Jeremiah’s emphatic preaching on the judgment of Jerusalem and Judah. Cf. G. Brunet, “Une interpretation nouvelle du livre biblique des Lamentations,” RHR 175 (1969): 115–17. While the poems of Lamentations are not inappropriate for Jeremiah, their tone is somewhat different from the “confessions” he offers.

7. This passage does, however, undergird the view that Jeremiah held King Josiah in great esteem, something that the book of Jeremiah also indicates (Jer. 22:15–16).

8. The temple was destroyed in the fifth month (2 Kings 25:8–9). The setting for the question to the prophet Zechariah is the fourth year of the Persian king Darius (Zech. 7:1), which would be 518 B.C.

9. For a good introduction to the characteristics of Hebrew poetry, with many bibliographical references, see the entry by A. Berlin, “Parallelism,” ABD, 5:155–62. For Lamentations in particular, see Hillers, Lamentations, 16–31.

10. Several Psalms (Ps. 9–10, 25, 34, 37, 111, 112, 119, 145) and Proverbs 31:10–31 are also acrostics.

11. The first word in each verse of Lam. 3:1–3 begins with a word whose initial letter is aleph, and the first word in each verse of 3:64–66 has taw for its initial letter.

12. Actually chs. 2, 3, and 4 alter the traditional sequence of letters, putting the pe () before the ayin (). This would be like putting the English letter p before the letter o. There is limited but suggestive evidence that some in Syria-Palestine followed an alphabet with the pe before the ayin. For details, see Hillers, “Lamentations, Book of,” 4:139.

13. Amos offers a Qinah (a funeral lament) against Israel in 5:1–2, saying that the “Virgin Israel” is fallen, no more to rise. The term virgin is female and honorific and likely refers to the capital city of Samaria. F. W. Dobbs-Allsopp, Weep, O Daughter of Zion: A Study of the City-Lament Genre in the Hebrew Bible (Rome: Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1993), 97–154, demonstrates the broad connections between prophetic judgment speeches and the description of humiliated Jerusalem.

14. A classic treatment of the lament in the Old Testament is given in C. Westermann, Praise and Lament in the Psalms (Atlanta: John Knox, 1981), 165–213.

15. Hillers, Lamentations, 124, cites a number of the thematic and verbal parallels.

16. For further discussion see W. C. Gwaltney, “The Biblical Book of Lamentations in the Context of Near Eastern Lament Literature,” in Scripture in Context II: More Essays on the Comparative Method, ed. W. W. Hallo et al. (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 1983), 191–211; Dobbs-Allsopp, Weep, O Daughter of Zion. A convenient translation of some Sumerian city-laments can be found in ANET, 611–19. Dobbs-Allsopp proposes that the book of Lamentations as a whole is an example of a city-lament genre. Hillers, Lamentations, 32–39, speaks more broadly of the “city-lament tradition.”

17. Some English translations (e.g., NIV) render the Hebrew phrase bat ṣiyyon ( ) as “daughter of Zion” while others render “Daughter Zion.” There are complex grammatical matters in the discussion, but the better rendering in my judgment is the latter. “Daughter Zion” is the personified symbol of Jerusalem herself (cities are feminine in Hebrew); “Daughter of Zion” leaves open the possibility that it is someone who belongs to the city that is being described or addressed as the daughter. See the following helpful studies on this matter: M. E. Biddle, “The Figure of Lady Jerusalem: Identification, Deification and Personification of Cities in the Ancient Near East,” in The Biblical Canon in Comparative Perspective, ed. K. Lawson Younger et al. (Lewiston, N.Y.: Edwin Mellen, 1991), 173–94; E. Follis, “Zion, Daughter of,” ABD, 6:1103; and T. Frymer-Kensky, In the Wake of the Goddesses: Women, Culture and the Biblical Transformation of Pagan Myth (New York: Fawcett, 1992), 168–78.

18. On this issue, see the discussion in M. Ydit, “Av, The Ninth of,” in Encyclopedia Judaica (16 vols.; Jerusalem: MacMillan, 1971), 3:936–40. According to the Talmud (b. Ta’an. 30b), this commemoration of the temples’ destructions is as important as Yom Kippur (= the Day of Atonement).

19. One thinks of the impact in modern culture of the studies on death and dying by E. Kubler-Ross, and more particularly the ways in which she has assisted people in processing their grief. This is not to endorse all that has been claimed for her studies; rather, it is to note how influential she has been in her psychological analysis of the process. Indeed, there is a whole industry related to grief, death, and dying in Western culture. Among her works are: On Death and Dying (New York: MacMillan, 1969); Questions and Answers on Death and Dying (New York: Collins, 1974); Death: The Final Stage of Growth (Englewood, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1975); To Live Until We Say Goodbye (Englewood, N.J.: Prentice-Hall); Living With Death and Dying (New York: MacMillan, 1981); and On Children and Death (New York: MacMillan, 1983).

20. C. Westermann, “The Complaint Against God,” in God in the Fray: A Tribute to Walter Brueggemann, ed. T. Linafelt and T. Beal (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1998), 233–41 (quote on p. 236). See also his Lamentations: Issues and Interpretation (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1994).

21. F. W. Dobbs-Allsopp, “Tragedy, Tradition, and Theology in the Book of Lamentations,” JSOT 74 (1997): 29–60, proposes that Lamentations is a work about tragedy. He points out that the book contains more complaints addressed to God than confessions of sin on the part of the community. Judgment on sin, he maintains, is a claim of the book, but the perspectives associated with tragedy and suffering are dominant. He understands that one contribution of the book is the heroic response to tragedy, i.e., the community should not react passively to suffering. Another is the compassion that the articulation of suffering brings. A third is the possibility that healing comes with the recitation of the laments.

22. K. Heim, “The Personification of Jerusalem and the Drama of Her Bereavement in Lamentations,” in Zion, City of Our God, ed. R. S. Hess and G. J. Wenham (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 129–69.

23. In some Christian liturgies portions of Lamentations are read during Holy Week, including the Tenebrae service. Making Lamentations a part of the scriptural lesson for Holy Week entails an interpretation of the book as a witness to human suffering that Jesus has taken up and made his own.

24. J. Calvin, Commentaries on the Prophet Jeremiah and Lamentations (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1950), 513.

1. On the cultural habit of depicting cities as female and on the language of funeral, see the introduction. “Unclean” and “nakedness” are used by the prophets (e.g., Ezek. 7:19–20; ch. 16) to depict sinful behavior. Whether such usage developed as part of the prophetic speech repertoire or whether they borrowed it from another rhetorical tradition is unknown. Judgments about clean and unclean are the work of priests and Levites. In 2 Chron. 29:5 Levites are asked to remove the “defilement” (so NIV) from the sanctuary. It is the same term translated “unclean” in Lam. 1:17.

2. In Amos 7:2, 5, Jacob is a synonym for Israel and refers to the northern kingdom and its capital city of Samaria. Cf. Lam. 2:2–3.

3. In the Heb. text of Lam. 1:3, the verbs associated with Judah are inflected as feminine.

4. This last phrase can refer to physical illness or emotional distress (cf. Isa. 1:5; Jer. 8:18).

5. Cf. Lam. 4:21–22 and the caustic language about Edom.

1. Lam. 2:1, 4, 8, 10, 18 = Daughter Zion; 2:13 = Virgin Daughter Zion; 2:2, 5 = Daughter Judah; 2:13, 15 = Daughter Jerusalem.

1. See the discussion in the introduction regarding authorship.

2. Among these elements are: description of dire circumstances, references to the persecution of the enemy, plea for God to judge the enemies, plea to God for protection or deliverance, invitation to repentance. Two examples can be cited for comparison. Psalm 56 speaks of the persecutions of the enemies and implores God to be gracious and to deliver the psalmist. Psalm 88 speaks of travail as the threats of the “pit” (cf. Lam. 3:53, 55).

3. See, e.g., Job 9:34 and 21:9 (3:1); Job 19:8 (3:2); Job 7:18 (3:3); Job 3:23 (3:7); Job 30:20 (3:8); Job 7:20 (3:12); Job 6:4 (3:13). Other examples could be cited.

4. See Mic. 7:8–10, where sitting in darkness is a sign of judgment (see also Job 23:16–17).

5. See Hos. 2:6, where God builds a wall so that the wayward mother (Israel) cannot find her way.

6. Ps. 10:9; 22:13; Hos. 13:7–8.

7. Ps. 7:12–13; 38:2–3.

8. Ps. 11:1; 69:1–2; 124:2–7; 140:5.

9. Cf. Job 6:11; also 1 Sam. 10:8; 13:8.

10. D. A. Baer and R. P. Gordon, “,” NIDOTTE, 2:211–18.

11. M. Butterworth, “,” NIDOTTE, 3:1093–97. Lam. 3:32 pairs the words ḥesed and rḥm (vb. in Piel, to have compassion).

12. Raḥum is an adjective formed from the basic root rḥm.

13. Heb. ʾ emet is a variant form of the basic term ʾ emuna.

1. Note the brief (but ominous) comment about famine in 2 Kings 25:3. Lam. 2:11–12 also reminds the reader of the insidious affliction of famine.

2. Deut. 28:53–57 lists cannibalism as a curse to come on God’s people should they break the covenant God granted them. Lev. 26:29 similarly speaks of the eating of children as a curse to come on Israel for disobedience to the Lord. Since in Lam. 4:11 the poet speaks of God’s venting his anger on Zion, it may be that he links the cannibalism of 4:10 with God’s judgment and not only with a tragedy brought on by Zion’s enemies. In any case, it is almost certain that he understands the fall of Zion and its horrific aftermath as the outworking of Zion’s failures (i.e., breach of covenant faithfulness).

3. See Deut. 29:23; Isa. 1:9–10; Jer. 49:18; 50:40; cf. Matt. 11:20–24.

4. Ps. 106:38–39 states that the shedding of innocent blood defiles a land and the perpetrating state.

5. Judah traced her lineage back to Jacob and Edom to Esau (cf. Gen. 36:1, where Esau is explicitly equated with Edom).

6. Jeremiah uses the image several times (Jer. 13:13; 25:15–29; 48:26; 49:12; 51:7, 39). The majority of these references come in oracles against the wickedness of other nations. Cf. Hab. 2:15–16 and esp. Obad. 15–16 “The day of the LORD is near for all nations. As you [Edom] have done, it will be done to you.… Just as you drank on my holy hill, so all the nations will drink continually; they will drink … and be as if they had never been.”

1. Lam. 5:1 contains three imperatives: “Remember … look, and see.” Verse 20 has the interrogative “why,” which occurs once in the Hebrew text, but it is probably assumed to do double duty with the next poetic line as well: “[Why] do you forsake us so long?” The imperative of 5:21 deserves some scrutiny. It is the Hiphil imperative of šub, a primary term meaning “turn” or “repent.” What God can demand, i.e., repentance, is something that God can also effect by working in and through the people’s circumstances. Cf. 3:40, where the poet proposes that the community “return” (šub) to the Lord.

2. Cf. Lam. 5:20; also Ps. 13:1.

3. Cf. Lam. 5:19.

4. Cf. Lam. 5:1.

5. Lam. 5:16, by contrast, has: “Woe to us, for we have sinned!” (cf. 5:7).

6. Cf. Hos. 7:11; also Jer. 2:18.

7. Calvin, Commentaries on the Prophet Jeremiah and Lamentations, 300.