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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Jeremiah 22:20 - 22:20
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The ruin about to fall on Judah. - Jer 22:20. "Go up on Lebanon and cry, and lift up thy voice in Bashan and cry from Abarim; for broken are all thy lovers. Jer 22:21. I spake to thee in thy prosperity; thou saidst: I will not hear; that was thy way from thy youth up, that thou hearkenedst not to my voice. Jer 22:22. All thy shepherds the wind shall sweep away, and thy lovers shall go into captivity; yea, then shalt thou be put to shame and ashamed for all thy wickedness. Jer 22:23. Thou that dwellest on Lebanon and makest thy nest on cedars, how shalt thou sigh when pangs come upon thee, pain as of a woman in travail!" - It is the people personified as the daughter of Zion, the collective population of Jerusalem and Judah, that is addressed, as in Jer 7:29. She is to lift up her wailing cry upon the highest mountains, that it may be heard far and near. The peaks of the mountain masses that bordered Palestine are mentioned, from which one would have a view of the land; namely, Lebanon northwards, the mountains of Bashan (Psa 86:16) to the north-east, those of Abarim to the south-east, amongst which was Mount Nebo, whence Moses viewed the land of Canaan, Num 27:12; Deu 32:49. She is to lament because all her lovers are destroyed. The lovers are not the kings (Ros., Ew., Neum. Näg.), nor the idols (Umbr.), but the allied nations (J. D. Mich., Maur., Hitz.), for whose favour Judah had intrigued (Jer 4:30) - Egypt (Jer 2:36) and the little neighbouring states (Jer 27:3). All these nations were brought under the yoke by Nebuchadnezzar, and could not longer give Judah help (Jer 28:14; Jer 30:14). On the form צֳעָקִי, see Ew. 41, c.
Jer 22:21-23
The cause of this calamity: because Judah in its prosperity had not hearkened to the voice of its God. שַׁלְֹות, from שַׁלְוָה, security, tranquillity, state of well-being free from anxiety; the plur. denotes the peaceful, secure relations. Thus Judah had behaved from youth up, i.e., from the time it had become the people of God and been led out of captivity; see Jer 2:2; Hos 2:17. - In Jer 22:22 תִּרְעֶה is chosen for the sake of the word-play with רֹעַיִךְ, and denotes to depasture, as in Jer 2:16. As the storm-wind, especially the parching east wind, depastures, so to speak, the grass of the field, so will the storm about to break on Judah sweep away the shepherds, carry them off; cf. Jer 13:24, Isa 27:8; Job 27:21. The shepherds of the people are not merely the kings, but all its leaders, the authorities generally, as in Jer 10:21; and "thy shepherds" is not equivalent to "thy lovers," but the thought is this: Neither its allies nor its leaders will be able to help; the storm of calamity will sweep away the former, the latter must go captive. So that there is no need to alter רֹעַיִךְ into רֵעַיִךְ (Hitz.). With the last clause cf. Jer 2:36. Then surely will the daughter of Zion, feeling secure in her cedar palaces, sigh bitterly. The inhabitants of Jerusalem are said to dwell in Lebanon and to have their nests in cedars in reference to the palaces of cedar belonging to the great and famous, who at the coming destruction will suffer most. As to the forms יֹשַׁבְתְּי and מְקֻנַּנְתְּי, see on Jer 10:17. The explanation of the form נֵחַנְתְּי is disputed. Ros., Ges., and others take it for the Niph. of חָנַן, with the force: to be compassionated, thus: who deserving of pity or compassion wilt thou be! But this rendering does not give a very apt sense, even if it were not the case that the sig. to be worthy of pity is not approved by usage, and that it is nowhere taken from the Niph. We therefore prefer the derivation of the word from אנץ, Niph. נֶאֱנַח .hpi, contr. נֵנַח, a derivative founded on the lxx rendering: τὶ καταστενάξεις, and Vulg. quomodo congemuisti. The only question that then remains is, whether the form נֵחַנְתְּ has arisen by transposition from נְנַחְתְּ, so as to avoid the coming together of the same letter at the beginning (Ew., Hitz., Gr.); or whether, with Böttch. ausf. Gramm. §1124, B, it is to be held as a reading corrupted from נֵנַחְתִּי. With "pangs," etc., cf. Jer 13:21; Jer 6:24.