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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Jeremiah 25:3 - 25:3
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The seventy years' Chaldean bondage of Judah and the peoples. - Jer 25:3. "From the thirteenth year of Josiah, son of Amon king of Judah, unto this day, these three and twenty years, came the word of Jahveh to me, and I spake to you, from early morn onwards speaking, but ye hearkened not. Jer 25:4. And Jahveh sent to you all His servants, the prophets, from early morning on sending them, but ye hearkened not, and inclined not your ear to hear. Jer 25:5. They said: Turn ye now each from his evil way and from the evil of your doings, so shall ye abide in the land which Jahveh hath given to your fathers from everlasting to everlasting. Jer 25:6. And go not after other gods, to serve them and to worship them, that ye provoke me not with the work of your hands, and that I do you no evil. Jer 25:7. But ye hearkened not to me, to provoke me by the work of your hands, to your own hurt. Jer 25:8. Therefore thus hath said Jahveh of hosts: Because ye have not heard my words, Jer 25:9. Behold, I send and take all the families of the north, saith Jahveh, and to Nebuchadrezzar my servant (I send), and bring them upon this land, and upon its inhabitants, and upon all these peoples round about, and ban them, and make them an astonishment and a derision and everlasting desolations, Jer 25:10. And destroy from among them the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the mill and the light of the lamp. Jer 25:11. And this land shall become a desert, a desolation, and these peoples shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years."
The very beginning of this discourse points to the great crisis in the fortunes of Judah. Jeremiah recalls into the memory of the people not merely the whole time of his own labours hitherto, but also the labours of many other prophets, who, like himself, have unremittingly preached repentance to the people, called on them to forsake idolatry and their evil ways, and to return to the God of their fathers - but in vain (Jer 25:3-7). The 23 years, from the 13th of Josiah till the 4th of Jehoiakim, are thus made up: 19 years of Josiah and 4 years of Jehoiakim, including the 3 months' reign of Jehoahaz. The form אַשְׁכֵּים might be an Aramaism; but it is more probably a clerical error, since we have הַשְׁכֵּם everywhere else; cf. Jer 25:4, Jer 7:13; Jer 35:14, etc., and Olsh. Gramm. §191, g. For syntactical reasons it cannot be 1st pers. imperf., as Hitz. thinks it is. On the significance of this infin. abs. see on Jer 7:13. As to the thought of Jer 25:4 cf. Jer 7:25. and Jer 11:7. לֵאמֹר introduces the contents of the discourses of Jeremiah and the other prophets, though formally it is connected with וְשָׁלַח, Jer 25:4. As to the fact, cf. Jer 35:15. וּשְׁבוּ, so shall ye dwell, cf. Jer 7:7. - With Jer 25:6 cf. Jer 7:6; Jer 1:16, etc. (אָרַע, imperf. Hiph. from רעע). הַכְעִסוּנִי cannot be the reading of its Chet., for the 3rd person will not do. The ו seems to have found its way in by an error in writing and the Keri to be the proper reading, since לְמַעַן is construed with the infinitive.