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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - Jeremiah 3:16 - 3:16
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In Jer 3:16 and Jer 3:17 also the thought is clothed in a form characteristic of the Old Testament. When the returned Israelites shall increase and be fruitful in the land, then shall they no more remember the ark of the covenant of the Lord or feel the want of it, because Jerusalem will then be the throne of the Lord. The fruitfulness and increase of the saved remnant is a constant feature in the picture of Israel's Messianic future; cf. Jer 23:3; Eze 36:11; Hos 2:1. This promise rests on the blessing given at the creation, Gen 1:28. God as creator and preserver of the world increases mankind together with the creatures; even so, as covenant God, He increases His people Israel. Thus He increased the sons of Israel in Egypt to be a numerous nation, Exo 1:12; thus, too, He will again make fruitful and multiply the small number of those who have been saved from the judgment that scattered Israel amongst the heathen. In the passages which treat of this blessing, פָּרָה generally precedes רָבָה; here, on the contrary, and in Eze 36:11, the latter is put first. The words 'לֹא יֹאמְרוּ וגו must not be translated: they will speak no more of the ark of the covenant; אָמַר c. accus. never has this meaning. They must be taken as the substance of what is said, the predicate being omitted for rhetorical effect, so that the words are to be taken as an exclamation. Hgstb. supplies: It is the aim of all our wishes, the object of our longing. Mov. simply: It is our most precious treasure, or the glory of Israel, 1Sa 4:21.; Psa 78:61. And they will no more remember it. Ascend into the heart, i.e., come to mind, joined with זָכַר here and in Isa 65:17; cf. Jer 7:31; Jer 32:35; Jer 51:50; 1Co 2:9. וְלֹא יִפְקֹדוּ, and they will not miss it; cf. Isa 34:16; 1Sa 20:6, etc. This meaning is called for by the context, and especially by the next clause: it will not be made again. Hitz.'s objection against this, that the words cannot mean this, is an arbitrary dictum. Non fiet amplius (Chr. B. Mich.), or, it will not happen any more, is an unsuitable translation, for this would be but an unmeaning addition; and the expansion, that the ark will be taken into the battle as it formerly was, is such a manifest rabbinical attempt to twist the words, that it needs no further refutation. Luther's translation, nor offer more there, is untenable, since עָשָׂה by itself never means offer.
The thought is this: then they will no longer have any feeling of desire or want towards the ark. And wherefore? The answer is contained in Jer 3:17: At that time will they call Jerusalem the throne of Jahveh. The ark was the throne of Jahveh, inasmuch as Jahveh, in fulfilment of His promise in Exo 25:22, and as covenant God, was ever present to His people in a cloud over the extended wings of the two cherubim that were upon the covering of the ark of the law; from the mercy-seat too, between the two cherubs, He spake with His people, and made known to them His gracious presence: Lev 16:2; cf. 1Ch 13:6; Psa 80:2; 1Sa 4:4. The ark was therefore called the footstool of God, 1Ch 28:2; Psa 99:5; Psa 132:7; Lam 2:1. But in future Jerusalem is to be, and to be called, the throne of Jahveh; and it is in such a manner to take the place of the ark, that the people will neither miss it nor make any more mention of it. The promise by no means presumes that when Jeremiah spoke or wrote this prophecy the ark was no longer in existence; "was gone out of sight in some mysterious manner," as Movers, Chron. S. 139, and Hitz. suppose,
(Note: Against this Hgstb. well says, that this allegation springs from the incapacity of modern exegesis to accommodate itself to the prophetic anticipation of the future; and that we might as well infer from Jer 3:18, that at the time these words were spoken, the house of Judah must already in some mysterious manner have come into the land of the north. 2Ch 35:5 furnishes unimpeachable testimony to the existence of the ark in the 18th year of Josiah. And even Graf says he cannot find anything to justify Movers' conclusion, since from the special stress laid on the fact that at a future time they will have the ark no longer, it might more naturally be inferred that the ark was still in the people's possession, and was an object of care to them.)
but only that it will be lost or destroyed. This could happen only at and along with the destruction of Jerusalem; and history testifies that the temple after the exile had no ark. Hence it is justly concluded that the ark had perished in the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, and that upon the rebuilding of the temple after the exile, the ark was not restored, because the nucleus of it, the tables of the law written by the finger of God, could not be constructed by the hand of man. Without the ark the second temple was also without the gracious presence of Jahveh, the Shechinah or dwelling-place of God; so that this temple was no longer the throne of God, but only a seeming temple, without substance or reality. And thus the Old Testament covenant had come to an end. "We have here then before us," Hgstb. truly observes, "the announcement of an entire overthrow of the earlier form of the kingdom; but it is such an overthrow of the form that it is at the same time the highest perfection of the substance - a process like that in seed-corn, which only dies in order to bring forth much fruit; like that in the body, which is sown a corruptible that it may rise an incorruptible." For the dwelling and enthronement of the Lord amidst His people was again to come about, but in a higher form. Jerusalem is to become the throne of Jahveh, i.e., Jerusalem is to be for the renewed Israel that which the ark had been for the former Israel, the holy dwelling-place of God. Under the old covenant Jerusalem had been the city of Jahveh, of the great King (Psa 48:3); because Jerusalem had possessed the temple, in which the Lord sat enthroned in the holy of holies over the ark. If in the future Jerusalem is to become the throne of the Lord instead of the ark, Jerusalem must itself become a sanctuary of God; God the Lord must fill all Jerusalem with His glory (כָּבֹוד), as Isaiah prophesied He would in Isaiah 60, of which prophecy we have the fulfilment portrayed in Apoc. 21 and 22. Jeremiah does not more particularly explain how this is to happen, or how the raising of Jerusalem to be the throne of the Lord is to be accomplished; for he is not seeking in this discourse to proclaim the future reconstitution of the kingdom of God. His immediate aim is to clear away the false props of their confidence from a people that set its trust in the possession of the temple and the ark, and further to show it that the presence of the temple and ark will not protect it from judgment; that, on the contrary, the Lord will reject faithless Judah, destroying Jerusalem and the temple; that nevertheless He will keep His covenant promises, and that by receiving again as His people the repentant members of the ten tribes, regarded by Judah as wholly repudiated, with whom indeed He will renew His covenant.
As a consequence of Jerusalem's being raised to the glory of being the Lord's throne, all nations will gather themselves to her, the city of God; cf. Zec 2:1-13 :15. Indeed in the Old Testament every revelation of the glory of God amongst His people attracted the heathen; cf. Jos 9:9. לְשֵׁם יהוה, not, to the name of Jahveh towards Jerusalem (Hitz.), but, because of the name of Jahveh at Jerusalem (as in Jos 9:9), i.e., because Jahveh reveals His glory there; for the name of Jahveh is Jahveh Himself in the making of His glorious being known in deeds of almighty power and grace. לִירוּשָׁלַם, prop. belonging to Jerusalem, because the name makes itself known there; cf. Jer 16:19; Mic 4:2; Zec 8:22. - The last clause, they will walk no more, etc., refers not to the heathen peoples, but to the Israelites as being the principal subject of the discourse (cf. Jer 5:16), since שְׁרִרוּת is used of Israel in all the cases (Jer 7:24; Jer 9:13; Jer 11:8; Jer 13:10; Jer 16:12; Jer 18:12; Jer 23:17, and Psa 81:13), thus corresponding to the original in Deu 29:18, whence it is taken. שְׁרִרוּת prop. firmness, but in Hebr. always sensu malo: obstinacy, obduracy of heart, see in Deut. l.c.; here strengthened by the adjective הָרָע belonging to לִבָּם.