Jeremiah 30:5-22

Description of the people's terror (Jeremiah 30:5 mg.) at the Day of Yahweh (Amos 5:18); but this Day shall bring deliverance from the (heathen) yoke (Jeremiah 30:8), and Israel shall have (religious) freedom under the future Davidic king. The gathered people shall be delivered from fear (like a protected flock, Isaiah 17:2); the heathen nations shall be destroyed, Israel escaping with proper chastisement only (Jeremiah 10:24). At present, Zion is sorely wounded (Jeremiah 30:13 as mg. 1), and forsaken of her old allies (lovers, Jeremiah 30:14; cf. Jeremiah 4:30; Jeremiah 22:20). Her condition is deserved, yet because she is so helpless (therefore, Jeremiah 30:16) her foes shall be overthrown, and she shall be healed; the city shall be rebuilt upon its mound, and the palace inhabited as usual (Jeremiah 30:18 mg.). There shall be joy (Psalms 126:1 f.) at the restoration of her numbers, and her former glory; for she will be in the care of Yahweh (before me, Jeremiah 30:20; cf. Psalms 102:28), and under a native ruler (Deuteronomy 17:15), with priestly rights of access to Yahweh (Ezekiel 44:13; Numbers 16:5), such as none would presumptuously claim. Jeremiah 30:23 f. is an eschatological fragment (found elsewhere as in mg.) which describes the destruction of the wicked within the Jewish nation.

Jeremiah 30:5 ff. The Day of Yahweh is a frequent idea of prophecy to denote the dramatic intervention of Yahweh in human history, cf. Isaiah 13:6 ff., where there is the same figure as here of men overcome in travail-like anguish.

Jeremiah 30:8. Cf. Isaiah 10:27; thy in both cases should be his; cf. LXX.

Jeremiah 30:9. A return of the original David is not meant, but the coming of an idealised descendant; cf. Hosea 3:5.

Jeremiah 30:10 f. (LXX omits) as Jeremiah 46:27 f.; see Isaiah 41:8 f. for thought and phrasing.

Jeremiah 30:20. The term for congregation is characteristic of the post-exilic period, when Israel had become a Church instead of a State.

Jeremiah 30:21. It is difficult for us to realise, in view of the Christian sense of direct fellowship with God in Christ, the old idea of the peril of any approach to deity.