Jeremiah 25 - Introduction

Jeremiah 25:1-38. Prediction of the supremacy of Babylon

The reply of the prophet to Zedekiah's message, comprised in the last four Chapter s, has come to an end. Accordingly we here return to a prophecy delivered during the time of Jehoiakim. It extends throughout the ch., with the exception of Jeremiah 25:12, where see notes. The ch. points out (i) the cause of the coming overthrow of Judah (Jeremiah 25:1), (ii) Babylon's victory and subsequent ruin in requital for their deeds (8 14), (iii) the wine-cup of God's fury to be drunk by all nations from Egypt to the Eastern kingdoms Elam, Media, and Babylon (15 29), (iv) the judgement to come upon all peoples of the earth (30 38).

Important and difficult questions arise in connexion with this chapter. (i) It has come down to us in the MT. in what is apparently by no means its original form. In the Hebrew Jeremiah 25:1 predict judgement as about to fall not only upon Judah and Jerusalem, but (Jeremiah 25:9) upon the "nations round about," all of whom shall be laid waste and serve Babylon for seventy years, while at the end of that period Jehovah will bring on Babylon itself (Jeremiah 25:13 "that land") the judgement foretold in extensoin chs. 50, 51. Schwally (The words of the Book of Jeremiah against the Heathen, ZATW, 1888, pp. 177 ff., quoted by Co.) rejects the whole of these vv. as not containing "the characteristic impress" of Jeremiah's theology, viz. the thought of the possibility of the people's conversion. Co. replies, however, that at such a crisis as had now arrived, the known world in general, and not only Judah, was ripe for judgement, and that the prophet must have realised that Nebuchadrezzar would take ruthless advantage of his great victory. Gi. thinks the main part of the passage to be genuine and introduced by Baruch from a clear recollection of his master's utterances. Du. considers a large part of Jeremiah 25:1 to be genuine, and to have formed originally the close of the first edition of the Roll as dictated to Baruch, and repeated to him for inclusion in the second edition together with the subsequent additions (Jeremiah 36:32), such as we have here in chs. 26 ff. Du. and Co. hold that the original form of the passage dealt only with the coming fate of the Jewish nation, and scarcely at all with that of others, and that the additions were made in order suitably to preface the insertion in the immediate context of the prophecies against foreign nations, now indeed found in chs. 46 51, but in LXX (see further below) following upon Jeremiah 25:13. These additions, Co. thinks, had only reached their first stage at the time when the LXX Version was made, while they now culminate in Jeremiah 25:12 (see on those vv.).