CHAPTER XXIX _This chapter contains the substance of two letters sent by the_ _prophet to the captives in Babylon. In the first he recommends_ _to them patience and composure under their present_ _circumstances, which were to endure for seventy years_, 1-14; _in which, however, they should fare... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:4. _THUS SAITH THE LORD OF HOSTS_] This was the commencement of the letter.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:5. _BUILD YE HOUSES_] Prepare for a long continuance in your present captivity. Provide yourselves with the _necessaries_ of life, and multiply in the land, that ye may become a powerful people.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:7. _SEEK THE PEACE OF THE CITY_] Endeavour to promote, as far as you can, the _prosperity_ of the places in which ye sojourn. Let no disaffection appear in word or act. Nothing can be more reasonable than this. Wherever a man lives and has his nourishment and support, that is his... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:8. _NEITHER HEARKEN TO YOUR DREAMS_] Rather, _dreamers_; for it appears there was a class of such persons, who not only had acquired a facility of dreaming themselves, but who undertook to interpret the dreams of others.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:10. _FOR THUS SAITH THE LORD_] It has been supposed that a very serious _transposition_ of verses has taken place here; and it has been proposed to read after Jeremiah 29:9 the _sixteenth_ to the _nineteenth_ inclusive; then the _tenth_, and on to the _fourteenth_ inclusive; then t... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:11. _THOUGHTS OF PEACE_] Here God gives them to understand, 1. That his love was moved towards them. 2. That he would perform his good word, his promises often repeated, to them. 3. That for the fulfilment of these they must _pray, seek_, and _search_. 4. That he would _hearken... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:14. _I WILL GATHER YOU FROM ALL THE NATIONS_] A quotation from Deuteronomy 30:3, and see also Deuteronomy 4:7.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:15. _BECAUSE YE HAVE SAID_] The _Septuagint_ very properly insert this verse between the _twentieth_ and the _twenty-first_, and thus the _connexion_ here is not disturbed, and the connexion below completed.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:17. _BEHOLD, I WILL SEND UPON THEM THE SWORD_] Do not envy the state of _Zedekiah_ who sits on the throne of David, nor that of the _people_ who are now in the land whence ye have been carried captive, (Jeremiah 29:16,) for "I will send the sword, the pestilence, and the famine upo... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:20. _HEAR YE THEREFORE THE WORD_] Dr. _Blayney_ thinks there were _two letters_ written by the prophet to the captives in Babylon, and that the _first_ ends with this verse. That having heard, on the return of the embassy (Elasah and Gemariah, whom Zedekiah had sent to Babylon, and... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:21. _HE SHALL SLAY THEM BEFORE YOUR EYES._] Nebuchadnezzar would be led by political reasons to punish these pretended prophets, as their predictions tended to make his Israelitish subjects uneasy and disaffected, and might excite them to rebellion. He therefore slew them; two of t... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:23. _HAVE COMMITTED ADULTERY WITH THEIR NEIGHBOURS' WIVES_] This is supposed to refer to the case of Susanna. See above.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:24. _SPEAK TO SHEMAIAH_] Zephaniah was the _second priest,_ _sagan_, or chief priest's deputy, and Seraiah, high priest, when Jerusalem was taken. See Jeremiah 52:24. Shemaiah directs his letter to the former, and tells him that God had appointed him to supply the place of the hig... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:26. _FOR EVERY MAN_ THAT IS _MAD, AND MAKETH HIMSELF A_ _PROPHET_] _Mad_, משגע meshugga, in ecstatic rapture; such as appeared in the prophets, whether _true_ or _false_, when under the influence, the one of God, the other of a demon. See 2 Kings 9:11; Hosea 9:7.... [ Continue Reading ]
Verse Jeremiah 29:32. _I WILL PUNISH SHEMAIAH_] 1. He shall have no posterity to succeed him. 2. His family, i.e., _relations_, c., shall not be found among those whom I shall bring back from captivity. 3. Nor shall _he_ himself see the good that I shall do for my people. And all this shall come... [ Continue Reading ]