Jeremiah 46:20

Egypt is like a very fair heifer, but destruction cometh; it cometh out of the north. EGYPT IS LIKE AS VERY FAIR HEIFER - wanton, like a fat untamed heifer (). Appropriate to Egypt, where Apis was worshipped under the form of a fair bull marked with spots. BUT DESTRUCTION - i:e., a destroyer "cometh:" Nebuchadnezzar. The Vulgate translates 'a goader,' answering to the metaphor, 'one who will goad the heifer' and tame her. The Arabian idiom favours this (Rosenmuller). COMETH ... COMETH - the repetition implies, it cometh surety and quickly (). OUT OF THE NORTH - (note, ;...

Jeremiah intimates here, that though Egypt indulged in pleasures, it could not yet escape the vengeance of God. We reminded you yesterday why the Prophets mentioned the wealth, the riches, and the power of the ungodly, even because they are blinded by all the good things in which they abound; for they fear nothing, nor feel any anxiety, but through a false notion they exempt themselves from every evil. As, then, the unbelieving are thus presumptuous and proud, the Prophets, on the other hand, warn them and say, that however they may exult in their own strength and defenses, _they _would yet, when it pleased God to make them prey, become the most miserable of all. The Prophet, then, in short, takes away the false conceit of the Jews, as well as of the Egyptians; as though he had said, “The Egyptians trust in their prosperity, even as though they were like a heifer frisking in the fields;...

13-28 Those who encroached on others, shall now be themselves encroached on. Egypt is now like a very fair heifer, not accustomed to the yoke of subjection; but destruction comes out of the north: the Chaldeans shall come. Comfort and peace are spoken to the Israel of God, designed to encourage them when the judgments of God were abroad among the nations. He will be with them, and only correct them in measure; and will not punish them with everlasting destruction from his presence....

Verse Jeremiah 46:20. _EGYPT_ IS LIKE _A VERY FAIR HEIFER_] Fruitful and useful; but destruction cometh out of the north, from Chaldea. It may be that there is an allusion here to _Isis_, worshipped in Egypt under the form of a beautiful cow....

IS LIKE - Or, is. Her god was the steer Apis Jeremiah 46:15, and she is the spouse. BUT DESTRUCTION COMETH; IT COMETH OUT OF THE NORTH - More probably, “a gadfly from the north has come upon her.” This is a sort of insect which stings the oxen and drives them to madness. Compare Isaiah 7:18....

EXPOSITION This chapter, the first of a series, consists of two prophecies united, though it is probable enough that the latter was intended to supplement the former, for Jeremiah 46:2 are clearly incomplete (from the point of view of this group of prophecies) without a distinct and unmistakable prediction of the conquest of Egypt. The earlier prophecy is, in fact, not itself a prediction, but a triumphal ode, analogous to such as we find in the Becks of Isaiah and Ezekiel. It falls into three stanzas: (1) verses 3-6; (2) verses 7-9; (3) verses 10-12. In the first two the great event is described with poetical imagery; in the third, its cause is declared, and the irremediable completeness of its effects. The point of time assumed is immediately before the battle of Carehemish. The Egyptian army h

EGYPT [IS LIKE] A VERY FAIR HEIFER,.... Like a heifer that has never been under a yoke, it having never been conquered, and brought under the power of another; and like a beautiful, fat, and well fed one, abounding in wealth and riches, in pleasures and delights, in wantonness and luxury, and fit for slaughter, and ready for it. The Targum is, "Egypt was a beautiful kingdom.'' Some think there is an illusion to the gods of Egypt, Apis and Mnevis, which were heifers or oxen, very beautiful, that had fine spots and marks upon them. Apis was worshipped at Memphis, or Noph, before mentioned, as to be wasted; and Mnevis at Heliopolis, the city of the sun, the same with Bethshemesh, whose destruction is prophesied of; Jeremiah 43:13; and both these were of various colours, as Ovid z says, particularly of one of them, and is true of both. Pomponius Mela a

IV. THE PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE GENTILE NATIONS CHAPTER 46 Concerning Egypt _ 1. Prophecy about Pharaoh-Necho (Jeremiah 46:1) _ 2. Nebuchadnezzar's invasion of Egypt (Jeremiah 46:13) 3. A message of comfort (Jeremiah 46:27) Jeremiah 46:1. This Pharaoh made an attempt to invade the territory of the king of Babylon, but was defeated by Nebuchadrezzar in a battle on the river Euphrates at Carchemish. This prophecy was given about eighteen years before the fall of Jerusalem. All was literally fulfilled....

JEREMIAH 46-51. THE FOREIGN PROPHECIES. These form the third principal division of the Book of Jeremiah. As already seen (Jeremiah 1:5; Jeremiah 1:10; Jeremiah 25:15), Jeremiah's prophetic horizon naturally included the surrounding nations; how far the prophecies that follow are his can be decided only by detailed criticism in each case. They refer, though in somewhat different order, to the several nations enumerated in Jeremiah 25:19 (which may be regarded as an introduction to them), except that an oracle on Damascus here replaces the reference to Tyre, Sidon, and the Mediterranean. (The LXX, which places this group of prophe

HEIFER. Probably an allusion to _Apis_, the sacred bull. DESTRUCTION. piercing. Hebrew. _kerez._ Occurs only here. Revised Version margin suggests gadfly. If it be so, the attack is on the heifer. COMETH. Some codices, with two early printed editions, Aramaean, Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate, read "attacketh her". THE NORTH. Though Babylon was on the east, the entry through Palestine was from the north, as Abraham entered it....