seek ... Lord--([Ho 3:5]).
5. thitherward--rather, "hitherward," Jeremiah's prophetical standpoint being at Zion. "Faces hitherward" implies their steadfastness of purpose not to be turned aside by any difficulties on the way.
perpetual covenant--in contrast to the old covenant "which they brake" ([Jr 31:31], &c.; [Jr 32:40]). They shall return to their God first, then to their own land.
6. ([Is 53:6]).
on the mountains--whereon they sacrificed to idols ([Jr 2:20]; , 23).
resting-place--for the "sheep," continuing the image; Jehovah is the resting-place of His sheep ([Mt 11:28]). They rest in His "bosom" ([Is 40:11]). Also His temple at Zion, their "rest," because it is His ([Psa 132:8], ).
7. devoured--([Psa 79:7]). "Found them" implies that they were exposed to the attacks of those whoever happened to meet them.
adversaries said--for instance, Nebuzara-dan ([Jr 40:2], ; compare [Zec 11:5]). The Gentiles acknowledged some supreme divinity. The Jews' guilt was so palpable that they were condemned even in the judgment of heathens. Some knowledge of God's peculiar relation to Judea reached its heathen invaders from the prophets ([Jr 2:3]; [Da 9:16]); hence the strong language they use of Jehovah here, not as worshippers of Him themselves, but as believing Him to be the tutelary God of Judah ("the hope of their fathers," [Psa 22:4]; they do not say our hope), as each country was thought to have its local god, whose power extended no farther.
habitation--([Psa 90:1]; ). Alluding to the tabernacle, or, as in [Eze 34:14], "fold," which carries out the image in [Jr 50:6], "resting-place" of the "sheep." But it can only mean "habitation" ([Jr 31:23]), which confirms English Version here.
hope of their fathers--This especially condemned the Jews that their apostasy was from that God whose faithfulness their fathers had experienced. At the same time these "adversaries" unconsciously use language which corrects their own notions. The covenant with the Jews' "fathers" is not utterly set aside by their sin, as their adversaries thought; there is still "a habitation" or refuge for them with the God of their fathers.
8. ([Jr 51:6], ; [Is 48:20]; [Zec 2:6], ; [Re 18:4]). Immediately avail yourselves of the opportunity of escape.
be as ... he-goats before ... flocks--Let each try to be foremost in returning, animating the weak, as he-goats lead the flock; such were the companions of Ezra ([Ezr 1:5], ).
9. from thence--that is, from the north country.
expert--literally, "prosperous." Besides "might," "expertness" is needed, that an arrow may do execution. The Margin has a different Hebrew reading; "destroying," literally, "bereaving, childless-making" ([Jr 15:7]). The Septuagint and Syriac support English Version.
In vain--without killing him at whom it was aimed ([2Sa 1:22]).
11. ([Is 47:6]).
grown fat--and so, skip wantonly.
at grass--fat and frisky. But there is a disagreement of gender in Hebrew reading thus. The Keri is better: "a heifer threshing"; the strongest were used for threshing, and as the law did not allow their mouth to be muzzled in threshing ([De 25:4]), they waxed wanton with eating.
bellow as bulls--rather, "neigh as steeds," literally, "strong ones," a poetical expression for steeds (see on [Jr 8:16]) [Maurer].
12. Your mother--Babylon, the metropolis of the empire.
hindermost--marvellous change, that Babylon, once the queen of the world, should be now the hindermost of nations, and at last, becoming "a desert," cease to be a nation!
13. ([Is 13:20]).
14. Summons to the Median army to attack Babylon.
against the Lord--By oppressing His people, their cause is His cause. Also by profaning His sacred vessels ([Da 5:2]).
15. Shout--Inspirit one another to the onset with the battle cry.
given ... hand--an idiom for, "submitted to" the conquerors ([1Ch 29:24], Margin; [La 5:6]).
as she hath done, do unto her--just retribution in kind. She had destroyed many, so must she be destroyed ([Psa 137:8]). So as to spiritual Babylon ([Re 18:6]). This is right because "it is the vengeance of the Lord"; but this will not justify private revenge in kind ([Mt 5:44]; [Ro 12:19-21]); even the Old Testament law forbade this, though breathing a sterner spirit than the New Testament ([Ex 23:4], ; [Pr 25:21], ).
16. Babylon had the extent rather of a nation than of a city. Therefore grain was grown within the city wall sufficient to last for a long siege [Aristotle, Politics, 3.2; Pliny, 18.17]. Conquerors usually spare agriculturists, but in this case all alike were to be "cut off."
for fear of ... oppressing sword--because of the sword of the oppressor.
every one to his people--from which they had been removed to Babylon from all quarters by the Chaldean conquerors ([Jr 51:9]; [Is 13:14]).
17. lions--hostile kings ([Jr 4:7]; ).
Assyria--([2Ki 17:6], Shalmaneser; [Ezr 4:2], Esar-haddon).
Nebuchadnezzar--([2Ki 24:10], ).
18. punish ... king of Babylon--Nabonidus, or Labynitus.
as ... punished ... Assyrian--Sennacherib and other kings [Grotius] ([2Ki 19:37]).
19. ([Is 65:10]; [Eze 34:13], ).
20. The specification of "Israel," as well as Judah, shows the reference is to times yet to come.
iniquity ... none--not merely idolatry, which ceased among the Jews ever since the Babylonian captivity, but chiefly their rejection of Messiah. As in a cancelled debt, it shall be as if it had never been; God, for Christ's sake, shall treat them as innocent ([Jr 31:34]). Without cleansing away of sin, remission of punishment would be neither to the honor of God nor to the highest interests of the elect.
whom I reserve--the elect "remnant" ([Is 1:9]). The "residue" ([Zec 14:2]; , ).
21. Merathaim--a symbolical name for Babylon, the doubly rebellious, namely, against God. Compare [Jr 50:24], "thou hast striven against the Lord"; and [Jr 50:29], "proud against the Lord." The "doubly" refers to: first, the Assyrian's oppression of Israel; next, the kindred Chaldean's oppression of Judah (compare Jr 50:17-20, 33; especially [Jr 50:18]).
Pekod--([Eze 23:23]); a chief province of Assyria, in which Nineveh, now overthrown, once lay. But, as in Merathaim, the allusion is to the meaning of Pekod, namely, "visitation"; the inhabitants whose time of deserved visitation in punishment is come; not, however, without reference to the now Babylonian province, Pekod. The visitation on Babylon was a following up of that on Assyria.
after them--even their posterity, and all that is still left of Babylon, until the very name is extinct [Grotius]. Devastate the city, after its inhabitants have deserted it.
all ... I ... commanded--by Isaiah ([Is 13:1], &c.).
23. hammer--that is, Babylon, so called because of its ponderous destructive power; just as "Martel," that is, "a little hammer," was the surname of a king of the Franks ([Is 14:6]).
24. I--Thou hast to do with God, not merely with men.