Jeremiah buys a field; God’s message about it
32
📚This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD in the tenth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, which was the eighteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar.32:1 This was the year before the Babylonians captured Jerusalem.⚜
2 📚For then the king of Babylon’s army besieged Jerusalem, and Jeremiah the prophet was imprisoned in the courtyard of the prison, which was at the palace of the king of Judah.
32:2 King Zedekiah had arrested Jeremiah (Jer 37:21).⚜
3 📚For Zedekiah king of Judah had imprisoned him, saying, “Why do you prophesy, and say, ‘Thus says the LORD, See, I will give this city into the hands of the king of Babylon, and he will take it, 4 📚and Zedekiah king of Judah will not escape out of the hands of the Chaldeans 📖, but will certainly be delivered into the hands of the king of Babylon, and will speak with him mouth to mouth, and his eyes will see his eyes, 5 📚and he will lead Zedekiah to Babylon, and there he will be until I visit him, says the LORD. Though you fight with the Chaldeans, you will not prosper.’ ”
32:3-5 The answer to Zedekiah’s question “why” was obvious. Jeremiah spoke what God told him to say. But this weak and evil king was not interested in the truth. These words of Jeremiah were fulfilled to the letter (Jer 52:7-14).⚜
6 And Jeremiah said, “The word of the LORD came to me, saying, 7 📚See, Hanameel the son of your uncle Shallum will come to you, saying, ‘Buy my field that is in Anathoth; for the right of redemption 📖 is yours to buy it.’
8 📚“So Hanameel, my uncle’s son, came to me in the courtyard of the prison in accordance with the word of the LORD, and said to me, ‘Please buy my field that is in Anathoth, which is in the region of Benjamin; for the right of inheritance is yours, and the redemption is yours. Buy it for yourself.’ Then I knew that this was the word of the LORD. 9 📚And I bought the field of Hanameel, my uncle’s son, that was in Anathoth, and weighed out the money to him, seventeen shekels 📖 of silver. 10 📚And I signed and sealed the deed, took witnesses, and weighed out the money to him in the balances. 11 📚So I took the deed of purchase, both the one that was sealed in accordance with the law and custom, and the one which was open,
32:11 One reason God gave this record of a kinsman with the right to redeem (buy back) a field, and a sealed scroll containing the deed with its terms and conditions may be this: to help us understand the meaning of the sealed scroll in Rev 5:1-10. The Lord Jesus is man’s kinsman-redeemer (see notes at Lev 25:24-31; Ruth 2:20). The title deed of the earth is His to open, the earth is His to claim – which He does in Revelation chapters 6–20.⚜
12 📚and I gave the deed of purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, the son of Maaseiah, in the sight of Hanameel, my uncle’s son, and in the presence of the witnesses that signed the deed of purchase, before all the Jews who were sitting in the courtyard of the prison.
32:12 Baruch was Jeremiah’s closest friend. See Jer 36:4-32.⚜
13 “And I charged Baruch before them, saying, 14 ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Take these deeds, this deed of purchase, both the sealed one, and this open deed, and put them in an earthenware jar, so that they may last a long time.’ 15 📚For thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: ‘Houses and fields and vineyards will be possessed again in this land.’
32:6-15 God had used object lessons with Jeremiah before (Jer 24:1-3). Now He uses Jeremiah himself as an object lesson to the people. God had spoken of the return of Israel from exile (Jer 23:3-4; 29:14; 30:10). Now with the armies of Babylon at the gates He orders His prophet to buy a field in Israel. Jeremiah thus demonstrated that he himself believed and obeyed God. All of God’s servants must show by their actions that they believe God. If they do not, how can they expect to convince others that they should believe God?⚜
32:15 Normal life would resume in Israel after the Babylonian captivity.⚜
16 📚“Now when I had delivered the deed of purchase to Baruch the son of Neriah, I prayed to the LORD, saying,
17 📚‘Ah Lord God! See, you have made the heavens and the earth by your great power and outstretched arm 📖, and there is nothing too hard 📖 for you. 18 📚You show loving kindness to thousands, and repay the guilt of the fathers into the bosom of their children after them. The Great, the Mighty God, the LORD of hosts, is his name, 19 📚great in counsel, and mighty in work 📖. For your eyes are open to all the ways of the sons of men, to give every one according to his ways, and according to the result of his deeds. 20 📚You set signs and wonders in the land of Egypt to this day, and in Israel, and among other men, and have made a name for yourself, as at this day.
21 📚And you brought your people Israel out of the land of Egypt with signs, and with wonders, and with a strong hand, and with an outstretched arm, and with great terror, 22 📚and gave them this land, which you swore to their fathers to give them, a land flowing with milk and honey. 23 📚And they came in and possessed it 📖. But they did not obey 📖 your voice, or walk in your law. Of all that you commanded them to do they have done nothing. Therefore you have caused all this disaster to come on them.
24 📚‘“See the siege mounds. They have come to the city to take it, and the city is given into the hands of the Chaldeans who are fighting against it, because of the sword and the famine and the plague. And what you have spoken has happened; and now you see it. 25 📚And you have said to me, O Lord God, Buy the field for money, and take witnesses, though the city is given into the hands of the Chaldeans.’ ”
26 Then the word of the LORD came to Jeremiah, saying,
32:25-26 Jeremiah wonders why God asked him to buy the field. He knew the captivity in Babylon would last for 70 years (Jer 25:11-12), and he was already an old man who would not live to see the return of Israel. What good, then, would the land be to him? Moreover, he had no children who could inherit it (Jer 16:1-2). Evidently he did not clearly understand that what he did was a symbolic action to teach a lesson to Israel (vs 42-44).⚜
27 📚“See, I am the LORD, the God of all 📖 those living. Is there anything too hard for me? 28 📚Therefore thus says the LORD: See, I will give this city into the hands of the Chaldeans, and into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will take it. 29 📚And the Chaldeans who are fighting against this city, will come and set fire to this city, and burn it with the houses, on the roofs of which they have offered incense to Baal 📖, and poured out drink offerings to other gods 📖, provoking me to anger.
30 📚“For the children of Israel and the children of Judah have done only evil in my sight from their youth, for the children of Israel have only provoked me to anger with the work of their hands, says the LORD. 31 📚For this city has been to me a cause for my anger and my fury from the day that they built it even to this day, so that I must remove it from in front of my face,
32:31 Before David captured Jerusalem and made it his capital it was in the hands of the idolatrous Jebusites (2 Sam 5:6-9). David’s son Solomon polluted the city with idols (1 Kings 11:7-8), and many kings after him did likewise. God’s wrath against all that was continually increasing until He could justly restrain it no longer. Notes on God’s anger at Num 25:3; Ps 90:7-11.⚜
32 📚because of all the evil of the children of Israel and the children of Judah which they have done, provoking me to anger, they, their kings, their princes, their priests, and their prophets, and the men of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 33 📚And they have turned their backs to me, and not their faces. Though I taught them, rising early and teaching them, yet they have not listened to receive instruction. 34 📚But they placed their abominations in the house which is called by my name, defiling it. 35 📚And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to make their sons and their daughters pass through the fire 📖 to Molech, though I did not command them, and it did not come into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.
36 📚“And now, therefore, thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, concerning this city, about which you say, ‘It will be delivered into the hands of the king of Babylon by the sword and by the famine and by the plague’: 37 📚See, I will gather them out of all countries where I have driven them in my anger, and in my fury and great wrath, and I will bring them back to this place, and I will cause them to dwell safely. 38 📚And they will be my people, and I will be their God. 39 📚And I will give them one heart 📖 and one way, that they may fear 📖 me forever 📖, for their good, and the good of their children after them. 40 📚And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from doing good to them, but I will put my fear in their hearts, that they will not depart from me 📖.
32:40 The new covenant of 31:31-34 will never be broken, will never fail in its purposes. It is eternal in contrast with the covenant made through Moses (Isa 55:3; Ezek 16:60; 37:26; Heb 8:7-8, 13).⚜
41 📚Yes, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will assuredly plant them in this land with my whole heart and with my whole soul.
32:41 See how God loves to do good! It delights Him! He will always do all the good He justly can to everyone (note at Ps 78:41). He hates to do harm to anyone; it grieves Him to punish and destroy anyone. When He does it, it is because He must do so according to the demands of justice.⚜
42 📚“For thus says the LORD: Just as I have brought all this great disaster on this people, so I will bring on them all the good that I have promised them. 43 📚And fields will be bought in this land, about which you say, ‘It is desolate without man or beast; it is given into the hands of the Chaldeans.’ 44 📚Men will buy fields for money, and sign deeds and seal them, and take witnesses in the land of Benjamin, and in the places around Jerusalem, and in the cities of Judah, and in the cities of the mountains, and in the cities of the valley, and in the cities of the south. For I will cause them to return from captivity 📖, says the LORD”.
32:36-44 In the midst of His denunciation of Israel’s sin God again gives His gracious promise of restoration.⚜
32:42-44 This is an expansion of v 15.⚜