Object lesson with a yoke: Judah to serve Babylon
27
📚In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah this word came from the LORD, speaking to Jeremiah. 2 📚Thus the LORD said to me: “Make bonds and yokes, and put them on your neck, 3 📚and send them to the king of Edom, and to the king of Moab, and to the king of the Ammonites, and to the king of Tyre, and to the king of Sidon, by the hand of the messengers who have come to Jerusalem to Zedekiah king of Judah; 4 📚and command them to say to their masters, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; thus you must tell your masters: 5 📚I have made the earth, the men and the beasts that are on the earth, by my great power and by my outstretched arm, and I give it to whomever I please. 6 📚And now I have given all these lands into the hands of my servant Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon; and I have also given him the beasts of the field to serve him. 7 📚And all nations will serve him, and his son, and his son’s son, until the very time for his land comes; and then many nations and great kings will make him their servant. 8 📚“And this will happen: the nation and kingdom which will not serve this Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, and which will not put their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, that nation I will punish with the sword and with the famine and with the plague until I have consumed them by their hand, says the LORD. 9 📚Therefore do not listen to your prophets, or to your diviners, or to your dreamers, or to your magicians, or to your sorcerers, who speak to you, telling you that you will not serve the king of Babylon, 10 📚for they prophesy a lie to you, resulting in your removal far from your land; and I will drive you out, and you will perish. 11 📚But the nations which bring their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him, those I will still let remain in their own land, says the LORD; and they will till it, and live in it.’ ”
27:1-11 Jeremiah was a prophet to the nations (Jer 1:5, 10). Here he sends God’s message to some of them. Putting on a yoke was a striking way of calling attention to the message. The message is the same as that which he gave to Judah. Speaking to them Jehovah God emphasizes that He is the great Creator and Governor of the universe (v 5. Note at Ps 47:2). And He warns them against false and harmful messages from other sources (vs 9,10. Compare Deut 18:9-12). In this way God showed His concern for the nations on the borders of Israel, some of which were ancient enemies of His people.⚜
12 📚I also spoke to Zedekiah king of Judah in accordance with all these words, saying, “Bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him and his people, and live. 13 📚Why will you die, you and your people, by the sword, by the famine, and by the plague, as the LORD has spoken against the nation that will not serve the king of Babylon? 14 📚Therefore do not listen to the words of the prophets who speak to you, saying, ‘You will not serve the king of Babylon’, for they prophesy a lie to you. 15 📚‘For I have not sent them’, says the LORD, ‘yet they prophesy a lie in my name, resulting in my driving you out and your perishing, you, and the prophets who prophesy to you.’ ”
16 📚Also I spoke to the priests and to all this people, saying, “Thus says the LORD: ‘Do not listen to the words of your prophets who prophesy to you, saying, “See, the articles in the LORD’s house will now shortly be brought back from Babylon”, for they prophesy a lie to you.
27:16 An example of the lies told by the false prophets (Jer 28:1-4). Several years before this (in 605 BC) the Babylonians carried off some articles from the temple.⚜
17 📚Do not listen to them. Serve the king of Babylon, and live. Why should this city be laid waste?’
27:17 Resistance to the king of Babylon would stir up his wrath and cause him to destroy Jerusalem.⚜
18 📚But if they are prophets, and if the word of the LORD is with them, let them now make intercession to the LORD of hosts, that the articles which are left in the house of the LORD and in the house of the king of Judah and in Jerusalem, do not go to Babylon.
27:18 The mark of a true prophet of God is not the telling of lies but the ability to plead with God.⚜
19 📚For thus says the LORD of hosts concerning the pillars, and concerning the sea, and concerning the stands, and concerning the rest of the articles that remain in this city, 20 📚which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon did not take when he carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah and all the officials of Judah and Jerusalem from Jerusalem to Babylon; 21 yes, thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, concerning the articles that remain in the house of the LORD, and in the house of the king of Judah and of Jerusalem: 22 📚‘They will be carried to Babylon, and they will be there until the day that I visit them, says the LORD. Then I will bring them 📖 up, and restore them to this place.’ ”
27:19-22 These articles were taken to Babylon in 586 BC (Jer 52:12-19; 2 Kings 25:13-17). “Jeconiah” (vs 20; Jer 28:4; 29:2) – a variant of Jehoiachin.⚜