Jeremiah 21:14

21:11-14 The wickedness of the king and his family was the worse because of their relation to David. They were urged to act with justice, at once, lest the Lord's anger should be unquenchable. If God be for us, who can be against us? But if he be against us, who can do any thing for us?

But I will punish you according to the fruit of your doings, saith the Lord,.... The situation of their city, and the strength of its fortifications, however sufficient they might be thought to keep out an enemy from annoying them; yet it was impossible to hinder the Lord's coming among them, as he here threatens to do; and "visit" them, as the word signifies, in a way of wrath and justice, according to the demerit of their sins, expressed by "the fruit of their doings"; their punishment was the reward of their unrighteousness, the effect of their sinful practices; and, though this was dreadful and terrible, they could not but own it was just and equitable: and I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof; not in the forest of Lebanon, but in the city of Jerusalem; whose houses stood as thick as trees in a forest, and which many of them, at least the most stately, might be built or ceiled with cedars from Mount Lebanon and its forest; though some understand this of the cities and towns about Jerusalem; and so the Targum renders it, "in its cities"; and the Syriac version, "its towns"; but these seem rather meant in the following clause: and it shall devour all things round about it; the mountains and trees upon them, the cities and towns adjacent.

14 . and I will kindle, etc .] Cp. on Jeremiah 17:27 . in her forest ] i.e. Jerusalem, which is likened to a forest about to be wholly consumed by fire. For the same figure, representing in that case the people of Israel, cp. Isaiah 9:18 . The expression does not mean literal trees, of which there was nothing like a forest in the neighbourhood of the city, but denotes either the houses clustering together like a forest, or, more generally, the beauty and grandeur of the place. Cp. for the general sense note on Gilead, etc . ch. Jeremiah 22:6 ; also Isaiah 10:34 , where Sennacherib, king of Assyria, is likened to “the thickets of the forest,” and to “Lebanon.”

(14) I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof. —The “forest” thus referred to may be either literally the woods, then covering a larger surface than in later times, at Kirjath-jearim ( Psalm 132:6 ; 1Samuel 7:2 ), or the wood of the lone wilderness of Ziph ( 1Samuel 23:15 ), or the valley of Rephaim ( 2Samuel 5:22 ), or, figuratively, the royal palace, which, from its cedar columns ( 1Kings 7:2 ; 1Kings 10:21 ), was known as “the house of the forest of Lebanon.” (Comp. the comparison of the king’s house to “Gilead and the head of Lebanon,” in Jeremiah 22:6 .) The desolation wrought by an invading army such as that of Nebuchadnezzar, cutting down the “choice fir-trees of Lebanon and the forest of Carmel” ( 2Kings 19:23 ), showed itself in this destruction of forests in its most conspicuous form, and explains the comparative scarcity of trees in modern Palestine. So Assur-nasirpal narrates, in the history of his conquests, how he had cut down the pine, box, cypress, and other trees of the forest ( Records of the Past, iii. p. 74).

I will punish you; in the Hebrew it is, I will visit upon you . God’s visitations are either of mercy , Psalm 80:14 106:4 , or of judgment ; therefore the sense is here rightly given by our translators punish. According to the fruit of your doings ; the fruit of men’s doings is the product of their actions; God punisheth the fruit of our doings. In showing mercy, he acts from prerogative; in punishments, he doth but fill men with their own ways, and give them according to the fruit of their doings; so Jeremiah 21:12 . I will kindle a fire in the forest thereof; by the forest he either meaneth the forest of Lebanon, or their houses made up of wood cut out of that forest, or their idolatrous groves. And it shall devour all things round about it; and this fire he saith should not determine in the destruction only of this city, but in the total destruction of all the country adjacent to Jerusalem.

The chastisement of Jerusalem. - Jeremiah 21:13 . "Behold, I am against thee, inhabitress of the valley, of the rock of the plain, saith Jahveh, ye who say: Who shall come down against us, and who shall come into our dwellings? Jeremiah 21:14 . And will visit you according to the fruit of your doings, saith Jahveh, and kindle a fire in her forest, that it may devour all her surroundings." This threatening is levelled against the citizens of Jerusalem, who vaunted the impregnableness of their city. The inhabitress of the valley is the daughter of Zion, the population of Jerusalem personified. The situation of the city is spoken of as עמק, ravine between mountains, in respect that Jerusalem was encircled by mountains of greater height ( Psalm 125:2 ); and as rock of the plain, i.e., the region regarded as a level from which Mount Zion, the seat of the kingdom, rose, equivalent to rock of the field, Jeremiah 17:3 . In the "rock" we think specially of Mount Zion, and in the "valley" of the so-called lower city. The two designations are chosen to indicate the strong situation of Jerusalem. On this the inhabitants pride themselves, who say: Who shall come down against us? יחת for ינחת, from נחת; cf. Ew. 139, c. Dwellings, cf. Jeremiah 25:30 , not cities or refuge or coverts of wild animals; מעון has not this force, but can at most acquire it from the context; see Del. on Psalm 26:8 .

The strength of the city will not shield the inhabitants from the punishment with which God will visit them. "According to the fruit," etc., cf. Jeremiah 17:10 . I kindle fire in her forest. The city is a forest of houses, and the figure is to be explained by the simile in Jeremiah 22:6 , but was not suggested by מעון equals lustra ferarum (Hitz.). All her surroundings, how much more then the city itself!

4 . But I will send a fire into the house of Hazael , and it shall devour the palaces of Ben-hadad ] The same refrain (only the names being varied), Amos 1:7; Amos 1:10; Amos 1:12 , Amos 2:2 ; Amos 2:5 , and (with kindle for send ) Amos 1:14 . Hosea ( Hosea 8:14 ) adopts it from Amos (“And I will send a fire into his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof”); and it recurs also (with kindle for send , as Amos 1:14 ) in Jeremiah 17:27 ; Jeremiah 21:14 ; Jeremiah 49:27 ; Jeremiah 50:32 . By fire is meant the flame of war, which, partly by literal conflagrations, partly by other destructive operations, works devastation far and near: cf. Numbers 21:28 . The house of Hazael is the family or dynasty founded by him ( 2 Kings 8:15 ): ‘Ben-hadad’ stands in the parallel clause either as the name of Hazael’s successor, who would still be remembered as the second of Israel’s recent oppressors, or, possibly, as the name of the monarch reigning when Amos wrote. 4–5 . The punishment.