Online Bible 1995 March/ROM-1025.iso/olb/gill/5_500_p.lzh/5_513.TXT

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into the hand of the king of Babylon; the whole land,
and the inhabitants of it: and he shall carry them cap-
tive into Babylon,, and shall slay them with the sword;
being in his hands, he shall do as he pleases with them,
either carry them captive, or slay them; and some he'll
dispose of one way, and some another.
Vet. 5. Moreover, I will deliver all the strength of
this city, &c.] The fortifications of it; its towers, as
the' Syriac version; the riches of it, as the Targum;
all its magazines and stores, in which its strength lay:
and all the labours thorcol; all the fruit of their la-
bours; all their wealth and riches got by labour; all
their goods in trade; all their manufactures and mer-
chandise: and all the .precious things thereof; all their
plate and jewels, the rich furniture of their houses,
and whatsoever was laid up in their treasures as rare
and valuable: and all the treasures of the kings of Ju-
dah will I give into the hand of their enemies; which
they iu successive reigns had been laying up in store
for years together; see Isa. xxxix. 6: which shall spoil
them, and take them, and carry them to Babylon; make
a prey of them, seize them as their property, and
carry them away with them.
Ver. 6. And thou, Pashur, and all that dwell in thine
house, shall go into captivity, &c.] Particularly he and
his family should not escape; whoever did: and thou
shalt come to Babylon; being brought there, though
sore against his will: and there thou shalt die, and shalt
be buried there; even in a defiled land, as all other'
countries were reckoned by the Jews; and to be buried
in such a land, Kimchi observes, was a curse; and so
it is here threatened as such: thou, and all thy friends;
that is, such as should escape the sword, ver. 4: to!
whom thou hast prophesied lies; this shows the cause of;
all this threatened destruction to him and his friends;
not only because he had so ill used Jeremiah, a true
prophet. of the Lord; but because he was a false
prophet, and his friends had hearkened to his lies,
and disbelieved those prophecies that came from the
Lord himself.
Ver. 7. 0 .Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was do-
tefred, &c.] What follows from hence to the end of
the chapter is thought to have been said by the pro-
phet, when in the stocks, or in prison, and shewa
mixture of grace and corruption in him; a struggle
between flesh and spirit, and the force of a temptation
under which he !aboured, arising from difficulties and
discouragements iu his work; and he not only com-
plains to God, but of him; that he had deceived him,
when he first called him to be a prophet, by telling
him that he should be set over nations and kingdoms,
to pull them down, ch. i. 10. which he understood of
foreign nations, but now found his own people were
meant, so Jerom; or in not immediately executing
the threatenings he sent him with; as was the case of
Jonah; or by giving him reason to expect honour and
ease, whereas he met with nothing but disrespect and
trouble; and that he should have divine protection and
success against his opposers, vet. 18, 19. whereas he
was now.delivered into their hands, and used in the most
reproachful manner; but be it so, this was all a mistake
of the prophet, and no deceFtion of God. Calvin takes it
to be ironically spoken, expressing the sense of his ene-
mies, whocharginghim with adeception, tacitly charged
God with being the author of it. Others, to soften the
expression, render the words, if thou hast deceived me,
I am deceived; or, thou hast deceived meif I am deceived {y}.
But it seems best of all to translate them, aS they will
hear it, O Lord, thou hast persuaded me, and I was per-
suaded "; so the word is used of God in Gen. ix. 27. God
shall enlarge or persuade Japhet ;' see also Hos. if. 14,
where it is rendered allure; and then the sense is, thou
hast persuaded me to take upon me the propheticat. of-
fice against my will, and against remonstrances made by
me; and I was persuaded by thy words and promises,
and by thy spirit and grace, to enter upon it; to
which sense the following words incline: thou art
stronger than f, and hastprevailed; so strong were the
arguments, motives, and inducements the Lord made
use of; so pressing his injunctions and commands; so
forcible the constraints of his spirit; that the prophet
was obliged to yield unto them, and was made willing
in the day of his power to comply, though first it was
sore against his will; but he could not withstand the
divine call, and therefore might have hoped, since it
was so manifest that he was sent of God, and did not
run of himself, that he should have met with a better
reception, and more success; but so it was not: I am
in derision daily, every one mocketh me; he was the
laughing-stock of every one of the people of Israel, from
the highest to the lowest; princes, priests, and people,
all derided him and his prophecies, and that con-
tinually, every day, and all th:e day long, anti espe--
cia!ly when he was in the stocks'; though it was not
only his person they mocked, but the word of theLord
by him, as appears from the next verse.
Ver. 8. For since I spake, I cried out, &c.] Or, when
I speak, .I cry {a}; whensoever I speak in the name of the
Lord, and deiivera message from him to the people, I
lift up my voice and cry aloud, that all may hear and
understand; and as shewing zeal, fervour, and dili-
gence: or, I cry with grief and trouble at the usage
I meet with, and the contempt that is cast upon the '
word; or because of what I am obliged to declare to
them, as follows. The Targum takes in both sense,
of the word thus, "for at the time that I prophesy, I
"lift up my voice, weeping, and crying." I cried
violence and spoil: or, proclaimed it {b}, for a different
word is here used; that is, he publicly declared the
rapine and oppression they were guilty of, inveighed
against it, and reproved them tbr it; and foretold the
violence of the enemy, anti the spoil that he should
make of them, when he should come upon them, even.
the king of Babylon; as well as cried out and corn-.
plained of the injurious treatment he himself met
with from them. Because the word of the Lord was
made a reproach unto me, and a derision daily; which
is a reason either why he cried with g-rief and sorrow ;.

{y} \^tpaw hwhy yntytp\^ Domine si ego sim seductus, tu es qui me
seduxit, Genevenses; pellexisti me, quando pellectus sum, Junius &
Tremellius; sic Syr. tu decepisti me, si deceptus sim; quidam in
Gataker.
{z} Persuasisti mihi, O Jehovah, & persuasus sum, Luther, Piscator,
Schmidt.
{a} \^qeza rbda ydm\^ quum loquor exclamavi, i.e. loquor exclamans,
Gataker.
{b} \^arqa\^ clamo, Pagninus, Junius & Tremellius; proclamo, Piscator.