This chapter is a collection of miscellaneous prophecies against Babylon which were probably composed by other inspired writers after the fall of Jerusalem, who may have used some of Jeremiah’s texts. Babylon fell to the Persians in 538 B.C. in a peaceful surrender without destruction. “Suddenly Babylon has fallen and been broken.” Against this background there is the agitation for return. The people, moved to tears have learned at last “to stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths.” The covenant consciousness has taken hold. In these times Jewish law required a kinsman-redeemer. If a man should become poor his next of kin should come to him and redeem what his brother has sold. It was also his office to buy back a member of his family who had been sold or who had sold himself into slavery. In this chapter we observe transference and projection of these offices upon Yahweh. Yahweh becomes the kinsman-redeemer of the people of Judah who have been taken into slavery. It is God himself who will plead their cause and stand for them over against the power of Babylon.
This chapter is a collection of miscellaneous prophecies against Babylon which were probably composed by other inspired writers after the fall of Jerusalem, who may have used some of Jeremiah’s texts. Babylon fell to the Persians in 538 B.C. in a peaceful surrender without destruction. “Suddenly Babylon has fallen and been broken.” Against this background there is the agitation for return. The people, moved to tears have learned at last “to stand by the roads, and look, and ask for the ancient paths.” The covenant consciousness has taken hold. In these times Jewish law required a kinsman-redeemer. If a man should become poor his next of kin should come to him and redeem what his brother has sold. It was also his office to buy back a member of his family who had been sold or who had sold himself into slavery. In this chapter we observe transference and projection of these offices upon Yahweh. Yahweh becomes the kinsman-redeemer of the people of Judah who have been taken into slavery. It is God himself who will plead their cause and stand for them over against the power of Babylon.
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