Charles Ellicott Commentary Jeremiah 31

The God of all the families of Israel. —The union of the ten tribes of Israel and the two of Judah is again prominent in the prophet’s mind. He cannot bear to think of that division, with its deep lines of cleavage in the religious and social life of the people, being perpetuated. Israel should be Israel. This is the crown and consummation of the promise of Jeremiah 30:24.

The people which were left of the sword ... —The main thought of this and the next verse is that the past experience of God’s love is a pledge or earnest for the future. Israel of old had found grace in the wilderness . But as the prophet has in his thoughts a new manifestation of that love, his language is modified accordingly. He thinks of the captives who had escaped, or would later escape, the sword of the Chaldeans (there had been no such deliverance in the case of the Egyptian exodus), and of their finding grace in the wilderness that lies between Palestine and the Euphrates. The verses that follow show, however, that the prophet is also thinking of the more distant exiles, the ten tribes in the cities of the Medes beyond the Tigris (2 Kings 17:6).

Even Israel, when I went to cause him to rest. —The verb that corresponds to the last five words includes the meaning of “settling” or “establishing,” as well as of giving rest; and the whole clause is better translated Let me go, or I will go (the verb is in the infinitive with the force of an imperative, but this is its meaning) to set him at rest, even Israel.

The Lord has appeared of old to me ... —The Hebrew adverb more commonly refers to distance than to time. From afar the Lord appeared to me. The thought is that of a deliverer who hears the cry of his people in the distance, and then draws near to help them. Jehovah enthroned in Zion, or in the heaven of heavens, hears the cry of the exiles by the waters of Babylon or Nineveh.

Therefore with lovingkindness I have drawn you. —Some translators render I have preserved (or respited) you, others I have continued my loving kindness to you, as in Psalm 36:10; Psalms 109:12; but the Septuagint, Vulgate, and Luther agree with the English Version, and it finds sufficient support in the meaning of the Hebrew verb and in the parallel of Hosea 11:4.

You shall again be adorned with your tabrets ... —The implied idea is that of a time of rejoicing after triumphant restoration (the “building” of the previous sentence is more than that of material walls and towers), when the daughters of Israel (Judges 11:34; 1 Samuel 18:6; Psalms 68:11) should again go forth with “timbrels and dances,” with tabrets and joy and instruments of music. The “tabret” was a musical instrument of the drum type, somewhat like the Spanish or Italian tambourine, with bells attached to the metal hoop.

You shall yet plant vines upon the mountains of Samaria ... —The mention of Samaria shows that the prophet is thinking of the restoration of the northern kingdom, as well as of Judah, under the rule of the true King. In the Hebrew words shall eat them as common things we have a remarkable train of associations. The primary meaning of the verb is to “profane.” The rule of Leviticus 19:23-24, based partly, perhaps, on grounds of culture, partly with a symbolic meaning, required that a vineyard for three years after it was planted should be treated as uncircumcised (i.e., that no use should be made of the fruit), in the fourth year the fruit was to be holy to praise the Lord with, and in the fifth the planter might take the fruit for himself.

So accordingly in Deuteronomy 20:6 we have, as one of the laws affecting war, that if a man had planted a vineyard and had not made it common—the same word as that used here—i.e., had not got beyond the fixed period of consecration, he might be exempted from military service, lest he should die and another eat of it. Compare also Deuteronomy 28:30, where the English “gather” answers, as the marginal reading shows, to the same verb. What is meant here, therefore, is, in contrast with the chances and changes of a time of war, that the planters of the vineyard should not be disturbed in their possession of it. They should not plant, and another eat thereof. (Deuteronomy 28:30.)