Jeremiahchapter 24
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Speaks with:Jeremiah 29×3Isaiah 5×22 Chronicles 36×12 Kings 24×1Micah 7×1Amos 8×1
Summary
Chapter summary
After Jeconiah and the craftsmen were carried to Babylon, Jeremiah sees two baskets of figs set before the temple. One very good, like first-ripe figs, the other so bad they cannot be eaten. The reading upends the popular arithmetic that survival equals blessing. The good figs are the exiles God has sent to Chaldea for their good: 'I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land… and I will give them a heart to know me, that I am Jehovah.' The bad figs are Zedekiah, his princes, the survivors in Jerusalem and those settled in Egypt. To be tossed among all the kingdoms of the earth for a reproach and a byword.
Context
Prophecy · Jeremiah — Jeremiah overview
- A. 1–3 Two Baskets of Figs Set Before the Temple
- B. 4–10 The Good Figs Carried Away, the Bad Left Behind
The outline
A.Two Baskets of Figs Set Before the Templevv. 1 to 3
Read vv. 1 to 3 →B.The Good Figs Carried Away, the Bad Left Behindvv. 4 to 10
Read vv. 4 to 10 →
The world behind this chapter
Jeremiah 24The history
The vision is set at a familiar sight. Baskets of first-ripe produce were carried up and set before the sanctuary as an offering, so two baskets of figs standing in front of the temple would have looked entirely ordinary. One holds very good figs, like the first-ripe crop of early summer that everybody prized. The other holds figs so rotten they cannot be eaten.
The event behind the vision is the deportation of 597 BC. Nebuchadnezzar took Jerusalem, removed King Jehoiachin, his mother, his officials, and — the text stresses — the craftsmen and the metalworkers. Empires deported skilled labour on purpose. A province with no smiths cannot make weapons, and a province with no engineers cannot rebuild a wall.
Zedekiah was left ruling what remained, which included most of the population, the surviving nobility, and the temple still standing with its furnishings. From inside Jerusalem it looked obvious who God had preserved.
The vision reverses it. The good figs are the exiles. The bad figs are Zedekiah, his officials, the remnant in Jerusalem, and those who had fled to Egypt.
What it meant to them
This was a direct attack on the comfort of the survivors. The people still holding the city and the temple were told they were the spoiled basket.
For the exiles, the same vision was the first hint of an extraordinary promise: God says he will set his eyes on them for good in the land of the Chaldeans, and give them a heart to know him. The blessing had moved to Babylon, and nobody in Jerusalem had noticed.
Sources cited
- The Babylonian Chronicle, in James B. Pritchard, ed., Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament
- Walton, Matthews and Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Jeremiah 24. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
Connections from this chapter
v. 6 · Bookends: the same words open and close
BOOK-LEVEL. 'To pluck up and to break down... to build and to plant' (1:10) returns at 24:6, bracketing Jeremiah chs. 1-24.
Jeremiah 1:10→See, I have appointed you today over nations and kingdoms to uproot and tear down, to destroy and overthrow, to build and plant.”
Wikipedia Inclusio (citing E. F. Campbell); ASV/WEB text
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.