Jeremiahchapter 27
22 verses · Jeremiah, written by Baruch · 7th to 6th century BC · The Prophets
This is what the LORD said to me: “Make for yourself a yoke out of leather straps and put it on your neck.
Introduction
Jeremiah, written by Baruch, The Prophets, Jeremiah Overview.
Jeremiah spoke these words in the early years of Zedekiah, while envoys from five neighbouring kingdoms met in Jerusalem to plan a revolt against Babylon. The chapter stands among the accounts of his struggle with the prophets who promised a quick end to Babylon's rule. Its first hearers were kings, priests and foreign ambassadors. The prophet teaches with an object as well as with words. Listen for the one message given to three audiences in turn, and for what is said about the temple's vessels. Read it as a word about bowing to God's discipline when resistance looks like faith.
Context
- Who
- Foreign ambassadors, the king of Judah, the priests, and everyone watching the summit
- What
- A sign in which Jeremiah wears an ox yoke and tells five foreign kings, Zedekiah and the priests to serve the king of Babylon.
- Where
- Jerusalem, where envoys from Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre and Sidon had gathered.
- When
- The reign of Zedekiah, about 594 to 593 BC.
- Why
- To warn every nation planning revolt that God had given the lands to Nebuchadnezzar and that submission would keep them alive.
Historical context
Envoys from Edom, Moab, Ammon, Tyre and Sidon have come to Jerusalem. Five states meeting in one capital under Babylonian rule means one thing: a coordinated revolt is being planned. Babylonian records from these years mention unrest in the west and a disturbance at home, which is exactly the kind of moment small states watch for.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
Jeremiah walks into the middle of it wearing a yoke, the wooden crossbar and leather straps put on the neck of a plough ox. It was the standard picture for submission to an overlord, used in treaty language across the region, and he sends duplicate yokes home with the ambassadors for their kings.
His message to five foreign courts is that God, the maker of the earth, has given all these lands to Nebuchadnezzar, and any nation that puts its neck under his yoke will remain on its own soil. Their own diviners, dreamers and fortune tellers are telling them otherwise, and are lying.
The last section deals with the temple vessels taken in 597. Court prophets were promising their quick return. Jeremiah says the rest of the furnishings, pillars, bronze sea and stands still in the house, are going to Babylon too, and will stay there until God brings them back. Ezra's account of the return records those same vessels being handed over decades later.
Significance
First hearers watched a Judean prophet contradict the foreign policy of six governments at once, in front of their ambassadors, wearing farm equipment.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
The argument underneath is that submission was not surrender to Babylon's gods; it was obedience to Israel's God, who was handing out empires. Rebellion, sold as faith, would end the nation.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
The site's own table in src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, probed for this lane, printed no weekly portion and no Haftarah from this chapter, and no festival reading for the book. That table carries the Haftarah of each of the fifty-four weekly portions and the books read whole at the feasts, and it carries nothing for the special Sabbaths or the fast days. This card therefore names no public reading of the chapter and leaves that question to a source that holds those readings.
The corpus joins the chapter to the weeks of the Torah portions through the works arranged by portion. Under the second verse it carries Midrash Tanchuma, Vayera 13:4. Under the sixth verse it carries Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vaera 18:1.
How it is read
Rashi is the one commentator on this chapter whose English the corpus carries, quoted here from The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, which Sefaria reports as CC-BY. Every quotation of it is held to fifty words or fewer because the translation is modern, and his headwords, which carry the verse in that translation's wording, are never quoted.
Rashi dates the chapter from its first line. The word came three years before Nebuchadnezzar took the throne, and the prophet "prophesied about him that he would reign" (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:1:1). He places the sending of the yoke to the neighbouring kings later. It came "In the days of Zedekiah in the fourth year of his reign, when Nebuchadnezzar made him ruler over five kings" (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:3:1). The word to Zedekiah in the twelfth verse he reads as part of the same errand: "All this Jeremiah said to the ambassadors of the kings" (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:12:1).
The title given to the king of Babylon in the sixth verse draws a short note. He is God's servant as the one "Who will perform My will to requite My enemies" (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:6:1). The son who follows him in the seventh verse Rashi names as Evil-Merodach (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:7:1). The vessels of the house of the Lord in the sixteenth verse he takes as the vessels that went into exile with Jeconiah (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:16:1). The day of their return in the last verse he sets "In the days of Cyrus, as is explained in the Book of Ezra" (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:22:1).
The rest of his notes are glosses on words. He gives the Old French name for the thongs of the yoke and sets the bases of the nineteenth verse beside Targum Jonathan (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:2:1 and 27:19:1). He also explains the grammar of the verb for exiling in the twentieth verse (Rashi on Jeremiah 27:20:1).
The corpus carries fourteen further notes on this chapter without an English text. Each is marked linked because Sefaria holds no English version of the ref, so each is cited here and none is quoted. The notes of Radak are cited at Radak on Jeremiah 27:1:1, 27:2:1, 27:5:1, 27:8:1, 27:9:1 and 27:18:1. The notes of Metzudat David are cited at Metzudat David on Jeremiah 27:4:1, 27:10:1, 27:11:1, 27:13:1, 27:14:1, 27:15:1, 27:17:1 and 27:21:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries forty rabbinic locators on this chapter and the text of none, so each is cited and linked here rather than quoted. On the first verse it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sanhedrin 11:78. On the second verse it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Ketubot 13:12, Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Shabbat 3:1 and Midrash Tanchuma, Vayera 13:4. On the third verse it holds Eikhah Rabbah 2:14. On the sixth verse it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 20:1, Ein Yaakov, Shabbat 23:2, Midrash Lekach Tov on Lamentations 3:37:1, Midrash Tanchuma Buber, Vaera 18:1 and Midrash Tanchuma, Balak 1:1. On the seventh verse it holds Esther Rabbah 3:5, Midrash Lekach Tov on Esther, Introduction 2, Midrash Lekach Tov on Esther, Introduction 3, Midrash Tehillim 10:10 and Midrash Tehillim 10:8.
On the eighth verse it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Megillah 1:17, Ein Yaakov, Megillah 1:22, Megillah 11a:24, Seder Olam Rabbah 24:1 and Vayikra Rabbah 33:6. On the tenth verse it holds Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Vayehi Beshalach 2:19. On the twelfth verse it holds Midrash Tanchuma, Vayera 13:3, Pesikta Rabbati 27:1 and Yalkut Shimoni on Nach 443:2. On the sixteenth verse it holds Midrash Lekach Tov, Deuteronomy 18:22:1, Otzar Midrashim, Midrash on Yirmiyahu, Introduction 2, Pesikta Rabbati 26:1, Sifrei Devarim 178:2 and Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 919:7. On the seventeenth verse it holds Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 42:18:2.
On the eighteenth verse it holds Bereshit Rabbah 68:9, Jerusalem Talmud Berakhot 4:1:8, Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Vayehi Beshalach 3:10, Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 23:8:5 and Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 30:13:4. On the twenty-first verse it holds Ketubot 111a:1. On the twenty-second verse it holds Berakhot 24b:8, Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Berakhot 3:7, Ein Yaakov, Berakhot 3:16 and Ein Yaakov, Ketubbot 13:8. What each of them teaches is a saying of the rabbis, and is reported as theirs wherever this site quotes one. The quotations wait on a fetch that carries the text.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on Jeremiah 27:1:1 to 27:22:1, The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, reported CC-BY; Radak, Radak on Jeremiah 27:1:1, 27:2:1, 27:5:1, 27:8:1, 27:9:1 and 27:18:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; Metzudat David, Metzudat David on Jeremiah 27:4:1, 27:10:1, 27:11:1, 27:13:1, 27:14:1, 27:15:1, 27:17:1 and 27:21:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Sefaria corpus, scripts/data/sources/sefaria/jeremiah/27.json, the 40 Talmud and Midrash locators of this chapter; The site's own files, src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, printing no portion and no Haftarah for this chapter and no festival reading for this book.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
Bonds and Yokes Sent to the Neighbouring Kings
At the beginning of the reign: The Berean heading names Zedekiah, the king the oracle addresses throughout. The Hebrew heading here names Jehoiakim, and the Septuagint omits the verse. The older commentators hold two views: that Jehoiakim is a copyist's slip, or that the sign was given under Jehoiakim and recorded again under Zedekiah.
Jeremiah 27:1
“Jehoiakim--The prophecy that follows was according to this reading given in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, fifteen years before it was published in the reign of Zedekiah to whom it refers; it was thus long deposited in the prophet's bosom, in order that by it he might be supported under trials in his prophetic career in the interim [CALVIN].”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verseWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Jeremiah 27:1
“Of Jehoiakim - Really, of Zedekiah, as the Syriac reads (see Jer 27:3). In the Septuagint the verse is missing. Some scribe has confused the title of this chapter with that of Jer. 26.”
Jeremiah 27:2-4
This is what the LORD said: Jeremiah is told, “Make for yourself a yoke out of leather straps and put it on your neck.” The message goes through “the envoys who have come to Jerusalem to Zedekiah,” so five kings hear one word. The sign joins those of chapters 13 and 19.
Jeremiah 27:2
“We find him with one on, ch. xxviii. Hereby he intimated that he advised them to nothing but what he was resolved to do himself; for he was not one of those that bind heavy burdens on others, which they themselves will not touch with one of their fingers.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Send word to the kings of Edom: Barnes explains that the envoys had come to Jerusalem to plan a league against Babylon, a plan that failed. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note the faith this task took. A yoke sent home to their kings was an open insult to their hopes.
Jeremiah 27:3
“Come - Or, are come. The ambassadors of these five kings had probably come to Jerusalem to consult about forming a league to throw off the Babylonian supremacy. The attempt failed.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 27:3
“The task assigned to Jeremiah required great faith, as it was sure to provoke alike his own countrymen and the foreign ambassadors and their kings, by a seeming insult, at the very time that all were full of confident hopes grounded on the confederacy.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Give them a message from the LORD: Here the God of Israel speaks to foreign kings. Their envoys must carry home a message from a God their masters had never served. Matthew Henry notes that Jeremiah wore the yoke himself first, so he asked of them only what he did.
Jeremiah 27:5-7
By My great power and outstretched: The LORD's claim, “I made the earth and the men and beasts on the face of it,” grounds the transfer of empire. Nebuchadnezzar is called “My servant.” The grant has a term, “until the time of his own land comes,” so Babylon's fall is written into its rise.
Jeremiah 27:5
“If it be asked, why God designed what he purposed to be made known to be concealed for so long a time? the answer is this, -- that it was done for the sake of the Prophet himself, in order that he might with more alacrity perform his office, knowing of a certainty that no one thought that it could ever happen, and certainly the thing was incredible.”
John Calvin · Commentaries (1554)reformed
all these lands under the authority: Even the beasts of the field are placed under Nebuchadnezzar. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown recall the rule over the beasts given to Adam in Genesis 1:28 and Psalm 8. The king holds that power only until the One comes whose right it is, in Ezekiel 21:27.
Jeremiah 27:6
“As the beasts are to submit to Christ, the Restorer of the dominion over nature, lost by the first Adam (compare Ge 1:28; Ps 8:6-8), so they were appointed to submit to Nebuchadnezzar, the representative of the world power and prefigurer of Antichrist; this universal power was suffered to be held by him to show the unfitness of any to wield it "until He come whose right it is" (Eze 21:27).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
All nations will serve him and his son: Babylon rules the nations for a set time, through a son and a grandson. Wesley names the son as Evil-Merodach and the grandson as Belshazzar, while Barnes names Nabonadius. Wesley sets its end at the seventy years of 29:10.
Jeremiah 27:7
“His son, and his son’s son - Evil-Merodach and Nabonadius (see Dan 5:1 note). Shall serve themselves of him - See the marginal reference. After long servitude to the Persian and Median kings, the Selucidae ruined the remains of Babylon.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 27:7
“All nations - That is, all these nations. His son - And Evil- Merodach his son, and Belshazzar his grand-child. Until - Until the period of his kingdom shall come, which was after seventy years, according to chap. xxix, 10.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Jeremiah 27:8-11
As for the nation or kingdom: The nation that refuses Babylon's yoke is promised “sword and famine and plague” until it is destroyed. The nation that submits keeps its land. The prophets who say “You will not serve the king of Babylon” prophesy “a lie that will serve to remove you from your land.”
Jeremiah 27:8
“By the mouth of his prophet God called the heathen king Nebuchadnezzar, king of kings. For Jeremiah said, "Every people and kingdom that shall not put his neck into the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar, king of kings, my servant, with famine and with sword and with pestilence will I visit that people." Though he is the great King, God does not begrudge the name of kingship to mortals. Though he is the great God, yet he did not grudge the name of godhead to the children of flesh. Though all fatherhood is his, he has called men fathers too.”
Aphrahat the Persian Sage · written before 345 · DEMONSTRATIONS 17:6patristic
2 more voices on this verse
Jeremiah 27:8
“And it shall come to pass, that the nation and kingdom which will not serve the same Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon,.... Will not, upon his approaching to them, invading and besieging them, submit and become tributary to him, as is more fully expressed in the next clause: and that will not put their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon; or voluntarily become subject to him, and pay a tax he shall impose upon them.”
Jeremiah 27:8
“For Jeremiah also prophesied that the Lord commanded them to go into Babylon. He reproved as false prophets any of the other prophets who told the people not to go to Babylon. Let those who read the Scriptures remember this as we do. Let those who do not, give us credit. Jeremiah, then, on the part of God, threatened those who would not go to Babylon, whereas he promised rest to those who would go and even a kind of contentment in the cultivation of their vines, and planting of their gardens and the abundance of their fruits.”
Augustine of Hippo · written before 430 · SERMON 51.14patristic
your diviners, your interpreters of dreams: These are the counselors of the five foreign kings. Each told the kings to refuse the yoke. Matthew Henry points ahead to chapters 48 and 49 and to Ezekiel 25, where each of these nations meets its own ruin.
Jeremiah 27:9
“Particular prophecies against these nations that bordered on Israel severally, the ruin of which is here foretold in the general, we shall meet with, ch. xlviii. and xlix., and Ezek. xxv. , which had the same accomplishment with this here.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
they prophesy to you a lie: The lie of the false prophets would bring the very exile they claimed to prevent. Rebellion against Babylon would drive the people from their land. Gill notes that serving the king of Babylon was the way to live in the land, and that the city fell when they rebelled.
Jeremiah 27:10
“To remove you far ... - That would be the result of their vaticinations.”
will put its neck under the yoke: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown note that one Hebrew root means both to serve and to till. They cite Calvin: serve the king of Babylon, and the land will serve you. The nation that bows keeps its own fields.
Jeremiah 27:11
“It is often more a point of honour than true wisdom to prefer liberty before life. It is not mentioned to the disgrace of Issachar that because he saw rest was good, and the land pleasant, that he might peaceably enjoy it, he bowed his shoulder to bear, and became a servant to tribute ( Gen. xlix.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Serve the King of Babylon and Live
Jeremiah 27:12-13
And to Zedekiah king of Judah: Zedekiah hears in person the offer: “Put your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon; serve him and his people, and live!” Verse 13 asks, “Why should you and your people die by sword and famine and plague,” so his refusal is a choice against a warning.
Jeremiah 27:12
“And is it not much more our wisdom to submit to the sweet and easy yoke of our rightful Lord and Master Jesus Christ, that we may secure the lives of our souls? Bring down your spirits to repentance and faith, and that is the way to bring up your spirits to heaven and glory.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Why should you and your people die: Barnes notes that Zedekiah chafed under the yoke of Babylon and gave the false prophets a ready hearing. The plural you takes in his officials and his people, who shared his mood. The question asks why they would choose death.
Jeremiah 27:13
“Zedekiah was restless under the Babylonian yoke, and the false prophets found only too ready a hearing from him. He is addressed in the plural because his feelings were fully shared by the mass of the officers of state and by the people.”
Jeremiah 27:14-15
Do not listen to the words: Jeremiah names the prophets' source: “I have not sent them, declares the LORD, and yet they are prophesying falsely in My name.” The test is whether a prophet is sent. Those prophets use the LORD's name for a message He never gave, and they and their hearers “will perish.”
For I have not sent them: The false prophets will perish with those they misled. The next chapter gives one case: Hananiah speaks in the name of the LORD without being sent, and he dies within the year. Clarke calls their promise about the temple articles a plain lie in the next verse.
Jeremiah 27:16-18
Then I said to the priests: The priests are warned against the promise that “very soon now the articles from the house of the LORD will be brought back from Babylon.” Jeremiah offers a test: if they are prophets, “let them now plead with the LORD of Hosts” that the articles still in Jerusalem stay.
Jeremiah 27:16
“The vessels of the Lord’s house - Which had been carried away by Nebuchadnezzar under the reigns of Jehoiakim and Jeconiah, 2Ch 36:7-10. Shall now shortly be brought again - This is a lie. They shall not be restored till I bring them up, Jer 27:22, which was after the captivity, when they were sent back by Cyrus, the Lord inclining his heart to do it, Ezr 1:7, and Ezr 7:19.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Serve the king of Babylon and live!: Gill explains that to “Serve the king of Babylon” meant paying him homage and tribute. That submission was the way to “live,” and refusing it would make the city “a ruin.” Judah rebelled, and the city fell as the verse warned.
Jeremiah 27:17
“Hearken not unto them,.... The false prophets: serve the king of Babylon, and live; pay homage and tribute to him; which is the way to live in your own land, and enjoy the benefits of that, and of the temple worship; which, if not, you will be utterly deprived of: wherefore should this city be laid waste? as it certainly will, should you rebel against the king of Babylon; and as it was in a few years after, when they did.”
If they are indeed prophets: Jeremiah gives the false prophets a test. If they are truly sent, let them pray to keep the articles still in the house of the LORD. Matthew Henry notes that prophets must be praying men, who keep up their contact with heaven.
Jeremiah 27:18
“Note, Prophets must be praying men; by being much in prayer they must make it to appear that they keep up a correspondence with heaven. We cannot think that those do, as prophets, ever hear thence, who do not frequently by prayer send thither.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Jeremiah 27:19-22
For this is what the LORD: The chapter closes on an inventory of what Nebuchadnezzar left, “the pillars, the sea, the bases, and the rest of the articles.” These too “will be carried to Babylon and will remain there until the day I attend to them again,” the visitation chapter 29 dates.
Jeremiah 27:19
“For thus saith the Lord of hosts concerning the pillars,.... The pillars of brass that stood in the temple; the one called Boaz, and the other Jachin, 1Ki 7:15; and concerning the sea; the sea of molten brass, which stood upon twelve oxen, 1Ki 7:23; and concerning the bases: the ten bases, which also were made of brass, 1Ki 7:27; and concerning the residue of the vessels that remain in this city; in the king's palace, and in the houses of the noblemen, and of the rich and wealthy inhabitants of Jerusalem.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 27:19
“Concerning the pillars - Two brazen columns placed by Solomon in the pronaos or portico of the temple, eighteen cubits high, and twelve in circumference, 1Ki 7:16-22; Jer 52:11. The sea - The brazen sea, ten cubits in diameter, and thirty in circumference. It contained water for different washings in the Divine worship, and was supported on twelve brazen oxen. Perhaps these are what are called the bases here. See the parallel places at 2Ki 25:13 (note), etc.; Jer 52:17 (note), Jer 52:20-21 (note), and the notes on them.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
did not take when he carried Jeconiah: When Nebuchadnezzar carried Jeconiah into exile, Gill notes, he took the gold and left the heavy bronze, as 2 Kings 24:13 records. Matthew Henry adds that the house of the LORD was the pride of Judah. Their loss would show that God had left them.
Jeremiah 27:20
“Which Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took not,.... For he seems only to have taken the vessels of gold, and left the vessels of brass, as the above were; see 2Ki 24:13; when he carried away captive Jeconiah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, from Jerusalem to Babylon, and all the nobles of Judah and Jerusalem; of which see 2Ki 24:12.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 27:20
“This was grievous to them above any thing; for the temple was their pride and confidence, and the stripping of that was too plain an indication of that which the true prophet told them, that their God had departed from them.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
about the articles that remain: Three places still held these articles. Gill reads those left in Jerusalem as the vessels in the houses of the nobles and the rich. The loss will reach from the temple and the palace of the king to every wealthy house.
Jeremiah 27:21
“Yea, thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, concerning the vessels that remain in the house of the Lord,.... Which are mentioned in Jer 27:19; together with others: and in the house of the king of Judah, and of Jerusalem; see Jer 27:18.”
Clarke notes that the remaining articles were carried off, as 52:17 to 23 records. The promise of return also came true. Cyrus sent the vessels back to Jerusalem in Ezra 1:7, as Clarke observes on verse 16.
Jeremiah 27:22
“They shall be carried to Babylon - Far from those already taken being brought back, those which now remain shall be carried thither, unless ye submit to the Chaldeans. They did not submit, and the prophecy was literally fulfilled; see Jer 52:17-23; 2Ki 25:13, 2Ch 36:18.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Keep studying
Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes; Carl Friedrich Keil, The Prophecies of Jeremiah; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Calvin, Commentary on Jeremiah and Lamentations; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.