Geremia 51:35 Commento

The prophet, in this chapter, goes on with the prediction of Babylon's fall, to which other prophets also bore witness. He is very copious and lively in describing the foresight God had given him of it, for the encouragement of the pious captives, whose deliverance depended upon it and was to be the result of it. Here is, I. The record of Babylon's doom, with the particulars of it, intermixed with the grounds of God's controversy with her, many aggravations of her fall, and great encouragements given thence to the Israel of God, that suffered such hard things by her (v. 1-58). II. The representation and ratification of this by the throwing of a copy of this prophecy into the river Euphrates (Jer 51:59-64).

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH 51 The former part of this chapter is a continuation of the prophecy of the preceding chapter, concerning the destruction of Babylon, Jer 51:1; the latter part of it contains a prophecy of Jeremiah sent to the captives in Babylon by the hand of Seraiah, with the copy of the above prophecy against Babylon, and an order to fasten a stone to it, and cast it into the river Euphrates, as a sign, confirming the utter and irreparable ruin of Babylon, Jer 51:59.

And Babylon shall become heaps,.... The houses should be demolished, and the stones lie in heaps one upon another, and become mere rubbish: a dwelling place for dragons; and other wild and savage creatures. Dragons, as Aelianus (a) observes, love to live in desert places, and such now Babylon is; it lies in ruins; and even its palace is so full of scorpions and serpents, as Benjamin of Tudela (b) says it was in his time, that men durst not enter into it; see Jer 50:39; an astonishment, and an hissing, without an inhabitant; an astonishment to neighbouring nations, and to all that pass by; who shall hiss at the destruction of it, and rejoice, there being not so much as a single inhabitant in it; which is its case to this day; see Jer 50:13. (a) De Animal. l. 6. c. 63. (b) Itinerarium, p. 76.

CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY AGAINST BABYLON BEGUN IN THE FIFTIETH CHAPTER. (Jer. 51:1-64) in the midst of them that rise . . . against me--literally, "in the heart" of them. Compare Psa 46:2, "the midst of the sea," Margin; Eze 27:4, "the heart of the seas"; Margin; Mat 12:40. In the center of the Chaldeans. "Against Me," because they persecute My people. The cabalistic mode of interpreting Hebrew words (by taking the letters in the inverse order of the alphabet, the last letter representing the first, and so on, Jer 25:26) would give the very word Chaldeans here; but the mystical method cannot be intended, as "Babylon" is plainly so called in the immediately preceding parallel clause. wind--God needs not warlike weapons to "destroy" His foes; a wind or blast is sufficient; though, no doubt, the "wind" here is the invading host of Medes and Persians (Jer 4:11; Kg2 19:7).

my flesh--which Nebuchadnezzar hath "devoured" (Jer 51:34). Zion thus calls her kinsmen (Rom 11:14) slain throughout the country or carried captives to Babylon [GROTIUS]. Or, as "my blood" follows, it and "my flesh" constitute the whole man: Zion, in its totality, its citizens and all its substance, have been a prey to Babylon's violence (Psa 137:8).