เยเรมีย์ 41:8 วิจารณ์

It is a very tragical story that is related in this chapter, and shows that evil pursues sinners. The black cloud that was gathering in the foregoing chapter here bursts in a dreadful storm. Those few Jews that escaped the captivity were proud to think that they were still in their own land, when their brethren had gone they knew not whither, were fond of the wine and summer-fruits they had gathered, and were very secure under Gedaliah's protectorship, when, on a sudden, even these remains prove ruins too. I. Gedaliah is barbarously slain by Ishmael (Jer 41:1, Jer 41:2). II. All the Jews that were with him were slain likewise (Jer 41:3) and a pit filled with their dead bodies (Jer 41:9). III. Some devout men, to the number of fourscore, that were going towards Jerusalem, were drawn in by Ishmael, and murdered likewise (Jer 41:4-7). Only ten of them escaped (Jer 41:8). IV. Those that escaped the sword were taken prisoners by Ishmael, and carried off towards the country of the Ammonites (Jer 41:10). V. By the conduct and courage of Johanan, though the death of the slain is not revenged, yet the prisoners are recovered, and he now becomes their commander-in-chief (Jer 41:11-16). VI. His project is to carry them into the land of Egypt (Jer 41:17, Jer 41:18), which we shall hear more of in the next chapter.

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH 41 This chapter relates the event of the conspiracy against Gedaliah Johanan and the princes had informed him of, to which he gave no credit; but it proved true. An account is given of the murder of Gedaliah, and of the Jews and Chaldeans with him; and of the perpetrators of it, Jer 41:1; and of the chief of them, Ishmael's treacherous dealing with fourscore men that came from several parts to the house of God to offer sacrifice, who all perished by his hands, excepting ten, Jer 41:4; and of the rest of the people at Mizpah being carried away, in order to be captives among the Ammonites, Jer 41:10; and of Johanan, and the rest of the captives, hearing of all this, and coming out to fight with Ishmael; upon which the people deserted him, and he fled to the Ammonites, Jer 41:11; and of Johanan and the people settling in the way to Egypt, to flee there on occasion, should the Chaldeans fall on them for what was done to the governor, which they feared, Jer 41:16.

But ten men were found among them, that said unto Ishmael, slay us not,.... They begged for their lives, using what follows as an argument to prevail upon him: for we have treasures in the field, of wheat, and of barley, and of oil, and of honey; not that they had then a stock upon the ground at this time; for this being the seventh month, not only the barley and wheat harvests had been over long ago, but the rest of the fruits of the earth were gathered in: but this either means storehouses of such things in the field; or else that these things were hid in cells under ground, the land having been invaded, to secure them from the enemy, as is common to do in time of war; and so Josephus says (i), they promised to deliver to him things hid in the fields, household goods, clothes, and corn: so he forbore, and slew them not among their brethren; but saved them, and kept and carried them with him, in order to take these hidden treasures, which lay in his way to Ammon; for between Gibeon, where he was found, Jer 41:12; and Ammon, lay Samaria, Sichem, and Shiloh; at least it was not far out of his way to take that course; and thus he appears to be a covetous man, as well as a cruel one. (i) Ibid. (Antiqu. l. 10. c. 9. sect. 4.)

ISHMAEL MURDERS GEDALIAH AND OTHERS, THEN FLEES TO THE AMMONITES. JOHANAN PURSUES HIM, RECOVERS THE CAPTIVES, AND PURPOSES TO FLEE TO EGYPT FOR FEAR OF THE CHALDEANS. (Jer. 41:1-18) seventh month--the second month after the burning of the city (Jer 52:12-13). and the princes--not the nominative. And the princes came, for the "princes" are not mentioned either in Jer 41:2 or in Kg2 25:25 : but, "Ishmael being of the seed royal and of the princes of the king" [MAURER]. But the ten men were the "princes of the king"; thus MAURER'S objection has no weight: so English Version. eat bread together--Ishmael murdered Gedaliah, by whom he was hospitably received, in violation of the sacred right of hospitality (Psa 41:9).

treasures--It was customary to hide grain in cavities underground in troubled times. "We have treasures," which we will give, if our lives be spared. slew . . . not-- (Pro 13:8). Ishmael's avarice and needs overcame his cruelty.

Only ten men out of the eighty saved their lives, and this by saying to Ishmael, "Do not kill us, for we have hidden stores in the field - wheat, and barley, and oil, and honey." מטמנים are excavations in the form of cisterns, or subterranean storehouses in the open country, for keeping grain; the openings or entrances to these are so concealed that the eye of a stranger could not perceive them. Such places are still universally employed in Palestine at the present day (Robinson's Palestine, i. pp. 324-5), and are also to be found in other southern countries, both in ancient and modern times; see proofs of this in Rosenmller's Scholia ad hunc locum. It is remarked, in Jer 41:9, of the pit into which Ishmael threw the corpses, that it was the same that King Asa had made, i.e., had caused to be made, against, i.e., for protection against, Baasha the king of Israel. In the historical books there is no mention made of this pit in the account of the war between Asa and Baasha, Kg1 15:16-22 and Ch2 16:1-6; it is only stated in Kg1 15:22 and Ch2 16:6 that, after Baasha, who had fortified Ramah, had been compelled to return to his own land because of the invasion of Benhadad the Syrian king, whom Asa had called to his aid, the king of Judah ordered all his people to carry away from Ramah the stones and timber which Baasha had employed in building, and therewith fortify Geba and Mizpah. The expression מפּני בעשׁא certainly implies that the pit had been formed as a protection against Baasha, and belonged to the fortifications raised at that time. However, הבּור cannot mean the burial-place belonging to the city (Grotius), but only a cistern (cf. Kg2 10:14); and one such as could contain a considerable store of water was as necessary as a wall and a moat for the fortification of a city, so that it might be able to endure a long siege (Graf). Hitzig, on the other hand, takes בּור to mean a long and broad ditch which cut off the approach to the city from Ephraim, or which, forming a part of the fortifications, made a break in the road to Jerusalem, though it was bridged over in times of peace, thus forming a kind of tunnel. This idea is certainly incorrect; for, according to Jer 41:7, the "ditch" was inside the city (בּתוך). The expression בּיד גּדליהוּ is obscure, and cannot be explained with any of certainty. בּיד cannot mean "through the fault of" Gedaliah (Raschi), or "because of" Gedaliah - for his sake (Kimchi, Umbreit), or "coram" Gedaliah (Venema), but must rather be rendered "by means of, through the medium of," or "at the side of, together with." Ngelsbach has decided for the rendering "by means of," giving as his reason the fact that Ishmael had made use of the name of Gedaliah in order to decoy these men into destruction. He had called to them, "Come to Gedaliah" (Jer 41:6); and simply on the authority of this name, they had followed him. But the employment of the name as a means of decoy can hardly be expressed by בּיד. We therefore prefer the meaning "at the hand = at the side of" (following the Syriac, L. de Dieu, Rosenmller, Ewald), although this signification cannot be established from the passages cited by Rosenm. (Sa1 14:34; Sa1 16:2; Ezr 7:23), nor can the meaning "together with" (Ewald) be shown to belong to it. On the other hand, a passage which is quite decisive for the rendering "by the hand of, beside," is Job 15:23 : "there stands ready at his hand (בּידו, i.e., close to him) a day of darkness." If we take this meaning for the passage now before us, then בּיד גּדליהוּ cannot be connected with אשׁר , in accordance with the Masoretic accents, but with השׁליך שׁם, "where Ishmael cast the bodies of the men whom he had slain, by the side of Gedaliah;" so that it is not stated till here and now, and only in a casual manner, what had become of Gedaliah's corpse. Nothing that admits of being proved can be brought against this view. (Note: Because the lxx have, for בּיד גּדליהוּ הוּא, φρέαρ μέγα τοῦτό ἐστιν, J. D. Michaelis, Dahler, Movers, Hitzig, and Graf would change the text, and either take ryb lwdg 'wh (Dahler, Movers) or בּיר הגּדול הוּא (= בּור) as the original reading, inasmuch as one codex of De Rossi's also has בור. But apart from the improbability of בּור גּדול or הגּדול being incorrectly changed into בּיד גּדליהוּ, we find that הוּא stands provokingly in the way; for it would be superfluous, or introduce an improper emphasis into the sentence. The lxx have but been attempting to guess at a translation of a text they did not understand. What Hitzig further supposes has no foundation, viz., that this "ditch" is identical with that mentioned Sa1 19:22, in שׂכוּ, and with τὸ φρέαρ τὸ μέγα of 1 Macc. 7:19; for the ditch at Sechu was near Ramah, which was about four miles from Mizpah, and the large fountain 1 Macc. 7:19 was ἐν Βηζέθ, an unknown place in the vicinity of Jerusalem.) The הוּא which follows is a predicate: "the ditch wherein...was that which Asa the king had formed." The motive for this second series of assassinations by Ishmael is difficult to discover. The supposition that he was afraid of being betrayed, and for this reason killed these strangers, not wishing to be troubled with them, is improbable, for the simple reason that these strangers did not want to go to Mizpah, but to Jerusalem. For the supposition of Thenius (on Kg2 25:23) and of Schmieder, that the people had intended going to Mizpah to a house of God that was there, is very properly rejected by Hitzig, because no mention is made in history of a place of worship at Mizpah; and, according to the express statement of Jer 41:6., Ishmael had enticed them into this city only by inviting them to come and see Gedaliah. Had Ishmael wished merely to conceal the murder of Gedaliah from these strangers, he ought to have done anything but let them into Mizpah. As little can we regard this deed (with Graf) as an act of revenge on these Israelites by Ishmael for the murder of his relations and equals in rank by Nebuchadnezzar (Jer 52:10), because these men, who had now for a long time been living together with heathens, were Assyrian and Chaldean subjects. For we cannot comprehend how he could look on these Israelites as friends of the Chaldeans, and vent his anger against the Chaldean rule by murdering them; the mournful procession which they formed, and the offerings they were carrying to present, proclaimed them faithful adherents of Judah. Ngelsbach, accordingly, is of opinion that Ishmael had simply intended robbery. As it is evident that he, a rough and wild man, had assassinated the noble Gedaliah from personal jealousy, and in order to further the political interest of his Ammonite patron, he must have been seeking to put himself in the position of his victim, or to flee. "When we find, moreover, that he soon murdered a peaceable caravan of pilgrims, and preserved the lives only of a few who offered to show him hidden treasures; when, finally, we perceive that the whole turba imbellis of Mizpah were seized and carried off into slavery, Ishmael proves himself a mere robber." But, though the fact that Ishmael spared the lives of the ten men who offered to show him hidden treasures seems to support this view, yet the supposition that nothing more than robbery was intended does not suffice to explain the double murder. The two series of assassinations plainly stand in the closest connection, and must have been executed from one and the same motive. It was at the instigation of the Ammonite king that Ishmael murdered Gedaliah; moreover, as we learn from the report brought to Gedaliah by Johanan (Jer 40:15), the crime was committed in the expectation that the whole of Judah would then be dispersed, and the remnant of them perish. This murder was thus the work of the Ammonite king, who selected the royally-descended Ishmael as his instrument simply because he could conveniently, for the execution of his plans, employ the personal envy of one man against another who had been preferred by the king of Babylon. There can be no doubt that the same motive which urged him to destroy the remnant of Judah, i.e., to frustrate the attempt to gather and restore Judah, was also at work in the massacre of the pilgrims who were coming to the temple. If Ishmael, the leader of a robber-gang, had entered into the design of the Ammonite king, then everything that might serve for the preservation and consolidation of Judah must have been a source of pain to him; and this hatred of his towards Judah, which derived its strength and support from his religious views, incited him to murder the Jewish pilgrims to the temple, although the prospect of obtaining treasures might well cooperate with this in such a way as to make him spare the ten men who pretended they had hidden stores. With this, too, we can easily connect the hypocritical dealing on the part of Ishmael, in going forth, with tears, to meet these pious pilgrims, so that he might deceive them by making such a show of grief over the calamity that had befallen Judah; fore the wicked often assume an appearance of sanctity for the more effectual accomplishment of their evil deeds. The lxx evidently did not know what to make of this passage as it stands; hence, in Jer 41:6, they have quite dropped the words "from Mizpah," and have rendered הלך הלך by αὐτοὶ ἐπορεύοντο καὶ ἔκλαιον. Hitzig and Graf accept this as indicating the original text, since Ishmael had no ostensible ground for weeping. But the reasons which are supposed to justify this conjecture are, as Ngelsbach well remarks, of such a nature that one can scarcely believe they are seriously held.