Speaking of Kings (21:1-23:8) 115vation high above these valleys gives the city a look of being secure, which is
what this oracle is all about (Calvin).
rock of the tableland. Hebrew $UT hammfsor. Although mfs8r can mean "level
ground, plain," a better translation here is "tableland," as in 48:8 and 21, where
the term denotes the Moab highlands. Jerusalem sits high in the hill country of
Judah, remote and secure like a rock on the height.
Who can come down upon us. I.e., from the hills around about Jerusalem,
particularly the Mount of Olives to the east, which looks down upon the city.
Hebrew yebat is from the root nbf, meaning "to descend, penetrate." The LXX
(tis ptoesei hemas, "Who will frighten us?") and Vg (quis percutiet nos, "Who
will pierce us?") appear to read an N-stem imperfect of the verb btt, "be shat-
tered, terrified" (cf. Isa 7 :8; 30:31). The boast of the royal house is that J erusa-
lem is impervious to attack. Moab and Edom harbored a similar pride about
their cities ( 48:28-30; 49: 16).
and who can enter into our habitations? I.e., the royal buildings of the city.
The T has "into our palaces." But Heb me<8n8tenu may carry the disparaging
meaning, "our (hidden) dens" (NJV: "Who can get into our lairs?").- But I will reckon upon you according to the fruit of your doings-oracle of
Yahweh. The LXX omits, which can be attributed to haplography (homoeoarc-
ton: w ... w). In such a brief oracle the line can hardly be an add-on (pace
Rudolph; Janzen 1973: 44 #47; and Holladay, who take it as quarried from
23:2). The phrase is different in 23:2. Aquila and Theod have the line here.
On the verb pqd ("to reckon, pay a visit, punish"), which occurs very often in
Jeremiah, see Note for 5:9.
according to the fruit of your doings. The phrase (with "his doings") occurs
in the poetry of 17: 10 and the prose of 32: 19, the only other occurrences in the
OT (Holladay 1960: 3 5 5). The "fruit of your doings" refers here to miscarriages
of justice, a theme upon which the OT prophets never ceased to vent their ire
(Amos 5:10-13; Isa 1:15-17, 21-23; 5:22-23; Jer 2:34; 5:26-28; Ezek 22:29) and
which was also voiced impassionedly in Temple Psalms (Ps 94: 1-7). Injustice
is commonplace during the reign of Jehoiakim (22:17; cf. 7:8-11). Unjust
reigns in other societies similarly came under censure (see Neo-Babylonian
and much earlier Ugaritic texts in Notes for 2:34 and 5:28).
And I will kindle a fire in her forest, and it will consume everything around
her. For variations of this refrain in Jeremiah and elsewhere, see Note for
17:27. This "forest" (ya<ar) is not the wooded hills surrounding Jerusalem
(pace McKane) but royal buildings within the city (Calvin). Because of a lav-
ish use of cedar, one of the buildings of the royal palace was called "The
House of the Forest of Lebanon" (1Kgs7:2-12; 10:17-21), whose destruction
is again predicted in 22:5, 6-7, and 20-23.
MESSAGE AND AUDIENCE
In the first of these oracles, Yahweh begins by admonishing the royal house to
carry out justice in the manner it is supposed to, one example being to rescue