208 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTSconfused with faithful preaching of Yahweh's word. The shift to the singular
sets forth a general principle, which is used here in defense of Jeremiah's
preaching and maybe also to designate him "the prophet like Moses" ( 1 :6-9;
cf. Num 12:6-8). For another shift to the singular to state a general principle,
see v 3 7. The LXX has "let him recount his dream," which some commentators
(Cornill; Rudolph; Weiser; Bright; cf. BHS) adopt. The MT may have lost a
waw through haplography (next word begins with waw).
faithfully. Or "truthfully." Hebrew >emet. The term is an adverbial accusative
(Giesebrecht; Cornill; cf. GKC § l 18m). On faithful preaching in the NT, see
2 Cor 2:17 and 2 Tim 2:15.
What is the grain to the straw? Hebrew bar is clean, threshed grain; teben the
crushed stalks, i.e., "straw" or "chaff." This oracle may be an old proverb (Mc-
Kane), here pressed into service to contrast the divine word with narrated
dreams. The contrast is not, as Overholt ( 1970: 68) maintains, between dreams
and words that call a wayward people to repentance, on the one hand, and
dreams and words that lead people astray, on the other. It is between the true
word of Yahweh and dreams that are false. The "grain and straw" image gets a
different but not entirely contrary twist in the Talmud (Nedarim 8a-8b),
where, in a discussion about how a ban placed upon one in a dream might be
lifted, Rabbi A}:ia is said to have posed the question to Rabbi Ashi: "What if one
was both banned and freed from the ban in a dream?'' Rabbi Ashi answered:
"Just as grain is impossible without straw, so is there no dream without mean-
ingless matter."
oracle of Yahweh. The LXX omits this formula but then adds, "so are my
words." This is probably from the kh dbry that begins the next oracle, which in
the MT is pointed to read "so-my word." Here we seem to have a good case
for dittography, since "my words" (but not "so") occurs in the LXX at the be-
ginning of v 29. Janzen (1973: 12) proposes a double reading, conflated differ-
ently in MT and LXX. The suggestion by Polak ( 1984), who reads the verse as
poetry, that the LXX with an "expanded colon" is the more original text, the
MT being a secondary condensation, is unconvincing.
- Is it not so-my word is like fire ... and like a hammer shattering rock?
Yahweh's words in the mouth of Jeremiah were to become like a fire that would
consume people (5: 14). Within him, the divine word was a fire he could not
contain (20:8-9). Nahum spoke of Yahweh's wrath being poured out as a con-
suming fire and a force sufficient to shatter rocks (Nah 1:6). The ancient He-
brews, along with other peoples of preclassical antiquity, are said to have
understood the spoken word as creative energy (Thornton 1945-46), i.e., words
were invested with enormous power, enabling them to create and destroy, as
well as to be self-fulfilling. Once spoken, words could not be called back. In
support of this view it is pointed out that dabar means both "word" and "act,''
and it is said that a distinction between the two was not made by the ancient
Hebrews. The latter point, however, has not gone unchallenged (Thiselton
1974: 287). Language of such a dynamic character is particularly in evidence
when God speaks or when prophets speak on his behalf (Amos 3:8; Hos 6:5;