Jeremiah 21-36 A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary by (Anchor Yale Bible Commentaries)

444 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTS

for the shame of your youth you will forget

and the reproach of your widowhood you will not remember any more.

for I bore the reproach of my youth. Hebrew berpa ("reproach") is a common

Jeremiah term, appearing often in strings of curse words (see Note for 24:9).

Israel has accumulated both sin and shame from her youth (3:24-25; 22:21;

32:30; cf. Isa 48:8; 54:4).

MESSAGE AND AUDIENCE

Jeremiah here tells his Judahite audience that from the distant north the wim-
pering voice of Ephraim can be heard. It speaks words of contrition, and Jere-
miah repeats them for all to hear. Ephraim admits to having accepted
Yahweh's discipline. He was, by his own admission, like a young bull unwilling
to bear the yoke. Now he asks that Yahweh restore him; without this, estrange-
ment will continue and he may remain forever in the land where he now re-
sides. More confession follows. Ephraim says that after turning away he was
genuinely sorry and repented, and once he did some self-evaluation he reacted
with horror. He was ashamed and disgraced, for the reproach of his youth he
was forced to bear.
This may also be early preaching with a focus on Northern Israel; similarly,
Yahweh's response that follows. The Judahite audience hearing it can sense
its own need to confess sin and be restored to Yahweh's favor, but will it? After
the fall of Jerusalem, the poem and its companion oracle will be a timely
word for all the exiles, making it clear to them that the way back into Yah-
weh's favor and the way back to the Land of Promise is through repentance
and self-understanding.

m) But I Still Remember Ephraim (31:20)

31 20 Is Ephraim my dear son?

Is he the child of delight?

For more than all my speaking against him

I will assuredly remember him still

Therefore my innards moan for him

I will assuredly have mercy on him

-oracle of Yahweh.

RHETORIC AND COMPOSITION

MT 31:20 = LXX 38:20. The present verse contains a divine oracle answering
Ephraim's confession in vv 18-19. Yahweh does not address Ephraim directly,
as he did Rachel in vv 16-17, but rather speaks to an unspecified audience.
There are no section markings separating this oracle from its companion
poem, but a setumah in 4QJerc and ML and a petubah in Mr follow the "oracle