522 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTSfor I will surely restore their fortunes. Hebrew kf->asfb >et-sebUtam. The theme
of the completed Book of Restoration, on which see Rhetoric and Composi-
tion for 30:1-3. For the expression elsewhere and those occurrences in Jere-
miah employing an internal H-stem as here, see Note for 29:14.MESSAGE AND AUDIENCE
A small Judahite audience assembled in the court of the guard witnessed the
unusual land purchase reported here, and sometime later another audience,
perhaps a bit larger, heard this report along with eight oracles and a prayer by
Jeremiah, which make up the narrative as we now have it. This later audience
is told that in the tenth year of Zedekiah, when Nebuchadrezzar was besieg-
ing Jerusalem, Jeremiah received a word from Yahweh while he was in the
court of the guard. The reason for his confinement is explained. He was put
there by Zedekiah, who wanted to know why Jeremiah was prophesying evil
for Jerusalem and himself. The two oracles that follow were presumably spo-
ken to the king before Jeremiah was put into the court of the guard. In the
first, Yahweh says he is giving Jerusalem into the hand of the king of Babylon.
Zedekiah too will be given into his hand, and he can expect to be mouth to
mouth and eye to eye before the great king. Nebuchadrezzar will do the talk-
ing, roundly denouncing the enchained Zedekiah for breaking an oath he had
sworn to him. In a second oracle, Yahweh says that Nebuchadrezzar will take
Zedekiah to Babylon, and there he will remain until Yahweh visits him. A
Judahite audience is then told directly that although they are fighting the
Chaldeans, it is a lost cause and they will not succeed.
Following this background, the audience is told what came to Jeremiah as a
present word from Yahweh. The account comes as a first-person report. Yah-
weh told Jeremiah that his cousin Hanamel would come and ask him to buy
his field in Anathoth. The cousin had evidently fallen on hard times and
needed to sell. The right of redemption belonged to Jeremiah. Things hap-
pened just as Yahweh said. Hanamel came to the court of the guard and asked
Jeremiah to buy his field. Jeremiah says that then he knew this was a word from
Yahweh. So he bought the field, weighed out 17 shekels of silver, signed the
deed, had it sealed, and called for witnesses. Once the transaction was com-
pleted, Jeremiah took the deed-both the sealed and the open copy containing
the contract and the conditions-and gave them to Baruch in the presence of
Hanamel, the witnesses, and others who were present.
Two oracles were then spoken to Baruch in the presence of those assembled.
In the first, Baruch was commanded to take the deeds and put them in an
earthenware jar for safekeeping. He would probably bury them. In a second or-
acle, Yahweh gave the larger meaning of what had just transpired: once again,
houses, fields, and vineyards would be bought in the land of Judah.
With the land purchase completed, a prayer to Yahweh by Jeremiah is then
reported. It is not known whether those assembled in the court of the guard
heard this prayer. It may have been prayed later. But the audience now hearing