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

422 TRANSLATION, NOTES, AND COMMENTS

v 9 they shall come yabo'Ct

Israel

and I will make

them glad

v 14 my people

NOTES

wesimmal;itfm

31:7. For thus said Yahweh: Cry with gladness for Jacob, and scream over The
Head of the Nations. The LXX expands the messenger formula, rearranges the
two verbs, and omits siml;ia ("gladness"), its translation being: "For thus said
the Lord to Jacob: Rejoice and exult over the head of the nations." But Yahweh
is not addressing Jacob. Jeremiah begins as speaker of the oracle by telling an
unspecified audience to be joyful on Jacob's behalf. This directive to cry out in
hymnic joy occurs often in the Psalms (Pss 5:12[Eng 5:11]; 33:1; 98:4, 8; 132:9;
149:5), as well as in Second Isaiah (Isa 44:23; 49:13; 52:9; 54:1). Isaiah 51:11
says that the ransomed of Yahweh will come with singing (berinna) to Zion.
See also Deut 32:43; Zeph 3:14; Isa 55:12; and Zech 2:14[Eng 2:10]. The two
verbs, mn ("cry for joy") and $hl ("shout, scream"), occur together in Isa 12:6
and 24:14.
Jacob. Here referring to just Northern Israel (Cornill), as is the case with
"Ephraim" in v 9.
and scream over The Head of the Nations. Hebrew we$ahalu hero's hagg6yim.
The verb is $hl, which means "scream, make a shrilling cry," or with reference
to horses, "neigh" (5:8; 13:27; 50:11). Here is it a human scream of joy (cf. Isa
24:14). Parallelism in the bicolon makes "The Head of the Nations" a boastful
epithet for Jacob. This epithet could also be translated "The First of the Na-
tions" (Weiser; Bright), which would go better with Ephraim the "firstborn" in
v 9. In Amos 6: 1 Jerusalem and Samaria's notables are ironically called "distin-
guished ones of the first of the nations (re'sft hagg6yim)." One of the covenant
curses states that if the covenant is disobeyed the sojourner in Israel will be-
come the "head" (ro'S) and the Israelite the "tail" (Deut 28:43-44). Now, with
restoration in view, Israel will once again become "head (of the nations)."
Babylon in her day of reckoning will become "last of the nations," 'af:iarft
goyim (Jer 50:12). Rashi imagines the joyful scream here as being made from
lofty towers so it can be heard. Duhm is thinking along similar lines in wanting
to emend "the nations" (haggoyim) to "mountains" (harfm). The scream in his
view is made on the top (ro'S) of the mountains (cf. Isa 42:11). Some scholars
(Giesebrecht; Peake; Cornill; Ehrlich 1912: 320; Snaith 1945: 25; Hyatt) have
adopted this reading, but it is self-serving to the extent that it creates yet an-
other parallel to Second Isaiah for those wanting to date the oracle in the post-
exilic period. As a matter of fact, the scream of joy, the proclamation, and the
praise of Yahweh's salvation could occur anywhere.
Proclaim, praise, and say. Asyndeton, on which see Note on 4:5.
Yahweh has saved your people. The Masoretes pointed the verb as an imper-
ative: h68a' ("Save!"), but T and LXX translate a perfect form, "(he) has saved."