Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Jeremiah 5:17
And they shall eat up thine harvest, and thy bread, [which] thy sons and thy daughters should eat: they shall eat up thy flocks and thine herds: they shall eat up thy vines and thy fig trees: they shall impoverish thy fenced cities, wherein thou trustedst, with the sword.
17. which thy sons and thy daughters should eat ] This is the rendering which the Heb. on the whole suggests, though the meaning may be, they shall eat thy sons and thy daughters. Seeing, however, that cannibalism is not to be attributed to the Scythians, it is probable that the clause is either metaphorical (cp. Jer 3:24) or has been inserted through the influence of the closely connected passage, Deu 28:49-53, where, however, it is the besieged who are driven to this resort.
shall beat down ] not, as mg. impoverish.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Or,
It shall eat thine harvest and thy bread:
They shall eat thy sons and thy daughters.
It shall eat thy sheep and thy cattle:
It shall eat thy vines and thy fig-trees.
They shall impoverish … – Or, It shall batter thy fortified cities, wherein thou trustest, with weapons of war. There is probably reference here to an instrument like a battering-ram, with which the Assyrians beat down the walls of their enemies.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
They shall eat up thine harvest, and thy bread; they shall make clean riddance, leave thee, no supports of life, but bring an utter famine upon thee; it is thus threatened Deu 28:30,48,51.
Which thy sons and thy daughters should eat; or, they shall eat up thy sons and thy daughters; but this is only a metonymy of the effect: but properly, this aggravates the dreadfulness of the judgment; parents, out of the tenderness of their affection, choosing rather to die themselves, than to live to see their children starved before their eyes, and they no ways able to relieve them, Lam 2:10,11.
They shall eat up thy flocks, & c.; a particular enumeration of the desolation that would be made, all tending to the greatness of the former. They shall impoverish thy fenced cities, wherein thou trustedst, with the sword, i.e. beside the waste that the famine would make among persons, their cities also should be depopulated by the sword of the enemy; or rather, possibly the siege should be so strait and strict, as may be implied in the word impoverish, that they should be forced to eat one another, till they were quite wasted, they should be reduced to such poverty and exigencies; or the sword may relate to the mentioned mischiefs, as the cause of them all, the sword shall do all this: in all which he doth not so much tell them that the Chaldeans shall conquer them, for that is taken as it were for granted, as what cruelties they shall use when they have conquered.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
17. (Le26:16).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And they shall eat up thine harvest,…. The standing corn in the fields, cut it down, and give it as fodder to their horses, which is usually done by armies; or the increase of the earth, when gathered into the barn, which so great an army would consume:
and thy bread; which includes all kind of provisions:
which thy sons and thy daughters should eat; which is an aggravation of the calamity and misery, that that should become the prey of their enemies, which they with so much labour and pains had provided for their children, who would now be deprived of it, and suffer want, The Targum renders it,
“shall kill thy sons and thy daughters;”
that is, with the sword; and so Kimchi interprets it; and so other versions read, “they shall eat up, or devour, thy sons and thy daughters” z; the sword ate them up, or devoured them; and they who besieged them were the cause or occasion of their being eaten literally, even by their own parents; see La 2:20:
they shall eat up thy flocks and thy herds; their sheep and oxen, as the Targum interprets it:
they shall eat up thy vines and thy fig trees: that is, the fruit of them, as the same paraphrase explains it:
they shall impoverish thy fenced cities, wherein thou trustedst, with the sword; that is, such strong and fortified cities as Jerusalem, and others, in which the Jews trusted they should be safe from their enemies; these the Chaldeans would enter into, kill with the sword those they found in garrisons, demolish the fortifications, take away what wealth and riches were laid up there, and so impoverish them, and render them weak and defenceless. The Targum of this clause is,
“shall destroy the fortified cities of thy land, in which thou trustedst thou shouldest be safe from those that kill with the sword.”
z “vorabunt filios tuos et filias tuas”, Calvin; “devorabunt”, Vatablus; “comedent filios tuos et filias tuas”, Pagninus, Montanus, Cocceius.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
This people will devour the harvest and the bread, the children, the cattle, and the best fruits of the land. Devour, here as often, in the wider sense, destroy; cf. e.g., Jer 3:24 and Jer 10:25, where the first half of the present verse is compressed into the words: they ate up Jacob. We need not wait to refute Hitz.’s absurd remark, that the author imagined the enemy, the assumed Scythians, to be cannibals. In the second half of the verse the words, “the fenced cities wherein thou trustest,”are a reminiscence of Deu 28:52; and hence we may see, that while our prophet is describing the enemy in Jer 5:15-18, Moses’ threatening, Deu 28:49-52, was in his mind. , break in pieces, as in Mal 1:4. With the sword, i.e., by force of arms; the sword, as principal weapon, being named, instead of the entire apparatus of war. In Jer 5:18 the restriction of Jer 5:10 (cf. Jer 4:27) is repeated, and with it the threatening of judgment is rounded off.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
He continues to speak in a similar way of the cruelty of their enemies; as though he said that victory was already in their hand, for they were the scourges of God. He does not then set before the Jews the troubles of war, but speaks of them as conquered; and he only shews that the Chaldeans would be cruel in the use they would make of their victory. He takes it as granted that the Chaldeans would be conquerors, for they would come armed from above: and he makes this addition, — that they would act cruelly and in an unusual manner towards the vanquished Jews.
Hence he says, They will eat (it will eat, for he changes the number, though the sense remains the same (146)) thine harvest and thy bread; that is, all that thou gatherest shall become a prey to thine enemies; for by harvest and bread he means every kind of provision. Then he adds, thy sons and thy daughters, which was still worse; it is indeed hard to be deprived of food, but it is still more dreadful for parents to see their children slain before them. The Prophet however says, that such would be the barbarity of their enemies, that they would not spare even boys and girls. He further mentions herds and flocks; and then he adds the vine and the fig-tree; as though he said, nothing would be safe among the Jews, for their enemies would plunder everything, and that being not content with meat and drink, they would kill their very infants. And further, as the Jews had fortified cities, and were on that account insolent towards the prophets, their vain pride is here brought down; for he says, that their fortified cities would be reduced to poverty; and he adds, in which thou trustest All these, he says, shall fall by the sword; for this last word, בחרב, becherab, applies to the whole verse, and to each part of it; as though he had said, “By the right of the sword shall the conquerors lay waste thy whole country, even all thy possessions; yea, and they shall slay thy sons and thy daughters.” It follows —
(146) According to the Hebrew, the verbs, except the second, are all in the singular number. The Septuagint have pluralized them, but the singular is retained by the Vulgate, the Targum, and the Syriac. It is the “nation” described in the 15 verse. The second verb may be rendered in a passive sense, and the meaning will be more appropriate, —
And it will devour thy harvest and thy food, Devoured shall be thy sons and thy daughters; It will devour thy sheep and thy ox, It will devour thy wine and thy fig-tree; It will wholly desolate thy fortified cities, In which thou trustest, by the sword.
The language used here, and in the 15 verse, is remarkably like that of Moses in Deu 28:48. The second line may be deemed parenthetic. It is better to preserve the poetic singular in sheep, ox, vine, and fig-tree. As it is a reduplicate verb, entire desolation is intended, and that by the “sword” in destroying all the occupants of fortified cities. Venema, and others, as well as Calvin, connect the “sword” with all the preceding clauses; but this is not necessary, nor is it indeed suitable. — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(17) Which thy sons and thy daughters should eat.There is no relative pronoun in the Hebrew, and the clause stands parallel with the others, they shall eat (i.e., destroy) thy sons and thy daughters, and is so translated in all the older versions. In the other clauses the verb is in the singular, it (i.e., the invading army) shall eat.
Impoverish.Better, break down, or shatter. The sword is used, as in Eze. 26:9, for battle-axes and other weapons used in attacking cities.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
17. They shall eat up thine harvest The English differs from the other Versions on this passage, and clearly misses the construction. It should be rendered, as by Keil, It shall eat up thy sons and thy daughters: it shall eat up thy flocks and thy cattle; eat up thy vine and thy fig tree.
They shall impoverish Rather, it shall break down. The word is used besides only in Mal 1:4.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jer 5:17 And they shall eat up thine harvest, and thy bread, [which] thy sons and thy daughters should eat: they shall eat up thy flocks and thine herds: they shall eat up thy vines and thy fig trees: they shall impoverish thy fenced cities, wherein thou trustedst, with the sword.
Ver. 17. And they shall eat up thy harvest. ] Partita gladio, partita gala. Consider the calamity of war, and take course to prevent it.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
they shall eat up. Reference to Pentateuch (Lev 26:16). App-92. Repeated three times by Figure of speech Anaphora, for great emphasis.
harvest, &c. Note the similar enumeration in Hab 3:17.
impoverish = beat down. Only again in Mal 1:4.
trustedst = confidedst. Hebrew. batah. App-69.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Marg
trustedst (See Scofield “Psa 2:12”)
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
And they: Lev 26:16, Deu 28:30, Deu 28:31, Deu 28:33, Jdg 6:3, Jdg 6:4, Isa 62:9, Isa 65:22, Hab 3:17, Hab 3:18
they shall impoverish: Jer 1:15, Jer 4:7, Jer 4:26, Lam 2:2, Eze 36:4, Zep 3:6
Reciprocal: Deu 8:8 – vines Jdg 6:6 – impoverished Psa 73:12 – they Isa 62:8 – Surely I will no more give Hos 11:6 – the sword Joe 2:3 – and behind Zep 1:13 – their goods
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Jer 5:17. This verse is almost literal in that it predicts what was done by the Babylonians in taking possession of the property in Palestine. The last chapter of 2 Kings gives a history of the final invasion wherein the country was taken over.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
These soldiers would devour and demolish everything that the Judahites owned and trusted in for security.