1The word that Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Baruch son of Neriah as he wrote these words in a book from the mouth of Jeremiah in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, saying, 2“Thus said the LORD God of Israel concerning you, Baruch: 3You said, ‘O woe is me, for the LORD has added sorrow to my pain. I am weary with my groaning, and no rest have I found.’ 4Thus shall you say to him: Thus said the LORD. Look, what I built I will destroy. What I planted I will uproot—all of that land is Mine. 5As for you, do you seek great things for yourself? Do not seek, for I am about to bring evil upon all flesh, said the LORD, but I will give you your life as booty in all the places where you go.”
CHAPTER 45 NOTES
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1. The word that Jeremiah the prophet spoke to Baruch son of Neriah. After the narrative of Jeremiah’s probably unwilling descent into Egypt and his confrontation with his countrymen there, the text goes back to the fourth year of Jehoiakim, which would be 605 B.C.E., almost two decades earlier. This brief chapter may have been intended editorially as a kind of concluding frame for all the preceding narrative material, especially if, as is often inferred, Baruch is the author of these narratives.
as he wrote these words in a book from the mouth of Jeremiah. “From the mouth of,” as before, means “from the dictation of.” The book of prophecies that Baruch is writing out could not be the one burned by Zedekiah because that happened considerably later. The reasonable inference is that this is a first installment of the prophecies of Jeremiah, perhaps chapters 1–20 in the canonical collection.
3. O woe is me. The language here is close to poetry—specifically the poetry of lament—although the sentence does not quite scan as formal verse. The cause for the woe may be the dire content of the prophecies.
I am weary with my groaning. Approximate parallels of this language appear in Psalms 6:7 and 69:4.
4. all of that land is Mine. The Masoretic Text reads, abruptly, “all of that land,” prefaced by an accusative particle but without a verb. The Targum Yonatan translates as “all of the Land of Israel, for it is Mine,” but it is uncertain whether this is based on a Hebrew text that showed this reading or is simply an interpretive clarification.
5. As for you, do you seek great things for yourself? This is not a time for personal ambition (which would not have been out of place on the part of a scribe) when the entire country is about to be laid waste. Against the background of the preceding chapters, Baruch’s fate, with the national hierarchy where he might have risen in ruins, will be to go with a group of exiles to Egypt and, in all likelihood, to chronicle the conflict there between the prophet and the other exiles.
I will give you your life as booty in all the places where you go. As before, this expression means: I will enable you to survive, but you can count on little more than that. “All the places where you go” probably intimates the future destiny of exile.