JEREMIAH 31

4 Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built [rebuilt], O virgin of Israel [Betulat Yisroel]: thou shalt again be adorned [adorn thyself] with thy tabrets [ timbrels], and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry [the dance of merrymakers].

Jeremiah must have delivered the prophecy of chapter 31 with joy. It demonstrates that though Jewry would receive divine punishments as they deserved and for their good, the nation will ultimately be saved. The apostle Paul similarly argues in Rom. 11 - GEM

www.logos.org.au

10 Hear the word [Devar] of Yahweh, O ye nations [Goyim], and declare it in the isles afar off [preach it in the farthest shores], and say, He that scattered Israel [Yisroel ] will gather him [Yisroel ], and keep him [He shall be shomer over Yisroel], as a shepherd doth his flock [Ro'eh over the Eder thereof].

11 For Yahweh hath redeemed Jacob [Ya'akov], and ransomed [made Geulah] him from the hand [ yad ] of him that was stronger [ chazak] than he [Ya'akov].

...for the past few weeks we have been with the prophet Jeremiah in his trials and sufferings. His life was one of the loneliest and saddest in Scripture. His personal experiences were bitter. The message of disaster he had to proclaim was depressing and unwelcome. And the times in which he lived were of unparalleled national calamity. His efforts were foredoomed to failure. It was a lost cause from the beginning. He was everywhere hated and misunderstood. While intensely loving and grieving for his countrymen and his nation, he was despised and persecuted as an enemy and a traitor.

But amidst all this background of thick gloom, there shines in a few chapters in the center of the book the glorious picture of the eternal kingdom of righteousness that will finally triumph, and in which this rejected prophet will have an honored part.

"Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will raise up into David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth. In his days Judah shall be saved, and Israel shall dwell safely" - chapter 23.

Chapter 31 - "He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock."

Jeremiah was born in the closing years of the long evil reign of Manasseh. This king's reign sealed the doom of the kingdom and brought to an end God's much-tried longsuffering and patience. Jeremiah records, in chapter 15, God speaking, "I will cause them to be removed into all kingdoms of the earth, because of Manasseh the son of Hezekiah king of Judah, for that which he did in Jerusalem...I am weary with repenting."

The evil Manasseh was born during the fifteen years that were added to Hezekiah's life, when he pleaded with God. Far better for Hezekiah and for Israel, if Hezekiah had submitted to God's wisdom and gone to his rest with his glorious record of faith unsullied, as God in His mercy had planned.

Jeremiah begins his ministry in the reign of the good king Josiah. It was a bright brief interlude of righteousness, but it did not last. Josiah began to reign when he was eight years old. When he was sixteen, he dedicated himself to serve God, and when he was twenty, he set about purging Judah from all their wickedness and idolatry. Jeremiah began his ministry in the next year-the thirteenth of Josiah's reign. Jeremiah would be about the same age as Josiah-about twenty.

It is truly a touching picture of these two young men-king and prophet-laboring to turn the nation to righteousness, as the smoldering judgments of God hovered over the land, just as two young men-a prophet and a king, John and Jesus-did in the days of the nation's final judgment.

It is notable that Jeremiah's ministry began just 40 years before the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning of the temple by the Babylonians. We remember that Jesus began his ministry just 40 years before the destruction of Jerusalem and the burning of the temple by the Romans. In each case a 40-year period of final probation was given to the city.

Jeremiah's mission was to witness for God against apostate and worldly Israel. The Jews today still jealously preserve and revere the prophecy of Jeremiah, though it contains their condemnation as a nation and the record of God pleading in vain with them to return and be saved.

Jeremiah's work was not only as a witness of condemnation. It had a far more glorious purpose. It was principally to encourage and strengthen the scattered faithful remnant of his own day and of all ages since. In this sad time of present crisis for the Truth, its message of comfort has great and sustaining power.

Bro Growcott - Prophet of Judgment and Glory

15 Thus saith Yahweh; A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rahel [Rachel] weeping for her children [banim] refused to be comforted for her children [banim], because they were not [no more].

Rachel is put for the town, or women inhabiting the town of Bethlehem, wherein was the sepulchre of the literal Rachel, of which, consequently, those inhabitants were still in possession.

Eureka 13.12.

In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not - Matt 2: 18.

It is impossible to conceive acuter natural agony than that inflicted on the mothers of Bethlehem. As no human affection is stronger than that of a mother for her child, so no suffering could be greater than that caused by this cruel slaughter.

... It is one of the most harrowing episodes in the story of human suffering -- a long, dark, dreadful story. Then was indeed fulfilled, in its most literal and striking manner, that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying

"In Ramah was there a voice heard, lamentation and weeping and great mourning."

The primary application of this prophecy was to the removal of Israel in captivity from the land, but the richness and depth of the mind of God are often seen in two or more analogous coming events being covered in the same prophecy.

Had Joseph and Mary and "the young child" been in Bethlehem at the time, nothing short of a miracle would have saved the child from Herod's executioners. A miracle, no doubt, would in that case have been performed; but God does not work miracles unless they are absolutely necessary.

He shielded His Son from harm by having him removed beforehand [the descent into Egypt]. He has other sons who may hope for similar providential favour; for all His sons are precious to Him.

Nazareth Revisited Ch 9

16 Thus saith Yahweh; Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded [sachar], saith Yahweh; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy [ return from the eretz oyev].

17 And there is hope [tikveh] in thine end [thine acharit (future, latter end)], saith Yahweh, that thy children [ banim ] shall come again [return] to their own border.

I have said, that this belligerent state of things between the King of Israel and the nations of Gogue's dominion, styled "the goats," will continue for forty years. The subjugation will be gradual as Israel is made to "go through" from kingdom to kingdom. "Feed thy people," saith the prophet, "with thy rod, the flock of thy heritage, which dwell solitarily in the wood; let them feed in Bashan and Gilead as in the days of old." In answer to this petition, the Lord replies,

"According to the days of thy coming out of the land of Egypt will I show unto him (Israel) marvellous things."

This is forty years; for so long were they in passing from Egypt to Canaan, which was the type of their coming out from among the nations to the holy land under the generalship of Elijah, the Lord's harbinger, to the Ten Tribes. The "marvellous things" to be shown them will not be performed in private, but will be as notorious as the plagues of Egypt; for

"the nations shall see and be confounded at all their might: they shall lay their hand upon their mouth, their ears shall be deaf. They shall lick the dust like a serpent, they shall move out of their holes like worms of the earth; they shall be afraid of the Lord the God of Israel, and shall fear because of thee" (Mic. 7:14-17).

The more immediate consequence of these exterminating wars will be the cessation of all further resistance in the north, which will have been thus compelled to "give up" the Israelites among them, and to let them go and serve in "the wilderness of the people." They will not march directly into the Holy Land, because the generation of Israelites who leave the north, will be no more fit for immediate settlement there than their fathers were who left Egypt under Moses. They would be as rebellious under the Government of Shiloh as that generation whose carcasses fell in the wilderness, and concerning whom "Yahweh sware in his wrath that they should not enter into his rest."

They must, therefore, be subjected to discipline, and trained up under the divine admonition. But, notwithstanding all the "marvellous things" they will have witnessed, they will prove themselves true to the character of their fathers, who were stiff-necked and perverse, and resistant always of the spirit of God; so that they will not be permitted to enter into the land of Israel. Their children, however, will come thither from "the land of the enemy," and attain to their own border (Jer. 31:15-17).

The reader will, doubtless, desire to know upon what ground I affirm these things. This is as it ought to be; for he should set his face like a flint, and refuse credence to any thing and every thing which is not sustained by "the testimony of God." Turn, then, to the prophet Ezekiel, where it is thus written,

"As I live, saith the Lord God, surely with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out, will I rule over you: and I will bring you out from the people, and will gather you out of the countries wherein ye are scattered with a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out. And I will bring you into the wilderness of the people, and there will I plead with you face to face; like as I pleaded with your fathers in the wilderness of the land of Egypt, so will I plead with you, saith the Lord God. And I will cause you to pass under the rod; and will bring you into a delivering of the covenant: and I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me: I will bring them forth out of the country where they sojourn, and they shall not enter into the land of Israel: and ye shall know that I am the Lord" (Ezek. 20:33-38).

While they are in this wilderness it is, that the Lord Jesus becomes "a stone of stumbling and rock of offence to the house of Israel," as he had before been to Judah; and the consequence is, that "the rebels among them" are excluded flom the blessings of Shiloh's government, and eternal life and glory in the then world to come. Nothing can be plainer than Ezekiel's testimony.

If the reader know how the Lord pleaded with Israel face to face in the wilderness by the hand of Moses, he will well understand the ordeal that yet awaits the tribes to qualify them for admission into the Holy Land. The Lord's power and the angel were with them in the wilderness of Arabia, but they saw not his person; so, I judge, will the Lord Jesus and some of the saints be with Israel in their second Exodus, seen perhaps by their leaders, as the Elohim were by Moses, Aaron, the elders, and by Joshua; but not visible to the multitude of the people, who must walk by faith and not by sight; for, though God is able to graft them in again, he can only do it upon a principle of faith; for the condition of their restoration laid down in his word is, "if they abide not in unbelief they shall be grafted in again."

Elpis Israel 3.6.

18 I have surely heard [Ephrayim] bemoaning himself thus; Thou hast chastised me, and I was chastised, as a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke [ like an unbroken egel]: turn Thou me, and I shall be turned; for thou art Yahweh my Elohim.

While they are in this wilderness it is, that the Lord Jesus becomes "a stone of stumbling and rock of offence to the house of Israel," as he had before been to Judah; and the consequence is, that "the rebels among them" are excluded from the blessings of Shiloh's government, and eternal life and glory in the then world to come. Nothing can be plainer than Ezekiel's testimony.

If the reader know how the Lord pleaded with Israel face to face in the wilderness by the hand of Moses, he will well understand the ordeal that yet awaits the tribes to qualify them for admission into the Holy Land. The Lord's power and the angel were with them in the wilderness of Arabia, but they saw not his person; so, I judge, will the Lord Jesus and some of the saints be with Israel in their second Exodus, seen perhaps by their leaders, as the Elohim were by Moses, Aaron, the elders, and by Joshua; but not visible to the multitude of the people, who must walk by faith and not by sight; for, though God is able to graft them in again, he can only do it upon a principle of faith; for the condition of their restoration laid down in his word is, "if they abide not in unbelief they shall be grafted in again."

It would seem from the testimony of Malachi, who prophesied concerning the ten tribes, that while they are in the wilderness of the people they will be disciplined by the law of Moses as their national code, while things concerning Jesus will be propounded to them as matter of faith; for it is testified by Hosea that they shall be gathered, and "shall sorrow a little for the burden of the King of princes" (Hos. 8:10).

The person with whom they will have more immediately to do in their second exodus is Elijah. There would seem to be a fitness in this.

In the days of their fathers, when they forsook the Lord and abolished the law of Moses, Elijah was the person whose ministerial life was occupied in endeavouring to "restore all things." Though he did much to vindicate the name and law of Yahweh, he was taken away in the midst of his labours. For what purpose? That he might at a future period resume his work and perfect it by restoring all things among the ten tribes according to the law of Moses, preparatory to their being planted in their land under a new covenant to be made with them there (Mal. 4:4-6; Jer. 31:31).

Elpis Israel 3.6.

27 Behold, the days come, saith Yahweh, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man, and with the seed of beast.

The New Covenant of the Kingdom

The "house" here signifies their country, or territory of the kingdom.

"And it shall come to pass that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to throw down, and to afflict; so will I watch over them, to build, and to plant, saith Yahweh."

"If the ordinances of the sun, moon, and stars, depart from before me, saith Yahweh, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me for ever. If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith Yahweh."

The ordinances of the heavenly bodies cannot depart from before Yahweh; heaven cannot be measured; nor the foundations of the earth discovered: therefore, Israel, though widely scattered and peeled, are not cast off for ever; but are certain to be restored, and thenceforth to continue always a nation before God—Jer. 31.

Under the Mosaic Covenant the Twelve Tribes were divided into two nations under two distinct kings from the fourth of Rehoboam to the sixth of Hezekiah, being 256 years. But when they shall cease to be cast off, and instead of being called Lo-ammi, shall become a nation before Yahweh,

"they shall be no more two nations, neither shall they be divided into two kingdoms any more at all;" for "thus saith the Lord Yahweh, I will take the children of Israel from among the nations (goyim) whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them unto their own land: and I will make them one nation in the land upon the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king to them all."—Ezek. 37:21, 22.

When the two houses of Israel, or the Twelve Tribes, are brought into their own land again, the Law, or New Covenant is delivered to them from Mount Zion by their Lord and king; "for out of Zion is to go forth the law," by which their organization as a kingdom is to be accomplished. Referring to this time Yahweh saith, some 470 years after David's decease,

"My servant David shall be their prince for ever. And I will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant with them: and I will place them, and multiply them, and will set my temple (miqudashi) in the midst of them for evermore. My dwelling (mishkani) also shall be with them: yea, I will be their Elohim, and they shall be my people.

And the nations shall know that I Yahweh do sanctify Israel, when my temple shall be in the midst of them for evermore."—Ezek. 37:25–28.

From this testimony it will be seen, first, that the Covenant is not yet made with Israel and Judah; second, that they are in the Lo-ammi state; and thirdly, that they are not yet sanctified, or made holy: for the declared reason that the temple of Yahweh is not yet in the midst of them—and cannot be there until they are restored, and the Lord returns to build it.

Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Sept 1851

31 Behold [Hinei], the days come, saith Yahweh, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel [cut a Brit Chadasha with Bais Yisroel], and with the house of Judah [Bais Yehudah]:

I will make a New Covenant with the House of Israel—Jer. 31:31.

The New Covenant is to be made with the two houses of Israel some time subsequently to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldees when the promise was made. It cannot have been made with them yet; for from the time it is made their iniquity will have been forgiven and forgotten. Will any man in his right mind affirm that the sin and iniquity of the house of Judah is forgiven? Can Judah be forgiven their treatment of their King so long as they continue in unbelief? No; the grafting of the Twelve Tribes into their own Olive is predicated on their not continuing in unbelief.—Rom. 11:23.

The Covenant is not yet made with Israel, or we should behold every Israelite a living tablet of the new law, full of the knowledge of God, and in disposition like their fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

The Mosaic Covenant was engraved on stones; but the New is not to be recorded thus; it is to be inscribed upon their hearts by the spirit; for, saith Yahweh,

" I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them. And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and ye shall be my people, and I will be your God."—Ezek. 36:27.

And again,

"I will hide my face no more from them; for I have poured out my spirit upon the house of Israel, saith Yahweh."—ch. 39:29.

No sophistry can make this applicable to the past. God's face is now hid from them, and because of the hiding thereof, they are wanderers among the nations, not walking in his statutes, nor observing his judgments to do them.

By the New and everlasting covenant of peace, the Twelve Tribes will be brought into legal possession of their country; Jerusalem will be safely inhabited; it will become the Lord's throne; and the nation will be constituted holy with an everlasting righteousness in the Lord their king; for

"in Yahweh shall all the seed of Israel be justified, and shall glory."—Isai. 45:25.

They will be justified in the Lord by faith in him, and because they believe in him, they will glory in him. But before they can be justified in him, they must be introduced into him; the nation must put him on as "Yahweh its righteousness."

During the interregnum, an individual believer in Jesus and the things of the covenant, is introduced into Jesus as the Christ that he may be "justified in the Lord," by baptism into his name; so the believing nation will be baptized in the Red Sea into Jesus, as it was before into Moses, when all its sins will be cast into the depths of the sea, and it will come to Zion to receive the law, or Covenant of peace.

In proof of this second passage of Israel through the Red Sea, see Ps. 68:22; Isai. 11:15, 16; Zech. 10:10–12; and Mic. 7:19.

Thus is the nation introduced into the name of the Lord, in which its "new heart and new spirit," and its faith in Jesus, are granted to it for repentance and remission of sins; and they are accepted. Henceforth, "they shall walk up and down in his name." They shall be "settled after their old estates."

"Their land that was desolate shall become as the garden of Eden; and the waste, and desolate, and ruined cities, fenced and inhabited."

As for Jerusalem it shall be called "a city of truth," and

"its name from that day shall be, Yahweh-shammah, the Lord is there."—Ezek. 36:26; Acts 5:31; Ezek. 48:35.

Herald of the Kingdom and Age to Come, Sept 1851

32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers [Brit that I cut with their Avot] in the day that I took them by the hand [yad] to bring them out of the land of Egypt [Eretz Mitzrayim]; which My covenant they brake [My Brit they broke], although I was an Husband [Ba'al] unto them, saith Yahweh:

The first constitution of things under which the Jews existed as the Kingdom of God has been done away with, and will not be re-established. When they are restored, a New Covenant will be made with them...

The Good Confession

33 But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel [Brit that I will cut with Bais Yisroel]; After those days, saith Yahweh, I will put My law in their inward parts [Torah in them inwardly], and write it in their hearts [ketuvim on their hearts]; and [I] will be their Elohim, and they shall be my people.

Ketuvim - The third and final section of the Hebrew Bible: Psalms, Proverbs, Job, Songs, Lamentations, Ruth, Esther, Ecclesiastes, Daniel, Ezra, Esther.

There is poetry - of Temple ritual, private prayer, wisdom, national tragedy, even love. There is philosophical exploration-of the wisest path in life, of God's goodness and justice. There are historical retellings and short stories.

https://www.myjewishlearning.com/article/ketuvim-writings/

The Name was "written"

Three terms are used in this connection-to write, to engrave, to seal. To write implies the implanting of information, knowledge, understanding, thoughts-

"I will put My law in their inward parts and write it in their hearts" (Jer. 31:33).

"Ye are our epistle, written in our hearts, known and read of all men . . . written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the Living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart" (2 Cor. 3:2, 3).

To engrave carries the thought further. It speaks of a shaping, a deep and permanent penetration and impression. God declares of the Christ-stone, cut out of the mountain

without hands (Zech. 3:9)-

"Upon one stone shall be seven eyes-(the seven eyes of the little lamb, the seven spirits of Deity)-Behold, I will engrave the graving thereof."

In the Mosaic Tabernacle, only three things were engraved, all to do with the High Priest's vestments-

1. The stones on the shoulders-the strength;

2. The stones in the breastplate-the heart;

3. The pure golden plate on the forehead-the mind.

"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy strength and with all thy heart and with all thy mind."

Bro Growcott - 144 000 on Mount Zion

34 And they shall teach no more every man his neighbour [ ish his re'a ], and every man [ ish] his brother, saying, Know Yahweh: for they shall all know Me [have da'as of Me], from the least [katon] of them unto the greatest [gadol] of them, saith Yahweh: for I will forgive their iniquity [avon], and I will remember their sin [chattat] no more.

When this is accomplished, they will be a truthful and righteous nation, and filled with the spirit as the apostles were of old. Thus anointed, they will be intelligent and wise, and the mightiest of the nations of the earth. The Hebrew nation has never attained to so high a position as this yet; nevertheless, it is the destiny that awaits their repentance, and acknowledgement of Jesus Anointed, as their Lord and King.

Eureka 3.2.8.