Jeremiah 24

24:1 THE LORD shewed me, and, behold, two baskets of figs set before the temple of the LORD; after that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon had carried away captive Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, and the princes of Judah, with the craftsmen and smiths, from Jerusalem, and had brought them to Babylon. One basket had very good figs, like the figs that are first ripe: and the other basket had very bad figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad. Then said the LORD unto me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs, very good; and the bad, very bad, that cannot be eaten, they are so bad. And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Thus saith the LORD, the God of Israel; Like these good figs, so will I regard the captives of Judah, whom I have sent out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans, for good. For I will set mine eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them again to this land: and I will build them, and not pull them down; and I will plant them, and not pluck them up. And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God: for they shall return unto me with their whole heart. And as the bad figs, which cannot be eaten, they are so bad; surely thus saith the LORD, So will I give up Zedekiah the king of Judah, and his princes, and the residue of Jerusalem, that remain in this land, and them that dwell in the land of Egypt: I will even give them up to be tossed to and fro among all the kingdoms of the earth for evil; to be a reproach and a proverb, a taunt and a curse, in all places whither I shall drive them. And I will send the sword, the famine, and the pestilence, among them, till they be consumed from off the land that I gave unto them and to their fathers.

Chap. 24. This is one of those prophecies which were delivered after the reign of Jehoiakim, and in the former or peaceable part of Zedekiah’s reign, before he renounced his allegiance to the king of Babylon. We cannot be mistaken in placing this chapter at the very beginning of Zedekiah’s reign, within the first year at least, since the vision is dated from after the carrying away of Jeconiah and the people with him into captivity, as from an event which happened but a little before. Blayney.—The date and subject of this short chapter are obvious—the date being after the second deportation of captives to Babylon at the close of the short reign of Jehoiachin (“Jeconiah”), and, indeed, after Zedekiah, his successor, had ascended the throne. The subject is the character of those who were carried to Babylon in contrast with the character of those who remained behind. H. C.

This short chapter helps us to put a very comfortable construction upon a great many long ones, by showing us that the same providence which to some is a savor of death unto death, may by the grace and blessing of God be made to others a savor of life unto life; and that though God’s people share with others in the same calamity, yet that it is not the same to them that it is to others, but is designed for their good, and shall issue in their good; to them it is a correcting rod in the hand of a tender Father, while to others it is an avenging sword in the hand of a righteous Judge. H

During the miserable eleven years of Zedekiah’s reign, the prophet had consistently declared that not the king and the nobles and people of Jerusalem were God’s true Israel, but the exiles carried captive to Babylon with Jeconiah. In chap. 24 he compares these latter to a basket of very good figs, like those first ripe, while Zedekiah and his people were but the refuse, “very naughty figs, which could not be eaten, they were so bad.” I need not say how irritating such a method of treatment would be to both king and nobles; but at Babylon it had a different effect. Jeremiah, though not without opposition, became the great authority there. He wrote the exiles also a letter (chap. 29), directing them to dwell quietly at Babylon, and build houses, and plant gardens, and take wives, and in all things prepare for a lengthened sojourn of seventy years. They were even “to seek the peace of Babylon,” and settle down as loyal and industrious citizens. And then God would grant them a return to their land; in them the fortunes of Israel would revive; for they were Jehovah’s people, the possessors of the promise, and not Zedekiah and his court, and the dwellers at Jerusalem, for whom Jeremiah predicts nothing but evil and misery, and again contemptuously calls them " vile figs, too bad to be eaten" (verse 17.)

As time rolled on, and the destruction of Jerusalem confirmed the truth of the prophet’s words, his prediction of a restoration after seventy years became the great solace of the exiles. They read with pleasure how God had chosen them as the depositories of the promise, even while Jerusalem was still standing; they saw that that promise was not bound up so much with places and things as with true and believing hearts. And gradually a change passed over them. No doubt among the exiles there were many whose characters had been formed by Jeremiah, and who wrought heartily for the same ends. The children of the men who had stood by Josiah in his reforms were the dominant leaders at Babylon. And there they prevailed. Instead of the old longing for idolatry, a passionate devotion to the one true spiritual God became inwrought deeply into their hearts. And Jeremiah they felt to be, as in truth he was, the deliverer of their nation. The man who in life had been branded as a traitor and falsehearted, became the object of their fervent love. R. P. S.

1-3. The prophet indicates that these baskets of figs are seen in vision only, and have no reality in actual life. He did not say, " The Lord sent me to gather one basket of first ripe figs, very good, and another of foul rotten figs, and I did so ;" but he says, " The Lord showed me"—i.e., by the Spirit upon me caused me to see two baskets, etc. The deportation of captives with Jeconiah took away the better class—the princes, artisans and mechanics who had more stamina of character, and would be more useful to the king of Babylon in his great building schemes, than the lower, less skilled, less industrious classes. The author of 2 Kings (in chap. 24:14-16) was careful to state precisely this fact—that Nebuchadnezzar took away all the better people, " the mighty of the land," the skilful mechanics as well as the princes. The selection and removal of these classes would not only augment the working force in Babylon, but would lessen the working force in Jerusalem.

4-7. The basket of good figs represented these better classes taken away to Babylon. In His kind and wise providence the Lord had taken this method to sift the nation and save the more precious grain for replanting in the land after the captivity. The Lord twice sifted the Jewish people to get good seed wherewith to replant the land; first, in taking away, under Nebuchadnezzar, the more industrious and skilful citizens, who may, on this very ground, be safely presumed to have been less corrupt morally, and less debased by idolatry, than the indolent classes. Laziness and idleness are Satan’s recruiting officers. He never fails to find work for idle hands to do. Then, again, the Lord sifted the captive population when the decree of Cyrus invited them to return to their land. The men of faith in God, the men who cherished most fondly in their hearts the love of their holy city and sacred Temple and the classic memories of their heroic dead, would tear themselves away from their Chaldean homes and their accumulated comforts, and strike out upon the hardships of a wilderness journey and of a new settlement. This call would also somewhat test their physical energy. Invalids and men broken down by their vices or their age would shrink from these hardships. These better people taken to Babylon, the Lord would meet there with His blessing. H. C.

5. God owns their captivity to be His doing; whoever were the instruments of it, He ordered and directed it; I have sent them out of this place into the land of the Chaldeans. It is God that puts His gold into the furnace to be tried; His hand is, in an especial manner, to be eyed in the afflictions of good people. The judge orders the malefactor into the hand of an executioner, but the father corrects the child with his own hand. Even this uncomfortable captivity God intended for their benefit, and we are sure that His intentions are never frustrated: I have sent them into the land of the Chaldeans for their good. It seemed to be every way for their hurt, not only as it was the ruin of their estates, honors and liberties, parted them from their relations and friends, and put them under the power of their enemies and oppressors, but as it sunk their spirits, discouraged their faith, deprived them of the benefit of God’s oracles and ordinances, and exposed them to temptations; and yet it was designed for their good, and proved so, in the issue, as to many of them. By their afflictions they were humbled under the hand of God, taught to pray, and turned from their iniquity, particularly they were cured of their inclination to idolatry; and thus it was good for them that they were afflicted.

6. God assures them of His protection in their trouble, and a glorious deliverance out of it in due time (verse 6). Being sent into captivity for their good, they shall not be lost there; but it shall be with them as it is with gold which the refiner puts into the furnace.

He has his eye upon it while it is there, and it is a careful eye, to see that it sustain no damage: I will set Mine eyes upon them for good, to order everything for the best. He engages to prepare them for these temporal mercies which He designed for them, by bestowing spiritual mercies upon them. It is this that will make their captivity be for their good; this shall be both the improvement of their affliction, and their qualification for deliverance. When our troubles are sanctified to us, then we may be sure that they will end well. Now that which is promised is that they should be better acquainted with God; they should learn more of God by His providences in Babylon than they had learned by all His oracles and ordinances in Jerusalem, thanks to Divine grace, for if that had not wrought mightily upon them in Babylon, they would forever have forgotten God. It is here promised, I will give them, not so much a head to know Me, as a heart to know Me, for the right knowledge of God consists not in notion and speculation, but in the convictions of the practical judgment directing and governing the will and affections. H.

A heart to know the Lord. It was “for good” that God sent the captive portion of His people “into the land of the Chaldeans” (verse 5). The germs of the better life of the future were preserved in them, and their very tribulations were the instruments of His gracious purpose and blessings in disguise. In the “evil figs”—the refuse left behind—there was nothing worth preserving (verse 8). Of all the beneficent Divine purposes, this had in it the promise of highest good—“I will give them an heart to know Me, that I am the Lord.” W.

8-10. On the other hand, the remnant that were left in the land, including those also who went into Egypt, were the dregs of the population, and God let them gravitate to the very bottom of human existence, and finally become extinct. They went into Egypt in defiance of the Lord’s repeated warnings by His prophet. Their going was itself proof of their vain confidence in themselves and in human help, in contempt of the word of the Lord their God. Hence they could rationally expect nothing better than His exterminating curse. It never can be well for men to press their way in a course of defiance against the warnings of Jehovah. What can result from such a course but ruin! This chapter is a beautiful lesson on the ways of God in His providence over nations and entire classes of men. With far-reaching plans, with perfect command of all the agencies of war and of captivity, with full control over the master mind of Nebuchadnezzar, and of his schemes for building great Babylon, the Lord makes all these agencies subserve His purpose of sifting the Jewish people, and taking out for His future use all the nobler elements. These He purposed to convert to Himself, under the discipline of this fearful captivity, and then to lead them back to rebuild His city and Temple, to reconstruct the Hebrew nation, and to nurture the germs of their religious life, till in the fulness of time, the Messiah should come. What cannot this all-wise and all-pervading providence of God accomplish! Was ever anything too hard for the Lord! Let such manifestations of His Divine power and wisdom inspire our confidence afresh in His resources now and evermore to fulfil all His plans of mercy for His Zion and for this lost world. H. C.

The exposition and application of this vision. God intended by it to raise the dejected spirits of those that were gone into captivity, by assuring them of a happy return, and to humble and awaken the proud and secure spirits of those who continued yet in Jerusalem, by assuring them of a miserable captivity. The good figs were the first ripe; these represented the pious captives, that seemed first ripe for ruin, for they went first into captivity, but should prove first ripe for mercy, and their captivity should help to ripen them; these are pleasing to God, as good figs are to us, and shall be carefully preserved for use.

The best men may be the greatest sufferers. The good figs represent the Jews who suffered most severely from the invasion of Nebuchadnezzar, who were torn from their homes, robbed of their property, driven into captivity; the bad figs represent the seemingly more fortunate Jews over whose head the tide of invasion passes, leaving them still in their homes and in quiet, and also those who escaped from it entirely by a flight into Egypt. We may often notice that very good people are not only not spared, but suffer the most severe calamities. “Whom the Lord loveth He chasteneth.” Therefore chastisement is an evidence of God’s love. Good men should understand this, and not be surprised at the advent of trouble, but expect it; not be dismayed at the incongruity of it, but recognize its fitness; not despair of themselves, and think that they must be hypocrites after all, nor doubt and distrust God, but submit to what is clearly foretold and wisely arranged. Adeney.