Jeremiah 47

beginning of the world. They may not know from what particular tribe or family they are descended; but they know certainly that they all sprung from the stock of Abraham. And yet the contempt with which they have been treated, and the hardships they have undergone in almost all countries, should, one would think, have made them desirous to forget or renounce their original; but they profess it; they glory in it; and after so many wars, massacres and persecutions, they still subsist; they are still very numerous. And what but a supernatural power could have preserved them in such a manner, as no other nation upon earth has been preserved? Nor is the providence of God less remarkable in the destruction of their enemies than in their own preservation. For, from the beginning, who have been the great enemies and oppressors of the Jewish nation, removed them from their own land and compelled them into captivity and slavery? The Egyptians afflicted them much, and detained them in bondage several years. The Assyrians carried away captive the Ten Tribes of Israel; and the Babylonians afterward the two remaining tribes of Judah and Benjamin. The Syro-Macedonians, especially Antiochus Epiphanes, cruelly persecuted them; and the Romans utterly dissolved the Jewish state, and dispersed the people so as that they have never been able to recover their city and country again. And where are now these great and famous monarchies, which in their turn subdued and oppressed the people of God? Are they not vanished as a dream; and not only their power, but their very names, lost in the earth? The Egyptians, Assyrians and Babylonians were overthrown and entirely subjugated by the Persians; and the Persians, it is remarkable, were the restorers of the Jews as well as the destroyers of their enemies. The Syro-Macedonians were swallowed up by the Romans; and the Roman Empire, great and powerful as it was, was broken into pieces by the incursions of the northern nations; while the Jews are subsisting as a distinct people at this day. And what a wonder of Providence is it, that the vanquished should so many ages survive the victors; and the former be spread all over the world, while the latter are no more? Bp. Newton.

Chap. 47. This short chapter is devoted to the Philistines—for several centuries the formidable border enemies of the Hebrew people on the west and southwest. They come in the same order here (next after Egypt) as in chap. 25:19, 20. Several other prophets speak of the fall of the Philistine principalities—e.g.,