The Lord said. The prophets are usually so tenacious of the same formulae that even their slight deviations are noteworthy. "The Lord said," for "Thus saith the Lord," occurs only here and in Jeremiah 46:25 (where, however, the phrase has possibly been detached by mistake from the preceding verse).
It shall be well with thy remnant; rather, I have loosed thee for (thy) good, or, thy loosing (shall be) for (thy good), according as we adopt the reading of the Hebrew text or that of the margin, which differs in form as slightly as it is possible to do.
If we accept the historical setting proposed by Gratz for this paragraph, the reference will be to the "loosing" of Jeremiah from his chains mentioned in Jeremiah 40:4. The rendering given here is, however, only a probable one; it is in conformity with the Aramaic usage of the verb (the Targum uses it in this sense in Jeremiah 40:4), and is supported by its suitability to the context and, philologically, by the fact of the growing influence of Aramaic upon Hebrew.
Gesenius, in his anxiety to keep close to the native use of the root, produces a rendering which does not suit the context, viz. "I afflict thee for (thy) good." Jeremiah does not complain of being afflicted by God, but that all the world is against him; Ewald, comparing a different Aramaic verb to that appealed to above, renders, "I strengthen thee," etc; which is adopted by Keil, but does not accord with the second half of the verse so well as the rendering adopted.
The Authorized Version follows the Targum, the Vulgate, Aquila, Symmachus, Rashi, and Kimchi, assuming that sherith is contracted from sh'erith (as in 1 Chronicles 12:38), and that "remnant" is equivalent to "remnant of life."
But, though the sense is not unacceptable (comp. Verses 20, 21), the form of expression is unnatural; we should have expected akharith'ka, "thy latter end" (comp. Job 8:7). I will cause the enemy to entreat thee well.
This expression is as difficult as the preceding, and our rendering of it will depend entirely on our view of the context. If "the enemy" means the Chaldeans, the Authorized Version will be substantially correct.
Rashi has already mentioned the view that the phrase alludes to Nebnzar-adan's respectful inquiry as to the wishes of Jeremiah in Jeremiah 40:2-5. In this ease, the literal rendering is, I will cause the enemy to meet thee (as a friend); comp.
Isaiah 47:3; Isaiah 64:4. But if "the enemy" means the Jews, then we must render, I grill cause the enemy to supplicate thee, and illustrate the phrase by the repeated applications of Zedekiah to the prophet (Jeremiah 21:1, Jeremiah 21:2; Jeremiah 37:3; Jeremiah 38:14), and the similar appeal of the "captains of the forces," in Jeremiah 42:1-3.