The visitation upon Egypt.
Here again is one of the symbolic acts which the prophets were commanded at times to perform. So the hiding of the girdle by Euphrates (Jeremiah 13:1-27), the commanded celibacy of the prophet (Jeremiah 16:1-21.), the dashing of the potter s bottle to pieces (Jeremiah 19:1-15.). But while these symbolic acts are described in terms which make them perfectly clear, the hiding of the great stones mentioned here needs more full explanation than we can reach to get the significance it. Still, this much of the drift of the action we perceive that Jehovah will make quite manliest, that Nebuchadnezzar's conquest of Egypt is one divinely ordained and sustained. Not, of course, that Egypt is to suffer simply because these men have gone there; its idolatries are the deepest ground of its calamities. But the delusion of the men of Judah must be looked at in the light of the sufferings of Egypt. In all this experience of death and captivity and slaughter, of temple burning and image breaking; in all this entire appropriation of Egypt by the Babylonian king, these men of Judah must not expect to escape. There is no second land of Goshen for them—a place of immunity and peace. If only they had stayed where they thought there would be no safety, then they would have been safe; and going where they made sure of safety, they found the worst of ruin. It reads as if Egypt was to come under Babylon more even than Jerusalem had done.—Y.
Jeremiah
Jeremiah 43 - jeremiah-43 - worlddic.com