Jeremiah 46:16

16 Your soldiers have stumbled and fallen; each one says to the other, "Hurry! Let's go home to our people and escape the enemy's sword!'

Jeremiah 46:16 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 46:16

He made many to fall
That is, the Lord, by the hand of the Chaldeans, by whose sword multitudes fell in battle: yea, one fell upon another;
they fell in heaps, denoting the multitude of the slain; or rather they fell in flight one upon another; one fell, and then another upon him, as usually they do, when men are frightened and flee precipitantly, as in ( Jeremiah 46:12 ) ; and they said, arise:
not those that fell, which may seem at first sight; but either the strangers in the land of Egypt, as Kimchi, such as the Jews were; who, perceiving the destruction that was coming on Egypt, exhort one another to arise, and get out of it; or rather the auxiliaries of the Egyptians, as the Ethiopians, Lybians, and Lydians, ( Jeremiah 46:9 ) ; who finding the enemy too strong for them, and they themselves deserted or unsupported by Pharaoh's army, advise one another to quit his service, and provide for their own safety: and let us go again to our own people, and to the land of our
nativity;
their own country, where they were born, and their friends and relations lived; that so they might be safe from the oppressing sword;
the sword of the Chaldeans. The Septuagint version is a very bad one, followed by the Arabic, which renders it, "from the Grecian sword"; and so is the Vulgate Latin version, "from the face of the dove"; to countenance which it is said, that the Chaldeans and Assyrians had a dove in their ensigns; (See Gill on Jeremiah 25:38); and so a most ancient Saxon translation in the library of Christ's Church in Oxford, "from the face of the sword of the culver" ^F11, or "dove"; that is, from their sword, who display their banners in the field with the ensign of a dove; meaning the Chaldeans. The Targum is,

``from the sword of the enemy, which is as wine inebriating;''

which sense is followed by Jarchi.

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FOOTNOTES:

F11 Apud Gregory's Posthuma, p. 236.

Jeremiah 46:16 In-Context

14 "Proclaim it in the towns of Egypt, in Migdol, Memphis, and Tahpanhes: "Get ready to defend yourselves; all you have will be destroyed in war!

15 Why has your mighty god Apis fallen? The Lord has struck him down!'

16 Your soldiers have stumbled and fallen; each one says to the other, "Hurry! Let's go home to our people and escape the enemy's sword!'

17 "Give the king of Egypt a new name - "Noisy Braggart Who Missed His Chance.'

18 I, the Lord Almighty, am king. I am the living God. As Mount Tabor towers above the mountains and Mount Carmel stands high above the sea, so will be the strength of the one who attacks you.

Footnotes

• [a] [Probable text] Your soldiers . . . fallen; [Hebrew unclear.]