Introduction
3. Conflict with the false prophets in exile ch. 29
This chapter continues the theme of the previous three, namely: controversies about false prophets. Jeremiah also had problems with the false prophets who were taken with the 3,023 exiles who went into captivity in 597 B.C. (Jeremiah 52:28).
There are references to and citations from at least four letters that went back and forth between Jerusalem and Babylon in this narrative. Three of these letters were from Jeremiah, and one was from a false prophet in Babylon. We do not know exactly where in Babylon Jeremiah’s letters went, but the largest settlement of exiles was near Nippur, close to the Kabar Canal. [Note: Harrison, Jeremiah and . . ., p. 132.] Jeremiah 29:1-23 contain the first letter in the Bible. [Note: Feinberg, p. 551. For other letters in the Old Testament, see 2 Chronicles 21:12-15; 30:1, 6-9; 32:17; Ezra 1:2-4; 4:9-22; 5:7-16; 6:3-12; 7:12-26.]
Jeremiah wrote a letter to the exiles (Jeremiah 29:1-23). What Jeremiah sent the exiles may have been more like a booklet containing a collection of prophecies than a simple letter. [Note: Scalise, p. 65.] This letter contains several messages from Yahweh. He then wrote a letter to the false prophet Shemaiah in Babylon (Jeremiah 29:24-28), in which he referred to a previous letter that Shemaiah had written to the priest Zephaniah, who lived in Jerusalem (Jeremiah 29:26-28). Finally, Jeremiah wrote a third letter, this time to the exiles again (Jeremiah 29:31-32).
Within all this correspondence, there are two promise oracles (concerning the exiles’ immediate future, Jeremiah 29:4-7; and concerning Israel’s distant future, Jeremiah 29:10-14). There are three judgment oracles (on false prophets, Jeremiah 29:16-19; Jeremiah 29:21-23; Jeremiah 29:31-32), a warning oracle (concerning false prophets, Jeremiah 29:8-9), and an unfinished though implied judgment oracle (concerning a false prophet, Jeremiah 29:25-28).
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