Speaking about the age of prosperity awaiting the people after repentance and renewed conversion, Jeremiah repeats again and again that this prosperity, like the very possibility of any historical future, is connected only...
Speaking about the age of prosperity awaiting the people after repentance and renewed conversion, Jeremiah repeats again and again that this prosperity, like the very possibility of any historical future, is connected only with God's action and His providence. He Himself proves to be the Redeemer of His people. The Hebrew word usually translated into English as “redeemer” denotes a liberator who buys his fellow tribesmen out of slavery. The Messiah is called Redeemer in the same sense. When sin is concerned, redemption usually means deliverance from its consequences.
In antiquity, there was a widespread conviction that the consequences of a sin once committed, and indeed of every evil, were irreversible. In the East, this conviction gave rise to the idea of karmic dependencies, regarded precisely as the inevitable consequence of a sin once committed. It was impossible to free oneself from this; every attempt to do so merely produced still greater evil. Yahwism allowed for the possibility of deliverance from the consequences of committed sin. Special purification rituals existed for this purpose, based on washings and particular sacrifices. But even these could help a person avoid retribution only if the sin had been committed unintentionally. In the case of a deliberate sinful act, its consequences weighed upon a person throughout life, even if he later repented sincerely of what he had done. Such was the power of evil in the fallen world before the coming of Christ.
Here, however, the subject was an entire people that had consciously chosen the path of sin during a certain period of its history: a mass apostasy, if not formal, then actual. Of course, in this respect God's people repeated in their history the path of all humanity, which at the Fall likewise consciously betrayed God and chose the path of sin. But that did not make the problem any smaller. A special intervention by God was required for His people to be freed from the consequences of their former historical life.
This was possible only within the framework of the general plan for humanity's salvation. The people's new historical life not only had meaning but could be realized only in the context of the Messiah's coming. It was an advance granted by God to His people against the future redemption of all humanity. Of course, it is unlikely that anyone clearly understood this situation either in Jeremiah's time or later, in the postexilic era. Nevertheless, the connection between the redemption of God's people and the redemption of humanity is quite evident. They are elements of a single plan and a single spiritual process; without one there would not have been the other. But it was precisely with God's people that the beginning had to be made, as was revealed to Jeremiah.
31 The restoration of Israel published, Jer 31:1-14.
Rachel mourning is comforted, Jer 31:15-17.
Ephraim repenting is brought home, Jer 31:18-21.
Christ promised, Jer 31:22-26.
His care over the church, Jer 31:27-30.
His new covenant, Jer 31:31-34.
The stability and enlargement of the church, Jer 31:35-40.