Jeremiah 26:17 - Exposition

The elders of the land add their voice in favor of Jeremiah, not, however, without first of all consulting the people whose representatives they are. The whole verse is thoroughly technical in its phraseology. The word ( qahal ) rendered "assembly" is the traditional legal term for the "congregation of Israel" ( Deuteronomy 31:30 ); comp. verse 9, where the verb is the corresponding one to qahal . Thus, with all the faults of the government of Judah, which Jeremiah himself reveals to us, it was very far removed from the Oriental despotisms of our day. The "elders" are still an important element in the social system, and form a link with that earlier period in which the family was the leading power in the social organization. Originally the term denoted, strictly and in the full sense, heads of families; they have their analogue in the councils of the Aryan village communities. "References to their parliamentary status occur in Exodus 3:16 ; 2 Samuel 19:11 ; 1 Kings 8:1 ; 1 Kings 20:7 . The institution lingered on during and after the Babylonian Exile." We find another reference to their quasi-judicial authority in Deuteronomy 21:2 .