Jeremiah 48:36 - Exposition

Based on Isaiah 16:11 ; Isaiah 15:7 . Like pipes. Isaiah has, "like the harp [or, 'lute']." The pipe, or flute, was specially used at funeral ceremonies ( Matthew 9:23 ; Luke 7:32 ), and therefore, perhaps, seemed to Jeremiah more appropriate. Because the riches , etc. This is, no doubt, what we should have expected, but this is not what Jeremiah wrote; "because" should rather be therefore. Jeremiah simply transferred a clause (substantially at least) from his original, Isaiah 15:7 , but into a context where it stands rather less naturally. The meaning of the words in Isaiah is that, the desolation being so great, the Moabites shall carry away as much of their goods as they can. In this new context, however, we can only explain this unexpected "therefore" by referring to a habit of the Israelitish mind by which that which contributed to a result was regarded as worked purposely for that result. Good instances of this habit are Genesis 18:5 ; Psalms 45:3 ; Psalms 51:6 ; comp. Winer's 'New Testament Grammar' (Clark), pp. 573, 574, especially note 1 on p. 574, though the idiom also occurs in Old Testament passages in which the religious view of life is hardly traceable.