Jeremiah 31:21 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Jeremiah 31:21
Set thee up waymarks, make thee high heaps: set thine heart toward the highway, even the way which thou wentest: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities.
to station · verb, hiphil imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
waymarks
צִיֻּנִ֗יםtzi.yu.Nim
H6725
a monumental or guiding pillar · noun, common masculine plural absolute
make
שִׂ֤מִיSi.mi
H7760
to put (used in a great variety of applications · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
heaps
תַּמְרוּרִ֔יםtam.ru.Rim
H8564
an erection · noun, common masculine plural absolute
set
שִׁ֣תִיShi.ti
H7896
to place (in a very wide application) · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
heart
לִבֵּ֔ךְli.Bekh
H3820
the heart · noun, common masculine singular construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
highway
לַֽמְסִלָּ֖הlam.si.Lah
H4546
a thoroughfare (as turnpiked) · preposition with the article + noun, common feminine singular absolute
way
דֶּ֣רֶךְDe.rekh
H1870
a road (as trodden) · noun, common both genders singular absolute
wentest
הָלָ֑כְתְּha.la.khe.ti
H1980
to walk (in a great variety of applications · verb, qal perfect, 2nd person feminine singular
again
שׁ֚וּבִיShu.vi
H7725
to turn back (hence · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
virgin
בְּתוּלַ֣תbe.tu.Lat
H1330
a virgin (from her privacy) · noun, common feminine singular construct
Israel
יִשְׂרָאֵ֔לYis.ra.'El
H3478
Jisrael · proper noun, a place name
again
שֻׁ֖בִיShu.vi
H7725
to turn back (hence · verb, qal imperative, 2nd person feminine singular
cities
עָרַ֥יִךְ'a.Ra.yikh
H5892
a city (a place guarded by waking or a watch) in the wi… · noun, common masculine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 2nd person feminine singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Jeremiah 50:5 They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward, saying, Come, and let us join ourselves to the LORD in a perpetual covenant tha…
Isaiah 62:10 Go through, go through the gates; prepare ye the way of the people; cast up, cast up the highway; gather out the stones; lift up a standard…
Psalms 84:5 Blessed is the man whose strength is in thee; in whose heart are the ways of them.
Isaiah 48:20 Go ye forth of Babylon, flee ye from the Chaldeans, with a voice of singing declare ye, tell this, utter it even to the end of the earth; sa…
Isaiah 52:11-12 Depart ye, depart ye, go ye out from thence, touch no unclean thing; go ye out of the midst of her; be ye clean, that bear the vessels of th…
Isaiah 57:14 And shall say, Cast ye up, cast ye up, prepare the way, take up the stumblingblock out of the way of my people.
Jeremiah 3:14 Turn, O backsliding children, saith the LORD; for I am married unto you: and I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will…
Jeremiah 31:4 Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built, O virgin of Israel: thou shalt again be adorned with thy tabrets, and shalt go forth in th…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Jeremiah 31:18-26
We have here,
I. Ephraim's repentance, and return to God. Not only Judah, but Ephraim the ten tribes, shall be restored, and therefore shall thus be prepared and qualified for it, Hos 14:8. Ephraim shall say, What have I do to any more with idols? Ephraim the people, is here spoken of as a single person to denote their unanimity; they shall be as one man in their repentance and shall glorify God in it with one mind and one mouth, one and all. it is likewise thus expressed that it might be the better accommodated to particular penitents, for whose direction and encouragement this passage is intended. Ephraim is here brought in weeping for sin, perhaps because Ephraim, the person from whom tha…
waymarks--pillars to mark the road for the returning exiles. Caravans set up pillars, or pointed heaps of stones, to mark the way through the desert against their return. So Israel is told by God to mark the way by which they went in leaving their country for exile; for by the same way they shall return.
highway-- (Isa 35:8, Isa 35:10).
John Gill on Jeremiah 31:21
Set thee up way marks, make thee high heaps,.... Of stones, raised up as pillars, or like pyramids; or upright, as palm trees, which signification the word (z) has; to be marks and signs, to know the way again upon a return. The Targum is,
"O congregation of Israel, remember the right works of thy fathers; pour out supplications; in bitterness set thy heart.''
And so the Vulgate Latin version interprets the last clause, "put on bitternesses", without any sense; so Cocceius. The design of the words is to put the Jews upon thoughts of returning to their own land, and to prepare for it;
set thine heart towards the highway, even the way which thou wentest; from Judea to Babylon, or into other…
Jeremiah 31:21
21. Set thee up waymarks, make thee high heaps: set thine heart toward the highway, even the way which thou wentest: turn again, O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities.
21. Statue tibi titulos, pone tibi acervos, adjice (vel, applica) cor tuum ad semitam, ad viam per quam ambulasti; revertere virgo Israel, revertere ad urbes tuas istas.
He describes what mercy would do, even that God would at length restore the captives and bring them back from exile to their own country. There was however mention made previously of his favor, that we may know that the people were restored for no other reason but because God had mercy on them. The Prophet then having pointed out…
The Church Fathers
(Vers. 21, 22.) Set up watchmen for yourself, make for yourself bitternesses: direct your heart to the straight path in which you have walked. Return, O virgin Israel, return to your cities. How long will you indulge in pleasures, wandering daughter? For the Lord has created something new on the earth: a woman will encompass a man. LXX: Set up watchmen for yourself, do penance, put your heart on your shoulders, the way in which you have walked. Return, O virgin Israel, return to your mourning cities. How long will you turn away, despised daughter? For the Lord has created you for salvation in a new plantation: men will surround you in your salvation. Where we say, how long will you dissolve in pleasures, Symmachus set forth, how long will you sink into the depths? But I have presented both editions in their entirety, so that I may show the most obscure passage, containing the sacraments of the Church, either unknown or omitted, from the Septuagint (or anyone else who has interpreted this prophet). The Hebrew word 'Sionim' can be translated as either 'watchers' or 'watchtowers', as Aquila and Symmachus have interpreted. I am puzzled by what the Vulgate edition intended by replacing 'Sionim' with 'Sion', which confuses the reader's understanding, making them think that after Ephraim, suddenly God's word happened to Sion and the tribe of Judah, even though the continuous speech is directed towards Ephraim, as mentioned earlier: 'I have surely heard Ephraim.' And: Son, honorable to me Ephraim, or delicate boy, to whom even now he speaks: Set up for yourself watchtowers, or spies, who may inform you of the coming of such great happiness in all things. And what follows, the bitternesses, which in Hebrew are called Themrurim (), for which Symmachus interpreted, the transformations, this indicates that he should weep either for past sins or for the greatness of joy, and with the whole mind turn to the Lord, and set, or direct, his heart on the path along which it has gone, for from there it will return. And what the Seventy said about this: 'Put your heart on your shoulders', signifies that thoughts should be joined to actions, or contemplate the shoulders of those who bear themselves, from the captivity of those bringing them back. This is more fully expressed by Isaiah in regard to camels, chariots, and dromedaries, stating that they are to be brought back (Isa.…
The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).
Dictionary and topics
Highways · Marked out by heaps of stones — Marked out by heaps of stones
Pillar · Used to mark roads — Used to mark roads
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Changing of sorrow into joy, because Ephraim will turn to the Lord, and the Lord will lead him back. - Jer 31:15. "Thus saith Jahveh: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation, bitter weeping, Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are not. Jer 31:16. Thus saith Jahveh: Restrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears; for there is a reward for thy work, saith Jahveh, and they shall return from the land of the enemy. Jer 31:17. And there is hope for thy latter end, saith Jahveh, that children shall return to thy border. Jer 31:18. I have certainly heard Ephraim complaining, Thou hast chastised me and I was chastised, like a calf…
road signs . . . guideposts: The Lord guided his people physically back to the land of Israel and spiritually back to their covenant relationship with him.
Rashi on Jeremiah 31:21
Set up markers for yourself Signs in the good ways of your ancestors.
small palms small palms (תְּמָרִים) planted for a sign on the way. And the simple interpretation of the verse is. Make signs to know the way you traversed from Eretz Israel to Babylon, so that you will return by that road; that is to say that you will surely return from there.
the road upon which you went The “kethib” is הָלָכְתִּי, “I went,” and everywhere that you went I went with you Jonathan, however, renders. place “tamrurim” for yourself: Pray with embittered spirit, deriving תַּמְרוּרִים from מַר bitter. (And Menahem [Machbereth p. 119] explained תַּמְרוּרִים as an expression of raising up, and so he explained וְת…
