Jeremiah 51:1-35, Oracles Against the Nations: A Message for Babylon (Part Three)

This is the third quarter of this four-part oracle against Babylon. Why so long? Because though Babylon was the “sword of Yahweh” to implement His judgment on Judah and the nations, he is not exempt from judgment himself. She was the arrogant, violent, pitiless conqueror who thought she was defeating all the gods of the nations, including Yahweh. She did it in the name of Bel Marduk, even though she was an agent of Yahweh.

^51:1 This is what Yahweh says: “See, I will stir up the spirit of a destroyer against Babylon and the people of Leb Kamai. ² I will send foreigners to Babylon to winnow her and to devastate her land; they will oppose her on every side in the day of her disaster. ³ Let not the archer string his bow, nor let him put on his armor. Do not spare her young men; completely destroy her army. ⁴ They will fall down slain in Babylon, fatally wounded in her streets. ⁵ For Israel and Judah have not been forsaken by their God, Yahweh Almighty, though their land is full of guilt before the Holy One of Israel.

Now that Yahweh is through using Babylon, He calls other nations to come and judge her, using a cipher for her name (Chaldea), Leb Kamai (which literally means “the heart of those who rise against me”). He will later name the nations He is calling to attack her. She might as well give up, not string her bows or put on her armor, because she will be fatally wounded. Israel and Judah, however, who are exiled within her, will not be forsaken, despite their guilt of idolatry.

⁶ “Flee from Babylon! Run for your lives! Do not be destroyed because of her sins. It is time for Yahweh’s vengeance; he will repay her what she deserves. ⁷ Babylon was a gold cup in Yahweh’s hand; she made the whole earth drunk. The nations drank her wine; therefore they have now gone mad. ⁸ Babylon will suddenly fall and be broken. Wail over her! Get balm for her pain; perhaps she can be healed. ⁹ “‘We would have healed Babylon, but she cannot be healed; let us leave her and each go to our own land, for her judgment reaches to the skies, it rises as high as the heavens.’

If her inhabitants are smart, they will run from Yahweh’s vengeance. This nation whose wealth made the whole earth drunk will suddenly be broken. No balm will be able to heal her. The same can be said for the future “Babylon” of the last days (Revelation 17 and 18) whose demise the peoples of the earth will mourn for the loss of revenue.

¹⁰ “‘Yahweh has vindicated us; come, let us tell in Zion what Yahweh our God has done.’ ¹¹ “Sharpen the arrows, take up the shields! Yahweh has stirred up the kings of the Medes, because his purpose is to destroy Babylon. Yahweh will take vengeance, vengeance for his temple. ¹² Lift up a banner against the walls of Babylon! Reinforce the guard, station the watchmen, prepare an ambush! Yahweh will carry out his purpose, his decree against the people of Babylon. ¹³ You who live by many waters and are rich in treasures, your end has come, the time for you to be destroyed. ¹⁴ Yahweh Almighty has sworn by himself: I will surely fill you with troops, as with a swarm of locusts, and they will shout in triumph over you.

Zion, Israel and Judah, may feel vindicated by Babylon’s defeat by the Medes (Cyrus is the king of the Medes and the Persians who defeated Babylon). Israel will know it was Yahweh who engineered this victory over the hated nation.

¹⁵ “He made the earth by his power; he founded the world by his wisdom and stretched out the heavens by his understanding. ¹⁶ When he thunders, the waters in the heavens roar; he makes clouds rise from the ends of the earth. He sends lightning with the rain and brings out the wind from his storehouses. ¹⁷ “Everyone is senseless and without knowledge; every goldsmith is shamed by his idols. The images he makes are a fraud; they have no breath in them. ¹⁸ They are worthless, the objects of mockery; when their judgment comes, they will perish. ¹⁹ He who is the Portion of Jacob is not like these, for he is the Maker of all things, including the people of his inheritance— Yahweh Almighty is his name.

Yahweh pauses, so to speak, to explain who He is. He is not a senseless idol made by a goldsmith who knows the idol is really nothing. He is the creator of the heavens and the earth. He controls the weather. He is the Portion of Jacob (the ḥēleq yaăqōḇ), the One who provides all Jacob needs. He is the Maker of all things (the yatsar hakol), including Israel and Judah.

²⁰ “You are my war club, my weapon for battle—with you I shatter nations, with you I destroy kingdoms, ²¹ with you I shatter horse and rider, with you I shatter chariot and driver, ²² with you I shatter man and woman, with you I shatter old man and youth, with you I shatter young man and young woman, ²³ with you I shatter shepherd and flock, with you I shatter farmer and oxen, with you I shatter governors and officials.

Cyrus is Yahweh’s club, which beats and beats and beats with shattering force.

²⁴ “Before your eyes I will repay Babylon and all who live in Babylonia for all the wrong they have done in Zion,” declares Yahweh. ²⁵ “I am against you, you destroying mountain, you who destroy the whole earth,” declares Yahweh. “I will stretch out my hand against you, roll you off the cliffs, and make you a burned-out mountain. ²⁶ No rock will be taken from you for a cornerstone, nor any stone for a foundation, for you will be desolate forever,” declares Yahweh.

Babylon was a destroying mountain, a powerful force, but will become an extinct volcano, a burned-out mountain. There won’t be left large stones to use as cornerstones or foundation stones when God is done with her.

²⁷ “Lift up a banner in the land! Blow the trumpet among the nations! Prepare the nations for battle against her; summon against her these kingdoms: Ararat, Minni and Ashkenaz. Appoint a commander against her; send up horses like a swarm of locusts. ²⁸ Prepare the nations for battle against her—the kings of the Medes, their governors and all their officials, and all the countries they rule. ²⁹ The land trembles and writhes, for Yahweh’s purposes against Babylon stand—to lay waste the land of Babylon so that no one will live there. ³⁰ Babylon’s warriors have stopped fighting; they remain in their strongholds. Their strength is exhausted; they have become weaklings. Her dwellings are set on fire; the bars of her gates are broken. ³¹ One courier follows another and messenger follows messenger to announce to the king of Babylon that his entire city is captured, ³² the river crossings seized, the marshes set on fire, and the soldiers terrified.”

The nations that had once been subdued by Babylon, Ararat (Urartu), Minni, and Ashkenaz, will send their armies against Babylon, along with the Medes, and Babylon will be exhausted by her warfare and defeated.

³³ This is what Yahweh Almighty, the God of Israel, says: “Daughter Babylon is like a threshing floor at the time it is trampled; the time to harvest her will soon come.” ³⁴ “Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon has devoured us, he has thrown us into confusion, he has made us an empty jar. Like a serpent he has swallowed us and filled his stomach with our delicacies, and then has spewed us out. ³⁵ May the violence done to our flesh be on Babylon,” say the inhabitants of Zion. “May our blood be on those who live in Babylonia,” says Jerusalem.

Israel will see the nation who once subdued her thrown down in confusion, made an empty jar. The violence done to her by Babylon will be done to Babylon.

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Discussion Questions:

1. Upon whom would you see the vengeance of God carried out?
2. What feelings or thoughts do you have as you think of God as in control of the nations?
3. The prophet Habakkuk struggled with how God could use such a vile nation to punish Israel. How do you reconcile that?