What Does Jeremiah 34:17 Mean?
Therefore thus says the LORD, You have not heard and responded to me, in proclaiming a flowing-free, each to his brother and each to his neighbor. Behold, I proclaim a flowing-free for you, says the LORD, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine; and I will make you a shaking among all the kingdoms of the earth.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Therefore thus saith the LORD; Ye have not hearkened unto me, in proclaiming liberty, every one to his brother, and every man to his neighbour: behold, I proclaim a liberty for you, saith the LORD, to the sword, to the pestilence, and to the famine; and I will make you to be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth.THE KEY
The same liberty they withhold from their neighbors is proclaimed over them, now with the sword, pestilence, and famine released toward them.
THE MEANING
The repeated announcement holds refusal and consequence together: the freedom denied to each neighbor is now named for the people, with sword, pestilence, and famine as its direction. The scattering that follows carries the consequence across every kingdom of the earth.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The verse undoes the belief that freedom can be withheld from a neighbor without consequence returning to the one who withholds it.
THE ROOT
דְּרוֹר
deror
GROWS FROM
ד־ר־ר
d-r-r
Move freely; flow without restraint.
“flowing-free” in this verse is deror. The same word, דְּרוֹר (deror, liberty or release), appears first in the freedom owed to a neighbor and then in the announcement directed toward the people. Its sense of unbound movement sharpens the reversal: what they refused to let go is now released toward them as sword, pestilence, and famine.
ALSO GROWS
deror: Liberty, release.
דְּרוֹר
This is the word repeated in both proclamations, binding the neighbors’ freedom to the people’s exposure to disaster.
deror: Swallow, a bird.
דְּרוֹר
The same Hebrew form names a freely moving bird; this traditional connection is suggestive of the root’s sense of movement, though the etymology is uncertain.
קֹרֵא
qore
GROWS FROM
ק־ר־א
q-r-ʾ
Call, summon, proclaim.
The verse repeats the act of calling: they do not proclaim liberty to one another, and the LORD proclaims liberty for them. The repeated verb makes the turn public and deliberate, not an unnoticed change in circumstance.
ALSO GROWS
qara: Call, summon, proclaim.
קָרָא
This is the verb behind both announcements, so the refusal and its reversal share the same act of calling.
miqra: Reading, assembly, or convocation.
מִקְרָא
This noun from the same root carries the sense of a public calling together, echoing the verse’s openly declared reversal.
שְׁמַעְתֶּם
shemaʿtem
GROWS FROM
ש־מ־ע
sh-m-ʿ
Hear, listen, respond.
“have not heard and responded to me” in this verse is shemaʿtem. Here, hearing is measured by response: the people hear the command but do not release their neighbors. The word holds listening and answering together, so the failure is not a lack of sound reaching them but a refusal to act on what they hear.
ALSO GROWS
shama: Hear, listen, respond.
שָׁמַע
This is the root of “hearkened”; in this verse, the response implied by hearing is the release they withhold.
shemuah: Report, message.
שְׁמוּעָה
This related word shows the root extending from hearing to what is heard and carried; Jeremiah’s charge concerns a message that calls for a real response.
THE PATTERN
A public proclamation of release changes the status of those held under another’s power.
And you shall set apart the fiftieth year, and proclaim a free flowing through all the land to all who settle in it. It shall be a ram's horn year for you, and you shall turn back each to his holding, and each to his family you shall turn back.The breath of the Lord LORD is upon me, for the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the bowed ones; he has sent me to bind up the broken of heart, to proclaim flowing freedom to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are chained.The breath of the LORD is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring good news to the emptied. He has sent me to heal the shattered in heart, to herald release to the captives, and the return of sight for the blind, to send the crushed away into release.THE THREAD
The breath of the Lord LORD is upon me, for the LORD has anointed me to bring good news to the bowed ones; he has sent me to bind up the broken of heart, to proclaim flowing freedom to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are chained.Isaiah uses the same word, דְּרוֹר (deror, liberty or release), but directs it toward captives and people bound in prison. Jeremiah turns that word toward the sword, pestilence, and famine after the people refuse to release their neighbors.
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