Jeremiah 43
Jeremiah 43 opens on the heel of a broken oath. In the chapter before, the frightened survivors left in the land after Jerusalem's fall had come to Jeremiah and pleaded with him to pray for direction, vowing, Whether it be good, or whether it be evil, we will obey the voice of the LORD our God (42:6). They waited ten days. The answer came, and it was clear: remain in the land and do not be afraid of the king of Babylon, for the LORD would build them and not pull them down - but if they set their faces to go into Egypt, the sword and famine they dreaded would overtake them there. The very first verse of chapter 43 marks the moment of decision: when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking unto all the people all the words of the LORD their God (v. 1). The word has been fully and faithfully delivered. Now comes the response.3
The response is not repentance but accusation. Then spake Azariah… and Johanan… and all the proud men, saying unto Jeremiah, Thou speakest falsely (v. 2). They charge that Baruch his scribe has set him on against them, scheming to deliver them into Babylon's hand. It is a stunning reversal: the men who swore to obey now brand the answer a lie. And having branded it false, they act on what they had wanted all along. Johanan… and all the captains of the forces, and all the people, obeyed not the voice of the LORD (v. 4). They take the whole remnant - men, women, children, even the king's daughters - and carry them down into Egypt, and they take Jeremiah the prophet, and Baruch the son of Neriah with them (v. 6). The man who spent a lifetime speaking the word is dragged off by the people who refused to hear it, down to Tahpanhes on the Egyptian frontier.
But the word of the LORD is not bound by the disobedience of those who carry it. In Tahpanhes - in Egypt, the very place they fled for safety - God speaks again. He tells Jeremiah to take great stones and hide them in the clay of the brickkiln at the entry of Pharaoh's house, in plain sight of the men of Judah, and to announce that the king they ran from is coming to that exact spot: I will send and take Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will set his throne upon these stones that I have hid (vv. 9-10). The refuge will be no refuge. Babylon will smite Egypt, burn the houses of its gods, and depart unharmed, as a shepherd putteth on his garment (v. 12). The chapter that began with a word called false ends with that word reaching, unstoppably, all the way into the land of their hiding.2
Tap any highlighted phrase to jump to the commentary that unpacks it.
Jeremiah 43:1-4Thou Speakest Falsely
1And it came to pass, that when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking unto all the people all the words of the LORD their God, for which the LORD their God had sent him to them, even all these words, 2Then spake Azariah the son of Hoshaiah, and Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the proud men, saying unto Jeremiah, Thou speakest falsely: the LORD our God hath not sent thee to say, Go not into Egypt to sojourn there: 3But Baruch the son of Neriah setteth thee on against us, for to deliver us into the hand of the Chaldeans, that they might put us to death, and carry us away captives into Babylon. 4So Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the captains of the forces, and all the people, obeyed not the voice of the LORD, to dwell in the land of Judah.
The chapter opens by underlining how complete the message was: when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking unto all the people all the words of the LORD their God, for which the LORD their God had sent him to them, even all these words (v. 1). The verse is almost overloaded with assurance - all the people, all the words, even all these words - and twice over it names the source: these are the words of the LORD their God, and it was the LORD who had sent him to them. Nothing has been withheld, softened, or invented. Jeremiah has discharged his commission down to the last syllable. This matters because of what comes next. When the people reject the word, they cannot plead that it was unclear, partial, or doubtful in its origin. They had asked for it; they had sworn to obey it; and now they have heard every word of it. The narrator builds an airtight case before a single objection is raised. The fault that follows lies nowhere in the messenger and nowhere in the message. It lies entirely in hearts that had already decided.3
The reply is breathtaking in its boldness: Then spake Azariah the son of Hoshaiah, and Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the proud men, saying unto Jeremiah, Thou speakest falsely: the LORD our God hath not sent thee (v. 2). Read it against the oath they had sworn only days before - Whether it be good, or whether it be evil, we will obey the voice of the LORD our God (42:6). The instant the answer crossed what they wanted, they did not say, we will not obey. That would have been honest rebellion. Instead they attacked the word itself: you are lying; God never said this. The narrator is careful to label the speakers - all the proud men. Pride is the engine here. A humble heart, hearing an unwelcome word, asks whether it is true; a proud heart, hearing an unwelcome word, declares it false. And notice whose authority they reject. They had called Him the LORD our God when they wanted His guidance; now they say the LORD our God hath not sent thee. The quarrel was never really with Jeremiah. It was with the God they had claimed as their own only when His answer suited them.
Having declared the word false, the proud men supply a motive for the supposed deception: But Baruch the son of Neriah setteth thee on against us, for to deliver us into the hand of the Chaldeans, that they might put us to death, and carry us away captives into Babylon (v. 3). It is the classic move of a heart determined not to obey - invent a conspiracy. The word cannot simply be from God and inconvenient; it must be a plot. So Baruch the scribe, Jeremiah's faithful companion, is cast as the hidden hand manipulating the prophet for some treasonous end. The charge is doubly absurd. Jeremiah had spent decades begging Judah not to resist Babylon, had been beaten and imprisoned for it, and had nothing whatever to gain by their deaths. But absurdity is no obstacle to a mind looking for an excuse. When people will not face the real reason they are disobeying - that they are afraid, and that they prefer their own plan - they reach for a story that lets them feel wronged instead of guilty. Suspicion of the messenger becomes the cover for rejecting the message.
The verdict is stated with terrible simplicity: So Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the captains of the forces, and all the people, obeyed not the voice of the LORD, to dwell in the land of Judah (v. 4). Strip away the accusation and the conspiracy theory, and here is the bare fact. They obeyed not the voice of the LORD. All the talk of Jeremiah lying and Baruch scheming was scaffolding around this single act of disobedience. And the narrator names exactly what was refused: the command to dwell in the land of Judah - the one thing God had asked, the thing that would have meant life. Notice too that the disobedience has now spread from the leaders to all the people. What began with the proud men giving voice to it becomes the act of the whole company. This is how a wrong decision works in a community: a few confident voices declare the unwelcome truth a lie, supply a reason to distrust the one who spoke it, and the crowd, already inclined to fear, follows. The verse refuses every excuse and leaves only the thing itself - a people who heard the voice of the LORD plainly, and would not do what it said.
Jeremiah 43:5-7Even to Tahpanhes
5But Johanan the son of Kareah, and all the captains of the forces, took all the remnant of Judah, that were returned from all nations, whither they had been driven, to dwell in the land of Judah; 6Even men, and women, and children, and the king's daughters, and every person that Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had left with Gedaliah the son of Ahikam the son of Shaphan, and Jeremiah the prophet, and Baruch the son of Neriah. 7So they came into the land of Egypt: for they obeyed not the voice of the LORD: thus came they even unto Tahpanhes.
The disobedience is now carried out in full, and the scale of it is laid out deliberately: Johanan… and all the captains of the forces, took all the remnant of Judah… Even men, and women, and children, and the king's daughters, and every person that Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard had left with Gedaliah (vv. 5-6). This was the seed of a future - the last of Judah left in the land after the catastrophe, the survivors gathered up under Gedaliah, the very ones from whom the nation might have been rebuilt. The narrator lingers on the list precisely because it is so tragic: not a few hardened men but a whole people, the children and the king's own daughters among them, swept along by the decision of their leaders. Verse 5 quietly twists the knife - these were the remnant that were returned from all nations, whither they had been driven, to dwell in the land of Judah. God had already gathered them back from scattering. They had come home. And now, of their own choosing, they march back out again - reversing the very homecoming God had granted, undoing His gathering with their flight.
Two names close the list, and they change its whole weight: and Jeremiah the prophet, and Baruch the son of Neriah (v. 6). The prophet who had faithfully delivered the word, and the scribe accused of plotting against the people, are carried off with the rest - against the word, against their will, into the very land God said not to enter. There is something deeply poignant here. Jeremiah does not flee; he is taken. He had spent a lifetime urging surrender to God's discipline, and now he submits to being dragged where he warned no one should go, sharing the exile of the people who would not hear him. He does not abandon them, and he does not stop being the LORD's mouth - as the next verses will show, the word of God comes to him even in Egypt. The shepherd goes down with the straying flock. It is a small, dark foreshadowing of a pattern that runs through Scripture: the faithful one bound up with the fate of the unfaithful, carrying the word into the place of their disobedience, present with them even in the consequences they brought on themselves.
The destination is named twice, framed by the reason for the flight: So they came into the land of Egypt: for they obeyed not the voice of the LORD: thus came they even unto Tahpanhes (v. 7). Of all the places to run, they ran to Egypt - the house of bondage out of which the LORD had brought their fathers with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. The whole story of Israel began with a deliverance from Egypt; to flee back into it for safety was to reverse that history, to seek refuge in the very land that stood in their memory for slavery. And the law had been explicit that a king should never cause the people to return to Egypt (Deut. 17:16). Tahpanhes was a fortress city on Egypt's eastern frontier, the first major settlement a traveler from Judah would reach - the doorway of the refuge. But the heart of the verse is the clause set between the two halves: for they obeyed not the voice of the LORD. That is the real reason they are in Egypt at all. Not strategy, not necessity - disobedience. They had been told plainly that the sword they feared would follow close after them into Egypt (42:16). They fled the danger straight into its arms. The place chosen against God's word can never be the place of safety, however strong its walls.3
Jeremiah 43:8-13His Throne Upon These Stones
8Then came the word of the LORD unto Jeremiah in Tahpanhes, saying, 9Take great stones in thine hand, and hide them in the clay in the brickkiln, which is at the entry of Pharaoh's house in Tahpanhes, in the sight of the men of Judah; 10And say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will send and take Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant, and will set his throne upon these stones that I have hid; and he shall spread his royal pavilion over them. 11And when he cometh, he shall smite the land of Egypt, and deliver such as are for death to death; and such as are for captivity to captivity; and such as are for the sword to the sword. 12And I will kindle a fire in the houses of the gods of Egypt; and he shall burn them, and carry them away captives: and he shall array himself with the land of Egypt, as a shepherd putteth on his garment; and he shall go forth from thence in peace. 13He shall break also the images of Bethshemesh, that is in the land of Egypt; and the houses of the gods of the Egyptians shall he burn with fire.
The first words of this section are quietly astonishing: Then came the word of the LORD unto Jeremiah in Tahpanhes (v. 8). The people had branded that word a lie and fled it across a border - and the word follows them across the border. It comes to Jeremiah in Tahpanhes, in Egypt, in the very place they thought they had left God's claims behind. There is no country beyond the range of the LORD's voice; geography cannot mute Him. The disobedient flight has changed the prophet's address but not silenced his commission. And the message is to be delivered in the most public, undeniable way: a sign-act performed in the sight of the men of Judah (v. 9). Jeremiah is told to take great stones in his hand and bury them in the clay of the brickkiln at the entrance to Pharaoh's residence, while the refugees watch. The prophet who was dragged here as a supposed liar will now act out, before their eyes, a word that time itself will prove true. They could not stop the word by relocating; they will not stop it now by ignoring it.
The sign is concrete and strange: Take great stones in thine hand, and hide them in the clay in the brickkiln, which is at the entry of Pharaoh's house in Tahpanhes (v. 9). Jeremiah often preached with his hands as well as his mouth - a marred linen girdle, a smashed potter's vessel, a yoke worn on the neck - and here he buries stones in wet pavement-clay at the threshold of an Egyptian royal house. The meaning is unveiled in the next breath: I will send and take Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon… and will set his throne upon these stones that I have hid; and he shall spread his royal pavilion over them (v. 10). The hidden stones are a foundation laid in advance. On this exact patch of ground, the very king the remnant fled will plant his throne and stretch his royal canopy. The stones go down in obscurity, hid in the clay; but God says they are the seat of a coming judgment. There is a sober comfort in the image even for the faithful: what God buries quietly, He will one day raise up openly. The future Babylon's conqueror will sit upon is being set in place now, while the men of Judah imagine themselves safely beyond his reach.3
A single phrase in verse 10 carries a startling theology: I will send and take Nebuchadrezzar the king of Babylon, my servant. The pagan emperor - the man whose armies burned the temple of the LORD - is here called by God my servant. The title is not a commendation of Nebuchadnezzar's character; it is a declaration of God's sovereignty over him. The proudest king on earth, who imagined he conquered by his own might, is in truth an instrument in a hand greater than his own, accomplishing purposes he never knew he served. Jeremiah uses this same astonishing title elsewhere (Jer. 25:9; 27:6), and the point is consistent: the LORD rules not only His own people but the nations, not only the willing but the unwitting. This is why the flight to Egypt was so futile. The remnant fled from Babylon as though Babylon were the ultimate power to be escaped. But Babylon was only the servant. The real power was the One who sent him - and there is no fleeing from Him by running from his instrument. To escape the servant, you would have to escape the Master, and that no border allows.1
The prophecy widens from the throne at Tahpanhes to the whole land: when he cometh, he shall smite the land of Egypt, dealing out death, captivity, and the sword to those appointed for each (v. 11); he will kindle a fire in the houses of the gods of Egypt and carry off their idols (v. 12); he will break also the images of Bethshemesh - the great sun-temple of On - and burn the houses of Egypt's gods (v. 13). The mighty refuge will be plundered, its very gods proven helpless to defend their own shrines. And in the middle stands one of the most vivid pictures in the book: he shall array himself with the land of Egypt, as a shepherd putteth on his garment; and he shall go forth from thence in peace (v. 12). Conquering all Egypt will be no more strain for this servant of the LORD than a shepherd slipping on his cloak; he will wrap the whole country about himself as easily as pulling a coat over the shoulders, and then walk away unscathed, in peace. The image strips Egypt of every shred of the security the remnant sought there. The land they ran to for protection cannot so much as inconvenience the man God sends against it. He puts it on and takes it off like a garment - and the gods they might have hoped in burn in their own temples.
Further study
- The Hebrew text of Jeremiah 43 with Rashi, Radak, and other classical commentators side by side - useful for the accusation sheqer attah medabber (v. 2, “thou speakest falsely”), for the place name Tahpanhes (vv. 7-9), and for the striking title Nebuchadrezzar… my servant (v. 10).
- Jeremiah 43 ↔ John 8 · Deuteronomy 17 · Psalm 139Intertextual BibleTraces the threads tying Jeremiah 43 to the rest of Scripture - the true word rejected as false (v. 2) read alongside because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not (John 8:45), the flight back to Egypt (v. 7) read against the warning never to return there (Deut. 17:16), and the throne set on the hidden stones (v. 10) beside whither shall I flee from thy presence? (Ps. 139:7).
- Jeremiah 43 - Translators' NotesNET BibleThe NET Bible's detailed footnotes on Jeremiah 43 - the force of the accusation in verse 2, the location and significance of Tahpanhes on the Egyptian frontier, the meaning of the buried stones and the “brickkiln” in verses 8-9, and the difficult clause about Nebuchadnezzar arraying himself with Egypt “as a shepherd putteth on his garment” in verse 12.
Where this echoes in Scripture
Thou Speakest Falsely
- Jeremiah 42:5-6Whether it be good, or whether it be evil, we will obey the voice of the LORD our God... that it may be well with us.The oath they swore days before - making the “thou speakest falsely” of verse 2 a direct breaking of their own word.
- John 8:45And because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not.The exact mechanism of verse 2 - the true word rejected precisely because it is true and unwelcome.
- John 3:19this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.Why the proud men called the word a lie (v. 2) - the will, not the evidence, decided the verdict.
- Jeremiah 5:31The prophets prophesy falsely... and my people love to have it so: and what will ye do in the end thereof?The word <em>sheqer</em> (v. 2) belonged to the false prophets - here pinned, in reverse, on the one true voice.
- 2 Timothy 4:3-4they will not endure sound doctrine; but... shall they turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.The enduring pattern of verses 2-4 - the unwelcome truth refused, a preferred story embraced.
Even to Tahpanhes
- Jeremiah 42:15-17the sword, which ye feared, shall overtake you there in the land of Egypt... ye shall die by the sword, by the famine.The explicit warning the remnant defied in verse 7 - the very danger they fled would meet them in Egypt.
- Deuteronomy 17:16he shall not cause the people to return that way... forasmuch as the LORD hath said unto you, Ye shall henceforth return no more that way.The command broken by the flight of verses 5-7 - Israel was never to return to Egypt for refuge.
- Isaiah 31:1Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help... but they look not unto the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD!The recurring sin of verse 7 - trusting Egypt’s strength instead of the LORD’s word.
- Proverbs 18:10The name of the LORD is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe.The refuge the remnant refused (v. 7) - true safety is the LORD Himself, not a place apart from Him.
- Matthew 7:24-27whosoever heareth these sayings of mine, and doeth them, I will liken him unto a wise man, which built his house upon a rock.The principle behind the flight of verses 5-7 - security is found in doing the word, not in fleeing it.
His Throne Upon These Stones
- Psalm 139:7-10Whither shall I flee from thy presence?... if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.The truth the buried stones declare (v. 10) - there is no place beyond the reach of God.
- Amos 9:2-3Though they dig into hell, thence shall mine hand take them; though they climb up to heaven, thence will I bring them down.The same sovereignty as verse 10 - no hiding place escapes the hand of the LORD.
- Jeremiah 27:6now have I given all these lands into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, my servant.The startling title of verse 10 - the pagan king is an instrument in God’s hand, not an escape from it.
- Isaiah 19:1Behold, the LORD rideth upon a swift cloud, and shall come into Egypt: and the idols of Egypt shall be moved at his presence.The judgment on Egypt’s gods foretold in verses 12-13 - the idols of the refuge proven powerless.
- Hebrews 4:13all things are naked and opened unto the eyes of him with whom we have to do.The reach behind the hidden stones (v. 10) - nothing, and no one, is concealed from God.