(11) Say, Hear ye the word of the Lord.--The interpolated "say" is not wanted, and tends to convey the probably wrong impression that we are dealing with a new message rather than a continuation of the former one. The question whether it is such a continuation has been variously answered by different commentators. On the one hand, the conditional threatenings are said to imply an earlier stage of Jeremiah's work than the doom, absolute and unconditional, pronounced in Jeremiah 21:1-10, and so have led men to refer the message to the earlier years of Jehoiakim. On the other, it is urged that the words may have the character of a last promise, and therefore a last warning.

Verse 11. - And touching the house, etc. The formula with which this section is introduced shows that it was attached to vers. 1-7 at the same time as vers. 8-10, although obviously written at a much earlier period.

21:11-14 The wickedness of the king and his family was the worse because of their relation to David. They were urged to act with justice, at once, lest the Lord's anger should be unquenchable. If God be for us, who can be against us? But if he be against us, who can do any thing for us?And touching the house of the king of Judah, say,.... Or "to the house of the king of Judah" (p); that is, his palace, as Calvin understands it; go to it, and there say as follows, as in Jeremiah 22:1; and some think that this part of the chapter belongs to that, and was not delivered at the time the former part of it was; but before the peremptory decree was gone forth, to deliver the city into the hand of the king of Babylon to be burned with fire; since, upon a reformation, some hope of pardon and salvation is yet given. The Syriac version joins this clause to Jeremiah 21:10; "and he shall burn it with fire, and the house of the king of Judah"; burn the city of Jerusalem, and particularly the king's palace; but by "the house of the king" is not meant his dwelling house, but his family, himself, his sons, his servants, his courtiers and nobles, to whom the following speech is directed:

hear ye the word of the Lord; and obey it; for not bare hearing is meant, but a reverent attention to, and a cheerful and ready performance of, what is heard.

(p) "domui regis", Pagninus, Montanus, Tigurine version, Schmidt.