44:1 This superscription marks Jeremiah 44 as the latest passage in the book chronologically, since it completes the chronological progression that began with the chapter 39 record of the sacking of Jerusalem in 587 BC (cf. ch. 39). Chapter 45 travels back in time to the fourth year of King Jehoiakim (45:1) in 605 BC, while the so-called “Oracles concerning the Nations” in chapters 46–51 are similar to Jeremiah 25, a passage that resembles chapter 45 in being set in Jehoiakim’s fourth year (25:1; cf. 45:1). By contrast, the conclusion of the book in Jeremiah 52 is a narrative about the fall of Jerusalem, apparently appended from 2 Kings to the book of Jeremiah at a later stage.

Jeremiah 44:1 addresses the present oracle to “all the Judeans who lived in the land of Egypt.” In the list of Egyptian places that follows, Judeans are named in locations such as Tahpahnes near the Sinai Peninsula in the northeast, Migdol in the Nile Delta (i.e., Lower Egypt to the north), and Memphis in the area of Pathros (i.e., Upper Egypt to the south). The Judeans initially arrived in Egypt only at Tahpanhes (cf. 43:7), a waystation on the road from Canaan to Egypt. This indicates that some time has elapsed since the sordid events of chapters 42–43. But have these refugees from Judah learned anything in the trauma of leaving behind their own land?

44:2–6 Yahweh begins his history lesson by rehearsing events the Judean remnant had personally experienced. Before departing to Egypt, they had seen Jerusalem and other cities of Judah sacked (v. 2), not ultimately by the power of Babylon but by a persistent God who confronted their apostasy (v. 3) and sent prophets whom they continually refused to heed (vv. 4–5). With no end to these provocations, God’s patience finally ran out. His anger both oozed like water and burned like fire against them until Jerusalem and its environs were destroyed (v. 6; cf. 42:18). This picture of divine wrath and its metaphorical combination of flowing water and blazing fire is terrifying.

44:7–10 Yahweh levels his exasperation at the people with three rhetorical questions. The first aims at why an already-small remnant would continue in a course that would only shrink it further (v. 7). The second question unpacks the first by wondering why the remnant persists in inciting Yahweh’s wrath against them through veneration of other gods (v. 8). The third question laments that the people still refuse to learn from their own mistakes and those of their ancestors (v. 9). Simply put, Judah has no good answers to the first two questions, while “Yes!” is the indisputable answer to whether Judah has already forgotten its past sins.

The God of Israel proceeds to lament that such stubbornness goes back many generations. Indeed, Yahweh’s rebuke through Jeremiah that Judah has failed to “fear” and “walk” in his “law” and “statutes” (v. 10) borrows the characteristic terminology of Deuteronomy. Already in the time of Moses Israel had failed to obey the law of Yahweh (e.g., Deut. 9:6, 24; 30:1; 31:29). The persistence of these sins across the centuries means that Deuteronomic terms of apostasy apply to Jeremiah’s audience just as if Moses himself were present and speaking to them.

44:11–14 Because Judah’s pattern of apostasy repeats itself without end, Yahweh resolves that his pattern of opposing his people must also continue. Yahweh determines to “set [his] face against you” (Jer. 44:11), the plural “you” being the “remnant of Judah who have set their faces to come to the land of Egypt to live” (v. 12). The place of Judah’s flight will become the place of its death in the exact same manner that Yahweh “punished Jerusalem, with the sword, with famine, and with pestilence” (v. 13). Previously, this destructive trio of “sword, famine, and pestilence” described the means of Judah’s death in its own land (e.g., 14:12; 18:21; 21:9; 24:10; 32:24). But now these means will serve the same function in a foreign land, for Babylon remains an aggressive empire that will pursue Judah all the way to Egypt (cf. 43:10–13).

There is a deeper irony in Yahweh’s final verdict that the Judean remnant in Egypt will perish there, never to return (44:14). Prior to Jerusalem’s fall, King Zedekiah and his people were fixated on remaining in the land and bringing back the exiles Nebuchadnezzar had deported in 598 BC (e.g., 28:1–4; cf. 2 Kings 24:10–17). This obsession with a chosen land and city made the catastrophe of 587 BC inevitable. But, after the sacking of Jerusalem, Yahweh offered them the opportunity to remain in the land under the sympathetic rule of a Judean governor appointed by Babylon (e.g., Jer. 40:9–12). Yet Judah still refused to embrace Yahweh’s will—both his discipline before the exile and his offer of restoration after it. Thus he hands Judah over to receive precisely what it wants, to the end that their designs to find refuge in Egypt will lead to the very destruction the people sought to avoid.

44:15–19 The rightness of Yahweh’s verdict is confirmed by the recalcitrance of the people. With both nonchalance and irreverence the Judean remnant in Egypt responds to Jeremiah that they will continue defying Yahweh’s word through him (v. 15). They must worship the “queen of heaven,” an otherwise-unknown deity they had venerated since before the fall of Jerusalem (v. 16).127 Worse, the people even have the insolence to claim that everything went well until they stopped worshiping her (v. 17), effectively placing blame for Jerusalem’s fall and their suffering since then at the feet of the prophet Jeremiah and the God he serves.

As the people’s incoherent “theo-logic” goes, if they had ignored Jeremiah’s exhortation to worship Yahweh and not idols, then Babylon would never have triumphed (v. 18). The women among Jeremiah’s hearers, who apparently played a leading role in cultic service to the queen of heaven, add that their participation in worship was never at their own initiative (v. 19). These words echo the fall narrative of passing blame in Genesis 3, though now in the opposite direction when the wives in Jeremiah’s audience pin responsibility on their husbands (cf. Gen. 3:12).

44:20–23 Jeremiah retorts that “you” (plural), men and women alike, have faulty reasoning and selective recall of history (Jer. 44:20). Yahweh sees and knows perfectly that the responsible parties were “you” who offered cultic service to the queen of heaven (v. 21). The main factor in Babylon’s victory was not an on-and-off relationship between Judah and a lesser deity, as the audience supposes.

Instead, it was the agency of the God of Israel who judged his people for their on-and-off relationship with him (v. 22). Jerusalem fell to Babylon because of apostasy with the queen of heaven rather than any lapse in venerating her (v. 23). Interestingly, the book of Jeremiah indicates that the Judean remnant believes that Yahweh is obligated to defend them from enemies while also believing that other deities are the true guardians of their welfare. The instability of such syncretism has been and will continue to be Judah’s downfall.

44:24–30 The apostate remnant in Egypt has now steeled itself in word and deed against Yahweh. Thus Jeremiah outlines the further steps Yahweh must take against his people (v. 24). With unmistakable sarcasm the prophet encourages his hearers to follow through on their stated determination to make offerings to the queen of heaven (v. 25)—an action that, if completed, would likely be the only occasion on which fickle Judah managed to be faithful to a single deity!

Because Judah persists in refusing to repent, Yahweh asserts that it will become impossible to repent. That is, he will remove access to his “name” (v. 26)—the divine presence that Judah no longer wants anyway—that holds back the powers that would cause his people to suffer full destruction (v. 27). The historical fulfillment of this threat will be the diminution of an already-small remnant at the time of their return to the land (v. 28; cf. 25:11–12; 29:10). Despite Judah’s casting aside Yahweh’s word about not going to Egypt (cf. 42:9–17), his word will ultimately prevail (44:29) when he delivers Pharaoh over to King Nebuchadnezzar (v. 30). Both Judah and Egypt will discover that there is no escape from the long arm of Yahweh’s justice through Babylon. In Jeremiah 46:1–24 Yahweh will speak a similar verdict directly to Egypt in the first of the “Oracles concerning the Nations,” though this passage has an earlier pharaoh in mind (46:2). As noted in the Section Overview, Jeremiah 46 is chronologically prior to Jeremiah 44.