Then Jeremiah went forth, &c., to go into the land of Benjamin Jeremiah, having no further revelation from God to communicate, and knowing the city would soon be taken, resolves to go to his own country to Anathoth. To separate himself thence, &c. The Hebrew, בתוךְ העם
לחלק משׁם, is rendered by Houbigant, “That he might have there a possession for himself with the people;” by Dr. Waterland, “To take rents from thence,” &c.; and by Blaney, “To receive a portion thereof among the people.” “This,” says the last-mentioned critic, “seems a more natural interpretation of the words, than to understand them, as our translators seem to have done, of the prophet's withdrawing himself, or slipping away, (as it is expressed in the margin,) for fear of being shut up again in the city, on the renewal of the blockade. For the case appears to have been this, Jeremiah had been cut off from his patrimony in the land of Benjamin, by the Chaldeans having been masters there. But, upon their retreat, he meant to return, with a view of coming in for a share of the produce of the land with the rest of his neighbours. For that he was likely to want some means for his support is evident from his having been obliged to be subsisted in prison afterward upon a public allowance.”