Because of the Chaldeans: for they were afraid of them, because Ishmael the son of Nethaniah had slain Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, whom the king of Babylon made governor in the land.
Because of the Chaldeans; for they were afraid - lest the Chaldeans should suspect all the Jews of being implicated in Ishmael's treason, as though the Jews sought to have a prince of the house of David (Jeremiah 41:1). Their better way toward gaining God's favour would have been to have laid the blame on the real culprit, and to have cleared themselves. A tortuous policy is the parent of fear. Righteousness inspires with boldness (Psalms 53:5; Proverbs 28:1).
Remarks:
(1) How much of history consists of the intrigues, ambition, slander, treachery, deeds of violence, and bloodshedding of men! There is no hope that it will be otherwise until He comes who shall reign in righteousness. Ishmael's murder of Gedaliah was accompanied with foul treachery. After having been hospitably received (Jeremiah 41:1), he availed himself of the opportunity afforded, by his unsuspecting host being off his guard, to murder him and his retinue (Jeremiah 41:2-3). As death may surprise any of us, at a time and in a way least expected, we should seek to be always ready to meet our Almighty Judge.
(2) One crime generally leads to another, in order to shield the perpetrator, as he hopes, from the penal consequences of the first crime. So Ishmael added to his first awful crime of setting aside the Chaldean government, and murdering the appointed governor, the fresh crime of killing thirty out of fourscore men. As the greed of gain often accompanies cruelty and treachery, he spared the remaining ten, not from any relenting or pity, but in the hope of getting "treasures" which they professed to have hidden "in the field" (Jeremiah 41:8).
(3) But judgment, even in this life, generally overtakes the bloody and deceitful man. God employs one bad man as the instrument of chastising another, and, in one form or another, the nemesis of crime overtakes the criminal. However cunningly the sinner weaves his web of iniquity, the web, which has cost him a world of trouble, and which seemed a complete success, is in a moment torn asunder by the breath of God, and the victims escape. Cleverly and secretly as Ishmael perpetrated the deed, Johanan heard of it, and found the transgressor at the waters in Gibeon, where he rescued the captive multitude out of his hands (Jeremiah 41:2); and the only fruit which Ishmael derived from his crime was, he was forced to flee as an outlawed fugitive to Ammon (Jeremiah 41:15), bearing about with him, like Cain, the brand of the murderer wheresoever he went, and enduring in the accusations of conscience a torment worse than any temporal death, and a fearful foretaste of the eternal death before him. The success of villany is short, and is only a prelude to a terrible and ten-fold retribution.
(4) Had Johanan adopted a straightforward course after the overthrow of Ishmael, and explained to the Chaldeans the facts of the case as to Gedaliah's murder, instead of fleeing from the lawfully-constituted authorities toward Egypt (Jeremiah 41:17-18), he would have stayed himself, and the Jews with him, from many sorrows, and from destruction in the end. A right line is the shortest that can be drawn between two points. A crooked policy tends to misery in the end, and generates fear in the meantime. Those who guiltily fear where no fear is, are sure at last to get real cause for fear. A clear conscience and the path of rectitude produce at once fearlessness and safety.