37:11-12 During the lifting of the siege of Jerusalem just described (v. 5), Jeremiah left the city to conduct some personal business concerning the purchase of some property in the territory of Benjamin. This may have been the land in Anathoth that his cousin Hanamel later wanted him to buy (cf. 32:6-15).
Since Jeremiah was imprisoned in the court of the guard when Hanamel approached him about buying this property, Jeremiah may have left the city to view the land anticipating that his cousin would make the offer. The present incident closes with Jeremiah confined in the court of the guard (v. 21). This suggests that the present incident occurred before Hanamel's offer, which he made when Jeremiah was confined there. Or these may be two unrelated incidents.
37:13 Jeremiah was leaving Jerusalem by the northern gate that led to the territory of Benjamin when Irijah, a captain of the guard, arrested him.485He charged the prophet with defecting to the enemy. Jeremiah had urged others to submit to the Babylonians (21:9; 38:2), and some of the people had taken his advice (38:2, 19; 39:9; 52:15), so the charge was plausible.
37:14 Jeremiah denied the charge but to no avail. Irijah took him prisoner and brought him before the city officials.
37:15-16 The officials angrily beat Jeremiah and confined him in the house of a scribe named Jonathan, which they had converted into a jail.486Jeremiah remained in an underground dungeon for many days. The Hebrew words describing this cell are difficult to interpret. They may describe "a complex of large, underground cisterns that had been converted into a prison."487Jeremiah feared for his life there (v. 20). The attitude of Zedekiah's officials contrasts sharply with that of Jehoiakim's officials in the previous chapter (36:11-19).
