Publisher's Synopsis
Job puts it much more effectively: "Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together." "If that is not wit," says one, "there is no such thing as wit. And yet the commentators do not see it, or will not see it. They are perfectly wooden when they come to any such gleam of humor." There is a bit of ridicule in Jeremiah that we should be quick to call ridicule, if we came upon it elsewhere. He is describing the disasters that fell upon the allies of the King of Egypt. "Why are the strong ones swept away? They stood not because the Lord did thrust them down. He made them to stumble, yea they fell one upon another; and they said, Arise, and let us go again to our own people, and to the land of our nativity, from the oppressing sword." They are defeated in spite of all the promises of the King of Egypt. He does not seem to avail them.
