Jeremiah 31:31-34 (LXX: Jer. 38:31-34) is a prose oracle about the new covenant. It is inserted between two poetic oracles about the return of the Northern tribes from exile which event Jeremiah was sure would happen (cf. vv.35-37). Perhaps the renewal of the covenant during King Josiah's time as occassioned by the discovery of a part of Deuteronomy in the Temple inspired Jeremiah's hopes for the return of Israel/Ephraim. We know however that the northern tribes did not return. More, Jeremiah witnessed the fall of Jerusalem in 587 BC and was even among those deported to Egypt. However, there remained hope that God will not forsake His people. The prose oracle added at a later date (during the exile?) looks to a time when God will reach into the history of His people once more and make them into a people of His own heart.
The oracle can be divided into two parts: vv.31-32, with the images of a broken covenant, and vv. 33-34, the new covenant itself described as an intimate relationship between God and his people, a relationship based on knowledge and of forgiven sins. This division is not clear cut, however, since there are elements that closely link past and future covenantal actions of God:
- the oracular "ne'um YHWH", "says the Lord" (31,32,33,34)
- the expression "day(s)" as moments of God's action (31,32,33)
- members of the household that were and will be involved in the covenant: "their fathers" (32), "brother" (34), "eldest to youngest" (v. 34)
There is a significant change as one moves from the first part to the second. In verse 31, both the houses of israel and Judah are mentioned; in v. 33 only Israel is mentone. The change can be explained if the new covenant will involve the unification of the two kingdoms (Ephraim and Judah) into just one Israel.
The main contrast is between the covenant "with their fathers" and the new covenant (v. 31). The first, "they broke although I was supposed to be their Lord." The phrase "we'anoki ba'alty bam" is a disjunctive clause with the verb leb ba'al reminiscent of the idolatrous cult into which Yahwistic religion fell into because of Canaanite influence. The new covenant will be different from the first one because
I will put my torah in their midst;
and on their hearts I will carve it.
The Septuagint translator, rendered beqirbam (literally "in their midst") as dianoia dianoia "mind", perhaps to strengthen the parallel with bl leb ("heart").
With the new covenant that directly touches men's hearts (and minds), there will be real knowledge of the Lord and He shall no longer remember the sins of His people.
The relationshiop of covenant with knowledge on the one hand and sin on the other is best understood in the light of the concept of covenant as an act by which Yahweh chooses to make Israel His family. Filipinos would best understand the covenant as similar to a blood compact by which one makes another party a "blood-brother" (kadugo). Within the God-Israel covenant relationship, Yahweh becomes a "Father" to His people (Me, 'am literally, "those who sleep in my tent") whom He disciplines and instructs. In this context, then, the torah is equivalent to the wisdom of the father being handed over to the son. "Sin" can never be fully understood apart from a covenant relationship, for it is within such a relationship that it really emerges as the non-fulfillment of a contract, the inaction towards a shared goal, the outright refusal to fulfill a duty towards a partner.
The Letter to the Hebrews quotes this whole passage in Heb. 8:8-12 by way of introducing its main topic: Christ the High Priest of the New Covenant. (It is from this section of Hebrews that we get the distinction between vetus ac novum testamentum, old and new testaments.)
Again, in Heb. 10:16-17, the author of Hebrews quotes the beginning and end of this passage from Jeremiah to show that the once and for all sin-offering of Christ has put an end to all other sin-offerings.
