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also 3:3; 13:14; 15:7). Only the “major” prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah (who
each had an OT book under their name) are so identified; those who occur
in the Book of the Twelve (Micah, 2:6; Hosea, 2:15; Zechariah, 21:4) and
those who are not identifiable as prophets at all (2:23; 13:35) remain
anonymous, while in 27:9 Zechariah, the primary source of the quotation, is
subsumed under the major prophet Jeremiah. The only exception to this
pattern is 1:22, where there is no obvious reason for not identifying Isaiah.
18 Matthew’s wording of the quotation from Jer 31:15 agrees with LXX in
its first four and last three words. The intervening lines echo the sense and
some of the words of the LXX but not its actual phrasing; there is no
significant difference in meaning, though it is surprising that Matthew uses
“children” for LXX “sons,” where the latter would have fitted more exactly
his account of the killing of male children.¹⁸ Both Matthew and LXX fairly
represent the Hebrew text apart from its repetition of “for her children.”¹
The superficial point of Matthew’s quotation is that there is a scriptural
precedent for the loss of children. By linking the two events in the context of
scriptural fulfillment he invites his readers to find reassurance in the thought that
even human tragedy can be interpreted within the overall purpose of God. But
the situations are very different, in that Jeremiah depicts the grief of Rachel not
during her life and for her own children, but in her grave as she watches her
“children” (her later descendants, the exiles from the kingdom of Judah) being
“lost” not through death but by being deported to Babylon. So why does
Matthew feel that this text is appropriate here? The following suggestions seem
to me possible, though other interpreters have offered quite different
approaches.²
Jeremiah 31 is a chapter of hope and restoration, in which the grief of v. 15
strikes the only discordant note precisely because that grief is no longer
appropriate. So the prophecy goes on (vv. 16–17) to call on Rachel to stop
lamenting because the exiles will return. Is Matthew then inviting the reflection
that, radically different as the situations are, there is again hope beyond the
tragedy?²¹ If so, it seems an oblique argument from context rather than from
direct similarity in the text cited, since the restoration this time is not to be of
those who were “lost” but of others through the agency of the one who escaped
the slaughter; there is to be no “return” for the babies of Bethlehem.²² And by
quoting only the pessimistic v. 15 and not its reassuring sequel he has left a lot to
the imagination and contextual awareness of his readers. If such a “bonus point”
(see above p. 45) was intended, would most of his readers have been able to
grasp it? Perhaps some of them would, for the following reasons.
In this chapter in which geographical locations figure prominently, the name
Ramah in the quotation draws attention.²³ Readers with a good knowledge of the
OT might remember that it was specifically at Ramah that the exiles were
gathered for the march to Babylon in 586 B.C. (Jer 40:1), Jeremiah himself
being among them.²⁴ This then might be a trigger to thoughts of exile and (in the
context of Jer 31, though not of Jer 40) return, of hope beyond the disaster.
Moreover, Jeremiah was himself released at Ramah, and did not go to Babylon
with the other exiles, but stayed in Judah to try (unsuccessfully) to influence
those who remained (Jer 40:1–6). Is there a hint here of the role of the future
Jeremiah (as Jesus will be described in 16:14; see comments there) who was to
escape the fate of the “children” and go on to appeal (equally unsuccessfully) to
the leaders of God’s people in Judea? Might Matthew also have had in mind that
it was to Egypt that Jeremiah, like Jesus, ultimately escaped (though
unwillingly)?
But there may be more to the name Ramah than that. Rachel’s weeping is
located there because it is in the territory of Benjamin which, unlike Judah, was
one of the “Rachel” tribes and in which, according to one OT tradition, her grave
was located (1 Sam 10:2). Later tradition, however, based on Gen 35:16–20;
48:7, located Rachel’s tomb where it is still shown today, just outside Bethlehem
(in Judah, 12 miles south of Ramah)—though what the Genesis texts actually
say is that she died and was buried “on the way to Ephrath (Bethlehem)” and
“still some distance from Ephrath.” So the ambiguity²⁵ over the place of Rachel’s
burial (and therefore of her weeping) may have contributed to Matthew’s feeling
that this text about Ramah was in fact also relevant to the fate of Bethlehem’s
children, and that therefore Jeremiah’s message of hope for the exiles from
Ramah could also be applied mutatis mutandis to the tragedy at Bethlehem.
This is one of Matthew’s most elusive OT quotations, and few claim with any
confidence to have fathomed just what he intended, but the creativity which he
displays in many of his formula-quotations perhaps encourages us to believe that
in giving so prominent a place to Jer 31:15 he had more in mind than simply to
point out that there was a precedent for sorrow arising out of the loss of children,
even if we now lack the key to unlock the fuller meaning that some of his
readers may have been able to draw from the quotation.²
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