Israel · Restoration — sowing, watching, rebuilding
Jeremiah 31:27-30
Jeremiah · ~587 BC · Status: Disputed · Evidence weight: 60%
“Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man, and with the seed of beast. And it shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to throw down, and to destroy, and to afflict; so will I watch over them, to build, and to plant, saith the LORD.”
King James Version · the opening — all 4 verses are below
The God who 'watched over' Judah to pluck up and destroy pledges to watch just as vigilantly 'to build, and to plant' — and the proverb of inherited guilt ('the fathers have eaten a sour grape…') will be retired: each person answers for his own sin. Individual accountability enters covenant history on the eve of the new covenant passage (31:31-34).
Read the whole passage — all 4 verses (KJV)
31:27Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the seed of man, and with the seed of beast.
31:28And it shall come to pass, that like as I have watched over them, to pluck up, and to break down, and to throw down, and to destroy, and to afflict; so will I watch over them, to build, and to plant, saith the LORD.
31:29In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.
31:30But every one shall die for his own iniquity: every man that eateth the sour grape, his teeth shall be set on edge.
Fulfillment References
Ezekiel 18:2-4 Jeremiah 31:31-34 Ezra 3:10-13
How Traditions Read This Prophecy
Apostolic (Oneness) PentecostalPersonal accountability prepares personal salvation: the new covenant two verses later is entered one repentant believer at a time — nobody is baptized by proxy.
JewishEzekiel 18 develops the same reversal at length; the move from corporate to individual responsibility is a watershed of exilic theology.
CatholicThe dignity of the person before God emerges here — guilt is not fate, and grace addresses each soul.
ProtestantThe hinge into 31:31-34, the longest OT passage quoted in the NT (Heb. 8): individual hearts, individual knowledge of God, sins remembered no more.
AcademicThe sour-grapes proverb appears verbatim in Ezekiel 18:2, evidence of a live exilic debate the prophets adjudicated; the passage frames the Neue Bund pericope that follows.
Scholarship & Sources
Hebrews 8:8-12's full citation of Jer. 31:31-34 is the NT's longest OT quotation; the individual-responsibility development is treated in Moshe Greenberg's Ezekiel (AB) and Jeremiah commentaries ad loc.
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