Then was fulfilled that which was spoken through Jeremias the prophet, saying,
Matthew pauses the story of Herod's massacre and quotes the prophet Jeremiah, who wrote long before. The words he uses to introduce that quotation — "then was fulfilled" — are not the words he uses elsewhere, and that difference shapes how we read the verse.
Matthew has several ways of tying an event to a prophecy, and the Greek keeps them apart:
"In order that it might be" — hina (see Matt. 1:22); "so that it might be" — hupos (Matt. 2:23); and "then ... was fulfilled" — tote (Matt. 2:17) — are never confused in the quotations from the Old Testament. The first is the object of the prophecy. The second is not simply its object, but an event that fell within the scope and intention of the prophecy. The third is only a case in point, where what happened was an illustration of what the prophecy said.
Jeremiah wrote his lament long before Herod's day. Nobody would have expected those words here:
Nothing shows more clearly how Christ is always before the Holy Spirit than the way our inspired writer applies Jeremiah 31:15 here. A pagan, or certainly a Jew, might admire the picture for its beauty, its boldness, and its grandeur. But who except God would have thought just then of the mourning prophet's words? They brought His Son before Him in Herod the Edomite's slaughter of the babies of Bethlehem. Matthew does not say that this was the object of the prophecy, as he does in other cases.
Rachel was Jacob's wife, and she had died centuries earlier. Her name surfaces here because of where she was buried and which tribe held the land:
Why Rachel's voice? Bethlehem belonged to the tribe of Judah, but Benjamin was next to them; and you will remember Benjamin was Rachel's son. Bethlehem is first mentioned in connection with Rachel's death (Gen. 35:16-20), and her tomb was "in the territory of Benjamin at Zelzah" (1 Sam. 10:2). This piece of land belonged to Benjamin, but it dipped down into the land of Judah. A little building marks the site of her tomb to this day, about a mile north of Bethlehem, on the main road from Jerusalem and Bethel. Herod was so determined to sweep the whole area clear that he killed the children not only in Bethlehem but in "all that region" — the parts of Benjamin just mentioned.
God guarded His Son without any display of power, and left Him among His people in their grief:
We see from this that God puts forth no miraculous power to preserve Emmanuel. It was carrying out the prophecies — filling in the picture of ruin, both moral and national, that the Holy Spirit had sketched long years before. God was showing how precious every footstep of His Son was to Him… Wherever Christ was, His place was with His people in their sorrow, and He will not let them feel a pang without sharing it. … If Christ has the smallest connection with Israel, they become the object of Satan's hatred. Herod, led on by Satan, gave the order to kill their little ones, but the Messiah is taken away from the scene of his rage.
Jeremiah 31 does not end in tears. The next verse promises reward and return — and Matthew stops before it:
It is beautiful to see that the Holy Spirit (Matt. 2:17-18) applies to that event the passage about sorrow but not the passage about joy. Here is what follows: "Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the LORD, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy" (verse 16).
The withheld half of the prophecy is not lost. Another writer sees it answered by the one Child Herod failed to kill:
When Bethlehem mourned the babies Herod had killed, it was as if Rachel were repeating her lament from her grave nearby. But Rachel must find comfort here too, in a deeper way than in the prophet. The One who had escaped would in time offer Himself freely. He would redeem the heirs of death from the power of the grave and bring them back to a better life.
- Then, not that. "Then was fulfilled" marks a case in point: the event illustrates the prophecy; it is not the prophecy's stated object.
- Seen. The Spirit reached for an old lament because Christ is always before Him. God did not overlook the grief of Bethlehem.
- Shared. No miracle shielded the Child from His people's sorrow. Where Christ touches His people, Satan rages — and Christ feels every pang with them.
- Withheld. The quotation stops at the weeping and passes over Jeremiah's promised reward and return.
- Answered. Comfort still comes through the one Child who escaped. He would give Himself to redeem the heirs of death from the grave.
A voice has been heard in Rama, weeping, and great lamentation Rachel weeping [for] her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.
Matthew closes his account of Herod's slaughter at Bethlehem with a borrowed lament from Jeremiah. In it a mother of Israel, dead for centuries, weeps for children who are gone. Why does Matthew apply an old prophecy about exile to a massacre? And why does God allow such grief at all, when He has just rescued His own Son from it?
Matthew uses three different phrases when he quotes the Old Testament. Here he uses the loosest of them. One writer set out the difference:
Three phrases are never confused in the quotations of the Old Testament: "in order that it might be" (see Matt. 1:22); "so that it might be" (Matt. 2:23); and "then… was fulfilled" (Matt. 2:17). The first is the object of the prophecy. The second is not simply its object, but an event that fell within the scope and intention of the prophecy. The third is only a case in point, where what happened illustrated what the prophecy said.
Another writer draws out what that means for the scene itself:
The next quotation we find here is from Jeremiah, and it speaks of Rachel weeping over her dead. Matthew introduces it in a very different way — "then was fulfilled," not "that it might be." This is only an application. When Bethlehem mourned her babies slaughtered by Herod, it was then as if Rachel from her grave close by were repeating her lamentation.
Rachel died near Bethlehem, centuries before Herod's soldiers came.
Rachel had been dead for centuries and centuries. But the Spirit of God puts it in this remarkable way, as if her spirit had risen from the dead. This dreadful slaughter took so many of her own children, along with the murdered infants of the tribe of Judah. So Rachel's voice is lifted up in weeping, and her cries of sorrow reach even Ramah, the chief town of Benjamin… Bethlehem was the place where she died. Her children died there too, just because it was the spot where her Saviour and theirs was born.
There is a pattern in Rachel's family, and one writer reads the nation's whole story in it.
Like Jacob's, the nation's way to the glory runs through trial and trouble. The reference to Rachel's anguish shows this too (Jer. 31:15). "Benoni," the son of her sorrow, becomes "Benjamin," the son of the right hand. The nation's story is hidden like a riddle in the stories of Jacob, Rachel and her children.
Matthew stops the quotation before Jeremiah's answer to the weeping.
It is beautiful to see that the Holy Spirit (Matt. 2:17-18) applies to that event the passage about sorrow, but not the passage about joy. Here is what comes next in Jeremiah: "Thus says the LORD: 'Keep your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there is a reward for your work, declares the LORD, and they shall come back from the land of the enemy'" (verse 16).
The rest of Jeremiah's words were still there for the mothers who mourned.
But there was bitter sorrow for the mothers of Bethlehem… What comfort they would have found, if only they had turned to the Scripture that spoke of their sorrow! There we read: "I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you… There is hope for your future, declares the LORD, and your children shall come back to their own country" (Jer. 31).
A deeper comfort rests on the Child who escaped.
But Rachel must be comforted here also, in a deeper way than in Jeremiah. The One who escaped would later freely offer Himself, to redeem people from the power of the grave and bring the heirs of death back to a better life.
Herod struck at the children. Another hand moved him.
No doubt it was the devil who, knowing well Who had been born, moved Herod to commit such an atrocity (Revelation 12:4). Its purpose fails… Yet the blow falls, and who can tell the sorrow it must have caused?
The sorrow did not stop at Bethlehem.
The wicked deed is only a beginning of the sorrows of Israel, because they rejected the King… The worst is still to come, in the time of Jacob's trouble, when the false Messiah will be like Herod, shedding their blood… What greater crying and lamentation there will be in the land in the future!
- Applied, not predicted. "Then was fulfilled" marks a case in point — an old lament fitting a new grief — not a prophecy aimed at this event.
- A voice from the grave. Rachel lies buried near Bethlehem. Her weeping sounds in the place where her Saviour was born and her children died.
- Sorrow named, then renamed. She called her baby "son of my sorrow"; his father called him "son of the right hand." The nation's road to glory runs through trouble.
- Half a verse quoted. Matthew takes Jeremiah's weeping and leaves out his joy. The comfort still stands in the next verse, waiting to be read.
- A beginning, not an end. The devil moved Herod, and the blow missed the Child. He escaped death then, to offer Himself later — and Israel's greater sorrows still lie ahead.