How is the image of Rachel weeping in Jeremiah 31:15 fulfilled in the infanticide committed by Herod?
The grave of Rachel, Jacob’s wife, was well known in Israel, and was close to Bethlehem (Genesis 35:16,Genesis 48:7). Jeremiah 31:15 depicts the spirit of Rachel weeping over the children taken into exile, loudly enough to be heard in Ramah, on the border between Judah and Israel. The killing of Bethlehem’s baby boys parallels that destruction and fulfills the prophecy in a more concrete way. Rachel had been the mother of the twelve tribes who had had the most difficulty conceiving children, and had died in bearing her second child Benjamin, so her weeping became an image for extreme sorrow.
The grave of Jacob’s wife Rachel (see Genesis 35:19–20) had long been considered one of the holy places in the land and it was a site well known among the inhabitants of Bethlehem as it was located very close to the city (Genesis 35:16, Genesis 48:7).1
In Jeremiah 31:15 the prophet sees the spirit of Rachel, the matriarch of Israel, crying and weeping over her children who have been taken into captivity. Her crying and weeping is heard even in Ramah, on the border between Israel and Judah. The destruction of the nation of Israel by foreign rulers which had started with their captivity, now culminates in Herod’s murder of the innocent boys in Bethlehem. The mass infanticide in Bethlehem therefore marked the final episode in this national destruction prior to the Messiah being revealed (Matthew 3:13–17) and therefore constituted a very significant fulfillment of the prophecy of Jeremiah 31:15 (see also Jeremiah 31:16–30).2
In order to thoroughly understand Matthew’s quotation from Jeremiah, we have to pay attention to the passage from the prophet as a whole, of which the words quoted in Matthew 2:18 constitute only the beginning. Jeremiah 31:15–17 reads,
Thus says the Lord: A voice is heard in Ramah, lamentation and bitter weeping. Rachel is weeping for her children; she refuses to be comforted for her children, because they are no more.
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. There is hope for your future, declares the Lord, and your children shall come back to their own country.
The explanation then, is as follows: Of the mothers of the twelve tribes of Israel, Rachel had the greatest difficulty in terms of conceiving children. After a long period of childlessness, she then received Joseph. When her second child, Benjamin, was finally born quite some time later, Rachel passed away during childbirth. As such she becomes the symbol of the passionate sorrow of a mother of Israel, whose children are persecuted and exiled.3
17 Alors s'accomplit ce qui avait été annoncé par Jérémie, le prophète: