The prophet’s purchase of a field becomes a sign. After the fiery destruction of Jerusalem, people will eventually return to the city. Normal commerce will resume. The purchase takes the form of a sign act (32:1–15; cf. 13:1–14; 19:1–13; 27:1–7). The instruction is brief; so is the initial interpretation. Most attention is given to the report of compliance. A man who through poverty or debt was about to forfeit his land was to solicit a next of kin to buy it (Lev. 25:25–28; cf. Ruth 4:7).

The business transaction is given in detail—one of the fullest records we have on such matters. Scales were used to weigh bars or rings of silver. Seventeen shekels of silver equaled seven ounces. The two copies of the transaction, either transcribed on clay tablets, as is known from Mesopotamia, or on …