This haftarah opens with Jeremiah, imprisoned in the palace court during the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem, receiving word that his cousin Hanamel is coming to offer him the right to buy a field in Anathoth, invoking the ancient law that gives the nearest relative the first right to redeem family land rather than let it pass to strangers.
Jeremiah recognizes the request as confirmation of a prophecy he had already received, and proceeds with the purchase in full legal form despite the city's desperate circumstances, weighing out the silver, signing and sealing the deed before witnesses, and instructing his scribe Baruch to place both the sealed and open copies of the deed in an earthenware jar so they will be preserved for a long time, a deliberate act of investment in land whose value, given the siege closing in around the city, seems entirely irrational to anyone watching.
The haftarah closes with Jeremiah, having completed the purchase, praying to God and expressing his own uncertainty at what he has just done, given the overwhelming military disaster clearly approaching, and God answers that nothing is too difficult for Him, affirming that houses, fields and vineyards will again be bought in this land, even though it will first fall to the Babylonians exactly as feared.