Liberty taken Away - Jeremiah 34

Jeremiah 34:15 "And ye were now turned, and had done right in my sight, in proclaiming liberty every man to his neighbor; and ye had made a covenant before me in the house which is called by my name. v16 But ye turned and polluted my name, and caused every man his servant, whom he had set at liberty at their pleasure, to return and brought them unto subjection, to be unto you for servants and for handmaids."

The original covenant is found in Exodus 21:2. I suppose there were a number of reasons why a person could become a servant. He may have had a bad year and lost his home and crops. Being a servant would be a way for them to remain in the homeland and get a new start. The deal was that they would go free after a set time. These people were obeying the rule by letting them go free but then they would bring them under their authority immediately after.
They obeyed the letter of the law.

Exodus 21:2 "If thou buy an Hebrew servant, six years he shall serve; and in the seventh he shall go out free for nothing."

I believe if we looked back we would find that the Jews were confronted with the 'commandments' as a whole, then in one chapter only the sabbath was mentioned, then in this chapter it was the liberty of the servants that they had failed in. One by one they broke the commandments and covenant that they agreed to.

Their punishment was that they would be given over to the enemy and would die except for Zedekiah, king of Judah.

v4 Yet hear the word of the LORD, O Zedekiah kind of Judah; Thus saith the LORD of thee, Thou shalt not die by the sword; But thou shalt die in peace; and with the burnings of thy fathers, the former kings which were before thee, so shall they burn odors for thee; and they will lament thee, saying Ah lord! for I have pronounced the word, saith the LORD."

These one-by-one offenses show clearly to Israel that their punishment is justified. Jeremiah's book, he was commanded to write, will serve as a reminder when Israel looks back to the captivity.