{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"JER","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jeremiah","commonName":"Jeremiah","introduction":"JEREMIAH, son of Hilkiah, one of the ordinary priests, dwelling in Anathoth of Benjamin (Jer 1:1), not the Hilkiah the high priest who discovered the book of the law (Kg2 22:8); had he been the same, the designation would have been \"the priest\", or \"the high priest\". Besides, his residence at Anathoth shows that he belonged to the line of Abiathar, who was deposed from the high priesthood by Solomon (Kg1 2:26-35), after which the office remained in Zadok's line. Mention occurs of Jeremiah in Ch2 35:25; Ch2 36:12, Ch2 36:21. In 629 B.C. the thirteenth year of King Josiah, while still very young (Jer 1:5), he received his prophetical call in Anathoth (Jer 1:2); and along with Hilkiah the high priest, the prophetess Huldah, and the prophet Zephaniah, he helped forward Josiah's reformation of religion (2Ki. 23:1-25). Among the first charges to him was one that he should go and proclaim God's message in Jerusalem (Jer 2:2). He also took an official tour to announce to the cities of Judah the contents of the book of the law, found in the temple (Jer 11:6) five years after his call to prophesy. On his return to Anathoth, his countrymen, offended at his reproofs, conspired against his life. To escape their persecutions (Jer 11:21), as well as those of his own family (Jer 12:6), he left Anathoth and resided at Jerusalem. During the eighteen years of his ministry in Josiah's reign he was unmolested; also during the three months of Jehoahaz or Shallum's reign (Jer 22:10-12). On Jehoiakim's accession it became evident that Josiah's reformation effected nothing more than a forcible repression of idolatry and the establishment of the worship of God outwardly. The priests, prophets, and people then brought Jeremiah before the authorities, urging that he should be put to death for his denunciations of evil against the city (Jer 26:8-11). The princes, however, especially Ahikam, interposed in his behalf (Jer 26:16, Jer 26:24), but he was put under restraint, or at least deemed it prudent not to appear in public. In the fourth year of Jehoiakim (606 B.C.), he was commanded to write the predictions given orally through him, and to read them to the people. Being \"shut up\", he could not himself go into the house of the Lord (Jer 36:5); he therefore deputed Baruch, his amanuensis, to read them in public on the fast day. The princes thereupon advised Baruch and Jeremiah to hide themselves from the king's displeasure. Meanwhile they read the roll to the king, who was so enraged that he cut it with a knife and threw it into the fire; at the same time giving orders for the apprehension of the prophet and Baruch. They escaped Jehoiakim's violence, which had already killed the prophet Urijah (Jer 26:20-23). Baruch rewrote the words, with additional prophecies, on another roll (Jer 36:27-32). In the three months' reign of Jehoiachin or Jeconiah, he prophesied the carrying away of the king and the queen mother (Jer 13:18; Jer 22:24-30; compare Kg2 24:12). In this reign he was imprisoned for a short time by Pashur (Jer. 20:1-18), the chief governor of the Lord's house; but at Zedekiah's accession he was free (Jer 37:4), for the king sent to him to \"inquire of the Lord\" when Nebuchadnezzar came up against Jerusalem (Jer 21:1-3, &c.; Jer 37:3). The Chaldeans drew off on hearing of the approach of Pharaoh's army (Jer 37:5); but Jeremiah warned the king that the Egyptians would forsake him, and the Chaldeans return and burn up the city (Jer 37:7-8). The princes, irritated at this, made the departure of Jeremiah from the city during the respite a pretext for imprisoning him, on the allegation of his deserting to the Chaldeans (Jer 38:1-5). He would have been left to perish in the dungeon of Malchiah, but for the intercession of Ebed-melech, the Ethiopian (Jer 38:6-13). Zedekiah, though he consulted Jeremiah in secret yet was induced by his princes to leave Jeremiah in prison (Jer 38:14-28) until Jerusalem was taken. Nebuchadnezzar directed his captain, Nebuzar-adan, to give him his freedom, so that he might either go to Babylon or stay with the remnant of his people as he chose. As a true patriot, notwithstanding the forty and a half years during which his country had repaid his services with neglect and persecution, he stayed with Gedaliah, the ruler appointed by Nebuchadnezzar over Judea (Jer 40:6). After the murder of Gedaliah by Ishmael, Johanan, the recognized ruler of the people, in fear of the Chaldeans avenging the murder of Gedaliah, fled with the people to Egypt, and forced Jeremiah and Baruch to accompany him, in spite of the prophet's warning that the people should perish if they went to Egypt, but be preserved by remaining in their land (Jer. 41:1-43:13). At Tahpanhes, a boundary city on the Tanitic or Pelustan branch of the Nile, he prophesied the overthrow of Egypt (Jer 43:8-13). Tradition says he died in Egypt. According to the PSEUDO-EPIPHANIUS, he was stoned at TaphnÃ&brvbr or Tahpanhes. The Jews so venerated him that they believed he would rise from the dead and be the forerunner of Messiah (Mat 16:14).\n\nHAVERNICK observes that the combination of features in Jeremiah's character proves his divine mission; mild, timid, and susceptible of melancholy, yet intrepid in the discharge of his prophetic functions, not sparing the prince any more than the meanest of his subjects--the Spirit of prophecy controlling his natural temper and qualifying him for his hazardous undertaking, without doing violence to his individuality. Zephaniah, Habakkuk, Daniel, and Ezekiel were his contemporaries. The last forms a good contrast to Jeremiah, the Spirit in his case acting on a temperament as strongly marked by firmness as Jeremiah's was by shrinking and delicate sensitiveness. Ezekiel views the nation's sins as opposed to righteousness--Jeremiah, as productive of misery; the former takes the objective, the latter the subjective, view of the evils of the times. Jeremiah's style corresponds to his character: he is peculiarly marked by pathos, and sympathy with the wretched; his Lamentations illustrate this; the whole series of elegies has but one object--to express sorrow for his fallen country; yet the lights and images in which he presents this are so many, that the reader, so far from feeling it monotonous, is charmed with the variety of the plaintive strains throughout. The language is marked by AramÃ&brvbrisms, which probably was the ground of JEROME'S charge that the style is \"rustic\". LOWTH denies the charge and considers him in portions not inferior to Isaiah. His heaping of phrase on phrase, the repetition of stereotyped forms--and these often three times--are due to his affected feelings and to his desire to intensify the expression of them; he is at times more concise, energetic, and sublime, especially against foreign nations, and in the rhythmical parts.\n\nThe principle of the arrangement of his prophecies is hard to ascertain. The order of kings was--Josiah (under whom he prophesied eighteen years), Jehoahaz (three months), Jehoiakim (eleven years), Jeconiah (three months), Zedekiah (eleven years). But his prophecies under Josiah (the first through twentieth chapters) are immediately followed by a portion under Zedekiah (the twenty-first chapter). Again, Jer 24:8-10, as to Zedekiah, comes in the midst of the section as to Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Jeconiah (the twenty-second, twenty-third, twenty-fifth chapters, &c.) So the thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth chapters as to Jehoiakim, follow the twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth, twenty-ninth, thirty-third, thirty-fourth chapters, as to Zedekiah; and the forty-fifth chapter, dated the fourth year of Jehoiakim, comes after predictions as to the Jews who fled to Egypt after the overthrow of Jerusalem. EWALD thinks the present arrangement substantially Jeremiah's own; the various portions are prefaced by the same formula, \"The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord\" (Jer 7:1; Jer 11:1; Jer 18:1; Jer 21:1; Jer 25:1; Jer 30:1; Jer 32:1; Jer 34:1, Jer 34:8; Jer 35:1; Jer 40:1; Jer 44:1; compare Jer 14:1; Jer 46:1; Jer 47:1; Jer 49:34). Notes of time mark other divisions more or less historical (Jer 26:1; Jer 27:1; Jer 36:1; Jer 37:1). Two other portions are distinct of themselves (Jer 29:1; Jer 45:1). The second chapter has the shorter introduction which marks the beginning of a strophe; the third chapter seems imperfect, having as the introduction merely \"saying\" (Jer 3:1, Hebrew). Thus in the poetical parts, there are twenty-three sections divided into strophes of from seven to nine verses, marked some way thus, \"The Lord said also unto me\". They form five books: I. The Introduction, first chapter II. Reproofs of the Jews, the second through twenty-fourth chapters, made up of seven sections: (1) the second chapter (2) the third through sixth chapters; (3) the seventh through tenth chapters; (4) the eleventh through thirteenth chapters; (5) the fourteenth through seventeenth chapters; (6) the seventeenth through nineteenth and twentieth chapters; (7) the twenty-first through twenty-fourth chapters. III. Review of all nations in two sections: the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth through forty-ninth chapters, with a historical appendix of three sections, (1) the twenty-sixth chapter; (2) the twenty-seventh chapter; (3) the twenty-eighth and twenty-ninth chapters. IV. Two sections picturing the hopes of brighter times, (1) the thirtieth and thirty-first chapters; (2) the thirty-second and thirty-third chapters; and an historical appendix in three sections: (1) Jer 34:1-7; (2) Jer 34:8-22; (3) Jer. 35:1-19. V. The conclusion, in two sections: (1) Jer 36:2; (2) Jer 45:1-5. Subsequently, in Egypt, he added Jer 46:13-26 to the previous prophecy as to Egypt; also the three sections, the thirty-seventh through thirty-ninth chapters; fortieth through forty-third chapters; and forty-fourth chapter. The fifty-second chapter was probably (see Jer 51:64) an appendix from a later hand, taken from Kg2 24:18, &c.; Kg2 25:30. The prophecies against the several foreign nations stand in a different order in the Hebrew from that of the Septuagint; also the prophecies against them in the Hebrew (the forty-sixth through fifty-first chapters) are in the Septuagint placed after Jer 25:14, forming the twenty-sixth and thirty-first chapters; the remainder of the twenty-fifth chapter of the Hebrew is the thirty-second chapter of the Septuagint. Some passages in the Hebrew (Jer 27:19-22; Jer 33:14-26; Jer 39:4-14 Jer 48:45-47) are not found in the Septuagint; the Greek translators must have had a different recension before them; probably an earlier one. The Hebrew is probably the latest and fullest edition from Jeremiah's own hand. See on Jer 25:13. The canonicity of his prophecies is established by quotations of them in the New Testament (see Mat 2:17; Mat 16:14; Heb 8:8-12; on Mat 27:9, see on Introduction to Zechariah); also by the testimony of Ecclesiasticus 49:7, which quotes Jer 1:10; of PHILO, who quotes his word as an \"oracle\"; and of the list of canonical books in MELITO, ORIGEN, JEROME, and the Talmud. \n\n\n\nNext: Jeremiah Chapter 1\n\n","order":24,"numberOfChapters":52,"sha256":"c78e13c74a2800611f22cb60aa103f8a8343344fc49d4e0043f00d5c7e483f21","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JER/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JER","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":52,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JER/52.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JER","chapter":52},"totalNumberOfVerses":1164},"chapter":{"number":2,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["holiness unto the Lord--that is, was consecrated to the service of Jehovah (Exo 19:5-6). They thus answered to the motto on their high priest's breastplate, \"Holiness to the Lord\" (Deu 7:6; Deu 14:2, Deu 14:21). \n\nfirst-fruits of his increase--that is, of Jehovah's produce. As the first-fruits of the whole produce of the land were devoted to God (Exo 23:19; Num 18:12-13), so Israel was devoted to Him as the first-fruit and representative nation among all nations. So the spiritual Israel (Jam 1:18; Rev 14:4). \n\ndevour--carrying on the image of first-fruits which were eaten before the Lord by the priests as the Lord's representatives; all who ate (injured) Jehovah's first-fruits (Israel), contracted guilt: for example, Amalek, the Amorites, &c., were extirpated for their guilt towards Israel. \n\nshall come--rather, \"came.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["Jacob . . . Israel--the whole nation. \n\nfamilies--(See on Jer 1:15). Hear God's word not only collectively, but individually (Zac 12:12-14).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["iniquity--wrong done to them (Isa 5:4; Mic 6:3; compare Deu 32:4). \n\nwalked after vanity--contrasted with \"walkest after me in the wilderness\" (Jer 2:2): then I was their guide in the barren desert; now they take idols as their guides. \n\nvanity . . . vain--An idol is not only vain (impotent and empty), but vanity itself. Its worshippers acquire its character, becoming vain as it is (Deu 7:26; Psa 115:8). A people's character never rises above that of its gods, which are its \"better nature\" [BACON] (Kg2 17:15; Jon 2:8).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["Neither said they, Where, &c.--The very words which God uses (Isa 63:9, Isa 63:11, Isa 63:13), when, as it were, reminding Himself of His former acts of love to Israel as a ground for interposing in their behalf again. When they would not say, Where is Jehovah, &c., God Himself at last said it for them (compare see on Jer 2:2). \n\ndeserts . . . pits--The desert between Mount Sinai and Palestine abounds in chasms and pits, in which beasts of burden often sink down to the knees. \"Shadow of death\" refers to the darkness of the caverns amidst the rocky precipices (Deu 8:15; Deu 32:10).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["plentiful--literally, \"a land of Carmel,\" or \"well-cultivated land\": a garden land, in contrast to the \"land of deserts\" (Jer 2:6). \n\ndefiled--by idolatries (Jdg 2:10-17; Psa 78:58-59; Psa 106:38). \n\nyou . . . ye--change to the second person from the third, \"they\" (Jer 2:6), in order to bring home the guilt to the living generation.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["The three leading classes, whose very office under the theocracy was to lead the people to God, disowned Him in the same language as the nation at large, \"Where is the Lord?\" (See Jer 2:6). \n\npriests--whose office it was to expound the law (Mal 2:6-7). \n\nhandle--are occupied with the law as the subject of their profession. \n\npastors--civil, not religious: princes (Jer 3:15), whose duty it was to tend their people. \n\nprophets--who should have reclaimed the people from their apostasy, encouraged them in it by pretended oracles from Baal, the PhÅ“nician false god. \n\nby Baal--in his name and by his authority (compare Jer 11:21). \n\nwalked after things . . . not profit--answering to, \"walked after vanity,\" that is, idols (Jer 2:5; compare Jer 2:11; Hab 2:18).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["yet plead--namely, by inflicting still further judgments on you. \n\nchildren's children--Three manuscripts and JEROME omit \"children's\"; they seem to have thought it unsuitable to read \"children's children,\" when \"children\" had not preceded. But it is designedly so written, to intimate that the final judgment on the nation would be suspended for many generations [HORSLEY]. (Compare Eze 20:35-36; Mic 6:2).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["pass over the isles--rather, \"cross over to the isles.\" \n\nChittim . . . Kedar--that is, the heathen nations, west and east. Go where you will, you cannot find an instance of any heathen nation forsaking their own for other gods. Israel alone does this. Yet the heathen gods are false gods; whereas Israel, in forsaking Me for other gods, forsake their \"glory\" for unprofitable idols. \n\nChittim--Cyprus, colonized by PhÅ“nicians, who built in it the city of Citium, the modern Chitti. Then the term came to be applied to all maritime coasts of the Mediterranean, especially Greece (Num 24:24; Isa 23:1; Dan 11:30). \n\nKedar--descended from Ishmael; the Bedouins and Arabs, east of Palestine.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["glory--Jehovah, the glory of Israel (Psa 106:20; Rom 1:23). The Shekinah, or cloud resting on the sanctuary, was the symbol of \"the glory of the Lord\" (Kg1 8:11; compare Rom 9:4). The golden calf was intended as an image of the true God (compare Exo 32:4-5), yet it is called an \"idol\" (Act 7:41). It (like Roman Catholic images) was a violation of the second commandment, as the heathen multiplying of gods is a violation of the first. \n\nnot profit-- (Jer 2:8).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["Impassioned personification (Isa 1:2). \n\nhorribly afraid--rather, be horrified.\" \n\nbe . . . very desolate--rather, \"be exceedingly aghast\" at the monstrous spectacle. Literally, \"to be dried up,\" or \"devastated,\" (places devastated have such an unsightly look) [MAURER].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["two evils--not merely one evil, like the idolaters who know no better; besides simple idolatry, My people add the sin of forsaking the true God whom they have known; the heathen, though having the sin of idolatry, are free from the further sin of changing the true God for idols (Jer 2:11). \n\nforsaken me--The Hebrew collocation brings out the only living God into more prominent contrast with idol nonentities. \"Me they have forsaken, the Fountain,\" &c. (Jer 17:13; Psa 36:9; Joh 4:14). \n\nbroken cisterns--tanks for rain water, common in the East, where wells are scarce. The tanks not only cannot give forth an ever-flowing fresh supply as fountains can, but cannot even retain the water poured into them; the stonework within being broken, the earth drinks up the collected water. So, in general, all earthly, compared with heavenly, means of satisfying man's highest wants (Isa 55:1-2; compare Luk 12:33).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["is he a homeborn slave--No. \"Israel is Jehovah's son, even His first-born\" (Exo 4:22). Jer 2:16, Jer 2:18, Jer 2:36, and the absence of any express contrast of the two parts of the nation are against EICHORN'S view, that the prophet proposes to Judah, as yet spared, the case of Israel (the ten tribes) which had been carried away by Assyria as a warning of what they might expect if they should still put their trust in Egypt. \"Were Israel's ten tribes of meaner birth than Judah? Certainly not. If, then, the former fell before Assyria, what can Judah hope from Egypt against Assyria? . . . Israel\" is rather here the whole of the remnant still left in their own land, that is, Judah. \"How comes it to pass that the nation which once was under God's special protection (Jer 2:3) is now left at the mercy of the foe as a worthless slave?\" The prophet sees this event as if present, though it was still future to Judah (Jer 2:19).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["lions--the Babylonian princes (Jer 4:7; compare Amo 3:4). The disaster from the Babylonians in the fourth year of Jehoiakim's reign, and again three years later when, relying on Egypt, he revolted from Nebuchadnezzar, is here referred to (Jer 46:2; Kg2 24:1-2).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["Noph . . . Tahapanes--Memphis, capital of Lower Egypt, on the west bank of the Nile, near the pyramids of Gizeh, opposite the site of modern Cairo. Daphne, on the Tanitic branch of the Nile, near Pelusium, on the frontier of Egypt towards Palestine. Isa 30:4 contracts it, Hanes. These two cities, one the capital, the other that with which the Jews came most in contact, stand for the whole of Egypt. Tahapanes takes its name from a goddess, Tphnet [CHAMPOLLION]. Memphis is from Man-nofri, \"the abode of good men\"; written in Hebrew, Moph (Hos 9:6), or Noph. The reference is to the coming invasion of Judah by Pharaoh-necho of Egypt, on his return from the Euphrates, when he deposed Jehoahaz and levied a heavy tribute on the land (Kg2 23:33-35). Josiah's death in battle with the same Pharaoh is probably included (Kg2 23:29-30). \n\nhave broken--rather, shall feed down the crown, &c., that is, affect with the greatest ignominy, such as baldness was regarded in the East (Jer 48:37; Kg2 2:23). Instead of \"also,\" translate, \"even\" the Egyptians, in whom thou dost trust, shall miserably disappoint thy expectation [MAURER]. Jehoiakim was twice leagued with them (Kg2 23:34-35): when he received the crown from them, and when he revolted from Nebuchadnezzar (Kg2 24:1-2, Kg2 24:7). The Chaldeans, having become masters of Asia, threatened Egypt. Judea, situated between the contending powers, was thus exposed to the inroads of the one or other of the hostile armies; and unfortunately, except in Josiah's reign, took side with Egypt, contrary to God's warnings.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["Literally, \"Has not thy forsaking the Lord . . . procured this (calamity) to thee?\" So the Septuagint: the Masoretic accents make \"this\" the subject of the verb, leaving the object to be understood. \"Has not this procured (it, that is, the impending calamity) unto thee, that hast forsaken?\" &c. (Jer 4:18). \n\nled-- (Deu 32:10). \n\nthe way--The article expresses the right way, the way of the Lord: namely, the moral training which they enjoyed in the Mosaic covenant.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["now--used in a reasoning sense, not of time. \n\nthe way of Egypt--What hast thou to do with the way, that is, with going down to Egypt; or what . . . with going to Assyria? \n\ndrink . . . waters--that is, to seek reinvigorating aid from them; so Jer 2:13, Jer 2:36; compare \"waters,\" meaning numerous forces (Isa 8:7). \n\nSihor--that is, the black river, in Greek, Melas (\"black\"), the Nile: so called from the black deposit or soil it leaves after the inundation (Isa 23:3). The Septuagint identifies it with Gihon, one of the rivers of Paradise. \n\nthe river--Euphrates, called by pre-eminence, the river; figurative for the Assyrian power. In 625 B.C., the seventeenth year of Josiah, and the fourth of Jeremiah's office, the kingdom of Assyria fell before Babylon, therefore Assyria is here put for Babylon its successor: so in Kg2 23:29; Lam 5:6. There was doubtless a league between Judea and Assyria (that is, Babylon), which caused Josiah to march against Pharaoh-necho of Egypt when that king went against Babylon: the evil consequences of this league are foretold in this verse and Jer 2:36.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["correct . . . reprove--rather, in the severer sense, \"chastise . . . punish\" [MAURER]. \n\nbackslidings--\"apostasies\"; plural, to express the number and variety of their defections. The very confederacies they entered into were the occasion of their overthrow (Pro 1:31; Isa 3:9; Hos 5:5). \n\nknow . . . see--imperative for futures: Thou shalt know and see to thy cost. \n\nmy fear--rather, \"the fear of Me.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["I--the Hebrew should be pointed as the second person feminine, a form common in Jeremiah: \"Thou hast broken,\" &c. So the Septuagint, and the sense requires it. \n\nthy yoke . . . bands--the yoke and bands which I laid on thee, My laws (Jer 5:5). \n\ntransgress--so the Keri, and many manuscripts read. But the Septuagint and most authorities read, \"I will not serve,\" that is, obey. The sense of English Version is, \"I broke thy yoke (in Egypt),\" &c., \"and (at that time) thou saidst, I will not transgress; whereas thou hast (since then) wandered (from Me)\" (Exo 19:8). \n\nhill . . . green tree--the scene of idolatries (Deu 12:2; Isa 57:5, Isa 57:7). \n\nwanderest--rather, \"thou hast bowed down thyself\" (for the act of adultery: figurative of shameless idolatry, Exo 34:15-16; compare Job 31:10).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["The same image as in Deu 32:32; Psa 80:8-9; Isa 5:1, &c. \n\nunto me--with respect to Me.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["nitre--not what is now so called, namely, saltpeter; but the natron of Egypt, a mineral alkali, an incrustation at the bottom of the lakes, after the summer heat has evaporated the water: used for washing (compare Job 9:30; Pro 25:20). \n\nsoap--potash, the carbonate of which is obtained impure from burning different plants, especially the kali of Egypt and Arabia. Mixed with oil it was used for washing. \n\nmarked--deeply ingrained, indelibly marked; the Hebrew, catham, being equivalent to cathab. Others translate, \"is treasured up,\" from the Arabic. MAURER from a Syriac root, \"is polluted.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["(Pro 30:12). \n\nBaalim--plural, to express manifold excellency: compare Elohim. \n\nsee--consider. \n\nthe valley--namely, of Hinnom, or Tophet, south and east of Jerusalem: rendered infamous by the human sacrifices to Moloch in it (compare Jer 19:2, Jer 19:6, Jer 19:13-14; Jer 32:35; see on Isa 30:33). \n\nthou art--omit. The substantive that follows in this verse (and also that in Jer 2:24) is in apposition with the preceding \"thou.\" \n\ndromedary--rather, a \"young she-camel.\" \n\ntraversing--literally, \"enfolding\"; making its ways complicated by wandering hither and thither, lusting after the male. Compare as to the Jews' spiritual lust, Hos 2:6-7.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["(Jer 14:6; Job 39:5). \"A wild ass,\" agreeing with \"thou\" (Jer 2:23). \n\nat her pleasure--rather, \"in her ardor,\" namely, in pursuit of a male, sniffing the wind to ascertain where one is to be found [MAURER]. \n\noccasion--either from a Hebrew root, \"to meet\"; \"her meeting (with the male for sexual intercourse), who can avert it?\" Or better from an Arabic root: \"her heat (sexual impulse), who can allay it?\" [MAURER]. \n\nall they--whichever of the males desire her company [HORSLEY]. \n\nwill not weary themselves--have no need to weary themselves in searching for her. \n\nher month--in the season of the year when her sexual impulse is strongest, she puts herself in the way of the males, so that they have no difficulty in finding her.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":25,"content":["Withhold, &c.--that is, abstain from incontinence; figuratively for idolatry [HOUBIGANT]. \n\nunshod, &c.--do not run so violently in pursuing lovers, as to wear out thy shoes: do not \"thirst\" so incontinently after sexual intercourse. HITZIG thinks the reference is to penances performed barefoot to idols, and the thirst occasioned by loud and continued invocations to them. \n\nno hope-- (Jer 18:12; Isa 57:10). \"It is hopeless,\" that is, I am desperately resolved to go on in my own course. \n\nstrangers--that is, laying aside the metaphor, \"strange gods\" (Jer 3:13; Deu 32:16).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":26,"content":["is ashamed--is put to shame. \n\nthief-- (Joh 10:1). \n\nIsrael--that is, Judah (Jer 2:28).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":27,"content":["Thou art my father--(Contrast Jer 3:4; Isa 64:8). \n\nin . . . trouble they will say--namely, to God (Psa 78:34; Isa 26:16). Trouble often brings men to their senses (Luk 15:16-18).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":28,"content":["But--God sends them to the gods for whom they forsook Him, to see if they can help them (Deu 32:37-38; Jdg 10:14). \n\naccording to the number of thy cities--Besides national deities, each city had its tutelary god (Jer 11:13).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":29,"content":["plead with me--that is, contend with Me for afflicting you (Jer 2:23, Jer 2:35).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":30,"content":["(Jer 5:3; Jer 6:29; Isa 1:5; Isa 9:13). \n\nyour children--that is, your people, you. \n\nyour . . . sword . . . devoured . . . prophets-- (Ch2 36:16; Neh 9:26; Mat 23:29, Mat 23:31).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":31,"content":["The Hebrew collocation is, \"O, the generation, ye,\" that is, \"O ye who now live.\" The generation needed only to be named, to call its degeneracy to view, so palpable was it. \n\nwilderness--in which all the necessaries of life are wanting. On the contrary, Jehovah was a never-failing source of supply for all Israel's wants in the wilderness, and afterwards in Canaan. \n\ndarkness--literally, \"darkness of Jehovah,\" the strongest Hebrew term for \"darkness; the densest darkness\"; compare \"land of the shadow of death\" (Jer 2:6). \n\nWe are lords--that is, We are our own masters. We will worship what gods we like (Psa 12:4; Psa 82:6). But it is better to translate from a different Hebrew root: \"We ramble at large,\" without restraint pursuing our idolatrous lusts.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":32,"content":["Oriental women greatly pride themselves on their ornaments (compare Isa 61:10). \n\nattire--girdles for the breast. \n\nforgotten me-- (Jer 13:25; Hos 8:14).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":33,"content":["Why trimmest--MAURER translates, \"How skilfully thou dost prepare thy way,\" &c. But see Kg2 9:30. \"Trimmest\" best suits the image of one decking herself as a harlot. \n\nway--course of life. \n\ntherefore--accordingly. Or else, \"nay, thou hast even,\" &c. \n\nalso . . . wicked ones--even the wicked harlots, that is, (laying aside the metaphor) even the Gentiles who are wicked, thou teachest to be still more so [GROTIUS].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":34,"content":["Also--not only art thou polluted with idolatry, but also with the guilt of shedding innocent blood [MAURER]. ROSENMULLER not so well translates, \"even in thy skirts,\" &c.; that is, there is no part of thee (not even thy skirts) that is not stained with innocent blood (Jer 19:4; Kg2 21:16; Psa 106:38). See as to innocent blood shed, not as here in honor of idols, but of prophets for having reproved them (Jer 2:30; Jer 26:20-23). \n\nsouls--that is, persons. \n\nsearch--I did not need to \"search deep\" to find proof of thy guilt; for it was \"upon all these\" thy skirts. Not in deep caverns didst thou perpetrate these atrocities, but openly in the vale of Hinnom and within the precincts of the temple.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":35,"content":["(Jer 2:23, Jer 2:29).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":36,"content":["gaddest--runnest to and fro, now seeking help from Assyria (Ch2 28:16-21), now from Egypt (Jer 37:7-8; Isa 30:3).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":37,"content":["him--Egypt. \n\nhands upon . . . head--expressive of mourning (Sa2 13:19). \n\nin them--in those stays in which thou trustest.\n\nContrary to all precedent in the case of adultery, Jehovah offers a return to Judah, the spiritual adulteress (Jer 3:1-5). A new portion of the book, ending with the sixth chapter. Judah worse than Israel; yet both shall be restored in the last days (Jer. 3:6-25).\n\n\n\n\nNext: Jeremiah Chapter 3\n\n"]}],"introduction":"EXPOSTULATION WITH THE JEWS, REMINDING THEM OF THEIR FORMER DEVOTEDNESS, AND GOD'S CONSEQUENT FAVOR, AND A DENUNCIATION OF GOD'S COMING JUDGMENTS FOR THEIR IDOLATRY. (Jer. 2:1-37)\n\ncry--proclaim. \n\nJerusalem--the headquarters and center of their idolatry; therefore addressed first. \n\nthee--rather, \"I remember in regard to thee\" [HENDERSON]; \"for thee\" [MAURER]. \n\nkindness of thy youth--not so much Israel's kindness towards God, as the kindness which Israel experienced from God in their early history (compare Eze 16:8, Eze 16:22, Eze 16:60; Eze 23:3, Eze 23:8, Eze 23:19; Hos 2:15). For Israel from the first showed perversity rather than kindness towards God (compare Exo 14:11-12; Exo 15:24; Exo 32:1-7, &c.). The greater were God's favors to them from the first, the fouler was their ingratitude in forsaking Him (Jer 2:3, Jer 2:5, &c.). \n\nespousals--the intervals between Israel's betrothal to God at the exodus from Egypt, and the formal execution of the marriage contract at Sinai. EWALD takes the \"kindness\" and \"love\" to be Israel's towards God at first (Exo 19:8; Exo 24:3; Exo 35:20-29; Exo 36:5; Jos 24:16-17). But compare Deu 32:16-17; Eze 16:5-6, Eze 16:15, Eze 16:22 (\"days of thy youth\") implies that the love here meant was on God's side, not Israel's. \n\nthou wentest after me in . . . wilderness--the next act of God's love, His leading them in the desert without needing any strange god, such as they since worshipped, to help Him (Deu 2:7; Deu 32:12). Jer 2:6 shows it is God's \"leading\" of them, not their following after God in the wilderness, which is implied.\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JER/2.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JER","chapter":2},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JER/3.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JER","chapter":3},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/JER/1.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"JER","chapter":1},"numberOfVerses":35}