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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "//www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="//www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0;"/><title>Jeremiah 2 Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers</title><link rel="canonical" href="https://biblehub.com/commentaries/expositors/jeremiah/2.htm" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/5001com.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 4800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 4800px)" href="/4801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1550px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1550px)" href="/1551.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1250px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1250px)" href="/1251.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1050px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1050px)" href="/1051.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 900px), only screen and (max-device-width: 900px)" href="/901.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 800px)" href="/801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 575px), only screen and (max-device-width: 575px)" href="/501.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-height: 450px), only screen and (max-device-height: 450px)" href="/h451.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /><script type="application/javascript" src="https://scripts.webcontentassessor.com/scripts/8a2459b64f9cac8122fc7f2eac4409c8555fac9383016db59c4c26e3d5b8b157"></script><script src='https://qd.admetricspro.com/js/biblehub/biblehub-layout-loader-revcatch.js'></script><script id='HyDgbd_1s' src='https://prebidads.revcatch.com/ads.js' type='text/javascript' async></script><script>(function(w,d,b,s,i){var cts=d.createElement(s);cts.async=true;cts.id='catchscript'; cts.dataset.appid=i;cts.src='https://app.protectsubrev.com/catch_rp.js?cb='+Math.random(); document.head.appendChild(cts); }) (window,document,'head','script','rc-anksrH');</script></head> <script async src="https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtag/js?id=G-LR4HSKRP2H"></script> <script> window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; function gtag(){dataLayer.push(arguments);} gtag('js', new Date()); gtag('config', 'G-LR4HSKRP2H'); </script><body><div id="fx"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx2"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="30" scrolling="no" src="../cmenus/jeremiah/2.htm" align="left" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div><div id="blnk"></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable"><tr><td><div id="fx5"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx6"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="245" scrolling="no" src="//biblehu.com/bmcom/jeremiah/2-1.htm" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable3"><tr><td><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center" id="announce"><tr><td><div id="l1"><div id="breadcrumbs"><a href="//biblehub.com">Bible</a> > <a href="/commentaries/">Commentary</a> > <a href="../">Ellicott</a> > <a href="../jeremiah/">Jeremiah</a></div><div id="anc"><iframe src="/anc.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></div><div id="anc2"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><iframe src="/anc2.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></div></td></tr></table><div id="movebox2"><table border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td><div id="topheading"><a href="../jeremiah/1.htm" title="Jeremiah 1">◄</a> Jeremiah 2 <a href="../jeremiah/3.htm" title="Jeremiah 3">►</a></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center" class="maintable2"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><div id="leftbox"><div class="padleft"><div class="vheading">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers</div><div class="chap"> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-1.htm">Jeremiah 2:1</a></div><div class="verse">Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying,</div>II.</span><p>(1) The first chapter had given the narrative of the call which had impressed itself indelibly on the prophet’s mind. The next five run on as one continuous whole, and, looking to the fact that the original record of his prophetic work during the reign of Josiah had been destroyed by Jehoiakim (<a href="/jeremiah/36-23.htm" title="And it came to pass, that when Jehudi had read three or four leaves, he cut it with the penknife, and cast it into the fire that was on the hearth, until all the roll was consumed in the fire that was on the hearth.">Jeremiah 36:23</a>), and was afterwards re-written from memory, it is probable that we have a kind of <span class= "ital">précis </span>of what was then destroyed, with some additions (<a href="/jeremiah/36-32.htm" title="Then took Jeremiah another roll, and gave it to Baruch the scribe, the son of Neriah; who wrote therein from the mouth of Jeremiah all the words of the book which Jehoiakim king of Judah had burned in the fire: and there were added besides to them many like words.">Jeremiah 36:32</a>), and possibly some omissions. In <a href="/jeremiah/3-6.htm" title="The LORD said also to me in the days of Josiah the king, Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? she is gone up on every high mountain and under every green tree, and there has played the harlot.">Jeremiah 3:6</a> we have the name of Josiah definitely mentioned.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-2.htm">Jeremiah 2:2</a></div><div class="verse">Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the LORD; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land <i>that was</i> not sown.</div>(2) <span class= "bld">Go and cry . . .</span>—The scene of the call, was, we may believe, in his home at Anathoth. Now the prophet is sent to begin his work in Jerusalem.<p><span class= "bld">I remember thee.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">I have remembered for thee.</span><p><span class= "bld">The love of thine espousals.</span>—The imagery was one derived, as we find so often in Jeremiah’s writings, from the older prophets. It was implied in the “jealous God” of <a href="/exodus/20-5.htm" title="You shall not bow down yourself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation of them that hate me;">Exodus 20:5</a>, illustrated by an actual history, which was also a parable, in Hosea 1-3, and after its use by Jeremiah, expanded more fully by Ezekiel (Ezekiel 16). The “espousals” are thought of as coinciding with the great covenant of <a href="/exodus/24-8.htm" title="And Moses took the blood, and sprinkled it on the people, and said, Behold the blood of the covenant, which the LORD has made with you concerning all these words.">Exodus 24:8</a>, when the people solemnly entered into the relation to which God called them. Then the bride was ready to follow her lord and husband even in an “unsown land”—the “waste howling wilderness” of <a href="/deuteronomy/32-10.htm" title="He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.">Deuteronomy 32:10</a>. The faithfulness of the past is contrasted with the unfaithfulness of the present.<p><span class= "bld">When thou wentest after me.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">thy going after me.</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-3.htm">Jeremiah 2:3</a></div><div class="verse">Israel <i>was</i> holiness unto the LORD, <i>and</i> the firstfruits of his increase: all that devour him shall offend; evil shall come upon them, saith the LORD.</div>(3) <span class= "bld">Holiness unto the Lord.</span>—The thought was that expressed in the inscription on the gold plate worn on the high priest’s forehead (<a href="/exodus/28-36.htm" title="And you shall make a plate of pure gold, and grave on it, like the engravings of a signet, HOLINESS TO THE LORD.">Exodus 28:36</a>), and in the term “holy thing” (<a href="/leviticus/22-10.htm" title="There shall no stranger eat of the holy thing: a sojourner of the priest, or an hired servant, shall not eat of the holy thing.">Leviticus 22:10</a>; <a href="/matthew/7-6.htm" title="Give not that which is holy to the dogs, neither cast you your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn again and rend you.">Matthew 7:6</a>), applied to the consecrated gifts which were the portion of the priests. The prophet was taught that Israel, as a nation, had a priestly character, and was consecrated to the Lord as the “firstfruits” of the great harvest of the world. Compare the use of the same figure in <a href="/james/1-18.htm" title="Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures.">James 1:18</a>; <a href="/romans/11-16.htm" title="For if the first fruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.">Romans 11:16</a>.<p><span class= "bld">All that devour him shall </span>offend.—The imagery of the firstfruits is continued. The Hebrew for the word “offend” is used for transgressions against the ceremonial law in <a href="/leviticus/5-5.htm" title="And it shall be, when he shall be guilty in one of these things, that he shall confess that he has sinned in that thing:">Leviticus 5:5</a>; <a href="/leviticus/5-19.htm" title="It is a trespass offering: he has certainly trespassed against the LORD.">Leviticus 5:19</a>; <a href="/numbers/5-7.htm" title="Then they shall confess their sin which they have done: and he shall recompense his trespass with the principal thereof, and add to it the fifth part thereof, and give it to him against whom he has trespassed.">Numbers 5:7</a>. Here, however, it is probably better rendered, <span class= "ital">shall be condemned, </span>or <span class= "ital">shall be made to suffer, </span>as in <a href="/context/psalms/34-21.htm" title="Evil shall slay the wicked: and they that hate the righteous shall be desolate.">Psalm 34:21-22</a>, where the Authorised version has “shall be desolate.” Those who devour Israel—the enemies and invaders, the tyrants and oppressors—are guilty as of a sacrilege that will not remain unpunished.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-5.htm">Jeremiah 2:5</a></div><div class="verse">Thus saith the LORD, What iniquity have your fathers found in me, that they are gone far from me, and have walked after vanity, and are become vain?</div>(5) <span class= "bld">Vanity.</span>—In the special sense, as a synonym for idol-worship (<a href="/deuteronomy/32-21.htm" title="They have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities: and I will move them to jealousy with those which are not a people; I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation.">Deuteronomy 32:21</a>; <a href="/1_kings/16-13.htm" title="For all the sins of Baasha, and the sins of Elah his son, by which they sinned, and by which they made Israel to sin, in provoking the LORD God of Israel to anger with their vanities.">1Kings 16:13</a>). As in the character of a husband wronged by his wife’s desertion Jehovah pleads with His people, and asks whether He has failed in anything.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-6.htm">Jeremiah 2:6</a></div><div class="verse">Neither said they, Where <i>is</i> the LORD that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt?</div>(6) <span class= "bld">Neither said they.</span>—In somewhat of the same tone as in <a href="/deuteronomy/8-15.htm" title="Who led you through that great and terrible wilderness, wherein were fiery serpents, and scorpions, and drought, where there was no water; who brought you forth water out of the rock of flint;">Deuteronomy 8:15</a>; <a href="/deuteronomy/32-10.htm" title="He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.">Deuteronomy 32:10</a>, the horrors of the wilderness are painted in vivid colours, to heighten the contrast with the land into which they had been brought. The picture was true of part, but not of the whole, of the region of the wanderings. But the people had forgotten this. There was no seeking for the Lord who had then been so gracious. The question, Where is He? never crossed their thoughts.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-7.htm">Jeremiah 2:7</a></div><div class="verse">And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye defiled my land, and made mine heritage an abomination.</div>(7) <span class= "bld">A plentiful country.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">a land of Carmel, </span>that word, as meaning a vine-clad hill, having become a type of plenty. So “the forest of his Carmel,” in <a href="/isaiah/37-24.htm" title="By your servants have you reproached the Lord, and have said, By the multitude of my chariots am I come up to the height of the mountains, to the sides of Lebanon; and I will cut down the tall cedars thereof, and the choice fir trees thereof: and I will enter into the height of his border, and the forest of his Carmel.">Isaiah 37:24</a>; elsewhere, as in <a href="/isaiah/10-18.htm" title="And shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field, both soul and body: and they shall be as when a standard-bearer faints.">Isaiah 10:18</a>; <a href="/isaiah/32-15.htm" title="Until the spirit be poured on us from on high, and the wilderness be a fruitful field, and the fruitful field be counted for a forest.">Isaiah 32:15</a>, “fruitful.” The LXX. treats the word as a proper name, “I brought you unto Carmel.”<p><span class= "bld">When ye entered.</span>—The words point to the rapid degeneracy of Israel after the settlement in Canaan, as seen in the false worship and foul crimes of Judges 17-21. So in <a href="/context/psalms/78-56.htm" title="Yet they tempted and provoked the most high God, and kept not his testimonies:">Psalm 78:56-58</a>. Instead of being the pattern nation, the firstfruits of mankind, they sank to the level, or below the level, of the heathen.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-8.htm">Jeremiah 2:8</a></div><div class="verse">The priests said not, Where <i>is</i> the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after <i>things that</i> do not profit.</div>(8) <span class= "bld">The priests said not . . .</span>—As throughout the work of Jeremiah and most of the prophets of the Old Testament, that which weighed most heavily on their souls was that those who were called to be guides of the people were themselves the chief agents in the evil. The salt had lost its savour. The light had become darkness. The rebuke, we must remember, came from the lips of one who was himself a priest.<p><span class= "bld">The priests said not, Where is the Lord?</span>—The same failure to seek as that condemned in <a href="/jeremiah/2-6.htm" title="Neither said they, Where is the LORD that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelled?">Jeremiah 2:6</a>. To them, too, all was a routine. Jehovah was absent from their thoughts even in the very act of worship.<p><span class= "bld">They that</span> <span class= "bld">handle the law.</span>—These, probably, were also of the priestly order, to whom this function was assigned in <a href="/deuteronomy/33-10.htm" title="They shall teach Jacob your judgments, and Israel your law: they shall put incense before you, and whole burnt sacrifice on your altar.">Deuteronomy 33:10</a>. The order of non-priestly scribes, in the sense of interpreters of the law, does not appear till after the captivity. Their sin was that they “dealt with the law” as interpreters and judges, and forgot Jehovah who had given it.<p><span class= "bld">The pastors.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">shepherds, </span>the English “pastors” having gained a too definitely religious connotation. The Hebrew word was general in its significance, but in its Old Testament use was applied chiefly to civil rulers, as in <a href="/psalms/78-71.htm" title="From following the ewes great with young he brought him to feed Jacob his people, and Israel his inheritance.">Psalm 78:71</a>; <a href="/1_kings/22-17.htm" title="And he said, I saw all Israel scattered on the hills, as sheep that have not a shepherd: and the LORD said, These have no master: let them return every man to his house in peace.">1Kings 22:17</a>. Even in Ezekiel 34, where the spiritual aspect of rule is most prominent, the contrast between the false shepherds and the one true shepherd of the house of David (<a href="/jeremiah/2-23.htm" title="How can you say, I am not polluted, I have not gone after Baalim? see your way in the valley, know what you have done: you are a swift dromedary traversing her ways;">Jeremiah 2:23</a>) shows that the kingly, not the priestly, office was in the prophet’s mind.<p><span class= "bld">The prophets prophesied by Baal.</span>—The precise form of the sin described was probably connected with the oracular power ascribed to Baal-zebub, as in <a href="/2_kings/1-2.htm" title="And Ahaziah fell down through a lattice in his upper chamber that was in Samaria, and was sick: and he sent messengers, and said to them, Go, inquire of Baalzebub the god of Ekron whether I shall recover of this disease.">2Kings 1:2</a>. The evil was of long standing. It was one of the sins of the people in Isaiah’s time that they were “soothsayers like the Philistines” (<a href="/isaiah/2-6.htm" title="Therefore you have forsaken your people the house of Jacob, because they be replenished from the east, and are soothsayers like the Philistines, and they please themselves in the children of strangers.">Isaiah 2:6</a>). When Ahab first introduced the Phœnician worship, it was by the prophets rather than the priests of Baal that the new <span class= "ital">cultus </span>was propagated (<a href="/1_kings/18-19.htm" title="Now therefore send, and gather to me all Israel to mount Carmel, and the prophets of Baal four hundred and fifty, and the prophets of the groves four hundred, which eat at Jezebel's table.">1Kings 18:19</a>; <a href="/1_kings/22-6.htm" title="Then the king of Israel gathered the prophets together, about four hundred men, and said to them, Shall I go against Ramothgilead to battle, or shall I forbear? And they said, Go up; for the LORD shall deliver it into the hand of the king.">1Kings 22:6</a>).<p><span class= "bld">Things that do not profit.</span>—The word had acquired an almost proverbial force as applied to idols (<a href="/1_samuel/12-21.htm" title="And turn you not aside: for then should you go after vain things, which cannot profit nor deliver; for they are vain.">1Samuel 12:21</a>; <a href="/isaiah/44-9.htm" title="They that make a graven image are all of them vanity; and their delectable things shall not profit; and they are their own witnesses; they see not, nor know; that they may be ashamed.">Isaiah 44:9</a>). So the phrase is repeated in <a href="/jeremiah/2-11.htm" title="Has a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for that which does not profit.">Jeremiah 2:11</a>.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-9.htm">Jeremiah 2:9</a></div><div class="verse">Wherefore I will yet plead with you, saith the LORD, and with your children's children will I plead.</div>(9) <span class= "bld">I will yet plead with you.</span>—We hear, as it were, the echo of the words of <a href="/hosea/2-2.htm" title="Plead with your mother, plead: for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband: let her therefore put away her prostitutions out of her sight, and her adulteries from between her breasts;">Hosea 2:2</a>. The injured lord and husband will appear as the accuser of the faithless bride, and set forth her guilt as in an indictment.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-10.htm">Jeremiah 2:10</a></div><div class="verse">For pass over the isles of Chittim, and see; and send unto Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if there be such a thing.</div>(10) <span class= "bld">Pass over the isles . . .</span>—Chittim is named as being, from the prophet’s point of view, the furthest country in the west (<a href="/genesis/10-4.htm" title="And the sons of Javan; Elishah, and Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim.">Genesis 10:4</a>; <a href="/numbers/24-24.htm" title="And ships shall come from the coast of Chittim, and shall afflict Asshur, and shall afflict Eber, and he also shall perish for ever.">Numbers 24:24</a>), Kedar (<a href="/genesis/25-13.htm" title="And these are the names of the sons of Ishmael, by their names, according to their generations: the firstborn of Ishmael, Nebajoth; and Kedar, and Adbeel, and Mibsam,">Genesis 25:13</a>; <a href="/psalms/120-5.htm" title="Woe is me, that I sojourn in Mesech, that I dwell in the tents of Kedar!">Psalm 120:5</a>) in the east. The whole earth might be searched without finding a parallel to the guilt of Israel.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-11.htm">Jeremiah 2:11</a></div><div class="verse">Hath a nation changed <i>their</i> gods, which <i>are</i> yet no gods? but my people have changed their glory for <i>that which</i> doth not profit.</div>(11) <span class= "bld">Hath a nation . . .</span>—Emphatically a heathen “nation,” as contrasted with the “people” of Jehovah. They were faithful to their false gods; Israel was unfaithful to the true. The words “changed their glory” find an echo in <a href="/romans/1-23.htm" title="And changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four footed beasts, and creeping things.">Romans 1:23</a>, though here they express the thought that the worship of Jehovah was the true glory of Israel as a people, and that they had wilfully abandoned it.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-12.htm">Jeremiah 2:12</a></div><div class="verse">Be astonished, O ye heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid, be ye very desolate, saith the LORD.</div>(12) <span class= "bld">Be astonished, O ye heavens.</span>—The adjuration had been made familiar by a like utterance in <a href="/isaiah/1-2.htm" title="Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth: for the LORD has spoken, I have nourished and brought up children, and they have rebelled against me.">Isaiah 1:2</a>; Deut. 32 1 “Astonished”—in the old sense, “thunder-stricken,” stupefied. The whole universe is thought of as shocked and startled at the offence against its Creator.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-13.htm">Jeremiah 2:13</a></div><div class="verse">For my people have committed two evils; they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters, <i>and</i> hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water.</div>(13) <span class= "bld">The fountain of living waters.</span>—The word rendered “well,” as in <a href="/proverbs/10-11.htm" title="The mouth of a righteous man is a well of life: but violence covers the mouth of the wicked.">Proverbs 10:11</a>; <a href="/proverbs/18-4.htm" title="The words of a man's mouth are as deep waters, and the wellspring of wisdom as a flowing brook.">Proverbs 18:4</a>; “fountain,” as in <a href="/psalms/36-9.htm" title="For with you is the fountain of life: in your light shall we see light.">Psalm 36:9</a>, is used of water flowing from the rock. The “cistern,” on the other hand, was a tank for surface water. A word identical in sound and meaning, though differently spelt, is variously rendered by “pit,” “well,” or “cistern.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-14.htm">Jeremiah 2:14</a></div><div class="verse"><i>Is</i> Israel a servant? <i>is</i> he a homeborn <i>slave</i>? why is he spoiled?</div>(14) <span class= "bld">Is Israel a servant?</span>—The word “servant,” we must remember, had become, through its frequent use in Isaiah (<a href="/isaiah/20-3.htm" title="And the LORD said, Like as my servant Isaiah has walked naked and barefoot three years for a sign and wonder on Egypt and on Ethiopia;">Isaiah 20:3</a>; <a href="/isaiah/41-8.htm" title="But you, Israel, are my servant, Jacob whom I have chosen, the seed of Abraham my friend.">Isaiah 41:8</a>, <span class= "ital">et al.</span>)<span class= "ital">, </span>a word not of shame, but honour; and of all servants, he who was born in the house—as in the case of Eleazar (<a href="/genesis/15-3.htm" title="And Abram said, Behold, to me you have given no seed: and, see, one born in my house is my heir.">Genesis 15:3</a>)—occupied the most honourable place, nearest to a son. The point of the question is accordingly not “Is Israel become a slave,” kidnapped, as it were, and spoiled, but rather this: “Is Israel the servant of Jehovah, as one born in His house? Why, then, is he treated as one with no master to protect him?”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-15.htm">Jeremiah 2:15</a></div><div class="verse">The young lions roared upon him, <i>and</i> yelled, and they made his land waste: his cities are burned without inhabitant.</div>(15) <span class= "bld">The young lions roared . . .</span>—The real answer to the question, that Israel had forsaken its true master, is given in <a href="/jeremiah/2-17.htm" title="Have you not procured this to yourself, in that you have forsaken the LORD your God, when he led you by the way?">Jeremiah 2:17</a>. Here it is implied in the description of what the runaway slave had suffered. Lions had attacked him; not figuratively only, as symbolising invaders, but in the most literal sense, they had made his land waste (<a href="/2_kings/17-25.htm" title="And so it was at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they feared not the LORD: therefore the LORD sent lions among them, which slew some of them.">2Kings 17:25</a>).<p><span class= "bld">Are burned.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">levelled with the ground.</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-16.htm">Jeremiah 2:16</a></div><div class="verse">Also the children of Noph and Tahapanes have broken the crown of thy head.</div>(16) <span class= "bld">Also the children of Noph . . .</span>—We pass from the language of poetry to that of history, and the actual enemies of Israel appear on the scene, not as the threatening danger in the north, but in the far south. The words indicate that the prophet set himself from the first, as Isaiah had done (<a href="/isaiah/31-1.htm" title="Woe to them that go down to Egypt for help; and stay on horses, and trust in chariots, because they are many; and in horsemen, because they are very strong; but they look not to the Holy One of Israel, neither seek the LORD!">Isaiah 31:1</a>), against the policy of an Egyptian alliance. The LXX. translators, following, we must believe, an Egyptian tradition, identify the Hebrew Noph with Memphis in northern Egypt; later critics, with Napata in the south. Its conjunction with Tahapanes, the Daphnæ of the Greeks, which was on the Pelusiac mouth of the Nile, and on the frontier, seems in favour of the former view.<p><span class= "bld">Have broken.</span>—More accurately, <span class= "ital">shall feed on, lay waste, depasture, </span>so as to produce baldness. Baldness among the Jews, as with other -Eastern nations, was a shame and reproach (<a href="/isaiah/3-24.htm" title="And it shall come to pass, that instead of sweet smell there shall be stink; and instead of a girdle a rent; and instead of well set hair baldness; and instead of a stomacher a girding of sackcloth; and burning instead of beauty.">Isaiah 3:24</a>; <a href="/isaiah/15-2.htm" title="He is gone up to Bajith, and to Dibon, the high places, to weep: Moab shall howl over Nebo, and over Medeba: on all their heads shall be baldness, and every beard cut off.">Isaiah 15:2</a>; <a href="/isaiah/22-12.htm" title="And in that day did the Lord GOD of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:">Isaiah 22:12</a>; <a href="/2_kings/2-23.htm" title="And he went up from there to Bethel: and as he was going up by the way, there came forth little children out of the city, and mocked him, and said to him, Go up, you bald head; go up, you bald head.">2Kings 2:23</a>), and was therefore a natural symbol of the ignominy and ruin of a people.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-17.htm">Jeremiah 2:17</a></div><div class="verse">Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, when he led thee by the way?</div>(17) <span class= "bld">Hast thou not procured this . . .?</span>—The secret cause of the calamities is brought to light. Jehovah was leading Israel, but Israel has chosen another path, and so has procured sorrow upon sorrow to himself. The “way” here is scarcely the literal path through the wilderness, but much rather the true way of life.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-18.htm">Jeremiah 2:18</a></div><div class="verse">And now what hast thou to do in the way of Egypt, to drink the waters of Sihor? or what hast thou to do in the way of Assyria, to drink the waters of the river?</div>(18) <span class= "bld">In the way of Egypt . . .?</span>—The rebuke becomes more and more specific. Great rivers were, in the poetry of the prophets, the natural symbols of the kingdoms through which they flowed. Sihor (= the turbid or muddy river) here, and in <a href="/isaiah/23-3.htm" title="And by great waters the seed of Sihor, the harvest of the river, is her revenue; and she is a mart of nations.">Isaiah 23:3</a> the Nile (though in <a href="/joshua/13-3.htm" title="From Sihor, which is before Egypt, even to the borders of Ekron northward, which is counted to the Canaanite: five lords of the Philistines; the Gazathites, and the Ashdothites, the Eshkalonites, the Gittites, and the Ekronites; also the Avites:">Joshua 13:3</a> it stands for the border stream between Palestine and Egypt), represented Egypt. The “river,” or “flood,” needing no other name as pre-eminent in its greatness (comp. <a href="/context/joshua/24-14.htm" title="Now therefore fear the LORD, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve you the LORD.">Joshua 24:14-15</a>), the Euphrates, stood for Assyria (comp. <a href="/isaiah/8-7.htm" title="Now therefore, behold, the Lord brings up on them the waters of the river, strong and many, even the king of Assyria, and all his glory: and he shall come up over all his channels, and go over all his banks:">Isaiah 8:7</a>). The words point to the tendency to court the alliance now of one, now of the other of the great kingdoms of the world. The policy was no new one. Menahem in Israel, Ahaz in Judah, had courted Assyria (<a href="/2_kings/15-19.htm" title="And Pul the king of Assyria came against the land: and Menahem gave Pul a thousand talents of silver, that his hand might be with him to confirm the kingdom in his hand.">2Kings 15:19</a>; <a href="/context/2_kings/16-7.htm" title="So Ahaz sent messengers to Tiglathpileser king of Assyria, saying, I am your servant and your son: come up, and save me out of the hand of the king of Syria, and out of the hand of the king of Israel, which rise up against me.">2Kings 16:7-8</a>); Hezekiah, Babylon (Isaiah 39); Hoshea had sought help from Egypt (<a href="/2_kings/17-4.htm" title="And the king of Assyria found conspiracy in Hoshea: for he had sent messengers to So king of Egypt, and brought no present to the king of Assyria, as he had done year by year: therefore the king of Assyria shut him up, and bound him in prison.">2Kings 17:4</a>). The prophet Hosea had rebuked both policies (<a href="/hosea/5-13.htm" title="When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw his wound, then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to king Jareb: yet could he not heal you, nor cure you of your wound.">Hosea 5:13</a>; <a href="/hosea/7-11.htm" title="Ephraim also is like a silly dove without heart: they call to Egypt, they go to Assyria.">Hosea 7:11</a>; <a href="/hosea/8-9.htm" title="For they are gone up to Assyria, a wild ass alone by himself: Ephraim has hired lovers.">Hosea 8:9</a>). Even under Hezekiah there was a party seeking the Egyptian alliance (Isaiah 18, 19, 31. Under Manasseh and Amon that party was in power, and the very name of the latter probably bears witness to its influence. Josiah kept as far as possible the position of a neutral, but, when forced into action, and probably guided by the counsels of Hilkiah, resisted the advance of Pharaoh-nechoh (<a href="/2_kings/23-29.htm" title="In his days Pharaohnechoh king of Egypt went up against the king of Assyria to the river Euphrates: and king Josiah went against him; and he slew him at Megiddo, when he had seen him.">2Kings 23:29</a>). On his death the Egyptian party again gained ground under Jehoiakim, while Jeremiah, opposing its strength, urged the wisdom of accepting the guidance of events, and submitting to the Chaldæans (so far continuing the line of action adopted by Hezekiah), and ultimately was accused of deserting his own people and “falling away” to their oppressors (<a href="/jeremiah/37-13.htm" title="And when he was in the gate of Benjamin, a captain of the ward was there, whose name was Irijah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Hananiah; and he took Jeremiah the prophet, saying, You fall away to the Chaldeans.">Jeremiah 37:13</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-19.htm">Jeremiah 2:19</a></div><div class="verse">Thine own wickedness shall correct thee, and thy backslidings shall reprove thee: know therefore and see that <i>it is</i> an evil <i>thing</i> and bitter, that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, and that my fear <i>is</i> not in thee, saith the Lord GOD of hosts.</div>(19) <span class= "bld">Thine own wickedness.</span>—The strain is now of a higher mood, and rises from what is local and temporary to the eternal law of retribution. Punishment comes as the natural consequence of sins. Our “pleasant vices” become “whips to scourge us.” The “backslidings” of Israel, in courting the favour of foreign states by adopting their creed and worship, shall involve her in ever fresh calamities.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-20.htm">Jeremiah 2:20</a></div><div class="verse">For of old time I have broken thy yoke, <i>and</i> burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I will not transgress; when upon every high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the harlot.</div>(20) <span class= "bld">I have broken thy yoke</span>.—Better, with the LXX. and Vulg., <span class= "ital">thou hast broken thy yoke</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>cast off all allegiance and restraint. The Authorised Version, which follows the received Hebrew reading, may, however, be understood as referring to the deliverance of Israel from their Egyptian bondage.<p><span class= "bld">Thou saidst, I will not transgress</span>—Perhaps, following a various reading adopted by the LXX., Vulg., and Luther, <span class= "ital">I will not serve. </span>The words so taken paint vividly the wilful defiance of the rebellious nation. It threw off its allegiance. If we retain the Authorised version rendering, it would be better to take the verb in the present, <span class= "ital">I transgress not, </span>as expressing a like defiance.<p><span class= "bld">When.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">for, </span>as giving an illustration of the rebellious temper. The “high hill” and the “green tree” point to the localities of idol-worship—the “high places” that meet us so frequently in 1 and 2 Kings, the “tops of the mountains,” and the “oaks and poplars and elms” of <a href="/hosea/4-13.htm" title="They sacrifice on the tops of the mountains, and burn incense on the hills, under oaks and poplars and elms, because the shadow thereof is good: therefore your daughters shall commit prostitution, and your spouses shall commit adultery.">Hosea 4:13</a>. Tree-worship in Judæa, as elsewhere, appears to have exercised a wonderful power of fascination, and though the word translated “grove” (<span class= "ital">Asherah</span>) has not that meaning, it was probably connected with the same <span class= "ital">cultus.</span><p><span class= "bld">Playing the harlot.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">laying thyself down. </span>The idolatrous prostration was as an act of spiritual prostitution, often, as in the orgiastic worship of Baal and Ashtaroth, united with actual impurity.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-21.htm">Jeremiah 2:21</a></div><div class="verse">Yet I had planted thee a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then art thou turned into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me?</div>(21) <span class= "bld">A noble vine.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">a Sorek vine. </span>Elsewhere rendered <span class= "ital">choice </span>or <span class= "ital">choicest </span>(<a href="/genesis/49-11.htm" title="Binding his foal to the vine, and his ass's colt to the choice vine; he washed his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes:">Genesis 49:11</a>; <a href="/isaiah/5-2.htm" title="And he fenced it, and gathered out the stones thereof, and planted it with the choicest vine, and built a tower in the middle of it, and also made a wine press therein: and he looked that it should bring forth grapes, and it brought forth wild grapes.">Isaiah 5:2</a>). The word “Sorek” points primarily to the dark purple of the grape, and then to the valley of Sorek, between Ascalon and Gaza (<a href="/judges/16-4.htm" title="And it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah.">Judges 16:4</a>).<p><span class= "bld">Wholly a right seed.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">a seed of truth, </span>parallel with the “good seed” in the Parable of the Tares. Here, however, as in <a href="/context/isaiah/5-1.htm" title="Now will I sing to my well beloved a song of my beloved touching his vineyard. My well beloved has a vineyard in a very fruitful hill:">Isaiah 5:1-7</a>, which Jeremiah seems to have in his mind, stress is laid not on the mingling of the evil with the good, but on the degeneration which had changed the character of that which God had planted.<p><span class= "bld">Art thou turned . . .</span>?—Better, <span class= "ital">hast thou changed thyself . . .</span>?<p><span class= "bld">Plant.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">branches.</span><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-22.htm">Jeremiah 2:22</a></div><div class="verse">For though thou wash thee with nitre, and take thee much soap, <i>yet</i> thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord GOD.</div>(22) <span class= "bld">Nitre.</span>—The mineral alkali found in the natron lakes of Egypt that took their name from it. The Hebrew word <span class= "ital">nether </span>is the origin of the Greek <span class= "bld">and </span>English words. (Comp. <a href="/proverbs/25-20.htm" title="As he that takes away a garment in cold weather, and as vinegar on nitre, so is he that singes songs to an heavy heart.">Proverbs 25:20</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">Sope.</span>—Not the compounds of alkali and oil or fat now known by the name, but the potash or alkali, obtained from the ashes of plants, which was used by itself as a powerful detergent. The thought is the same as that of <a href="/job/9-30.htm" title="If I wash myself with snow water, and make my hands never so clean;">Job 9:30</a>, and, we may add, as that of <span class= "ital">Macbeth, </span>Acts 2, sc. 2 :—<p>“Will all great Neptune’s ocean wash this blood<p>Clean from my hand? No; this my hand will rather<p>The multitudinous seas incarnadine,<p>Making the green one red.”<p>The guilt was too strongly “marked,” too “deep-dyed in grain” to be removed by any outward palliatives.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-23.htm">Jeremiah 2:23</a></div><div class="verse">How canst thou say, I am not polluted, I have not gone after Baalim? see thy way in the valley, know what thou hast done: <i>thou art</i> a swift dromedary traversing her ways;</div>(23) <span class= "bld">How canst thou say . . .?</span>—The prophet hears, as it were, the voice of the accused criminal, with its plea of “not guilty.” Had not the worship of Jehovah been restored by Josiah? Had he not, acting on Hilkiah’s counsels, suppressed Baal-worship (<a href="/context/2_kings/23-4.htm" title="And the king commanded Hilkiah the high priest, and the priests of the second order, and the keepers of the door, to bring forth out of the temple of the LORD all the vessels that were made for Baal, and for the grove, and for all the host of heaven: and he burned them without Jerusalem in the fields of Kidron, and carried the ashes of them to Bethel.">2Kings 23:4-5</a>; <a href="/2_chronicles/34-4.htm" title="And they broke down the altars of Baalim in his presence; and the images, that were on high above them, he cut down; and the groves, and the carved images, and the molten images, he broke in pieces, and made dust of them, and strewed it on the graves of them that had sacrificed to them.">2Chronicles 34:4</a>)? The answer to such pleas is to point to the rites that were still practised openly or in secret. In the “valley” of Ben-Hinnom, which Josiah had defiled (<a href="/2_kings/23-10.htm" title="And he defiled Topheth, which is in the valley of the children of Hinnom, that no man might make his son or his daughter to pass through the fire to Molech.">2Kings 23:10</a>), the horrid ritual of Molech (<a href="/leviticus/18-21.htm" title="And you shall not let any of your seed pass through the fire to Molech, neither shall you profane the name of your God: I am the LORD.">Leviticus 18:21</a>; <a href="/leviticus/20-2.htm" title="Again, you shall say to the children of Israel, Whoever he be of the children of Israel, or of the strangers that sojourn in Israel, that gives any of his seed to Molech; he shall surely be put to death: the people of the land shall stone him with stones.">Leviticus 20:2</a>) was still in use (<a href="/jeremiah/7-31.htm" title="And they have built the high places of Tophet, which is in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my heart.">Jeremiah 7:31</a>), reviving, we may believe, on the death of Josiah; and this, though not actually the worship of Baal, was at least as evil, and probably, in the confluence of many forms of worship which marked the last days of the monarchy of Judah, was closely associated and practically identified with it, both by the prophet and the people (<a href="/jeremiah/19-5.htm" title="They have built also the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I commanded not, nor spoke it, neither came it into my mind:">Jeremiah 19:5</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/32-35.htm" title="And they built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through the fire to Molech; which I commanded them not, neither came it into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.">Jeremiah 32:35</a>).<p><span class= "bld">A swift dromedary.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">she-camel, </span>the Hebrew word not pointing to any specific difference. The words paint with an almost terrible vividness the eager, restless state of the daughter of Zion in its harlot-like lust for the false gods of the heathen. The female camel, in the uncontrollable violence of its brute passion, moving to and fro with panting eagerness—that was now the fit image for her who had once been the betrothed of Jehovah.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-24.htm">Jeremiah 2:24</a></div><div class="verse">A wild ass used to the wilderness, <i>that</i> snuffeth up the wind at her pleasure; in her occasion who can turn her away? all they that seek her will not weary themselves; in her month they shall find her.</div>(24) <span class= "bld">A wild ass . . .</span>—One image of animal desire suggests another, and the “wild ass” appears (as in the Hebrew of <a href="/genesis/16-12.htm" title="And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brothers.">Genesis 16:12</a>; <a href="/job/11-12.htm" title="For vain men would be wise, though man be born like a wild ass's colt.">Job 11:12</a>; <a href="/job/39-5.htm" title="Who has sent out the wild ass free? or who has loosed the bands of the wild ass?">Job 39:5</a>) as even a stronger type of passion that defies control. The description is startling in its boldness, but has a parallel in that of Virgil (<span class= "ital">Georg. </span>iii. 250).<p><span class= "bld">That snuffeth up the wind at her pleasure.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">in the desire of her heart, </span>as it bears to her the scent that draws her on. The “occasion” and the “month<span class= "ital">” </span>are, of course, the season when the stimulus of animal desire is strongest. There is no need for the stallion to seek her with a weary search, she presents herself and pursues him. So there was in Israel what we should describe as a mania for the hateful worship of the heathen.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-25.htm">Jeremiah 2:25</a></div><div class="verse">Withhold thy foot from being unshod, and thy throat from thirst: but thou saidst, There is no hope: no; for I have loved strangers, and after them will I go.</div>(25) <span class= "bld">Withhold thy foot.</span>—From the brute types of passion the prophet passes to the human. Here he has Hosea as giving a prototype (<a href="/hosea/2-5.htm" title="For their mother has played the harlot: she that conceived them has done shamefully: for she said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink.">Hosea 2:5</a>; <a href="/hosea/2-7.htm" title="And she shall follow after her lovers, but she shall not overtake them; and she shall seek them, but shall not find them: then shall she say, I will go and return to my first husband; for then was it better with me than now.">Hosea 2:7</a>), perhaps also Isaiah (<a href="/context/isaiah/23-15.htm" title="And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years, according to the days of one king: after the end of seventy years shall Tyre sing as an harlot.">Isaiah 23:15-16</a>). The picture may probably enough have been drawn from the life, but that sketched in <a href="/context/proverbs/7-10.htm" title="And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtle of heart.">Proverbs 7:10-23</a> may well have supplied the outline. Jehovah, as her true husband, bids the apostate wife to refrain for very shame from acting as the harlot, rushing barefoot into the streets, panting, as with a thirst that craves to be quenched, for the gratification of her desires. The “unshod” may possibly refer to one feature of the worship of Baal or Ashtaroth, men and women taking off their shoes when they entered into their temples, as being holy ground (<a href="/exodus/3-5.htm" title="And he said, Draw not near here: put off your shoes from off your feet, for the place where on you stand is holy ground.">Exodus 3:5</a>), and joining in orgiastic dances.<p><span class= "bld">Thou saidst, There is no hope: no.</span>—Here also we find a parallel to the thought and language of Hosea. There the one effectual remedy for the evil into which the apostate wife had fallen was to speak to her heart, and to open the door of hope (<a href="/context/hosea/2-14.htm" title="Therefore, behold, I will allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak comfortably to her.">Hosea 2:14-15</a>). Now the malignity of the evil is shown by the loss of all hope of recovery in returning to Jehovah:—<p>“Small sins the heart first desecrate,<p>At last despair persuades to great.”<p>Like Gomer, she will go after her “lovers,” though they are “strangers,” as if they were her only protectors. It would seem, from the recurrence of the phrase in <a href="/jeremiah/18-12.htm" title="And they said, There is no hope: but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart.">Jeremiah 18:12</a>, as if it were the formula of a despairing fatalism, like the proverb of the fathers eating sour grapes (<a href="/context/jeremiah/31-29.htm" title="In those days they shall say no more, The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge.">Jeremiah 31:29-30</a>; <a href="/ezekiel/18-2.htm" title="What mean you, that you use this proverb concerning the land of Israel, saying, The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge?">Ezekiel 18:2</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-26.htm">Jeremiah 2:26</a></div><div class="verse">As the thief is ashamed when he is found, so is the house of Israel ashamed; they, their kings, their princes, and their priests, and their prophets,</div>(26) <span class= "bld">As the thief . . .</span>—The words point to the sense of shame as already felt, and as therefore bringing with it the possibility of repentance. Once they gloried in their false worship; now they feel as if detected in a crime. Conscience had once again been roused into activity.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-27.htm">Jeremiah 2:27</a></div><div class="verse">Saying to a stock, Thou <i>art</i> my father; and to a stone, Thou hast brought me forth: for they have turned <i>their</i> back unto me, and not <i>their</i> face: but in the time of their trouble they will say, Arise, and save us.</div>(27) <span class= "bld">Saying to a stock . . .</span>—The “stock” and the “stone” represent respectively the images of wood and marble. In Hebrew the latter word is feminine, and thus determines the parts assigned to them in the figurative parentage.<p><span class= "bld">To a stock, Thou art my father.</span>—Literally, <span class= "ital">to a tree. </span>The words seem as if they were an actual quotation from the hymns of the idolatrous ritual.<p><span class= "bld">In the time of their trouble.</span>—So in Hosea (Hosea 2, 3) it is the discipline of suffering that leads the adulterous wife to repentance. In times of trouble and dismay those who had before turned their backs on Jehovah shall seek Him with outstretched hands, and the cry for help. The prophet half implies that then it maybe too late till chastisement has done its perfect work.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-28.htm">Jeremiah 2:28</a></div><div class="verse">But where <i>are</i> thy gods that thou hast made thee? let them arise, if they can save thee in the time of thy trouble: for <i>according to</i> the number of thy cities are thy gods, O Judah.</div>(28) <span class= "bld">Where are thy gods . . .?</span>—The question is asked in indignant scorn. “Thou madest the gods, and yet they cannot profit thee.” Though every city had its tutelary deity, there was none found to deliver. The LXX. adds, as in <a href="/jeremiah/11-13.htm" title="For according to the number of your cities were your gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have you set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense to Baal.">Jeremiah 11:13</a>, the words “according to the number of the streets in Jerusalem they sacrificed to Baal.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-29.htm">Jeremiah 2:29</a></div><div class="verse">Wherefore will ye plead with me? ye all have transgressed against me, saith the LORD.</div>(29) <span class= "bld">Wherefore will ye plead with me?</span>—The reply of the accuser to the false pleas of the accused. The transgression was too open to be glossed over. No plea was available but that of a full confession of the guilt into which Israel had fallen.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-30.htm">Jeremiah 2:30</a></div><div class="verse">In vain have I smitten your children; they received no correction: your own sword hath devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.</div>(30) <span class= "bld">Your own sword hath devoured your prophets.</span>—So in the long reign of Manasseh, the prophets who rebuked him had to do so at the risk of their lives. Isaiah, as the tradition ran, had been foremost among the sufferers. Much innocent blood had been shed from one end to another of Jerusalem (<a href="/context/2_kings/21-11.htm" title="Because Manasseh king of Judah has done these abominations, and has done wickedly above all that the Amorites did, which were before him, and has made Judah also to sin with his idols:">2Kings 21:11-16</a>).<span class= "bld"><p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-31.htm">Jeremiah 2:31</a></div><div class="verse">O generation, see ye the word of the LORD. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness? wherefore say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee?</div>(31) <span class= "bld">O generation, see ye.</span>—The pronoun occupies a different position in the Hebrew, “<span class= "ital">O generation, you, I mean, see ye.” </span>The prophet speaks to the men who are actually his contemporaries. <span class= "ital">They </span>are to look to the word of the Lord. Has He been to them as a waste land, a land of thick darkness (literally, according to one interpretation, <span class= "ital">darkness of Jah, </span>in the sense of intensity), that they are thus unmindful of Him? So in <a href="/songs/8-6.htm" title="Set me as a seal on your heart, as a seal on your arm: for love is strong as death; jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals thereof are coals of fire, which has a most vehement flame.">Song of Solomon 8:6</a> we have “flame of Jah,” as representing the Hebrew, in the margin, and “very vehement flame” in the text, of the Authorised version.<p><span class= "bld">We are lords.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">We rove at will, </span>as in <a href="/genesis/27-40.htm" title="And by your sword shall you live, and shall serve your brother; and it shall come to pass when you shall have the dominion, that you shall break his yoke from off your neck.">Genesis 27:40</a>, where, however, the Authorised version gives “when thou shalt have the dominion.” The sense is practically the same. Israel claims the power to do as she likes.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-32.htm">Jeremiah 2:32</a></div><div class="verse">Can a maid forget her ornaments, <i>or</i> a bride her attire? yet my people have forgotten me days without number.</div>(32) <span class= "bld">Or a bride her attire.</span>—The word is rendered “headbands” in <a href="/isaiah/3-20.htm" title="The bonnets, and the ornaments of the legs, and the headbands, and the tablets, and the earrings,">Isaiah 3:20</a>, but here it probably means the “girdle” which formed the special distinction of the wife as contrasted with the maiden. Such a girdle, like the marriage ring with us, would be treasured by the bride all her life long. Even the outward memorial of her union with her husband would be dear to her. But Israel had forgotten her lord and husband Himself.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-33.htm">Jeremiah 2:33</a></div><div class="verse">Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.</div>(33) <span class= "bld">Why trimmest thou thy way . . .?</span>—The verb is the same as that rendered <span class= "ital">“</span>amend” in <a href="/jeremiah/7-3.htm" title="Thus said the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, Amend your ways and your doings, and I will cause you to dwell in this place.">Jeremiah 7:3</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/7-5.htm" title="For if you thoroughly amend your ways and your doings; if you thoroughly execute judgment between a man and his neighbor;">Jeremiah 7:5</a>, and was probably often on the lips of those who made a show of reformation. Here it is used with a scornful irony, “What means this reform, this show of amendment of thy ways, which leads only to a further indulgence in adulterous love?”<p><span class= "bld">Hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">hast thou also taught thy ways wickednesses. </span>The professed change for the better was really for the worse.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-34.htm">Jeremiah 2:34</a></div><div class="verse">Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls of the poor innocents: I have not found it by secret search, but upon all these.</div>(34) <span class= "bld">Also in thy skirts . . .</span>—The general meaning is clear, and points to the guilt of Israel in offering her children—the “poor innocents”—in horrid sacrifice to Molech; perhaps, also, to her maltreatment of the prophets. Their “blood” is on the “skirts” of her raiment; perhaps, if we take another reading, on the “palms” of her hands. The last clause is, however, obscure enough. We have to choose, according to variations of reading and construction, between (1) <span class= "ital">I have not found it as by secret search </span>(literally, <span class= "ital">by digging, </span>as men dig through the wall of a house in search of plunder), <span class= "ital">but under every oak </span>or <span class= "ital">terebinth, </span>or, more probably, as in the Authorised version, <span class= "ital">upon all these</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>the sin was patent, flagrant, everywhere; and (2) <span class= "ital">Thou didst not find them </span>(those who had been put to death) <span class= "ital">in the place of breaking through</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., in the act of the robber that would have deserved death </span>(<a href="/exodus/22-2.htm" title="If a thief be found breaking up, and be smitten that he die, there shall no blood be shed for him.">Exodus 22:2</a>; <a href="/job/24-16.htm" title="In the dark they dig through houses, which they had marked for themselves in the daytime: they know not the light.">Job 24:16</a>); <span class= "ital">but because of all this</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>thou didst slay them through thy passion for idolatry. Of these (1) commends itself most.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-35.htm">Jeremiah 2:35</a></div><div class="verse">Yet thou sayest, Because I am innocent, surely his anger shall turn from me. Behold, I will plead with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.</div>(35) <span class= "bld">Yet thou sayest . . .</span>—Once again we have the equivocating plea of the accused. She takes up the word that had been used by the accuser: “You speak of the innocents; <span class= "ital">I, too, am innocent. His anger has turned away from me. </span>Here, as in <a href="/jeremiah/2-33.htm" title="Why trim you your way to seek love? therefore have you also taught the wicked ones your ways.">Jeremiah 2:33</a>, there is an implied reference to the partial reformation under Josiah. The accuser retorts, and renews his pleadings against her. Confession might have led to forgiveness, but this denial of guilt excluded it, and was the token of a fatal blindness (comp. <a href="/1_john/1-8.htm" title="If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.">1John 1:8</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-36.htm">Jeremiah 2:36</a></div><div class="verse">Why gaddest thou about so much to change thy way? thou also shalt be ashamed of Egypt, as thou wast ashamed of Assyria.</div>(36) <span class= "bld">Why gaddest thou . . .?</span>—The vigorous English expresses well, perhaps even with some added force, the frequentative force of the Hebrew. What meant this perpetual change of policy, this shifting of alliances? Shame and confusion should follow from the alliance with Nechoh, as it had followed from that with Tiglath-pileser (<a href="/2_kings/16-10.htm" title="And king Ahaz went to Damascus to meet Tiglathpileser king of Assyria, and saw an altar that was at Damascus: and king Ahaz sent to Urijah the priest the fashion of the altar, and the pattern of it, according to all the workmanship thereof.">2Kings 16:10</a>; <a href="/2_chronicles/28-20.htm" title="And Tilgathpilneser king of Assyria came to him, and distressed him, but strengthened him not.">2Chronicles 28:20</a>).<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/jeremiah/2-37.htm">Jeremiah 2:37</a></div><div class="verse">Yea, thou shalt go forth from him, and thine hands upon thine head: for the LORD hath rejected thy confidences, and thou shalt not prosper in them.</div>(37) <span class= "bld">From him.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">from it, sc., </span>from Egypt as a people.<p><span class= "bld">Thine hands upon thine head.</span>—The outward sign of depression and despair (<a href="/2_samuel/13-19.htm" title="And Tamar put ashes on her head, and rent her garment of divers colors that was on her, and laid her hand on her head, and went on crying.">2Samuel 13:19</a>).<p><span class= "bld">Thy confidences.</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e., </span>the grounds or objects of thy confidence.<p><span class= "bld"><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers<br /><br />Text Courtesy of <a href="//biblesupport.com" target="_top">BibleSupport.com</a>. 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