Jeremiah 6:27-30

6. The hopeless task of the Prophet (Jeremiah 6:27-30)

TRANSLATION

(27) A tower have I made you among My people, a fortified city that you may know, then test their way. (28) They are all rebellious revolters, those who go after slander, brass and iron all of them, corrupters are they. (29) The bellows are scorched! The lead is consumed by fire. In vain he continues to smelt but the wicked are not removed. (30) Refuse silver they shall call them, for the LORD has rejected them.

COMMENTS

In Jeremiah 6:27 God addresses Jeremiah. God has made His prophet as strong as a tower[171] a fortified city; the people will not be successful in attacking him. Jeremiah can then fearlessly test and try the way of the people by his preaching[172] (Jeremiah 6:27). In this and the following verses metallurgic phraseology is employed with a moral application. The men of Judah are unfaithful to God for they are in open rebellion against Him. They are unfaithful to their fellowmen because they engage in malicious slander. These wicked men are as hard as brass and iron. Their way of life is corruption; all of them are rotten to the core (Jeremiah 6:28). Try as he may the assayer is not able to extract any precious metal from the worthless ore of the nation Judah. The fire is so hot that the bellows are scorched. The lead which served as a flux to carry away the impurities melts. But no silver remains. There were no righteous ones from whom the wicked could be separated (Jeremiah 6:29). Once Israel had been as precious to God as silver (Deuteronomy 5:27-29). Now that silver had become refuse silver i.e., worthless silver, good for nothing dross (Jeremiah 6:30).

[171] Another possible rendering is smelter, prover or trier. For lengthy discussion and defense of the translation tower see Laetsch, op. cit., pp. 89-90.

[172] Elsewhere in Scripture men are tested in fire or furnace of trials and tribulations in order to refine and purify them from the dross of sin. See Proverbs 17:3; Zechariah 13:9; Jeremiah 6:29; Jeremiah 9:7.