Jeremiah 17:22

Neither carry forth a burden. — Interpreted by the parallel passage in Nehemiah 13:15, the burden would be the baskets of fruit, vegetables, or fish which were brought in from the country by the villagers who came to the Temple services, and the wares of the city which were taken to the gates to be sold in turn to them. The Sabbath was observed after a fashion, but, as Sunday has been for many centuries and in many parts of Christendom, it was turned into a market-day, and so, though men abstained probably from manual labour, the quiet sanctity which of right belonged to it was lost. Passages like Isaiah 56:2; Isaiah 58:13 show that the evil was one of some standing, and the practice of the time of Jehoiakim was not likely to be more rigorous than it had been in the time of Isaiah, or was, at a later period, after the return from the Captivity.