II. (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... [ Continue Reading ]
GO AND CRY... — 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. I REMEMBER THEE. — Literally, _I have remembered for thee._ THE LOVE OF THINE ESPOUSALS. — The imagery was one derived, as we find so often in Jeremiah’s writ... [ Continue Reading ]
HOLINESS UNTO THE LORD. — The thought was that expressed in the inscription on the gold plate worn on the high priest’s forehead (Exodus 28:36), and in the term “holy thing” (Leviticus 22:10; Matthew 7:6), applied to the consecrated gifts which were the portion of the priests. The prophet was taught... [ Continue Reading ]
VANITY. — In the special sense, as a synonym for idol-worship (Deuteronomy 32:21; 1 Kings 16:13). 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.... [ Continue Reading ]
NEITHER SAID THEY. — In somewhat of the same tone as in Deuteronomy 8:15; Deuteronomy 32:10, 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 w... [ Continue Reading ]
A PLENTIFUL COUNTRY. — Literally, _a land of Carmel,_ that word, as meaning a vine-clad hill, having become a type of plenty. So “the forest of his Carmel,” in Isaiah 37:24; elsewhere, as in Isaiah 10:18; Isaiah 32:15, “fruitful.” The LXX. treats the word as a proper name, “I brought you unto Carmel... [ Continue Reading ]
THE PRIESTS SAID NOT... — 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 h... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL YET PLEAD WITH YOU. — We hear, as it were, the echo of the words of Hosea 2:2. The injured lord and husband will appear as the accuser of the faithless bride, and set forth her guilt as in an indictment.... [ Continue Reading ]
PASS OVER THE ISLES... — Chittim is named as being, from the prophet’s point of view, the furthest country in the west (Genesis 10:4; Numbers 24:24), Kedar (Genesis 25:13; Psalms 120:5) in the east. The whole earth might be searched without finding a parallel to the guilt of Israel.... [ Continue Reading ]
HATH A NATION... — 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 Romans 1:23, though here they express the thought that the worship of Jehovah was... [ Continue Reading ]
BE ASTONISHED, O YE HEAVENS. — The adjuration had been made familiar by a like utterance in Isaiah 1:2; Deuteronomy 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.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE FOUNTAIN OF LIVING WATERS. — The word rendered “well,” as in Proverbs 10:11; Proverbs 18:4; “fountain,” as in Psalms 36:9, 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 v... [ Continue Reading ]
IS ISRAEL A SERVANT? — The word “servant,” we must remember, had become, through its frequent use in Isaiah (Isaiah 20:3; Isaiah 41:8, _et al._)_,_ a word not of shame, but honour; and of all servants, he who was born in the house — as in the case of Eleazar (Genesis 15:3) — occupied the most honour... [ Continue Reading ]
THE YOUNG LIONS ROARED... — The real answer to the question, that Israel had forsaken its true master, is given in Jeremiah 2:17. 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 lite... [ Continue Reading ]
ALSO THE CHILDREN OF NOPH... — 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 (Isaiah 31... [ Continue Reading ]
HAST THOU NOT PROCURED THIS...? — 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 wa... [ Continue Reading ]
IN THE WAY OF EGYPT...? — 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 Isaiah 23:3 the Nile (though in Joshua 13:3 it stands for the border... [ Continue Reading ]
THINE OWN WICKEDNESS. — 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 fo... [ Continue Reading ]
I HAVE BROKEN THY YOKE. — Better, with the LXX. and Vulg., _thou hast broken thy yoke_ — _i.e.,_ 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... [ Continue Reading ]
A NOBLE VINE. — Literally, _a Sorek vine._ Elsewhere rendered _choice_ or _choicest_ (Genesis 49:11; Isaiah 5:2). The word “Sorek” points primarily to the dark purple of the grape, and then to the valley of Sorek, between Ascalon and Gaza (Judges 16:4). WHOLLY A RIGHT SEED. — Literally, _a seed of... [ Continue Reading ]
NITRE. — The mineral alkali found in the natron lakes of Egypt that took their name from it. The Hebrew word _nether_ is the origin of the Greek AND English words. (Comp. Proverbs 25:20.) SOPE. — Not the compounds of alkali and oil or fat now known by the name, but the potash or alkali, obtained fr... [ Continue Reading ]
HOW CANST THOU SAY...? — 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 (2 Kings 23:4; 2 Chronicles 34:4)? The answer to such pl... [ Continue Reading ]
A WILD ASS... — One image of animal desire suggests another, and the “wild ass” appears (as in the Hebrew of Genesis 16:12; Job 11:12; Job 39:5) 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 (_Georg._ iii. 2... [ Continue Reading ]
WITHHOLD THY FOOT. — From the brute types of passion the prophet passes to the human. Here he has Hosea as giving a prototype (Hosea 2:5; Hosea 2:7), perhaps also Isaiah (Isaiah 23:15). The picture may probably enough have been drawn from the life, but that sketched in Proverbs 7:10 may well have su... [ Continue Reading ]
AS THE THIEF... — 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.... [ Continue Reading ]
SAYING TO A STOCK... — 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. TO A STOCK, THOU ART MY FATHER. — Literally, _to a tree._ The words seem as if... [ Continue Reading ]
WHERE ARE THY GODS...? — 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 Jeremiah 11:13, the words “according to the number of the streets in Jerusalem t... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEREFORE WILL YE PLEAD WITH ME? — 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.... [ Continue Reading ]
YOUR OWN SWORD HATH DEVOURED YOUR PROPHETS. — 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 (2 Kings 2... [ Continue Reading ]
O GENERATION, SEE YE. — The pronoun occupies a different position in the Hebrew, “_O generation, you, I mean, see ye.”_ The prophet speaks to the men who are actually his contemporaries. _They_ are to look to the word of the Lord. Has He been to them as a waste land, a land of thick darkness (litera... [ Continue Reading ]
OR A BRIDE HER ATTIRE. — The word is rendered “headbands” in Isaiah 3:20, 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... [ Continue Reading ]
WHY TRIMMEST THOU THY WAY...? — The verb is the same as that rendered _“_amend” in Jeremiah 7:3; Jeremiah 7:5, 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 o... [ Continue Reading ]
ALSO IN THY SKIRTS... — 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 re... [ Continue Reading ]
YET THOU SAYEST... — 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; _I, too, am innocent. His anger has turned away from me._ Here, as in Jeremiah 2:33, there is an implied reference to the partial reform... [ Continue Reading ]
WHY GADDEST THOU...? — 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... [ Continue Reading ]
FROM HIM. — Better, _from it, sc.,_ from Egypt as a people. THINE HANDS UPON THINE HEAD. — The outward sign of depression and despair (2 Samuel 13:19). THY CONFIDENCES. — _i.e.,_ the grounds or objects of thy confidence.... [ Continue Reading ]