VIII. (1) AT THAT TIME. — There is, it is obvious, no break in the discourse, and the time is therefore that of the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldæans, and of the burial of the slain. Not even the dead should sleep in peace. With an awful re-iteration of the word, so as to give the emphasis... [ Continue Reading ]
WHOM THEY HAVE LOVED... — Here, again, there is a peculiar characteristic emphasis in the piling up, one upon another, of verbs more or less synonymous. So far as there is a traceable order, it is from the first inward impulse prompting to idolatry to the full development of that feeling in ritual.... [ Continue Reading ]
THE RESIDUE OF THEM THAT REMAIN. — Once more the emphasis of re-iteration, “the remnant of a remnant.” The “evil family” is the whole house of Israel, but the words contemplate specially the exile of Judah and Benjamin, rather than that of the ten tribes.... [ Continue Reading ]
SHALL HE TURN. — Better, as both clauses arc indefinite, _Shall men fall and not arise? Shall one turn away and not return?_ The appeal is made to the common practice of men. Those who fall struggle to their feet again. One who finds that he has lost his way retraces his steps. In its spiritual aspe... [ Continue Reading ]
SLIDDEN BACK... BACKSLIDING. — The English fails to give the full emphasis of the re-iteration of the same word as in the previous verse. _Why doth this people of Jerusalem turn away with a perpetual turning?_ Here, so far, there was no retracing the evil path which they had chosen. I HEARKENED AND... [ Continue Reading ]
THE STORK IN THE HEAVEN. — The eye of the prophet looked on nature at once with the quick observation of one who is alive to all her changes, and with the profound thought of a poet finding inner meanings in all phenomena. The birds of the air obey their instincts as the law of their nature. Israel,... [ Continue Reading ]
HOW DO YE SAY...? — The question is put to priests and prophets, who were the recognised expounders of the Law, but not to them only. The order of scribes, which became so dominant during the exile, was already rising into notice. Shaphan, to whom Hilkiah gave the re-found Book of the Law, belonged... [ Continue Reading ]
THEY HAVE REJECTED THE WORD OF THE LORD. — The “wise men” are apparently distinguished from the scribes, probably as students of the ethical or sapiential books of Israel, such as the Proverbs of Solomon, as distinct from the Law. The reign of Hezekiah, it will be remembered, had been memorable for... [ Continue Reading ]
(10-12) EVERY ONE FROM THE LEAST... — The prophet reproduces, though not verbally, what he had already said in Jeremiah 6:12. (Comp. Notes there.) It is as though that emphatic condemnation of the sins of the false teachers were burnt into his soul, and could not but find utterance whenever he addre... [ Continue Reading ]
I WILL SURELY CONSUME. — Literally, _Gathering, I will sweep away_ — _i.e.,_ I will gather and sweep away, the two verbs being all but identical in sound and spelling, so that the construction has almost the force of the emphatic Hebrew reduplication. THERE SHALL BE. — These words are not in the Heb... [ Continue Reading ]
WHY DO WE SIT STILL?... — The cry of the people in answer to the threatening of Jehovah is brought in by the prophet with a startling dramatic vividness. They are ready to flee into the defenced cities, as the prophet had told them in Jeremiah 4:5, but it is without hope. They are going into the sil... [ Continue Reading ]
A TIME OF HEALTH... — Better, _healing,_ or, following another etymology, _a time of quietness, and behold alarm._ “Peace,” in the first clause, is used in its wider sense as including all forms of good.... [ Continue Reading ]
HEARD FROM DAN. — As in Jeremiah 4:13, the invasion by an army of which cavalry and war chariots formed the most terrible contingent was a special terror to Israelites. Even at Dan, the northern boundary of Palestine (see Note on Jeremiah 4:15), there was a sound of terror in the very snortings of t... [ Continue Reading ]
SERPENTS, COCKATRICES. — There is a sudden change of figure, one new image of terror starting from the history of the fiery serpents of Numbers 21:6, or, possibly, from the connection of Dan with the “serpent” and “adder” in Genesis 49:17. It is not easy to identify the genus and species of the serp... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEN I WOULD COMFORT MYSELF... — The word translated _comfort_ is not found elsewhere, and has been very differently understood. Taking the words as spoken after a pause, they come as a cry of sorrow following the proclamation of the judgment of Jehovah, _Ah, my comfort against sorrow!_ (mourning fo... [ Continue Reading ]
BECAUSE OF THEM THAT DWELL... — The verse should read thus: _Behold, the voice of the cry for help of the daughter of my people from the land of those that are far off._ The prophet, dramatising the future, as before, in Jeremiah 8:14, hears the cry of the exiles in a far-off land, and that which th... [ Continue Reading ]
THE HARVEST IS PAST... — The question of Jehovah, admitting of no answer but a confession of guilt, is met by another cry of despair from the sufferers of the future. They are as men in a year of famine — “The harvest is past,” and there has been no crop for men to reap. SUMMER. — In Isaiah 16:9; J... [ Continue Reading ]
FOR THE HURT... — Now the prophet again speaks in his own person. He is _crushed_ in that _crushing_ of his people. His face is _darkened,_ as one that mourns. (Comp. Psalms 38:6; Joshua 5:11.)... [ Continue Reading ]
IS THERE NO BALM IN GILEAD...? — The resinous gums of Gilead, identified by some naturalists with those of the terebinth, by others with mastich, the gum of the _Pistaccia lentiscus,_ were prominent in the pharmacopœia of Israel, and were exported to Egypt for the embalmment of the dead (Genesis 37:... [ Continue Reading ]