Jeremiah 4:1

CHAPTER IV

Sequel of the exhortations and promises addressed to Israel in

the preceding chapter, 1, 2.

The prophet then addresses the people of Judah and Jerusalem,

exhorting to repentance and reformation, that the dreadful

visitation with which they were threatened might be averted,

3, 4.

He then sounds the alarm of war, 5, 6.

Nebuchadnezzar, like a fierce lion, is, from the certainty of

the prophecy, represented to be on his march; and the

disastrous event to have been already declared, 7-9.

And as the lying prophets had flattered the people with the

hopes of peace and safety, they are now introduced, (when their

predictions are falsified by the event,) excusing themselves;

and, with matchless effrontery, laying the blame of the

deception upon God, ("And they said," c., so the text is

corrected by Kennicott,) 10.

The prophet immediately resumes his subject and, in the person

of God, denounces again those judgments which were shortly to

be inflicted by Nebuchadnezzar, 11-18.

The approaching desolation of Jerusalem lamented in language

amazingly energetic and exquisitely tender, 19-21.

The incorrigible wickedness of the people the sole cause of

these calamities, 22.

In the remaining verses the prophet describes the sad

catastrophe of Jerusalem by such a beautiful assemblage of the

most striking and afflictive circumstances as form a picture of

a land "swept with the besom of destruction." The earth seems

ready to return to its original chaos; every ray of light is

extinguished, and succeeded by a frightful gloom; the mountains

tremble, and the hills shake, under the dreadful apprehension

of the wrath of Jehovah; all is one awful solitude, where not a

vestige of the human race is to be seen. Even the fowls of

heaven, finding no longer whereon to subsist, are compelled to

migrate; the most fruitful places are become a dark and dreary

desert, and every city is a ruinous heap. To complete the

whole, the dolorous shrieks of Jerusalem, as of a woman in

peculiar agony, break through the frightful gloom; and the

appalled prophet pauses, leaving the reader to reflect on the

dreadful effects of apostasy and idolatry, 23-31.

NOTES ON CHAP. IV

Verse Jeremiah 4:1. Shalt thou not remove.] This was spoken before the Babylonish captivity; and here is a promise that if they will return from their idolatry, they shall not be led into captivity. So, even that positively threatened judgment would have been averted had they returned to the Lord.