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Israel and Judah Have Broken the Covenant

The word that came to Jeremiah from the L ord: ²Hear the words of this covenant, and speak to the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. ³You shall say to them, Thus says the L ord, the God of Israel: Cursed be anyone who does not heed the words of this covenant, ⁴which I commanded your ancestors when I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron-smelter, saying, Listen to my voice, and do all that I command you. So shall you be my people, and I will be your God, ⁵that I may perform the oath that I swore to your ancestors, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as at this day. Then I answered, “So be it, L ord.”

⁶ And the L ord said to me: Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem: Hear the words of this covenant and do them. ⁷For I solemnly warned your ancestors when I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, warning them persistently, even to this day, saying, Obey my voice. ⁸Yet they did not obey or incline their ear, but everyone walked in the stubbornness of an evil will. So I brought upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do, but they did not.

⁹ And the L ord said to me: Conspiracy exists among the people of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. ¹⁰They have turned back to the iniquities of their ancestors of old, who refused to heed my words; they have gone after other gods to serve them; the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken the covenant that I made with their ancestors. ¹¹Therefore, thus says the L ord, assuredly I am going to bring disaster upon them that they cannot escape; though they cry out to me, I will not listen to them. ¹²Then the cities of Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods to whom they make offerings, but they will never save them in the time of their trouble. ¹³For your gods have become as many as your towns, O Judah; and as many as the streets of Jerusalem are the altars to shame you have set up, altars to make offerings to Baal.

¹⁴ As for you, do not pray for this people, or lift up a cry or prayer on their behalf, for I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their trouble. ¹⁵What right has my beloved in my house, when she has done vile deeds? Can vows and sacrificial flesh avert your doom? Can you then exult? ¹⁶The L ord once called you, “A green olive tree, fair with goodly fruit”; but with the roar of a great tempest he will set fire to it, and its branches will be consumed. ¹⁷The L ord of hosts, who planted you, has pronounced evil against you, because of the evil that the house of Israel and the house of Judah have done, provoking me to anger by making offerings to Baal.

Jeremiah’s Life Threatened

It was the L ord who made it known to me, and I knew;

then you showed me their evil deeds.

But I was like a gentle lamb

led to the slaughter.

And I did not know it was against me

that they devised schemes, saying,

“Let us destroy the tree with its fruit,

let us cut him off from the land of the living,

so that his name will no longer be remembered!”

But you, O L ord of hosts, who judge righteously,

who try the heart and the mind,

let me see your retribution upon them,

for to you I have committed my cause.

²¹ Therefore thus says the L ord concerning the people of Anathoth, who seek your life, and say, “You shall not prophesy in the name of the L ord, or you will die by our hand”— ²²therefore thus says the L ord of hosts: I am going to punish them; the young men shall die by the sword; their sons and their daughters shall die by famine; ²³and not even a remnant shall be left of them. For I will bring disaster upon the people of Anathoth, the year of their punishment.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Here the Prophet, after having found that the impiety of the people was so great that he was speaking to the deaf, turns his address to God: O Jehovah of hosts, he says, who art a great Judge, who searchest the reins and the heart, may I see thy vengeance on them The Prophet seems here inconsistent with himself;, for he had before declared that he was like a lamb or a calf, as though he had offered, as they say, his life a wining sacrifice; but here he seems like one made suddenly angry, and he prays for God’s vengeance. These things appear indeed to be very different; for if he had offered himself a victim, why did he not wait calmly for the event; why is he inflamed with so much displeasure? why does he thus imprecate on them the vengeance of God? But these things will well agree together, if we distinguish between private feeling and that pure and discreet zeal by which the meekness of truth can never be disturbed. For though the Prophet disregarded his own life, and was not moved by private wrongs, he was nevertheless not a log of wood; but zeal for God did eat up his heart, according to what is said in common of all the members of Christ,

“Zeal for thine house hath eaten me, and the reproaches of those who upbraided thee have fallen on me.” (Psalm 69:9; John 2:17; Romans 15:3)

The Prophet then had previously freed himself from all suspicion by saying that he was prepared for the slaughter, as though he were a lamb or a calf; but he now shews that he was, notwithstanding, not destitute of zeal for God. Here then he gives vent to this new fervor when he says, “O Jehovah, who searchest the reins and the heart, may I see thy vengeance on them.”

The Prophet, no doubt, was free from every carnal feeling, and pronounced what we read through the influence of the Spirit. Since then the Holy Spirit dictated this prayer to the holy man, he might still have offered himself a voluntary sacrifice, while yet he justly appealed to God’s tribunal to take vengeance on the impiety of a reprobate people; for he did not indiscriminately include them all, but imprecated God’s judgment on the abandoned and irreclaimable.

It is indeed true, that we may regard the Prophet as predicting what he knew would happen to his people: and some give this explanation; they consider it as a prediction only and no prayer. But they are terrified without reason at the appearance of inconsistency, as they think it inconsistent in the Prophet to desire the perdition of his own people: for he might have wished it through the influ ence of that zeal, as I have said, which the Holy Spirit had kindled in his heart, and according to the words which the same Spirit had dictated.

He calls God the Judge of righteousness; and he so called him, that he might wipe away and dissipate the disguises in which the Jews exulted when they sought to prove their own cause. By this then he intimates that they gained no — thing by their evasions, for these would vanish like smoke when they came before God’s tribunal. He, in short, means that they could not stand before the judgment of God. He then adds, that God searches the reins and the heart He says this, not only that he might testify his own integrity, as some suppose, but that he might rouse hypocrites. For he intimates that they stood safe before men, as they concealed their wickedness, but that when they came before God’s tribunal another kind of account must then be given; for God would prove and try them, as the word בחן, bechen, signifies: he would search the ruins and the heart, that is, their most inward feelings; For the Scripture means by reins all the hidden feelings or affections.

He says, For to thee have I made known my judgment The Prophet, no doubt, appeals here to God’s tribunal, because he saw that he was destitute of every patronage — he saw that all were against him. Few pious men indeed were left, as we have elsewhere seen; but the Prophet speaks here of the mass of the people. As then there was no one among the people who did not then openly oppose God, so that there was no defender of equity and justice, he turns to God and says, “I have made known my cause to thee;” as though he had said, “O Lord, thou knowest what my cause is, and I do not act dissemblingly; for I serve thee faithfully and sincerely, as thou knowest. Since it is so, may I see thy vengeance on them.” ⁵¹⁵¹     The beginning of the verse is differently rendered: “O Lord,” in the vocative case, by the Septuagint, the Vulgate, and the Syriac; “The Lord,” by the Arabic and Targum. All the versions agree as to the imprecation, “May I see — ἴδοιμι — videam:” but the Targum has, “I shall see;” and so it is rendered by Gataker, Venema, Scott, and Adam Clarke. The verb is future, but the future in Hebrew has sometimes the meaning of the optative or the subjunctive, as well as of the imperative. But the future is the most suitable here; for the ו before “Jehovah” will not allow it to be in the vocative case. The verse then would be as follows, —
   20. But Jehovah of hosts, who art a righteous judge, The trier of the reins and of the heart, I shall see thy vengeance on them; For on thee have I devolved my cause.
   “Jehovah of hosts” is a nominative absolute — a form of expression very common in the Prophets. — Ed.

Now, we are taught in this passage, that even were the whole world united to suppress the light of truth, Prophets and teachers ought not to despond, nor to rely on the judgment of men, for that is a false and deceptive balance; but that they ought to persevere in the discharge of their office, and to be satisfied with this alone — that they render their office approved of God, and exercise it as in his presence. We may also learn, that the ungodly and hypocrites in vain make shifts and evasions, while they try to elude the authority of the Prophets; for they will at length be led before God’s tribunal. When therefore we find teachers rightly and sincerely discharging their office, let us know that we cannot possibly escape the judgment of God except we submit to their teaching. And Prophets and pastors themselves ought to learn from this passage, that though the whole world, as I have already said, were opposed to them, they ought not yet to cease from their perseverance, nor be changeable, but to consider it enough that God approves of their cause. It afterwards follows —

⁵¹ The beginning of the verse is differently rendered: “O Lord,” in the vocative case, by the Septuagint, the Vulgate, and the Syriac; “The Lord,” by the Arabic and Targum. All the versions agree as to the imprecation, “May I see — ἴδοιμι — videam:” but the Targum has, “I shall see;” and so it is rendered by Gataker, Venema, Scott, and Adam Clarke. The verb is future, but the future in Hebrew has sometimes the meaning of the optative or the subjunctive, as well as of the imperative. But the future is the most suitable here; for the ו before “Jehovah” will not allow it to be in the vocative case. The verse then would be as follows, — 20. But Jehovah of hosts, who art a righteous judge, The trier of the reins and of the heart, I shall see thy vengeance on them; For on thee have I devolved my cause. “Jehovah of hosts” is a nominative absolute — a form of expression very common in the Prophets. — Ed.