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The Imminence and Horror of the Invasion

Flee for safety, O children of Benjamin,

from the midst of Jerusalem!

Blow the trumpet in Tekoa,

and raise a signal on Beth-haccherem;

for evil looms out of the north,

and great destruction.

I have likened daughter Zion

to the loveliest pasture.

Shepherds with their flocks shall come against her.

They shall pitch their tents around her;

they shall pasture, all in their places.

“Prepare war against her;

up, and let us attack at noon!”

“Woe to us, for the day declines,

the shadows of evening lengthen!”

“Up, and let us attack by night,

and destroy her palaces!”

For thus says the L ord of hosts:

Cut down her trees;

cast up a siege ramp against Jerusalem.

This is the city that must be punished;

there is nothing but oppression within her.

As a well keeps its water fresh,

so she keeps fresh her wickedness;

violence and destruction are heard within her;

sickness and wounds are ever before me.

Take warning, O Jerusalem,

or I shall turn from you in disgust,

and make you a desolation,

an uninhabited land.

Thus says the L ord of hosts:

Glean thoroughly as a vine

the remnant of Israel;

like a grape-gatherer, pass your hand again

over its branches.

To whom shall I speak and give warning,

that they may hear?

See, their ears are closed,

they cannot listen.

The word of the L ord is to them an object of scorn;

they take no pleasure in it.

But I am full of the wrath of the L ord;

I am weary of holding it in.

Pour it out on the children in the street,

and on the gatherings of young men as well;

both husband and wife shall be taken,

the old folk and the very aged.

Their houses shall be turned over to others,

their fields and wives together;

for I will stretch out my hand

against the inhabitants of the land,

says the L ord.

For from the least to the greatest of them,

everyone is greedy for unjust gain;

and from prophet to priest,

everyone deals falsely.

They have treated the wound of my people carelessly,

saying, “Peace, peace,”

when there is no peace.

They acted shamefully, they committed abomination;

yet they were not ashamed,

they did not know how to blush.

Therefore they shall fall among those who fall;

at the time that I punish them, they shall be overthrown,

says the L ord.

Thus says the L ord:

Stand at the crossroads, and look,

and ask for the ancient paths,

where the good way lies; and walk in it,

and find rest for your souls.

But they said, “We will not walk in it.”

Also I raised up sentinels for you:

“Give heed to the sound of the trumpet!”

But they said, “We will not give heed.”

Therefore hear, O nations,

and know, O congregation, what will happen to them.

Hear, O earth; I am going to bring disaster on this people,

the fruit of their schemes,

because they have not given heed to my words;

and as for my teaching, they have rejected it.

Of what use to me is frankincense that comes from Sheba,

or sweet cane from a distant land?

Your burnt offerings are not acceptable,

nor are your sacrifices pleasing to me.

Therefore thus says the L ord:

See, I am laying before this people

stumbling blocks against which they shall stumble;

parents and children together,

neighbor and friend shall perish.

Thus says the L ord:

See, a people is coming from the land of the north,

a great nation is stirring from the farthest parts of the earth.

They grasp the bow and the javelin,

they are cruel and have no mercy,

their sound is like the roaring sea;

they ride on horses,

equipped like a warrior for battle,

against you, O daughter Zion!

“We have heard news of them,

our hands fall helpless;

anguish has taken hold of us,

pain as of a woman in labor.

Do not go out into the field,

or walk on the road;

for the enemy has a sword,

terror is on every side.”

O my poor people, put on sackcloth,

and roll in ashes;

make mourning as for an only child,

most bitter lamentation:

for suddenly the destroyer

will come upon us.

I have made you a tester and a refiner among my people

so that you may know and test their ways.

They are all stubbornly rebellious,

going about with slanders;

they are bronze and iron,

all of them act corruptly.

The bellows blow fiercely,

the lead is consumed by the fire;

in vain the refining goes on,

for the wicked are not removed.

They are called “rejected silver,”

for the L ord has rejected them.

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.

Jeremiah turns now his discourse to the whole people. In the last verse he reproved only the priests and the prophets; he now speaks more generally, and says, that they had put off all shame. “Behold,” he says, “they are sufficiently proved guilty, their wickedness is manifest, and yet there is no shame. Their disgrace is visible to heaven and earth; angels and all mortals are witnesses of their corruption; but they have such a meretricious front that they are touched by no sense of shame.” He means, in these words, that the wickedness of the people was past all remedy; for they had arrived to that degree of stupor, of which Paul speaks, when he calls those ἀπηλγηκότας, who were obstinate in their vices, who saw no difference between right and wrong, between white and black. (Ephesians 4:19.)

This, then, is what the Prophet means when he says, Have they been ashamed? But a question is much more emphatical, than if it was a simple reprobation or affirmation. They have not been even ashamed, he says. In their very shame, they knew not what it was to be touched by any shamefacedness. This may be classed with those reproofs, by which they had not been subdued; as though he had said, “Efforts having been made to expose their effrontery, in not humbling themselves under the hand of God; they shall therefore fall among the fallen;” that is, “I will dispute no longer with them, nor contend in words, but will execute on them my judgment.” Fall, then, shall they among the fallen; as though he had said, “I have more than sufficiently denounced war on them: had they been healable it would have availed to their conversion, that they had been so often warned; and still more, that I have so sharply stimulated them to come to me: but I will now no more employ words, on the contrary, I will execute my vengeance, so that the calamity which they have derived may devour them.” ¹⁷⁶¹⁷⁶     The Syriac is the only version that puts the first verb in an interrogatory form. “They have been confounded,“ is the Septuagint and Vulgate; and similar is the rendering of the Arabic and the Targum. The verb, taken literally, it being in Huphal, may be rendered, “They have been put to shame,“ or have been made to be ashamed; that is, they had been exposed to shame; but this shame they felt not, according to what follows. Their previous evils were enough to make them feel ashamed; but they had not that effect: hence entire ruin is denounced on them at the end of the verse. The rendering of the whole is as follows, —
   15. Exposed to shame have they been, Because abomination have they wrought: Neither with shame are they ashamed, Nor how to be abashed do they know; Therefore fall shall they with the fallen; At the time when I shall visit them, They shall perish, saith Jehovah.
   There is no necessity to make this verse and the 12th of chap. 8 (Jeremiah 8:12) the same in every particular, as Blayney attempts to do. Both passages are the same in meaning, with a little variety in some of the words. The particle גם, repeated, may be rendered by, either and nor. See Numbers 23:5. The verb הכליםis an infinitive Huphal. It is rendered as an infinitive by the Vulgate. “They shall perish,“ which is according to the Septuagint, the Syriac, and the Arabic, is literally, “They shall be made to stumble.” — Ed

They shall wholly fall, he says, in the day of their visitation From this second clause we understand more clearly what it is or what he means when he speaks of falling among the fallen, which is, that they should wholly fall, when God would come as it were with a drawn sword to destroy them, having been wearied with giving them so many warnings.

¹⁷⁶ The Syriac is the only version that puts the first verb in an interrogatory form. “They have been confounded,“ is the Septuagint and Vulgate; and similar is the rendering of the Arabic and the Targum. The verb, taken literally, it being in Huphal, may be rendered, “They have been put to shame,“ or have been made to be ashamed; that is, they had been exposed to shame; but this shame they felt not, according to what follows. Their previous evils were enough to make them feel ashamed; but they had not that effect: hence entire ruin is denounced on them at the end of the verse. The rendering of the whole is as follows, — 15. Exposed to shame have they been, Because abomination have they wrought: Neither with shame are they ashamed, Nor how to be abashed do they know; Therefore fall shall they with the fallen; At the time when I shall visit them, They shall perish, saith Jehovah. There is no necessity to make this verse and the 12th of chap. 8 (Jeremiah 8:12) the same in every particular, as Blayney attempts to do. Both passages are the same in meaning, with a little variety in some of the words. The particle גם, repeated, may be rendered by, either and nor. See Numbers 23:5. The verb הכליםis an infinitive Huphal. It is rendered as an infinitive by the Vulgate. “They shall perish,“ which is according to the Septuagint, the Syriac, and the Arabic, is literally, “They shall be made to stumble.” — Ed