17 See, I will send snakes and poison-snakes among you, against which the wonder-worker has no power; and they will give you wounds which may not be made well, says the Lord.
They will be wasted from need of food, and overcome by burning heat and bitter destruction; and the teeth of beasts I will send on them, with the poison of the worms of the dust.
Their poison is like the poison of a snake; they are like the adder, whose ears are shut; Who will not be moved by the voice of the wonder-worker, however great are his powers.
If a snake gives a bite before the word of power is said, then there is no longer any use in the word of power.
Be not glad, O Philistia, all of you, because the rod which was on you is broken: for out of the snake's root will come a poison-snake, and its fruit will be a winged poison-snake.
Though they take cover on the top of Carmel, I will go in search of them and get them out; though they keep themselves from my eyes in the bed of the sea, I will give orders to the great snake there and he will give them a bite:
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Jeremiah 8
Commentary on Jeremiah 8 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 8
The prophet proceeds, in this chapter, both to magnify and to justify the destruction that God was bringing upon this people, to show how grievous it would be and yet how righteous.
Jer 8:1-3
These verses might fitly have been joined to the close of the foregoing chapter, as giving a further description of the dreadful desolation which the army of the Chaldeans should make in the land. It shall strangely alter the property of death itself, and for the worse too.
Jer 8:4-12
The prophet here is instructed to set before this people the folly of their impenitence, which was it that brought this ruin upon them. They are here represented as the most stupid senseless people in the world, that would not be made wise by all the methods that Infinite Wisdom took to bring them to themselves and their right mind, and so to prevent the ruin that was coming upon them.
Jer 8:13-22
In these verses we have,