19 Therefore thus says Yahweh, If you return, then will I bring you again, that you may stand before me; and if you take forth the precious from the vile, you shall be as my mouth: they shall return to you, but you shall not return to them.
"Thus says Yahweh of hosts: 'If you will walk in my ways, and if you will keep my charge, then you also shall judge my house, and shall also keep my courts, and I will give you a place of access among these who stand by.
They shall teach my people the difference between the holy and the common, and cause them to discern between the unclean and the clean.
Her priests have done violence to my law, and have profaned my holy things: they have made no distinction between the holy and the common, neither have they caused men to discern between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my Sabbaths, and I am profaned among them.
Then said Yahweh to me, Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind would not be toward this people: cast them out of my sight, and let them go forth.
and that you are to make a distinction between the holy and the common, and between the unclean and the clean;
But solid food is for those who are full grown, who by reason of use have their senses exercised to discern good and evil.
For am I now seeking the favor of men, or of God? Or am I striving to please men? For if I were still pleasing men, I wouldn't be a servant of Christ.
You shall speak to him, and put the words in his mouth. I will be with your mouth, and with his mouth, and will teach you what you shall do. He will be your spokesman to the people; and it will happen, that he will be to you a mouth, and you will be to him as God.
Now therefore go, and I will be with your mouth, and teach you what you shall speak."
Therefore be watchful all the time, asking that you may be counted worthy to escape all these things that will happen, and to stand before the Son of Man."
Therefore we know no one after the flesh from now on. Even though we have known Christ after the flesh, yet now we know him so no more.
for I didn't shrink from declaring to you the whole counsel of God.
for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to withstand or to contradict.
for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that same hour what you must say."
The angel answered him, "I am Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God. I was sent to speak to you, and to bring you this good news.
"Arise, go to Nineveh, that great city, and preach to it the message that I give you."
Moreover he said to me, Son of man, all my words that I shall speak to you receive in your heart, and hear with your ears. Go, get you to them of the captivity, to the children of your people, and speak to them, and tell them, Thus says the Lord Yahweh; whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear.
You shall speak my words to them, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear; for they are most rebellious.
But Jeremiah said, They shall not deliver you. Obey, I beg you, the voice of Yahweh, in that which I speak to you: so it shall be well with you, and your soul shall live. But if you refuse to go forth, this is the word that Yahweh has shown me:
Woe is me, my mother, that you have borne me a man of strife and a man of contention to the whole earth! I have not lent, neither have men lent to me; [yet] everyone of them does curse me. Yahweh said, Most assuredly I will strengthen you for good; most assuredly I will cause the enemy to make supplication to you in the time of evil and in the time of affliction. Can one break iron, even iron from the north, and brass? Your substance and your treasures will I give for a spoil without price, and that for all your sins, even in all your borders. I will make [them] to pass with your enemies into a land which you don't know; for a fire is kindled in my anger, which shall burn on you. Yahweh, you know; remember me, and visit me, and avenge me of my persecutors; don't take me away in your longsuffering: know that for your sake I have suffered reproach. Your words were found, and I ate them; and your words were to me a joy and the rejoicing of my heart: for I am called by your name, Yahweh, God of hosts. I didn't sit in the assembly of those who make merry, nor rejoiced; I sat alone because of your hand; for you have filled me with indignation. Why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable, which refuses to be healed? will you indeed be to me as a deceitful [brook], as waters that fail?
The fool shall be no more called noble, nor the scoundrel be highly respected. For the fool will speak folly, and his heart will work iniquity, to practice profanity, and to utter error against Yahweh, to make empty the soul of the hungry, and to cause the drink of the thirsty to fail.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Jeremiah 15
Commentary on Jeremiah 15 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 15
Jer 15:1-21. God's Reply to Jeremiah's Intercessory Prayer.
1. Moses … Samuel—eminent in intercessions (Ex 32:11, 12; 1Sa 7:9; Ps 99:6).
be toward—could not be favorably inclined toward them.
out of my sight—God speaks as if the people were present before Him, along with Jeremiah.
2. death—deadly plague (Jer 18:21; 43:11; Eze 5:2, 12; Zec 11:9).
3. appoint—(Le 26:16).
kinds—of punishments.
4. cause … to be removed—(De 28:25; Eze 23:46). Rather, "I will give them up to vexation," I will cause them to wander so as nowhere to have repose [Calvin]; (2Ch 29:8, "trouble;" Margin, "commotion").
because of Manasseh—He was now dead, but the effects of his sins still remained. How much evil one bad man can cause! The evil fruits remain even after he himself has received repentance and forgiveness. The people had followed his wicked example ever since; and it is implied that it was only through the long-suffering of God that the penal consequences had been suspended up to the present time (compare 1Ki 14:16; 2Ki 21:11; 23:26; 24:3, 4).
5. go aside … how thou doest—Who will turn aside (in passing by) to salute thee (to wish thee "peace")?
6. weary with repenting—(Ho 13:14; 11:8). I have so often repented of the evil that I threatened (Jer 26:19; Ex 32:14; 1Ch 21:15), and have spared them, without My forbearance moving them to repentance, that I will not again change My purpose (God speaking in condescension to human modes of thought), but will take vengeance on them now.
7. fan—tribulation—from tribulum, a threshing instrument, which separates the chaff from the wheat (Mt 3:12).
gates of the land—that is, the extreme bounds of the land through which the entrance to and exit from it lie. Maurer translates, "I will fan," that is, cast them forth "to the gates of the land" (Na 3:13). "In the gates"; English Version draws the image from a man cleaning corn with a fan; he stands at the gate of the threshing-floor in the open air, to remove the wheat from the chaff by means of the wind; so God threatens to remove Israel out of the bounds of the land [Houbigant].
8. Their widows—My people's (Jer 15:7).
have brought—prophetical past: I will bring.
mother of the young men—"mother" is collective; after the "widows," He naturally mentions bereavement of their sons ("young men"), brought on the "mothers" by "the spoiler"; it was owing to the number of men slain that the "widows" were so many [Calvin]. Others take "mother," as in 2Sa 20:19, of Jerusalem, the metropolis; "I have brought on them, against the 'mother,' a young spoiler," namely, Nebuchadnezzar, sent by his father, Nabopolassar, to repulse the Egyptian invaders (2Ki 23:29; 24:1), and occupy Judea. But Jer 15:7 shows the future, not the past, is referred to; and "widows" being literal, "mother" is probably so, too.
at noonday—the hottest part of the day, when military operations were usually suspended; thus it means unexpectedly, answering to the parallel, "suddenly"; openly, as others explain it, will not suit the parallelism (compare Ps 91:6).
it—English Version seems to understand by "it" the mother city, and by "him" the "spoiler"; thus "it" will be parallel to "city." Rather, "I will cause to fall upon them (the 'mothers' about to be bereft of their sons) suddenly anguish and terrors."
the city—rather, from a root "heat," anguish, or consternation. So the Septuagint.
9. borne seven—(1Sa 2:5). Seven being the perfect number indicates full fruitfulness.
languisheth—because not even one is left of all her sons (Jer 15:8).
sun is gone down while … yet day—Fortune deserts her at the very height of her prosperity (Am 8:9).
she … ashamed—The mothers (she being collective) are put to the shame of disappointed hopes through the loss of all their children.
10. (Jer 20:14; Job 3:1, &c.). Jeremiah seems to have been of a peculiarly sensitive temperament; yet the Holy Spirit enabled him to deliver his message at the certain cost of having his sensitiveness wounded by the enmities of those whom his words offended.
man of strife—exposed to strifes on the part of "the whole earth" (Ps 80:6).
I have neither lent, &c.—proverbial for, "I have given no cause for strife against me."
11. Verily—literally, "Shall it not be?" that is, "Surely it shall be."
thy remnant—the final issue of thy life; thy life, which now seems to thee so sad, shall eventuate in prosperity [Calvin]. They who think that they shall be the surviving remnant, whereas thou shalt perish, shall themselves fall, whereas thou shalt remain and be favored by the conquerors [Junius], (Jer 40:4, 5; 39:11, 12). The Keri reads, "I will set thee free (or as Maurer, 'I will establish thee') for good" (Jer 14:11; Ezr 8:22; Ps 119:122).
to entreat thee well—literally, "to meet thee"; so "to be placable, nay, of their own accord to anticipate in meeting thee with kindness" [Calvin]. I prefer this translation as according with the event (Jer 39:11, 12; 40:4, 5). Gesenius, from Jer 7:16; 27:18; Job 21:15, translates (not only will I relieve thee from the enemy's vexations, but) "I will make thine enemy (that now vexeth thee) apply to thee with prayers" (Jer 38:14; 42:2-6).
12. steel—rather, brass or copper, which mixed with "iron" (by the Chalybes near the Euxine Pontus, far north of Palestine), formed the hardest metal, like our steel. Can the Jews, hardy like common iron though they be, break the still hardier Chaldees of the north (Jer 1:14), who resemble the Chalybian iron hardened with copper? Certainly not [Calvin]. Henderson translates. "Can one break iron, (even) the northern iron, and brass," on the ground that English Version makes ordinary iron not so hard as brass. But it is not brass, but a particular mixture of iron and brass, which is represented as harder than common iron, which was probably then of inferior texture, owing to ignorance of modern modes of preparation.
13. Thy substance … sins—Judea's, not Jeremiah's.
without price—God casts His people away as a thing worth naught (Ps 44:12). So, on the contrary, Jehovah, when about to restore His people, says, He will give Egypt, &c., for their "ransom" (Isa 43:3).
even in all thy borders—joined with "Thy substance … treasures, as also with "all thy sins," their sin and punishment being commensurate (Jer 17:3).
14. thee—Maurer supplies "them," namely, "thy treasures." Eichorn, needlessly, from Syriac and the Septuagint, reads, "I will make thee to serve thine enemies"; a reading doubtless interpolated from Jer 17:4.
fire—(De 32:22).
15. thou knowest—namely, my case; what wrongs my adversaries have done me (Jer 12:3).
revenge me—(See on Jer 11:20). The prophet in this had regard to, not his own personal feelings of revenge, but the cause of God; he speaks by inspiration God's will against the ungodly. Contrast in this the law with the gospel (Lu 23:34; Ac 7:60).
take me not away in thy long-suffering—By Thy long-suffering towards them, suffer them not meanwhile to take away my life.
for thy sake I have suffered rebuke—the very words of the antitype, Jesus Christ (Ps 69:7, 22-28), which last compare with Jeremiah's prayer in the beginning of this verse.
16. eat—(Eze 2:8; 3:1, 3; Re 10:9, 10). As soon as Thy words were found by me, I eagerly laid hold of and appropriated them. The Keri reads, "Thy word."
thy word … joy—(Job 23:12; Ps 119:72, 111; compare Mt 13:44).
called by thy name—I am Thine, Thy minister. So the antitype, Jesus Christ (Ex 23:21).
17. My "rejoicing" (Jer 15:16) was not that of the profane mockers (Ps 1:1; 26:4, 5) at feasts. So far from having fellowship with these, he was expelled from society, and made to sit "alone," because of his faithful prophecies.
because of thy hand—that is, Thine inspiration (Isa 8:11; Eze 1:3; 3:14).
filled me with indignation—So Jer 6:11, "full of the fury of the Lord"; so full was he of the subject (God's "indignation" against the ungodly) with which God had inspired him, as not to be able to contain himself from expressing it. The same comparison by contrast between the effect of inspiration, and that of wine, both taking a man out of himself, occurs (Ac 2:13, 15, 18).
18. (Jer 30:15). "Pain," namely, the perpetual persecution to which he was exposed, and his being left by God without consolation and "alone." Contrast his feeling here with that in Jer 15:16, when he enjoyed the full presence of God, and was inspired by His words. Therefore he utters words of his natural "infirmity" (so David, Ps 77:10) here; as before he spoke under the higher spiritual nature given him.
as a liar, and as—rather, "as a deceiving (river) … waters that are not sure (lasting)"; opposed to "living (perennial) waters" (Job 6:15). Streams that the thirsty traveller had calculated on being full in winter, but which disappoint him in his sorest need, having run dry in the heat of summer. Jehovah had promised Jeremiah protection from his enemies (Jer 1:18, 19); his infirmity suggests that God had failed to do so.
19. God's reply to Jeremiah.
return … bring … again—Jeremiah, by his impatient language, had left his proper posture towards God; God saith, "If thou wilt return (to thy former patient discharge of thy prophetic function) I will bring thee back" to thy former position: in the Hebrew there is a play of words, "return … turn again" (Jer 8:4; 4:1).
stand before me—minister acceptably to Me (De 10:8; 1Ki 17:1; 18:15).
take … precious from … vile—image from metals: "If thou wilt separate what is precious in thee (the divine graces imparted) from what is vile (thy natural corruptions, impatience, and hasty words), thou shall be as My mouth": my mouthpiece (Ex 4:16).
return not thou unto them—Let not them lead you into their profane ways (as Jeremiah had spoken irreverently, Jer 15:18), but lead thou them to the ways of godliness (Jer 15:16, 17). Eze 22:26 accords with the other interpretation, which, however, does not so well suit the context, "If thou wilt separate from the promiscuous mass the better ones, and lead them to conversion by faithful warnings," &c.
20, 21. The promise of Jer 1:18, 19, in almost the same words, but with the addition, adapted to the present attacks of Jeremiah's formidable enemies, "I will deliver thee out of … wicked … redeem … terrible"; the repetition is in order to assure Jeremiah that God is the same now as when He first made the promise, in opposition to the prophet's irreverent accusation of unfaithfulness (Jer 15:18).