39 therefore, behold, I will utterly forget you, and I will cast you off, and the city that I gave to you and to your fathers, away from my presence:
When this people, or the prophet, or a priest, shall ask you, saying, What is the burden of Yahweh? then shall you tell them, What burden! I will cast you off, says Yahweh.
Therefore will I also deal in wrath; my eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though they cry in my ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them.
who will pay the penalty: eternal destruction from the face of the Lord and from the glory of his might,
Then he will say also to those on the left hand, 'Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels;
Though they bring up their children, Yet I will bereave them, so that not a man shall be left. Indeed, woe also to them when I depart from them! Ephraim, like I have seen Tyre, is planted in a pleasant place; But Ephraim will bring out his children to the killer. Give them--Yahweh what will you give? Give them a miscarrying womb and dry breasts. "All their wickedness is in Gilgal; For there I hated them. Because of the wickedness of their deeds I will drive them out of my house! I will love them no more. All their princes are rebels. Ephraim is struck. Their root has dried up. They will bear no fruit. Even though they bring forth, yet I will kill the beloved ones of their womb." My God will cast them away, because they did not listen to him; And they will be wanderers among the nations.
For I will be to Ephraim like a lion, And like a young lion to the house of Judah. I myself will tear in pieces and go away. I will carry off, and there will be no one to deliver.
My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you, That you may be no priest to me. Because you have your God's law, I will also forget your children.
For thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I myself, even I, will search for my sheep, and will seek them out.
kill utterly the old man, the young man and the virgin, and little children and women; but don't come near any man on whom is the mark: and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the old men that were before the house.
therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: Behold, I, even I, am against you; and I will execute judgments in the midst of you in the sight of the nations.
I, even, I do bring the flood of waters on this earth, to destroy all flesh having the breath of life from under the sky. Everything that is in the earth will die.
I will punish him and his seed and his servants for their iniquity; and I will bring on them, and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, and on the men of Judah, all the evil that I have pronounced against them, but they didn't listen.
therefore thus says Yahweh, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: Behold, I will bring on Judah and on all the inhabitants of Jerusalem all the evil that I have pronounced against them; because I have spoken to them, but they have not heard; and I have called to them, but they have not answered.
Therefore thus says Yahweh: Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the Chaldeans, and into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and he shall take it: and the Chaldeans, who fight against this city, shall come and set this city on fire, and burn it, with the houses, on whose roofs they have offered incense to Baal, and poured out drink-offerings to other gods, to provoke me to anger. For the children of Israel and the children of Judah have done only that which was evil in my sight from their youth; for the children of Israel have only provoked me to anger with the work of their hands, says Yahweh. For this city has been to me a provocation of my anger and of my wrath from the day that they built it even to this day; that I should remove it from before my face, because of all the evil of the children of Israel and of the children of Judah, which they have done to provoke me to anger, they, their kings, their princes, their priests, and their prophets, and the men of Judah, and the inhabitants of Jerusalem. They have turned to me the back, and not the face: and though I taught them, rising up early and teaching them, yet they have not listened to receive instruction. But they set their abominations in the house which is called by my name, to defile it. They built the high places of Baal, which are in the valley of the son of Hinnom, to cause their sons and their daughters to pass through [the fire] to Molech; which I didn't command them, neither did it come into my mind, that they should do this abomination, to cause Judah to sin.
I will cast you out of my sight, as I have cast out all your brothers, even the whole seed of Ephraim.
I, even I, am he who comforts you: who are you, that you are afraid of man who shall die, and of the son of man who shall be made as grass;
Whoever despises instruction will pay for it, But he who respects a command will be rewarded.
Don't throw me from your presence, And don't take your holy Spirit from me.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Jeremiah 23
Commentary on Jeremiah 23 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 23
In this chapter the prophet, in God's name, is dealing his reproofs and threatenings,
When all have thus corrupted their way they must all expect to be told faithfully of it.
Jer 23:1-8
Jer 23:9-32
Here is a long lesson for the false prophets. As none were more bitter and spiteful against God's true prophets than they, so there were none on whom the true prophets were more severe, and justly. The prophet had complained to God of those false prophets (ch. 14:13), and had often foretold that they should be involved in the common ruin; but here they have woes of their own.
Jer 23:33-40
The profaneness of the people, with that of the priests and prophets, is here reproved in a particular instance, which may seem of small moment in comparison of their greater crimes; but profaneness in common discourse, and the debauching of the language of a nation, being a notorious evidence of the prevalency of wickedness in it, we are not to think it strange that this matter was so largely and warmly insisted upon here. Observe,