10 For the mountains will I take up a weeping and wailing, and for the pastures of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none passes through; neither can men hear the voice of the cattle; both the birds of the sky and the animals are fled, they are gone.
How long shall the land mourn, and the herbs of the whole country wither? for the wickedness of those who dwell therein, the animals are consumed, and the birds; because they said, He shall not see our latter end.
Therefore the land will mourn, And everyone who dwells therein will waste away. All living things in her, Even the animals of the field and the birds of the sky; Yes, the fish of the sea also die.
No foot of man shall pass through it, nor foot of animal shall pass through it, neither shall it be inhabited forty years.
If I cause evil animals to pass through the land, and they ravage it, and it be made desolate, so that no man may pass through because of the animals;
Cut off your hair, [Jerusalem], and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on the bare heights; for Yahweh has rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.
My eyes do fail with tears, my heart is troubled; My liver is poured on the earth, because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, Because the young children and the infants swoon in the streets of the city.
The field is laid waste. The land mourns, for the grain is destroyed, The new wine has dried up, And the oil languishes. Be confounded, you farmers! Wail, you vineyard keepers; For the wheat and for the barley; For the harvest of the field has perished. The vine has dried up, and the fig tree withered; the pomegranate tree, the palm tree also, and the apple tree, Even all of the trees of the field are withered; For joy has withered away from the sons of men.
For, as for your waste and your desolate places, and your land that has been destroyed, surely now shall you be too small for the inhabitants, and those who swallowed you up shall be far away.
For these things I weep; my eye, my eye runs down with water; Because the comforter who should refresh my soul is far from me: My children are desolate, because the enemy has prevailed.
The wild donkeys stand on the bare heights, they pant for air like jackals; their eyes fail, because there is no herbage.
Give glory to Yahweh your God, before he cause darkness, and before your feet stumble on the dark mountains, and, while you look for light, he turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness. But if you will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret for [your] pride; and my eye shall weep sore, and run down with tears, because Yahweh's flock is taken captive.
My anguish, my anguish! I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I can't hold my peace; because you have heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction on destruction is cried; for the whole land is laid waste: suddenly are my tents destroyed, [and] my curtains in a moment. How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet? For my people are foolish, they don't know me; they are foolish children, and they have no understanding; they are wise to do evil, but to do good they have no knowledge. I saw the earth, and, behold, it was waste and void; and the heavens, and they had no light. I saw the mountains, and, behold, they trembled, and all the hills moved back and forth. I saw, and, behold, there was no man, and all the birds of the sky were fled. I saw, and, behold, the fruitful field was a wilderness, and all the cities of it were broken down at the presence of Yahweh, [and] before his fierce anger.
Neither said they, Where is Yahweh who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought and of the shadow of death, through a land that none passed through, and where no man lived?
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Jeremiah 9
Commentary on Jeremiah 9 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 9
In this chapter the prophet goes on faithfully to reprove sin and to threaten God's judgments for it, and yet bitterly to lament both, as one that neither rejoiced at iniquity nor was glad at calamities.
Jer 9:1-11
The prophet, being commissioned both to foretel the destruction coming upon Judah and Jerusalem and to point out the sin for which that destruction was brought upon them, here, as elsewhere, speaks of both very feelingly: what he said of both came from the heart, and therefore one would have thought it would reach to the heart.
Jer 9:12-22
Two things the prophet designs, in these verses, with reference to the approaching destruction of Judah and Jerusalem:-
Jer 9:23-26
The prophet had been endeavouring to possess this people with a holy fear of God and his judgments, to convince them both of sin and wrath; but still they had recourse to some sorry subterfuge or other, under which to shelter themselves from the conviction and with which to excuse themselves in the obstinacy and carelessness. He therefore sets himself here to drive them from these refuges of lies and to show them the insufficiency of them.