8
📚“At that time”, says the LORD, “they will bring the bones of the kings of Judah, and the bones of its princes, and the bones of the priests, and the bones of the prophets, and the bones of the inhabitants of Jerusalem, out of their graves, 8:1 The contempt which they deserve will be shown even to their bones.⚜
2 📚and they will spread them out before the sun and the moon and all the starry host of heaven, which they have loved, and which they have served, and which they have followed, and which they have sought, and which they have worshipped. They will not be gathered, or buried. They will be like refuse on the surface of the earth.
8:2 They committed the senseless and terrible sin of worshiping and serving creation rather than the Creator (2 Kings 23:5; Jer 19:13; Acts 7:42; Rom 1:25).⚜
3 📚And death will be chosen rather than life by the remnant, all those who remain of this evil family, who remain in all the places where I have driven them, says the LORD of hosts.
8:3 Compare Rev 9:6.⚜
4 📚“Moreover you shall say to them, ‘Thus says the LORD:
Will they fall and not rise?
Will he turn away, and not return?
5 📚Why then has this people
of Jerusalem slidden back in a
perpetual backsliding?
They hold firmly to deceit 📖;
they refuse to return.
6 📚I listened and heard,
but they did not speak rightly.
No man repented of his wickedness,
saying, “What have I done?”
Everyone turned to his own course,
like a horse rushing into the battle.
7 📚Yes, the stork in the sky knows
its appointed times,
and the turtledove and the crane and
the swallow observe the time
of their coming.
But my people do not know the judgment
of the LORD.
8:7 Jer 4:22; Deut 32:28; Isa 1:2-3; 5:13; 27:11. Their ignorance was willful and therefore blameworthy. God holds us responsible for not knowing the truth if we could know it and will not bother to do so.⚜
8 📚“‘How do you say,
“We are wise, and the law
of the LORD is with us?”
See, the lying pen of the scribes
has made it into a lie.
8:8 Their religious teachers misinterpreted the law of God to the people. Compare Matt 15:3-9. Many Jewish commentators on the law, instead of making it clear, twisted and perverted its meaning.⚜
9 📚The wise men are put to shame,
they are dismayed and caught.
See, they have rejected the word
of the LORD, so what wisdom
is in them?
8:9 There is no true wisdom in those who disobey God’s Word. This includes educators, scientists, philosophers, writers and anyone else who ignores the Bible. Men can have much knowledge of various things without having wisdom. Notes on wisdom at Job 28:28; Ps 111:10; Prov 1:7; 1 Cor 1:20-21; 2:6-7; Col 2:3.⚜
10 📚Therefore I will give their wives
to others, and their fields
to those who will inherit them,
for everyone from the least
to the greatest is greedy for gain,
from the prophet to the priest
everyone deals falsely.
11 📚For they have lightly healed
the hurt of the daughter of my people,
saying, “Peace, peace”,
when there is no peace.
12 📚Were they ashamed when they had
committed abomination?
No, they were not at all ashamed,
and they could not blush.
Therefore they will fall among those who fall.
In the time of their punishment
they will be thrown down,
says the LORD.
13 📚I will surely consume them,
says the LORD.
There will be no grapes
on the vine,
no figs on the fig tree,
and the leaf will fade;
and the things that I have given
them will pass away from them.’ ”
8:13 What God gives He can justly take away. The meaning of the Hebrew for the last sentence of this verse is unclear.⚜
14 📚Why do we sit still? Come together,
and let us enter the fortified cities,
and let us be silent there;
for the LORD our God has put us
to silence,
and given us bitter water to drink,
because we have sinned against
the LORD.
8:14 Even if the people did not yet know the reason for their punishment Jeremiah did.⚜
15 📚We looked for peace,
but no good came, and
for a time of health, and see trouble!
16 📚The snorting of his horses was heard
from Dan.
The whole land trembled at the sound
of the neighing of his strong ones;
for they have come and devoured
the land,
and all that is in it, the city,
and those who dwell in it.
8:14-16 Looks forward to the invasion of the land by the Babylonians. Jeremiah speaks for the people.⚜
17 📚“For, see, I will send serpents
among you,
8:17 The Lord says He will do again what He had once done in their history (Num 21:6. See Deut 32:24).⚜
vipers which will not be
charmed, and they will bite you”,
says the LORD.
Jeremiah’s sorrow
18 📚When I would comfort
myself in sorrow,
my heart is faint in me.
8:18 Jeremiah cries to the Lord when he thinks of the coming destruction.⚜
19 📚Mark the voice of the cry of the daughter
of my people because of those
who dwell in a far country:
“Is the LORD not in Zion?
Is her king not in her?”
“Why have they provoked me to anger
with their carved images,
and with foreign idols?”
8:19 In the first part of the verse Jeremiah speaks of the people of Judah as though they were already in exile in Babylon. In the second part the Lord speaks and again gives one of the reasons why He punished His people. Notes on God’s anger at Num 25:3; Ps 90:7-11.⚜
20 📚The harvest is past,
the summer has ended,
and we are not saved.
8:20 The people in exile speak of their despair.⚜
21 📚Because of the wound of the daughter
of my people I am wounded;
I mourn 📖; horror has seized me.
22 📚Is there no balm in Gilead?
Is there no physician there?
Why then has the health of the daughter
of my people not recovered?
8:21-22 Jer 4:19-20; Lam 2:11. He speaks again and reveals the agony of his heart for his nation. He completely identified with the people even though they rejected and persecuted him and tried to kill him. Compare Luke 19:41-44; Rom 9:1-3; Ex 32:32; Dan 9:5.⚜