Then Yahweh asked me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I said, “Figs. The good figs are very good, and the bad are very bad, so bad that can’t be eaten.”
Parallel Translations
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Then Yahweh asked me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I said, “Figs. The good figs are very good, and the bad are very bad, so bad that can’t be eaten.”
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Then said the LORD unto me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs, very good; and the evil, very evil, that cannot be eaten, they are so evil.
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Then said the LORD unto me: 'What seest thou, Jeremiah?' And I said: 'Figs; the good figs, very good; and the bad, very bad, that cannot be eaten, they are so bad.'
Cross-references (7)
Passages linked to Jeremiah 24:3 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Amos 8:2 He said, “Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A basket of summer fruit.” Then Yahweh said to me, “The end has come on my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more.
- Jeremiah 1:11-14 Moreover Yahweh’s word came to me, saying, “Jeremiah, what do you see?” I said, “I see a branch of an almond tree.” Then Yahweh said to me, “You have seen well; for I watch over my word to perform it.” Yahweh’s word came to me the second time, saying, “What do you see?” I said, “I see a boiling cauldron; and it is tipping away from the north.” Then Yahweh said to me, “Out of the north, evil will break out on all the inhabitants of the land.
- Zechariah 4:2 He said to me, “What do you see?” I said, “I have seen, and behold, a lamp stand all of gold, with its bowl on the top of it, and its seven lamps on it; there are seven pipes to each of the lamps, which are on the top of it;
- Zechariah 5:5-11 Then the angel who talked with me came forward, and said to me, “Lift up now your eyes, and see what this is that is appearing.” I said, “What is it?” He said, “This is the ephah basket that is appearing.” He said moreover, “This is their appearance in all the land (and behold, a talent of lead was lifted up); and this is a woman sitting in the middle of the ephah basket.” He said, “This is Wickedness;” and he threw her down into the middle of the ephah basket; and he threw the weight of lead on its mouth. Then I lifted up my eyes and saw, and behold, there were two women, and the wind was in their wings. Now they had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the ephah basket between earth and the sky. Then I said to the angel who talked with me, “Where are these carrying the ephah basket?” He said to me, “To build her a house in the land of Shinar. When it is prepared, she will be set there in her own place.”
- Matthew 25:32-33 Before him all the nations will be gathered, and he will separate them one from another, as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.
- 1 Samuel 9:9 (In earlier times in Israel, when a man went to inquire of God, he said, “Come! Let’s go to the seer;” for he who is now called a prophet was before called a seer.)
- Amos 7:8 Yahweh said to me, “Amos, what do you see?” I said, “A plumb line.” Then the Lord said, “Behold, I will set a plumb line in the middle of my people Israel. I will not again pass by them any more.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain In the last Lecture we began to explain the…
In the last Lecture we began to explain the meaning of the vision which the Prophet relates. We said that the miserable exiles whose condition might have appeared to be the worst, are yet compared to good figs, and that those who still remained in the country are compared to bad and bitter figs. We have explained why God shewed this vision to his servant Jeremiah, even because the captives might have otherwise been driven to despair, especially through the weariness of delay, for they saw that their brethren were still in possession of the inheritance granted them by God, while they were driven into a far country, and as it were disinherited, so that no one could regard them as God’s people. As then despair might have overwhelmed their minds, God designed to give them some comfort. On the other hand, those who remained in the land not only exulted over the miserable exiles, but also abused the forbearance of God, so that they obstinately resisted all threatenings, and thus hardened themselves more and more against God’s judgment, hence God declares what was remotest from what was commonly thought, that they had a better lot who lived captives in Babylon than those who remained quietly as it were in their own nest.
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Jer 24:3 Then said the LORD unto me, What…
Jer 24:3 Then said the LORD unto me, What seest thou, Jeremiah? And I said, Figs; the good figs, very good; and the evil, very evil, that cannot be eaten, they are so evil.
Ver. 3. What seest thou, Jeremiah?] See on Jer 1:11.
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The good figs, very good.] See on Jer 24:2.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain God having caused the prophet to have such a…
God having caused the prophet to have such a visible object appear to him, asked him what he saw as Jer 1:11.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Then said the Lord unto me, what seest thou,…
Then said the Lord unto me, what seest thou, Jeremiah?.... This question is put, in order that, upon his answer to it, he might have an explication of the vision:
and I said, figs; the good figs, very good; and the evil, very evil,
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that cannot be eaten, they are so evil; or "so bad", or "because of badness" (b); which may be applied to mankind in general; who may be distinguished into good and bad: those that are good, who are made so by the grace of God; for none are so by nature, or of themselves; they are very good: they have many good things in them; they have a good heart, a new and a clean heart, and a right spirit created in them; they have a good understanding of spiritual things; they have a good will to that which is good, and good affections for God and Christ, and divine things; they have the good Spirit of God and his graces in them, and Christ and his word dwelling in them: and they do good things, and are prepared for every good work; they are good to others; pleasantly and acceptably good to God through Christ; and profitably good to their fellow saints and fellow creatures. On the other hand, those that are bad are exceeding bad; as they are by nature children of wrath, unclean, corrupt, loathsome, and abominable in the sight of God; so they are from their youth upward, and continue so, and are never otherwise; all in them, and that comes from them, are evil; their hearts are desperately wicked, the thoughts and imaginations of their hearts are evil continually; their words are idle, corrupt, and filthy, and all their actions sinful; there is no good in them, nor any done by them; they are good for nothing; they are of no use to God, to themselves, or others; sin has made them like itself, exceeding sinful: and now between these two sorts there is no medium; though all sins are not alike; and some in a comparative sense may be called greater or lesser sinners; yet all are exceeding bad, even the least: they are all of the same nature, and have the same wicked hearts; though some may be outwardly righteous before men; and hypocrites and formal professors are worst of all. There never were but two sorts of persons in the world; the seed of the woman, and the seed of the serpent; the children of God, and the children of the devil; and so things will appear hereafter at the great day; the one will be placed at Christ's right hand as good and righteous men, the other at his left hand as wicked, and will have separate states to all eternity: and so those figs are explained in the Talmud (c); the good figs, they are the perfect righteous; the bad figs, they are the perfect wicked.
(b) "prae pravitate", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator, Cocceius; "prae malitia", Schmidt. (c) T. Bab. Erubim, fol. 21. 2.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (3) What seest thou, Jeremiah?—The question is asked as…
(3) What seest thou, Jeremiah?—The question is asked as if to force the symbol as strongly as possible on the prophet’s mind, leaving him to wait till another word of the Lord should come and reveal its true interpretation. We are reminded, as he must have been, of the vision and the question which had first called him to his work as a prophet (Jer_1:11).
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.