Jeremiah 3:4-7 sits inside this longer paragraph.
2“Lift up your eyes to the bare heights, and see! Where have you not been lain with? You have sat waiting for them by the road, as an Arabian in the wilderness. You have polluted the land with your prostitution and with your wickedness. 3Therefore the showers have been withheld and there has been no latter rain; yet you have had a prostitute’s forehead and you refused to be ashamed. 4Will you not from this time cry to me, ‘My Father, you are the guide of my youth?’
5“ ‘Will he retain his anger forever? Will he keep it to the end?’ Behold, you have spoken and have done evil things, and have had your way.”
6Moreover, Yahweh said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen that which backsliding Israel has done? She has gone up on every high mountain and under every green tree, and has played the prostitute there. 7I said after she had done all these things, ‘She will return to me;’ but she didn’t return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it. 8I saw when, for this very cause, that backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away and given her a certificate of divorce, yet treacherous Judah, her sister, had no fear; but she also went and played the prostitute. 9Because she took her prostitution lightly, the land was polluted, and she committed adultery with stones and with wood. 10Yet for all this her treacherous sister, Judah, has not returned to me with her whole heart, but only in pretense,” says Yahweh.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv4–7 God, after having set forth the wickedness of his…
God, after having set forth the wickedness of his people, and severely reproved them as they deserved, now kindly invites them to repentance, Wilt thou not say to me hereafter, he says, My Father! Some incorrectly render the words, “Wilt thou say to me, My Father,” as though God would reject what they said: and they give the meaning, — that the Jews would act dishonestly in thus glorying in God’s name, from whom they were so alienated. But very different is the meaning of the Prophet: for God mitigates the severity of the reproof which we have observed, and shews that he would be ready to be reconciled to them, if they repented: nay, he waits not for their repentance, but of his own accord meets and allures these perfidious apostates: “What!” says God, “shall there be no more any union between us?” For God expresses here the feeling of one grieving and lamenting, when he saw the people perishing; and he seems anxious, if possible, to restore them.
It is with this design that he asks, “Will they not again call on me as their Father and the guide of their youth?” And by this periphrastic way of speaking, he intimates that he was the husband of that people; for most tender is that love which a youth has for a young virgin in the flower of her age. God, then, makes use now of this comparison, and says, that he still remembered the love which he had manifested towards his people. In short, he shews here that pardon was ready, if the people sought reconciliation; and he confirms the same thing when he adds —
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.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv4, 6 He showeth that the wicked in their miseries will…
He showeth that the wicked in their miseries will cry unto God and use outward prayer as the godly do, but because they turn not from their evil, they are not heard, Isa. 58:3, 4.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv4–7 Jer 3:4 Wilt thou not from this time cry…
Jer 3:4 Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me, My father, thou [art] the guide of my youth?
Ver. 4. Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me?] And is not this extreme impudence? Hast thou a face thus to collogue? Hypocritis nihil impudentius; hypocrites are impudent flatterers; they would, if they could, cheat God of his heaven.
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Thou art the guide of my youth,] i.e., My dear husband. {Pro 2:17} Fair words are light cheap, and may make fools fain; but God is not to be so courted and complimented.
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 On vv4–7 Wilt thou not from this time, viz. that I…
Wilt thou not from this time, viz. that I have withholden showers? Some refer this,
1. To the time to come; Wilt thou not yet be wise, and for the future seek to me, having found all thy other ways successless? Isa 9:13; Jer 8:14.
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2. To the time present; How canst thou challenge me for my present severity, and continuing it towards thee, when thou still retainest thy filthiness, thy whore’s forehead, Jer 3:3. Thou still continuest worshipping idols, and yet fanciest thyself faithful to me.
3. To the time past, i.e. Hast thou not all along pretended kindness to me, and as if thou hadst walked close with me? 2Ki 17:32,33; Eze 23:39.
Cry unto me, My father; wilt thou not as a child call upon, me, whom thou hast thus greatly provoked, and own me as a father? Jer 3:19; for such have I been to thee, Psa 103:13; Mal 1:6; 3:17.
The guide of my youth; either on whom I have depended, as being brought up by thee; or the submissive expression of a wife seeking to be reconciled to her husband, that God would be to her as he had been in the days of her youth; such a case as is expressed 1Co 7:11; words of flattery usual with hypocrites: or rather, being married to thee in thy youth; a periphrasis for husband, Pro 2:17; which argues great tenderness towards her, Jer 3:2. Thus the tenderness of this relation is expressed Mal 2:14, and so God is said to espouse them to himself Eze 16:8.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On v6 The date of this sermon must be observed, in…
The date of this sermon must be observed, in order to the right understanding of it; it was in the days of Josiah, who set on foot a blessed work of reformation, in which he was hearty, but the people were not sincere in their compliance with it; to reprove them for that, and warn them of the consequences of their hypocrisy, is the scope of that which God here said to the prophet, and which he delivered to them. The case of the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah is here compared, the ten tribes that revolted from the throne of David and the temple of Jerusalem and the two tribes that adhered to both. The distinct history of those two kingdoms we have in the two books of the Kings, and here we have an abstract of both, as far as relates to this matter.
I. Here is a short account of Israel, the ten tribes. Perhaps the prophet had been just reading the history of that kingdom when God came to him, and said, Hast thou seen what backsliding Israel has done? Jer 3:6. For he could not see it otherwise than in history, they having been carried into captivity long before he was born. But what we read in the histories of scripture should instruct us and affect us, as if we ourselves had been eye-witnesses of it. She is called backsliding Israel because that kingdom was first founded in an apostasy from the divine institutions, both in church and state. Now he had seen concerning them, 1. That they were wretchedly addicted to idolatry. They had played the harlot upon every high mountain and under every green tree (Jer 3:6), that is, they had worshipped other gods in their high places and groves; and no marvel, when from the first they had worshipped God by the images of the golden calves at Dan and Bethel. The way of idolatry is down-hill: those that are in love with images, and will have them, soon become in love with other gods, and will have them too; for how should those stick at the breach of the first commandment who make no conscience of the second? 2. That God by his prophets had invited and encouraged them to repent and reform (Jer 3:7): "After she had done all these things, for which she might justly have been abandoned, yet I said unto her, Turn thou unto me and I will receive thee." Though they had forsaken both the house of David and the house of Aaron, who both had their authority jure divino - from God, without dispute, yet God sent his prophets among them, to call them to return to him, to the worship of him only, not insisting so much as one would have expected upon their return to the house of David, but pressing their return to the house of Aaron. We read not that Elijah, that great reformer, ever mentioned their return to the house of David, while he was anxious for their return to the faithful service of the true God according as they had it among them. It is serious piety that God stands upon more than even his own rituals. 3. That, notwithstanding this, they had persisted in their idolatries: But she returned not, and God saw it; he took notice of it, and was much displeased with it, Jer 3:7, Jer 3:8. Note, God keeps account, whether we do or no, how often he has called to us to turn to him and we have refused. 4. That he had therefore cast them off, and given them up into the hands of their enemies (Jer 3:8): When I saw (so it may be read) that for all the actions wherein she had committed adultery I must dismiss her, I gave her a bill of divorce. God divorced them when he threw them out of his protection and left them an easy prey to any that would lay hands on them, when he scattered all their synagogues and the schools of the prophets and excluded them from laying any further claim to the covenant made with their fathers. Note, Those will justly be divorced from God that join themselves to such as are rivals with him. For proof of this go and see what God did to Israel.
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II. Let us now see what was the case of Judah, the kingdom of the two tribes. She is called treacherous sister Judah, a sister because descended from the same common stock, Abraham and Jacob; but, as Israel had the character of a backslider, So Judah is called treacherous, because, though she professed to keep close to God when Israel had backslidden (she adhered to the kings and priests that were of God's own appointing, and did not withdraw from her allegiance, so that it was expected she should deal faithfully), yet she proved treacherous, and false, and unfaithful to her professions and promises. Note, The treachery of those who pretend to cleave to God will be reckoned for, as well as the apostasy of those who openly revolt from him. Judah saw what Israel did, and what came of it, and should have taken warning. Israel's captivity was intended for Judah's admonition; but it had not the designed effect. Judah feared not, but thought herself safe because she had Levites to be her priests and sons of David to be her kings. Note, It is an evidence of great stupidity and security when we are not awakened to a holy fear by the judgments of God upon others. It is here charged on Judah, 1. That when they had a wicked king that debauched them they heartily concurred with him in his debaucheries. Judah was forward enough to play the harlot, to worship any idol that was introduced among them and to join in any idolatrous usage; so that through the lightness (or, as some read it, the vileness and baseness) of her whoredom, or (as the margin reads it) by the fame and report of her whoredom, her notorious whoredom, for which she had become infamous, she defiled the land, and made it an abomination to God; for she committed adultery with stones and stocks, with the basest idols, those made of wood and stone. In the reigns of Manasseh and Amon, when they were disposed to idolatry, the people were so too, and all the country was corrupted with it, and none feared the ruin which Israel by this means had brought upon themselves. 2. That when they had a good king, that reformed them, they did not heartily concur with him in the reformation. This was the present case. God tried whether they would be good in a good reign, but the evil disposition was still the same: They returned not to me with their whole heart, but feignedly, Jer 3:10. Josiah went further in destroying idolatry than the best of his predecessors had done, and for his own part he turned to the Lord with all his heart and with all his soul; so it is said of him, Kg2 23:25. The people were forced to an external compliance with him, and joined with him in keeping a very solemn passover and in renewing their covenants with God (Ch2 34:32, Ch2 35:17); but they were not sincere in it, nor were their hearts right with God. For this reason God at that very time said, I will remove Judah out of my sight, as I removed Israel (Kg2 23:27), because Judah was not removed from their sin by the sight of Israel's removal from their land. Hypocritical and ineffectual reformations bode ill to a people. We deceive ourselves if we think to deceive God by a feigned return to him. I know no religion without sincerity.
III. The case of these sister kingdoms is compared, and judgment given upon the comparison, that of the two Judah was the worse (Jer 3:11): Israel has justified herself more than Judah, that is, she is not so bad as Judah is. This comparative justification will stand Israel in little stead; what will it avail us to say, We are not so bad as others, when yet we are not really good ourselves? But it will serve as an aggravation of the sin of Judah, which was in two respects worse than that of Israel: - 1. More was expected from Judah than from Israel; so that Judah dealt treacherously, they vilified a more sacred profession, and falsified a more solemn promise, than Israel did. 2. Judah might have taken warning by the ruin of Israel for their idolatry, and would not. God's judgments upon others, if they be not means of our reformation, will help to aggravate our destruction. The prophet Ezekiel (Eze 23:11) makes the same comparison between Jerusalem and Samaria that this prophet here makes between Judah and Israel, nay, and (Eze 16:48) between Jerusalem and Sodom, and Jerusalem is made the worst of the three.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv4–7 Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me,....…
Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me,.... These words are either a confirmation and proof of that impudence with which these people are charged; for had they not been impudent, or had not a forehead like a whorish woman; or were they truly ashamed, they would have cried to the Lord henceforward; called upon him; claimed their relation to him; and owned his favours in time past: or, if they had not been impudent, they would not have dared from this time to have called God their Father and their guide, when they had so wickedly sinned against him; so that this is a charge of hypocrisy and deceit, calling God their Father and guide, when they were at the same time worshipping idols: or rather they are expressive of the wondrous grace and goodness of God towards this people, that had so highly offended him, yet he expostulates with them, puts words into their mouths to return unto him with, saying:
my father; I have sinned against thee, and am not worthy of the relation, yet receive me as a returning prodigal:
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thou art the guide of my youth; or, "hast been": I acknowledge the favours I have received in time past, which is an aggravation of my sin; reject me not, but receive me graciously into thy favour; see Hos 14:2, so the Targum interprets the words as a prayer,
"wilt thou not from this time pray before me, saying, thou art my Lord, my Redeemer, which art of old?''
or else they point to them their duty, what they ought to do from henceforward; that seeing the Lord had withheld from them the former and latter rain for their idolatry, it became them to return to him by repentance; and to call upon him, who had been their Father and their guide in time past, to have mercy on them, and avert his judgments from them.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv4–6 My father - Wilt thou not as a child…
My father - Wilt thou not as a child call upon me, whom thou hast thus greatly provoked. The guide - I have been brought up by thee.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv4–7 Verse 4. Wilt thou not - cry unto me,…
Verse 4. Wilt thou not - cry unto me, My father] Wilt thou not allow me to be thy Creator and Preserver, and cease thus to acknowledge idols? See on Jer 2:27.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv4, 6, 7 Jer 3:4-5. Wilt thou not from this time —…
Jer 3:4-5. Wilt thou not from this time — Namely, that I have withholden showers, this time of conviction and correction; now that thou hast been made to see thy sins, and to smart for them, wilt thou not forsake them and return to me, saying, I will go and return to my first husband, for then it was better with me than now? Or from this time that thou hast had so kind an invitation to return, and an assurance that thou shalt be well received. Wilt thou not cry unto me, My father? — Wilt thou not, as a child, humble thyself, and call upon me, whom thou hast greatly provoked, and own me as a father, for such I have been to thee? Psa 103:13; Mal 1:6; Mal 3:17. Wilt thou not beg pardon for thy undutiful carriage toward me, and hope to find in me the tender compassion of a father toward a returning prodigal? Wilt thou not come and make thy complaints to me as to a father, and confide in me for relief and succour? Thou art the guide of my youth — The husband who didst espouse me, and become my guide in the days of my youth: alluding to the time when their manners had not been corrupted by idolatry. Though thou hast gone after many lovers, wilt thou not at length remember the love of thine espousals, and return to the husband of thy youth? Or the relation of a father may rather be referred to; as if he had said, Wilt thou not remember and lay to heart under whose eye and care thou wast brought up, and who was the guide of thy inexperienced years? In our return to God, we ought thankfully to remember that he was our guide when we were young in years, in the way of comfort; and we must faithfully covenant that he shall be our guide from henceforward in the way of duty, and that we will follow his guidance, and give ourselves up to his government. Will he reserve anger for ever? — Surely he will not, for he hath proclaimed his name, gracious and merciful. They seem to be the words of the people reasoning thus with themselves, for their encouragement to return to God. Repenting sinners may encourage themselves with this, that though God chide, he will not always chide; though he be angry, he will not keep his anger to the end; but though he cause grief he will have compassion. Behold, thou hast spoken, &c. — Or, as Blaney translates the clause, “Behold, thou hast spoken and done; thou hast wrought wickedness, and hast prevailed.” These are the words of God, or of the prophet speaking in God’s name, reminding them of, and reproving them for, their long and obstinate continuance in idolatry and other sins. The prophets had endeavoured to dissuade them from persevering in their evil courses, but their arguments had no weight with them; “they continued to do as they had said, or resolved; they carried their wicked thoughts into execution, in spite of all that was urged to the contrary.”
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv4–7 Or, Hast thou Not from this time called “me,…
Or, Hast thou Not from this time called “me, My Father, thou art the” husband “of my youth?” i. e., from the time of Josiah’s reforms in his eighteenth year, in opposition to “of old time” Jer 2:20.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv4–6 Guide. Husband, Proverbs ii. 16., and Joel i. 8.
Guide. Husband, Proverbs ii. 16., and Joel i. 8.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv4–7 from this time--not referring, as MICHAELIS thinks, to the…
from this time--not referring, as MICHAELIS thinks, to the reformation begun the year before, that is, the twelfth of Josiah; it means--now at once, now at last.
me--contrasted with the "stock" whom they had heretofore called on as "father" (Jer 2:27; Luk 15:18).
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thou art--rather, "thou wast."
guide of . . . youth--that is, husband (Jer 2:2; Pro 2:17; Hos 2:7, Hos 2:15). Husband and father are the two most endearing of ties.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv4–7 4. Wilt thou not, etc. — Rather, Hast thou…
4. Wilt thou not, etc. — Rather, Hast thou not from this time called me, etc.? From this time, stands in contrast with “of old time,” in Jer_2:20.
Guide of my youth — That is, husband. See Hos_2:7; Hos_2:13.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv4–7 4. Wilt thou not from this time cry] Hast…
4. Wilt thou not from this time cry] Hast thou not but now cried. Judah, at the very time that she is deserting Jehovah, is using to Him the language of wheedling affection.
guide] mg. companion. The same word is used of a husband in Pro_2:17.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv4–7 (4) Wilt thou not from this time cry unto…
(4) Wilt thou not from this time cry unto me . . .?—Better, Hast thou not from this time cried unto me . . .? The prophet paints with a stern irony the parade of the surface repentance of Josiah’s reign. There had been a pathetic appeal to God as the forgiving husband of the faithless wife, but not the less had the wife returned to her wickedness.
Guide.—The same word as in Pro_2:17; the “chief friend,” as applied to the husband.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv4–7 Wilt thou not, etc.? rather, Truly from this time…
Wilt thou not, etc.? rather, Truly from this time thou callest unto me (literally, Dost thou not, etc.? a common way of giving an energetic assurance). The prophet admits the apparent revival of faith in Jehovah which attended the compulsory reformation under Josiah, but denies that it was more than apparent (comp, ver. 10). The guide of my youth; rather, the companion (the familiar associate); so in Pro_2:17. Comp. Jer_2:2, and especially Isa_54:6, "and a wife of youth" (i.e. married in youth), "that she should be rejected how incredible a thing!
Ver. 4. Filial reminiscences of God.
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We are here brought from the view of God as a Husband to that of him as a Father, for only when we consider his various relations with us can we measure the depth of our sin or the motives we have for returning to him.
I GOD"S PEOPLE CAN CALL TO MIND OLD MEMORIES OF HIS FATHERLY GOODNESS.
1. In our own experience of his grace he has revealed himself as a Father. He is the Source and Origin of life. In him we continue to exist. (Act_17:28) He is constantly protecting us and enriching us with his gifts.
2. God may be discerned as the Companion of his people"s early days.
(1) He was with his people a Companion not merely blessing them from a distance.
(2) He was with his people as a Friend, holding kindly intercourse, condescending to intimate communion, accompanying them as a Stay and Solace through their pilgrimage.
(3) He was with his people in their youth. None are too young to be honored with the friendship of God. Happy are they who have been in communion with God from their youth up, instead of only coming to him at the eleventh hour! They enjoy the most of him, have longest time for his service, have most advantages for growing and ripening in religious experience. As we look back on our early days, we may often discern how God has been with us in dark scenes where his presence was unrecognized at the time, and has been sustaining and cheering us when we have not recognized the hand from which the comfort was coming.
II OLD MEMORIES OF GOD"S FATHERLY GOODNESS MAY BE ABUSED. It would seem that the Jews often fell into this mistake.
1. We may assume that the past blessing of God is all that we need. Because we once enjoyed his presence we may be too ready to rest satisfied as though all must be well with us henceforth forever. But we cannot live in the past. It is vain to waste our time in idle self-congratulations on our early devotion if later years have found us wandering far from God. We must not say that all is done that our souls need if we can point to an early time when we were introduced to filial relations with God. It is nothing to us that God was the Friend of our youth if he has been rejected in our later days. Indeed, this early memory will be our accuser for subsequent unfaithfulness.
2. We may assume that if God was once our Father and Friend he will always stand in those relations to us. But if we lose our first love we lose the blessings which are connected with it. The past is no security for the present. The momentous questions is, Do we now stand in a true filial relation with God? Is he still our Friend? If he was valued as a Companion in the freshness of youth, is he not wanted in the toils and battles of manhood? will he not be needed in the Weariness of age? in the darkness and mystery of the lonely passage of death?
III OLD MEMORIES OF GOD"S FATHERLY GOODNESS MAY BE CONSIDERED WITH PROFIT.
1. They may reveal our subsequent unfaithfulness. We compare ourselves with ourselves and see how we have fallen.
2. They may lead us to see the blessedness of an earlier estate, to be awakened to the loss we have suffered, and to be roused to the desire for a return to it.
3. They may help us to trust God. He was our Father and our Friend in early days. He is changeless. If, then, we repent and return to him, will he not permit us still to cry, "My Father;" and again to enter into the blessed influences of friendly fellowship with him? So the prodigal remembers his early days, and is induced by old memories to say, "I will arise and go to my father". (Luk_15:18)
HOMILIES BY J. WAITE Ver. 4. A call to the young.
We need not hesitate so far to turn these words aside from their original meaning as to regard them as a Divine appeal to the young; especially if we understand that the prophet is here calling on Judah to return to the freshness of her "youth;" that "at this time," this hopeful reign of the good King Josiah, she should renew her covenant with Jehovah and the "love of her espousals". (Jer_2:2) In the days of youth the heart is most freely open to Divine influences, and it may be expected to respond readily to such an appeal as this. Note
I THE DEEPEST TRUTH OF RELIGION IS THE FATHERHOOD OF GOD. That he is the Father of our spirits is the basis of his claims upon us. The quality of our religious thought, the drift of our religious opinions, the tone of our religious life, depend very greatly on our faith in this truth. Fatherhood is our highest conception of God, and includes within it all aspects of his being, and all the relations he sustains towards us. This crowns them all, embraces all. We cannot rise above and beyond it. Our ideas are essentially defective if we fall short of it. Not that the actual human fatherhood worthily represents it; that, at its best, is but a marred and broken copy a feeble, distant reflection of the Divine. And yet the essential elements remain in spite of accidental faults. Power, wisdom, love, judicial authority, kingly rule, protective tenderness, these are the attributes of its ideal. And from the human, with all its imperfections and perversions, we rise to the Divine.
II THE APPREHENSION OF THIS SACRED RELATIONSHIP IS SPECIALLY BEFITTING THE SEASON OF YOUTH. What more natural than that young people should think of God as their Father; that this idea of him should give shape and coloring to all their other religious ideas, and blend with all their views of life, and all their impressions of personal duty? Those who have grown old old in the habit of frivolous thought, in the carnalizing ways of the world, in the debasing service of sin, are often dead to the impression of it. Their hearts are too much estranged to feel its charm. But shall not they who still have the dew of their youth upon them, the bloom of its quick sensibility and pure affection, love to hear a Fathers voice?
III Nevertheless, THE FULL DISCOVERY OF THIS RELATION MARKS A CRISIS IN THE HISTORY OF ANY SOUL. It is generally connected with the painful discovery of sin and need. "I write unto you, little children, because your sins are forgiven you for his Name"s sake.... because ye have known the Father". (1Jn_2:12, 1Jn_2:13) How suggestive is this of the bidden causes, the secret springs, the earliest realizations of Divine life in the soul! One of its first evidences is the recognition of the Father. The cry, "Abba, Father!" is the first that it breathes forth. But this comes with and through the recognition of Christ, the Son, the Savior. "No man knoweth the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son shall reveal him ". (Mat_11:27) And it is a revelation that brings the assurance of "forgiveness for his Name"s sake." The sense of dreary distance from God guilt, shame, hunger, degradation, this is the prelude to the sweet satisfactions of the life of sonship. It is the prodigal "coming to himself." When we are thus painfully feeling our way back to him, God comes forth in Christ to meet us, embracing us in the arms of his great love, breathing, weeping out upon us the infinite tenderness of his fatherly heart. Then we feel that we can dare to take that sacred name "Father" on our lips. It has a deep and blessed meaning in it never known before. And fear and shame and sorrow give place to the joy of eternal reconciliation.
IV THE NATURAL RESULT OF THIS DISCOVERY WILL BE FULL PERSONAL SURRENDER TO THE FATHER"S GUIDANCE AND CONTROL. "Guide," literally, Husband; and them word "husband "is suggestive of all thoughtful and kindly guardianship, the wisdom that directs, and the strength that sustains. Youth needs such guardianship:
1. Because of its special moral dangers, worldly fascinations, Satanic temptations, acting on quick natural susceptibility.
2. Because of its inexperience. Experience is the growth of years. It is not of itself always the parent of the highest practical wisdom, but the want of it calls for the help of a superior power.
3. Because of its weakness of moral principle. There may be excellent natural dispositions, germs of Christian virtue in the soul, but they are not yet developed. They are but latent possibilities of good. When put to the test, they may be found wanting. God"s grace alone can ripen them into mature and steadfast principles.
4. Because beneath its fairest promise there may be hidden seeds of evil, which only need the outward incentive to bring forth deadly fruit.
5. Because the after-destiny depends so much on how the steps of youth are guided. Let the young give heed to the Father"s voice, and yield themselves to his loving control, if they would tread the path of honor and safety and blessedness. W.
Israel"s cry to the Father and the Friend.
I OBSERVE THE SUDDEN CHANGE OF RELATION WHICH IS THUS BROUGHT BEFORE US. Hitherto we have had before us Jehovah"s description of Israel under the guise of a wife departing from her husband into the most degrading and shameless conduct. And now our thoughts are suddenly turned, with nothing to prepare for the transition, to a new relation that of father and child. Note that it is not God who directly presents himself in this relation. "Father" is a term put into the mouths of the people in the preceding chapter and also in this. In Jer_2:27 they are represented as saying to a stock," Thou art my father;" and now they say to Jehovah, "Thou art my Father, the Friend, the Companion of my youth." It may be that there was no depth of real sincerity in the cry, even though it is described as a cry, and not a mere perfunctory recognition at all events, it sets forth fact. Jehovah was a Father to the nation of Israel in this sense, that it was by his peculiar and necessary power that Israel was separated in all sorts of profoundly significant ways from the great mass of mankind. When Abram started forth, not knowing whither he went, this was to him a sort of Being born again; an- entirely new life lay before him, with expectations that he never could have cherished but that God planted them deep in his heart. And thus the name is a right and needful name to use. Israel is doing what it ought to do when it says, "Abba, Father!" The idea evidently is that Israel has learned to speak to God much in the same way that an English child learns to say "papa" or "father". (Isa_8:4)
II OBSERVE THE CONDUCT BY WHICH WHAT IS GOOD IS RECOGNIZED RELATION OF FATHER IS MANIFESTED. It was true that Jehovah had been Father to Israel; it was moreover true that he had been Guide, Friend, and Companion to Israel"s youth. It is not always the case that fatherhood means a loving and cherishing companionship. But here it is emphatically the case. Jehovah was a very close Companion to Israel in its youth; not really nearer, of course, than he had been since, but near in such a way that the people were compelled to note his proximity to them, and constant watchfulness over them. This, therefore, as Israel looked back upon its youth, was the right way for it to speak of Jehovah. Being Father, he had also been a true Companion and Support. "Guide of my youth" does very well for a rendering, if we bear in mind all that the guiding implies. There is a guiding which is a mere trade, a mere selling of the guide"s knowledge. He takes up any stranger, shows him the way, gets his pay, and then the relation is at an end. But the practical guiding here comes from a deep love and solicitude. Further, it must be remembered that Jehovah"s friendship and companionship were the friendship and companionship of one competent to guide. Friendship by itself is, of course, not sufficient to constitute guiding capacity. We see, then, that the expression of this verse is a very suggestive one by which to address God.
All fathers may learn from it the spirit of a right relation towards their children. It is the name which they should desire their children to associate with their childhood. It should be a remembrance having a binding power when the child has become a man, and the father an old man. It should be possible to look back on a childhood where the father was a true companion, one whose companionship was full of true befriending and guiding. There is also indicated the spirit in which youth should look beyond earthly dependencies to God himself. He who was so much to a youthful nation of old will be of inestimable service to the ignorance, weakness, and abounding need of all youth. Especially should this consideration have force when one thinks of the significance in the doctrine of being born again. He who is born again has then a second youth, even though he be in the full strength of natural manhood. And what is wanted is that the man in his strength and his wide outlook on the possibilities of life should choose a truly humble position before God. The expression is also one that may point back to a submissive, hopeful youth, wherein many Divine impressions were made, and from which there has been a great backsliding. Then how beautifully would such an expression come from the lips of the returning prodigal, "My Father, thou wast the Guide of my youth, and now after a bitter experience of trying to make my own way, which has ended in a mere drifting before the strong currents of passion and self-indulgence, I come back to thee!" It is sad to have the friendship of father and child broken, sad at any time, but saddest of all when it is not through some meddling whisperer or repeater of a matter, (Pro_16:28 Pro_17:9) but through the voluntary and obstinate departure of one of the friends. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv4–6 Writ thou not from this time cry unto Me,…
Jer_3:4
Writ thou not from this time cry unto Me, My Father, Thou art the guide of my youth?
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The Divine Guide
We are all travellers, but are not all travelling in the tame direction. We need a guide. There is only One to be relied upon.
I. Why we need a guide.
1. Because of our ignorance of the way.
2. Because of our liability to take the wrong path.
3. Because of our liability to leave the right path after we have chosen it.
II. We should take God as our guide.
1. Because He knows the way.
2. Because He knows the trials that will befall us.
3. Because He knows the perils that we shall encounter.
4. Because He is our Father, and therefore kind and considerate.
III. We should ask God to guide us now.
1. Because the present time is the best.
2. Because the present time is the safest.
3. Because the present may be the only time. (Homilist.)
Taking God as our Guide in youth
I. It is due to God.
1. He is your Maker, who gives you all things; therefore He has a supreme and sole right to you.
2. He has bought you at a vast expense, that you might be delivered from the curse of sin and the wrath to come. If an artist pays a large sum of money to get back his own painting from some one into whose hands it has fallen, and then labours to improve it, would you not say that he has a good title to such painting? Thus with the ransomed children of God.
II. It will be good for yourselves.
1. You need a guide.
(1) Consider your character. Ignorance of the future, and without experience, should you not tremble to go alone?
(2) Consider your situation. The road is beset with dangers, infested with robbers, filled with bypaths!
(3) Consider the importance of your steps. Begin to wander, and who shall tell the issue? Worn out with fatigue, benighted in that trackless wilderness, you fall a prey to the forest beast, or are dashed in pieces over a hidden precipice. One evil habit may lead you to ruin, must cause you pain and trouble. One false step in youth may mar you forever.
2. God is infinitely the best Guide. That He is a sure and safe Guide, none can doubt. He is wise, knows all things, and can proportion trials to your strength. He never fails. You live in a world of changes; but He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. But He is also a pleasant Guide. He is powerful to bring you out of trouble; He is gracious in it. In the day of the east wind He stays His rough wind, and tempers the wind to the shorn lamb. (J. C. Herdman, M. A.)
Gods tender expostulation with the young
I. The particulars of the proposal.
1. That you should make God your Father; to love honour, and obey.
2. To choose God for the Guide of your youth; to regard His authority, follow His will, and comply with His directions.
(1) By His Word.
(2) By His Spirit.
3. To do these things instantly, without delay.
II. Motives for co-reliance.
1. The grace and condescension of the proposal.
2. The reasonableness of such a proceeding. Refuse the offer of His heavenly guidance, and you will be like a vessel in a boisterous sea without a pilot to direct your course.
3. The seasonableness of the proposal. From this time. The time past cannot be recalled. You may deeply regret that you have hitherto neglected to make God your Father, and to choose Him for the Guide of your youth. But regret will not recover the time which is past. Opportunities lost are gone forever. Your business is to improve those which remain. The present time is still your own. (E. Cooper, M. A.)
God the Guide of youth
I. The proposal.
1. It requires penitence. You must feel your depravity and lament your guilt.
2. It includes prayer. A life of communion with God.
3. It implies yielding yourself up to God, to walk in His ways, be guided by His counsel, and glorify His name.
II. Your obligations. To whom will you give your affections if you withhold them from Him?
III. Advantages to be gained by compliance.
1. Safety. While leaning on your own wisdom, and walking in your own strength, you are liable to stray, stumble, fall.
2. Happiness. In His favour is life. No peace to the wicked.
3. Honour. Associated with the servants of God, angels, archangels, etc. Yes, and with Christ Himself, whose meat was to do Gods will.
IV. Combat objections.
1. Sins too great for pardon. Christs grace sufficient.
2. So weak. He takes by the hand, helps, upholds.
3. What need for being so religious? But you have no religion at all, if not wholly in earnest.
4. Not yet. This is impious as well as foolish. Every day and hour you are on the brink of death.
V. Your reply. Only two answers: will, or will not. Turn not away. (J. Wooldridge.)
The importance of early dedication to God
I. The assumption. That the person is in a state of unregeneracy. Multitudes are thus. Refusing to listen to God. In the neglect of the claims of God there is an amount of daring of which we can hardly form a conception, especially in the case of the child of many prayers.
II. The imitation. Why should you from this time say, Thou art the Guide of my youth?
1. The claims of Him who asks it.
2. The dangers of delay.
3. The final consequences of refusal. (D. E. Ford.)
God condescending to be the Guide of youth
I. Has not God already acted a most wise and friendly part?
1. Review your general privileges. Who formed you from nothing into being? who assigned you a rank among human creatures? who prepared in a parents heart the affections which welcomed and nourished the helpless stranger? who reared you up to youth? who kindled the dawn of mason? whose hand opened for you the warm and widening circle of friendship?
2. You are bound by peculiar obligations. It is no small thing that an heritage has been found for you in Britain. You are not the children of savages, mingling in their barbarous manners.
II. Is not God able to fill up, through all future periods, the relations to which He invites your notice? He offers Himself as a Father and as a Guide. His power, His wisdom, and His goodness will support the titles.
III. Does not the season of youth need such a Father and such a Guide? What can preserve the morals of youth? Shall the frail bark live in the tempest? Shall flames surround a military magazine, and not produce an explosion? Can a lamb make its way through a herd of wolves?
IV. May not the season of youth be the only one that shall display such advantages as are attached to it? You know not that you shall survive this age; that you are under sentence is felt by yourselves, and sometimes lamented. Can you charm death away? Can you obtain a momentary respite? (Evangelist.)
An address to youth
I. Youth needs a guide.
1. We are expressly assured by the prophet, That the way of man is not in himself; it is not in man that walketh to direct his steps. And if this be true of old travellers who have long been moving Zion-ward, how much more of those who are only beginning to start!
2. There is one kind of knowledge in which the young must be deficient--that which is derived from trial, and which we call experience.
3. Now, too, the passions and appetites begin to rage in their violence. These becloud the understanding, and prevent reflection; and rendering them averse to reproof and impatient of control, urge them on, and plunge them into a thousand improprieties and embarrassments.
II. God is ready to become your leader, and it is your duty and privilege to place yourselves under His direction. He is infinitely wise, and cannot lead you astray. He has conducted millions; and the wayfaring man, though a fool, has not erred under His direction. He is infinitely powerful. He can support you under the heaviest burdens, deliver you from every adversary, and make all things work together for your good. He is infinitely kind. He will bear with your infirmities, and sympathise with you in all your troubles. And He is infinitely faithful: not a word shall fail of all that He has spoken.
III. How you are to engage His attention. Cry unto Him. This familiar expression intends prayer and supplication; and it prevents you from using as an excuse for the omission of the duty--that you are not masters of words, and cannot deliver yourselves in proper language. For what is prayer? Is it not the desire of the heart towards God? If you cannot pray--cannot you cry unto Him?
IV. There are particular seasons in which He expects to be sought after by the young, and from which He dates the expostulation--Wilt thou not from this time, etc.
1. When they leave the house of their friends, and the wing of their relations.
2. When bereaved of their parents.
3. At the commencement of a new period of life.
4. When the young see friends or companions carried off by a premature death.
5. At times of peculiar convictions and impressions. (W. Jay.)
Youth encouraged to seek unto God
I. The import of this language.
1. Gratitude.
2. Confidence.
3. Prayer.
4. A determined compliance with Gods will.
II. The force of the appeal made by God.
1. Tender expostulation.
2. Seasonable admonition.
3. As arising from events which point out most clearly your need of an interest in the Divine favour. (R. Winter, D. D.)
God to be chosen as a Guide by the young
I. You greatly need some faithful and effective guidance in the shaping of your lives.
1. Because the path of duty and of safety is often exceedingly difficult to find. Often, when determining what you are bound to accept as duty or to receive as truth, you have many circumstances to consider, many probabilities to estimate, many opposing arguments to weigh. While the general direction in which you are to move, if you intend to live wisely, is obvious enough, you may still find perplexities at every point, to extricate yourself from which will try, perhaps baffle, your utmost wisdom, who is sufficient for these things?
2. Because your own strong impulses are likely to mislead you. It is easy to believe that to be right or useful which accords with inclination. It is hard to think that to be obligatory, or best, to which the feelings are averse, and which involves the necessity of self-denial.
3. Because there are many who will studiously seek your ruin.
(1) There are found even in the best conditions of society, the openly debased and vicious.
(2) Besides these, there are many--corrupt in heart--who will seek to reach you with influences fitted to destroy your virtuous sentiments, and principles, and ultimate well-being.
4. Because so many are continually ruined. Where many fall, there is reason that all should fear.
II. The reasonableness, the wisdom, of making God your guide.
1. You owe it to God Himself thus to honour Him with your confidence. It is His right.
2. God alone can afford you a sufficient guidance. Where can you find another to whose care and leading you can safely and without anxiety, commit the infinitely precious interests of your being?
III. When should Gods offered guidance be accepted? From this time.
1. The present is a practicable time--a time in which without hindrance God may be intelligently and cordially accepted as a guide.
2. The present is the very time that God Himself proposes. Remember now thy Creator.
3. It is at the present time that your need of the blessing in question is becoming manifest and urgent.
4. The present may not improbably be the only time in which you will have it in your power to secure the Divine guidance (Pro_1:24-29). (Ray Palmer, D. D.)
Divine guidance for lifes journey
Rev. Mark Guy Pearse says: I have read somewhere of one of our naval officers who sailed from Mexico round the Cape Horn to Rio, a distance of eight thousand miles, and for ninety days neither touched land nor scarcely saw a sail. At last he judged himself to be some twenty miles from Rio, and lay-to for the night. The next morning it was a dense fog, and he came on very cautiously, and when the fog suddenly lifted there in front of them rose the well-known Sugar-loaf Rock at the entrance of Rio Harbour. Thus it is that in spite of the great and wide sea where no landmarks or guide marks are, where are restless tides and currents and changeful winds, yet heaven stoops to teach men if they will be taught. The sun in the heavens gives every day its unerring counsel, the stars come out at night to whisper their cheery assurance. So He bringeth men to their desired haven. Now, if men can believe that, and so believe it as to trust themselves to it, I do not wonder that any can doubt that heaven bends over us to teach us where we are and whither we are going. If it is scientific to believe that heaven can grade us over the great sea, it does seem to be just simple common sense to think that heaven can lead us safe.
God the best Guide
The sailor, out on the restless sea, has one unfailing star to which he can always look with confidence, knowing that it will always be found at the same place. He may perhaps admire the brilliancy of Venus, or look with wonder at the ever-changing moon, but when he wants to take his bearings he looks at the unfailing, unchangeable polar star. Thank God that we have an unfailing Guide that will remain the same when the heavens have passed away. He, our Lord and Master, is the one absolutely unfailing star of hope to which we can look with implicit confidence.
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v6 Jer_3:6-25; Jer_4:1-2
CHAPTER III
ISRAEL AND JUDAH: A CONTRAST
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Jer_3:6-25; Jer_4:1-2
THE first address of our prophet was throughout of a sombre cast, and the darkness of its close was not relieved by a single ray of hope. It was essentially a comminatory discourse, the purpose of it being to rouse a sinful nation to the sense of its peril, by a faithful picture of its actual condition, which was so different from what it was popularly supposed to be. The veil is torn aside; the real relations between Israel and his God are exposed to view; and it is seen that the inevitable goal of persistence in the course which has brought partial disasters in the past, is certain destruction in the imminent future. It is implied, but not said, that the only thing that can save the nation is a complete reversal of policies hitherto pursued, in Church and State and private life; and it is apparently taken for granted that the thing implied is no longer possible. The last word of the discourse was: "Thou hast purposed and performed the evils, and thou hast conquered." {Jer_3:5} The address before us forms a striking contrast to this dark picture. It opens a door of hope for the penitent. The heart of the prophet cannot rest in the thought of the utter rejection of his people; the harsh and dreary announcement that his peoples woes are self-caused cannot be his last word. "His anger was only love provoked to distraction; here it has come to itself again," and holds out an offer of grace first to that part of the whole nation which needs it most, the fallen kingdom of Ephraim, and then to the entire people. The all Israel of the former discourse is here divided into its two sections, which are contrasted with each other, and then again considered as a united nation. This feature distinguishes the piece from that which begins Jer_4:3, and which is addressed to Judah and Jerusalem rather than to Israel and Judah, like the one before us. An outline of the discourse may be given thus. It is shown that Judah has not taken warning by Iahvahs rejection of the sister kingdom (Jer_3:6-10); and that Ephraim may be pronounced less guilty than Judah, seeing that she had witnessed no such signal example of the Divine vengeance on hardened apostasy. She is, therefore, invited to repent and return to her alienated God, which will involve a return from exile to her own land; and the promise is given of the reunion of the two peoples in a restored theocracy, having its centre in Mount Zion (Jer_3:11-19). All Israel has rebelled against God; but the prophet hears the cry of universal penitence and supplication ascending to heaven; and Iahvahs gracious answer of acceptance. {Jer_3:20-25; Jer_4:1-2}
The opening section depicts the sin which had brought ruin on Israel, and Judahs readiness in following her example, and refusal to take warning by her fate. This twofold sin is aggravated by an insincere repentance. "And Iahvah said unto me, in the days of Josiah the king, Sawest thou what the Turncoat or Recreant Israel did? she would go up every high hill, and under every evergreen tree, and play the harlot there. And methought that after doing all this she would return to Me; but she returned not; and the Traitress, her sister Judah saw it." And I saw that when for the very reason that she, the Turncoat Israel, had committed adultery, I had put her away, and given her her bill of divorce, the Traitress Judah, her sister, was not afraid, but she too went off and played the harlot. And so, through the cry {cf. Gen_4:10; Gen_18:20 sq.} of her harlotry (or defect through her manifold or abounding harlotry) she polluted the land (Jer_3:2), in that she committed adultery with the Stone and with the Stock. And yet though she was involved in all this guilt (lit. and even in all this.) Perhaps the sin and the penalties of it are identified; and the meaning is: "And yet for all this liability," cf. {Isa_5:25} the Traitress Judah returned not unto Me with all her heart (with a whole or undivided heart, with entire sincerity) but in falsehood, saith Iahvah. "The example of the northern kingdom is represented as a powerful influence for evil upon Judah. This was only natural; for although from the point of view of religious development Judah is incomparably the more important of the sister kingdoms; the exact contrary is the case as regards political power and predominance. Under strong kings like Omri and Ahab, or again, Jeroboam II, Ephraim was able to assert itself as a first-rate power among the surrounding principalities; and in the case of Athaliah, we have a conspicuous instance of the manner in which Canaanite idolatry might be propagated from Israel to Judah. The prophet declares that the sin of Judah was aggravated by the fact that she had witnessed the ruin of Israel, and yet persisted in the same evil courses of which that ruin was the result. She sinned against light. The fall of Ephraim had verified the predictions of her prophets; yet she was not afraid," but went on adding to the score of her own offences, and polluting the land with her unfaithfulness to her Divine Spouse. The idea that the very soil of her country was defiled by Judahs idolatry may be illustrated by reference to the well known words of Psa_106:38 : "They shed innocent blood, even the blood of their sons and their daughters whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan; and the land was defiled with the bloodshed." We may also remember Elohims words to Cain: "The voice of thy brothers blood is crying unto Me from the ground!" {Gen_4:10} As Iahvahs special dwelling place, moreover, the land of Israel was holy; and foreign rites desecrated and profaned it. and made it offensive in His sight. The pollution of it cried to heaven for vengeance on those who had caused it. To such a state had Judah brought her own land, and the very city of the sanctuary; and yet in all this amid this accumulation of sins and liabilities she turned not to her Lord with her whole heart. The reforms set on foot in the twelfth year of Josiah were but superficial and halfhearted; the people merely acquiesced in them, at the dictation of the court, and gave no sign of any inward change or deep-wrought repentance. The semblance without the reality of sorrow for sin is but a mockery of heaven, and a heinous aggravation of guilt. Hence the sin of Judah was of a deeper dye than that which had destroyed Israel. And Iahvah said unto me, The Turncoat or Recreant Israel hath proven herself more righteous than the Traitress Judah. Who could doubt it, considering that almost all the prophets had borne their witness in Judah; and that, in imitating her sisters idolatry, she had resolutely closed her eyes to the light of truth and reason? On this ground, that Israel has sinned less and suffered more, the prophet is bidden to hold out to her the hope of Divine mercy. The greatness of her ruin, as well as the lapse of years since the fatal catastrophe, might tend to diminish in the prophets mind the impression of her guilt; and his patriotic yearning for the restoration of the banished Ten Tribes, who, after all, were the near kindred of Judah, as well as the thought that they had borne their punishment, and thus atoned for their sin, {Isa_11:2} might cooperate with the desire of kindling in his own countrymen a noble rivalry of repentance, in moving the prophet to obey the impulse which urged him to address himself to Israel. Go thou, and cry these words northward (toward the desolate land of Ephraim), and say: Return, Turncoat or Recreant Israel, saith Iahvah; I will not let My countenance fall at the sight of you; {lit. against you, cf. Gen_4:5} for I am loving, saith Iahvah, I keep not anger forever. Only recognise thy guilt, that thou hast rebelled against Iahvah thy God, and hast scattered {or lavished: Psa_112:9} thy ways to the strangers hast gone now in this direction, now in that, worshipping first one idol and then another; cf. Jer_2:23; and so, as it were, dividing up and dispersing thy devotion under every evergreen tree; "but My voice ye have not obeyed, saith Iahvah." The invitation, "Return Apostate Israel!"-contains a play of words which seems to suggest that the exile of the Ten Tribes was voluntary, or self-imposed; as if, when they turned their backs upon their true God, they had deliberately made choice of the inevitable consequence of that rebellion, and made up their minds to abandon their native land. So close is the connection, in the prophets view, between the misfortunes of his people and their sins.
"Return, ye apostate children" (again there is a play on words-"Turn back, ye back-turning sons," or "ye sons that turn the back to Me) saith Iahvah; for it was I that wedded you" (Jer_3:14), and am, therefore, your proper lord. The expression is not stranger than that which the great prophet of the Return addresses to Zion: "Thy sons shall marry thee." But perhaps we should rather compare another passage of the Book of Isaiah, where it is said: "Iahvah, our God! other lords beside Thee have had dominion over us," {Isa_26:13} and render: "For it is I that will be your lord"; or perhaps, "For it is I that have mastered you," and put down your rebellion by chastisements; "and I will take you, one of a city and two of a clan, and will bring you to Zion." As a "city" is elsewhere spoken of as a "thousand," {Mic_5:1} and a "thousand" is synonymous with a "clan," as providing a thousand warriors in the national militia, it is clear that the promise is that one or two representatives of each township in Israel shall be restored from exile to the land of their fathers. In other words, we have here Isaiahs doctrine of the remnant, which he calls a "tenth," {Isa_6:13} and of which he declared that "the survivors of the house of Judah that remain, shall again take root downwards, and bear fruit upwards." {Isa_37:31} And as Zion is the goal of the returning exiles, we may see, as doubtless the prophets saw, a kind of anticipation and foreshadowing of the future in the few scattered members of the northern tribes of Asher, Manasseh, and Zebulun, who "humbled themselves," and accepted Hezekiahs invitation to the passover; {2Ch_30:11; 2Ch_30:18} and, again, in the authority which Josiah is said to have exercised in the land of the Ten Tribes (2Ch_34:6; 2Ch_34:9). We must bear in mind that the prophets do not contemplate the restoration of every individual of the entire nation; but rather the return of a chosen few, a kind of "firstfruits" of Israel, who are to be a "holy seed," {Isa_6:13} from which the power of the Supreme will again build up the entire people according to its ancient divisions. So the holy Apostle in the Revelation hears that twelve thousand of each tribe are sealed as servants of God. {Revelation 7}
The happy time of restoration will also be a time of reunion. The estranged tribes will return to their old allegiance. This is implied by the promise, "I will bring you to Zion," and by that of the next verse: "And I will give you shepherds after My own heart; and they shall shepherd you with knowledge and wisdom." Obviously, kings of the house of David are meant; the good shepherds of the future are contrasted with the "rebellious" ones of the Jer_2:8. It is the promise of Isaiah: {Isa_1:26} "And I will restore thy judges as at the first, and thy counsellors as at the beginning." In this connection, we may recall the fact that the original schism in Israel was brought about by the folly of evil shepherds. The coming King will resemble not Rehoboam but David. Nor is this all; for "It shall come to pass, when ye multiply and become fruitful in the land, in those days, saith Iahvah, men shall not say any more, The ark of the covenant of Iahvah," or, as LXX, "of the Holy One of Israel; nor shall it" (the ark) "come to mind; nor shall men remember it, nor miss it; nor shall it be made any more" (although the verb may be impersonal.) I do not understand why Hitzig asserts "Man wird keine andere machen" (Movers) oder; "sic wird nicht wieder gemacht" (Ew., Graf) "als ware nicht von der geschichtlichen Lade die Rede, sondern von ihr begrifflich, konnen die Worte nicht bedeuten." But cf. Exo_25:10; Gen_6:14; where the same verb is used. Perhaps, however, the rendering of C.B. Michaelis, which he prefers, is more in accordance with what precedes: "nor shall all that be done any more," Gen_29:26; Gen_41:34. But it does not mean "nachforschen." {cf. 1Sa_20:6; 1Sa_25:15} "In that time men will call Jerusalem the throne of Iahvah; and all the nations will gather into it," {Gen_1:9} "for the name of Iahvah" (at Jerusalem: LXX om.); "and they" (the heathen) "will no longer follow the stubbornness of their evil heart." {Jer_7:24; Deu_29:19}
In the new Theocracy, the true kingdom of God, the ancient symbol of the Divine presence will be forgotten in the realisation of that presence. The institution of the New Covenant will be characterised by an immediate and personal knowledge of Iahvah in the hearts of all His people. {Jer_31:31 sq.} The small object in which past generations had loved to recognise the earthly throne of the God of Israel, will be replaced by Jerusalem itself, the Holy City, not merely of Judah, nor of Judah and Israel, but of the world. Thither will all the nations resort "to the name of Iahvah"; ceasing henceforth "to follow the hardness (or callousness) of their own evil heart." That the more degraded kinds of heathenism have a hardening effect upon the heart; and that the cruel and impure worships of Canaan especially tended to blunt the finer sensibilities, to enfeeble the natural instincts of humanity and justice, and to confuse the sense of right and wrong, is beyond question. Only a heart rendered callous by custom, and stubbornly deaf to the pleadings of natural pity, could find genuine pleasures in the merciless rites of the Molech worship; and they who ceased to follow these inhuman superstitions, and sought light and guidance from the God of Israel, might well be said to have ceased "to walk after the hardness of their own evil heart." The more repulsive features of heathenism chime in too well with the worst and most savage impulses of our nature; they exhibit too close a conformity with the suggestions and demands of selfish appetite; they humour and encourage the darkest passions far too directly and decidedly, to allow us to regard as plausible any theory of their origin and permanence which does not recognise in them at once a cause and an effect of human depravity. {cf. Romans 1}
The repulsiveness of much that was associated with the heathenism with which they were best acquainted, did not hinder the prophets of Israel from taking a deep spiritual interest in those who practised and were enslaved by it. Indeed, what has been called the universalism of the Hebrew seers-their emancipation in this respect from all local and national limits and prejudices-is one of the clearest proofs of their divine mission. Jeremiah only reiterates what Micah and Isaiah had preached before him; that "in the latter days the mountain of Iahvahs House shall be established as the chief of mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all the nations will flow unto it". {Isa_2:2} In Jer_16:19 sq. our prophet thus expresses himself upon the same topic. "Iahvah, my strength and my stronghold, and my refuge in the day of distress! unto Thee shall nations come from the ends of the earth, and shall say: Our forefathers inherited naught but a lie, vanity, and things among which is no helper. Shall a man make him gods, when they are no gods?" How largely this particular aspiration of the prophets of the seventh and eighth centuries B.C. has since been fulfilled in the course of the ages is a matter of history. The religion which was theirs has, in the new shape given it by our Lord and His Apostles, become the religion of one heathen people after another, until at this day it is the faith professed, not only in the land of its origin, but by the leading nations of the world. So mighty a fulfilment of hopes, which at the time of their first conception and utterance could only be regarded as the dreams of enthusiastic visionaries, justifies those who behold and realise it in the joyful belief that the progress of true religion has not been maintained for six and twenty centuries to be arrested now; and that these old world aspirations are destined to receive a fulness of illustration in the triumphs of the future, in the light of which the brightest glories of the past will pale and fade away.
The prophet does not say, with a prophet of the New Covenant, that "all Israel shall be saved". {Rom_11:26} We may, however, fairly interpret the latter of the true Israel, "the remnant according to the election of grace," rather than of "Israel according to the flesh," and so both will be at one, and both at variance with the unspiritual doctrine of the Talmud, that "All Israel," irrespective of moral qualifications, will have "a portion in the world to come," on account of the surpassing merits of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and even of Abraham alone. {cf. St. Mat_3:9; St. Joh_8:33}
The reference to the ark of the covenant in the sixteenth verse is remarkable upon several grounds. This sacred symbol is not mentioned among the spoils which Nebuzaradan (Nabuziriddin) took from the temple; {Jer_52:17 sqq.} nor is it specified among the treasures appropriated by Nebuchadrezzar at the surrender of Jehoiachin. The words of Jeremiah prove that it cannot be included among "the vessels of gold" which the Babylonian conqueror "cut in pieces". {2Ki_24:13} We learn two facts about the ark from the present passage: (1) that it no longer existed in the days of the prophet; (2) that people remembered it with regret, though they did not venture to replace the lost original by a new substitute. It may well have been destroyed by Manasseh, the king who did his utmost to abolish the religion of Iahvah. However that may be, the point of the prophets allusion consists in the thought that in the glorious times of Messianic rule the idea of holiness will cease to be attached to things, for it will be realised in persons; the symbol will become obsolete, and its name and memory will disappear from the minds and affections of men, because the fact symbolised will be universally felt and perceived to be a present and self-evident truth. In that great epoch of Israels reconciliation, all nations will recognise in Jerusalem "the throne of Iahvah," the centre of light and source of spiritual truth; the Holy City of the world. Is it the earthly or the heavenly Jerusalem that is meant? It would seem, the former only was present to the consciousness of the prophet, for he concludes his beautiful interlude of promise with the words: "In those days will the house of Judah walk beside the house of Israel; and they will come together from the land of the North" ("and from all the lands": LXX add. cf. Jer_16:15) "unto the land that I caused your fathers to possess." Like Isaiah {Isa_11:12 sqq.} and other prophets his predecessors, Jeremiah forecasts for the whole repentant and united nation a reinstatement in their ancient temporal rights, in the pleasant land from which they had been so cruelly banished for so many weary years.
"The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life." If, when we look at the whole course of subsequent events, when we review the history of the Return and of the narrow religious commonwealth which was at last, after many bitter struggles, established on mount Sion; when we consider the form which the religion of Iahvah assumed in the hands of the priestly caste, and the half-religious, half-political sects, whose intrigues and conflicts for power constitute almost all we know of their period; when we reflect upon the character of the entire post-exilic age down to the time of the birth of Christ, with its worldly ideals, its fierce fanaticisms, its superstitious trust in rites and ceremonies; if, when we look at all this, we hesitate to claim that the prophetic visions of a great restoration found fulfilment in the erection of this petty state, this paltry edifice, upon the ruins of Davids capital; shall we lay ourselves open to the accusation that we recognise no element of truth in the glorious aspirations of the prophets? I think not.
After all, it is clear from the entire context that these hopes of a golden time to come are not independent of the attitude of the people towards Iahvah. They will only be realised, if the nation shall truly repent of the past, and turn to Him with the whole heart. The expressions "at that time," "in those days" (Jer_3:17-18), are only conditionally determinate; they mean the happy time of Israels repentance, "if such a time should ever come." From this glimpse of glorious possibilities, the prophet turns abruptly to the dark page of Israels actual history. He has, so to speak, portrayed in characters of light the development as it might have been; he now depicts the course it actually followed. He restates Iahvahs original claim upon Israels grateful devotion, {Jer_2:2} putting these words into the mouth of the Divine Speaker: "And I indeed thought, How will I set thee among the sons" (of the Divine household), "and give thee a lovely land, a heritage the fairest among the nations! And methought, thou wouldst call Me My Father, and wouldst not turn back from following Me." Iahvah had at the outset adopted Israel, and called him from the status of a groaning bondsman to the dignity of a son and heir. When Israel was a child, He had loved him, and called His son out of Egypt, {Hos_11:1} to give him a place and a heritage among nations. It was Iahvah, indeed, who originally assigned their holdings to all the nations, and separated the various tribes of mankind, "fixing the territories of peoples, according to the number of the sons of God". {Deu_32:8 Sept.} If He had brought up Israel from Egypt, He had also brought up the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Arameans from Kir. {Amo_9:7} But He had adopted Israel in a more special sense, which may be expressed in St. Pauls words, who makes it the chief advantage of Israel above the nations that "unto them were committed the oracles of God". {Rom_3:2} What nobler distinction could have been conferred upon any race of men than that they should have been thus chosen, as Israel actually was chosen, not merely in the aspirations of prophets, but as a matter of fact in the divinely directed evolution of human history, to become the heralds of a higher truth, the hierophants of spiritual knowledge, the universally recognised interpreters of God? Such a calling might have been expected to elicit a response of the warmest gratitude, the most enthusiastic loyalty and unswerving devotion. But Israel as a nation did not rise to the level of these lofty prophetic views of its vocation; it knew itself to be the people of Iahvah, but it failed to realise the moral significance of that privilege, and the moral and spiritual responsibilities which it involved. It failed to adore Iahvah as the Father, in the only proper and acceptable sense of that honourable name, the sense which restricts its application to one sole Being. Heathenism is blind and irrational as well as profane and sinful; and so it does not scruple to confer such absolutely individual titles as "God" and "Father" upon a multitude of imaginary powers.
"Methought thou wouldst call Me My Father, and wouldst not turn back from following Me. But" {Zep_3:7} "a woman is false to her fere; so were ye false to Me, O house of Israel, saith Iahvah." The Divine intention toward Israel, Gods gracious design for her everlasting good, Gods expectation of a return for His favour, and how that design was thwarted so far as man could thwart it, and that expectation disappointed hitherto; such is the import of the last two verses (Jer_3:19-20). Speaking in the name of God, Jeremiah represents Israels past as it appears to God. He now proceeds to show dramatically, or as in a picture, how the expectation may yet be fulfilled, and the design realised. Having exposed the national guilt, he supposes his remonstrance to have done its work, and he overhears the penitent people pouring out its heart before God. Then a kind of dialogue ensues between the Deity and His suppliants. "Hark! upon the bare hills is heard the weeping of the supplications of the sons of Israel, that they perverted their way, forgot Iahvah their God." The treeless hill tops had been the scene of heathen orgies miscalled worship. There the rites of Canaan performed by Israelites had insulted the God of heaven (Jer_3:2 and Jer_3:6). Now the very places which witnessed the sin, witness the national remorse and confession. The high places are not condemned even by Jeremiah as places of worship, but only as places of heathen and illicit worships. The solitude and quiet and purer air of the hill tops, their unobstructed view of heaven and suggestive nearness thereto, have always made them natural sanctuaries both for public rites and private prayer and meditation: cf. 2Sa_15:32; and especially St. Luk_6:12.
In this closing section of the piece {Jer_3:19-25; Jer_4:1-2} "Israel" means not the entire people, but the northern kingdom only, which is spoken of separately also in Jer_3:6-18, with the object of throwing into higher relief the heinousness of Judahs guilt. Israel-the northern kingdom-was less guilty than Judah, for she had no warning example, no beacon light upon her path, such as her own fall afforded to the southern kingdom; and therefore the Divine compassion is more likely to be extended to her, even after a century of ruin and banishment, than to her callous, impenitent sister. Whether at the time Jeremiah was in communication with survivors of the northern Exile, who were faithful to the God of their fathers, and looked wistfully toward Jerusalem as the centre of the best traditions and the sole hope of Israelite nationality, cannot now be determined. The thing is not unlikely, considering the interest which the prophet afterwards took in the Judean exiles who were taken to Babylon with Jehoiachin (chapter 29) and his active correspondence with their leaders. We may also remember that "divers of Asher and Manasseh and Zebulun humbled themselves" and came to keep passover with king Hezekiah at Jerusalem. It cannot, certainly, be supposed, with any show of reason, that the Assyrians either carried away the entire population of the northern kingdom, or exterminated all whom they did not carry away. The words of the Chronicler who speaks of "a remnant escaped out of the hand of the kings of Assyria," are themselves perfectly agreeable to reason and the nature of the case, apart from the consideration that he had special historical sources at his command. {2Ch_30:6; 2Ch_30:11} We know that in the Maccabean and Roman wars the rocky fastnesses of the country were a refuge to numbers of the people, and the history of David shows that this had been the case from time immemorial. {cf. Jdg_6:2} Doubtless in this way not a few survived the Assyrian invasions and the destruction of Samaria (B.C. 721). But to return to the text. After the confession of the nation that they have "perverted their way" (that is, their mode of worship, by adoring visible symbols of Iahvah, and associating with Him as His compeers a multitude of imaginary gods, especially the local Baalim, Jer_2:23, and Ashtaroth), the prophet hears another voice, a voice of Divine invitation and gracious promise, responsive to penitence and prayer: "Return, ye apostate sons, let Me heal your apostasies!" or "If ye return, ye apostate sons, I will heal your apostasies!" It is an echo of the tenderness of an older prophet. {Hos_14:1; Hos_14:4} And the answer of the penitents quickly follows: "Behold us, we are come unto Thee, for Thou art Iahvah our God." The voice that now calls us, we know by its tender tones of entreaty, compassion, and love to be the voice of Iahvah our own God; not the voice of sensual Chemosh, tempting to guilty pleasures and foul impurities, not the harsh cry of a cruel Molech, calling for savage rites of pitiless bloodshed. Thou, Iahvah-not these nor their fellows-art our true and only God.
"Surely, in vain" (for naught, bootlessly, 1Sa_25:21; Jer_5:2; Jer_16:19) "on the hills did we raise a din" (lit. "hath one raised";) surely in Iahvah our God is the safety of Israel! The Hebrew cannot be original as it now stands in the Masoretic text, for it is ungrammatical. The changes I have made will be seen to be very slight, and the sense obtained is much the same as Ewalds "Surely in vain from the hills is the noise, from the mountains" (where every reader must feel that "from the mountains" is a forcible feeble addition which adds nothing to the sense). We might also perhaps detach the mem from the term for "hills," and connect it with the preceding word, thus getting the meaning: "Surely, for Lies are the hills, the uproar of the mountains!" that is to say, the high places are devoted to delusive nonentities, who can do nothing in return for the wild orgiastic worship bestowed on them; a thought which contrasts very well with the second half of the verse: "Surely, in Iahvah our God is the safety of Israel!"
The confession continues: "And as for the Shame"-the shameful idol, the Baal whose worship involved shameful rites, {Jer_11:13; Hos_9:10} and who put his worshippers to shame, by disappointing them of help in the hour of their need {Jer_2:8; Jer_2:26-27} -"as for the Shame"-in contrast with Iahvah, the Safety of Israel, who gives all, and requires little or nothing of this kind in return-"it devoured the labour of our fathers from our youth, their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters." The allusion is to the insatiable greed of the idol priests, and the lavish expense of perpetually recurring feasts and sacrifices, which constituted a serious drain upon the resources of a pastoral and agricultural community; and to the bloody rites which, not content with animal offerings, demanded human victims for the altars of an appalling superstition. "Let us lie down in our shame, and let our infamy cover us! for toward Iahvah our God we trespassed, we and our fathers, from our youth even unto this day, and obeyed not the voice of Iahvah our God." A more complete acknowledgment of sin could hardly be conceived; no palliating circumstances are alleged, no excuses devised, of the kind with which men usually seek to soothe a disturbed conscience. The strong seductions of Canaanite worship, the temptation to join in the joyful merriment of idol festivals, the invitation of friends and neighbours, the contagion of example, -all these extenuating facts must have been at least as well known to the prophet as to modern critics, but he is expressively silent on the point of mitigating circumstances in the case of a nation to whom such light and guidance had come as came to Israel. No, he could discern no ground of hope for his people except in a full and unreserved admission of guilt, an agony of shame and contrition before God, a heartfelt recognition of the truth that from the outset of their national existence to the passing day they had continually sinned against Iahvah their God and resisted His holy Will.
Finally, to this cry of penitents humbled in the dust, and owning that they have no refuge from the consequences of their sin but in the Divine Mercy, comes the firm yet loving answer: "If thou wilt return, O Israel, saith Iahvah, unto Me wilt return, and if thou wilt put away thine Abominations" ("out of thy mouth and," LXX) "out of My Presence, and sway not to" and 1Ki_14:15, "but wilt swear By the Life of Iahvah! in good faith, justice, and righteousness; then shall the nations bless themselves by Him, and in Him shall they glory." {Jer_4:1-2} Such is the close of this ideal dialogue between God and man. It is promised that if the nations repentance be sincere-not half-hearted like that of Judah {Jer_3:10; 2Ch_34:33} -and if the fact be demonstrated by a resolute and unwavering rejection of idol worship, evinced by the disuse of their names in oaths, and the expulsion of their symbols "from the Presence," that is, out of the sanctuaries and domain of Iahvah, and by adhering to the Name of the God of Israel in oaths and compacts of all kinds, and by a scrupulous loyalty to such engagements; {Psa_15:4' Isa_48:1} then the ancient oracle of blessing will be fulfilled, and Israel will become a proverb of felicity, the pride and boast of mankind, the glorious ideal of perfect virtue and perfect happiness. {Gen_12:3; Isa_65:16} Then, "all the nations will gather together unto Jerusalem for the Name of Iahvah"; {Jer_3:17} they will recognise in the religion of Iahvah the answer to their highest longings and spiritual necessities, and will take Israel for what Iahvah intended him to be, their example and priest and prophet.
Jeremiah could hardly have chosen a more extreme instance for pointing the lesson he had to teach than the long since ruined and depopulated kingdom of the Ten Tribes. Hopeless as their actual condition must have seemed at the time, he assures his own countrymen in Judah and Jerusalem that even yet, if only the moral requirements of the case were fulfilled, and the heart of the poor remnant and of the survivors in banishment aroused to a genuine and permanent repentance, the Divine promises would be accomplished in a people whose sun had apparently set in darkness forever. And so he passes on to address his own people directly in tones of warning, reproof, and menace of approaching wrath. {Jeremiah 4:3-Jeremiah 6:30}
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v6 Jeremiah's Third Prophecy. The Fate of the Ten Tribes…
Jeremiah's Third Prophecy. The Fate of the Ten Tribes a Warning to Judah
In this prophecy, as in the last, idolatry is denounced under the figure of unfaithfulness to the marriage vow. But as a marked distinction, God here invites to repentance, and on this there hinges pardon.
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6-20. Israel and Judah have both forsaken their Divine Spouse, but forgiveness will follow repentance.
7-11. Samaria, the capital of the kingdom of the Ten Tribes, after a stubborn resistance had been captured by Sargon, king of Assyria, 722 b.c., and more than 27,000 of its inhabitants deported. The isolation and comparative poverty of Judah helped her to survive her northern sister for well over a hundred years. But failure to take advantage of the warning thus afforded her brought its inevitable results. Moreover, in spite of greater privileges, she had added to apostasy treachery, by hypocritically feigning still to pay homage to Jehovah under cover of idolatrous rites. She had rejected Josiah's reforms, and this rejection sealed her fate. 'It is not by the act of its government that a nation stands or falls; Ahaz and Manasseh lent the weight of their influence to the cause of idolatry; Hezekiah and Josiah to the cause of truth: but the nation had to determine which should prevail' (Speaker's Commentary).
8. I saw] some read, 'she saw.' Bill of di vorce] i.e. exile.
11. Justified herself more] for Judah had even more warning than Israel.
12. Toward the north] to Assyria, the place of Israel's captivity.
14. One of.. two of, etc.] A 'city' might be a mere village. A 'family,' i.e. descendants of a common ancestor, suggested a larger number. There were, e.g., only four or five families in the whole tribe of Judah. The reference here is to the return from the exile to Palestine.
16. The blessings of repentance and obedience. Even the ark with the mercy seat on which the brightness which marked Jehovah's presence rested shall be forgotten, for Jehovah shall no longer be confined to one place or one people. All nations shall serve Him; His dominion centred in Jerusalem shall extend to the ends, of the earth.
17. Imagination] RV 'stubbornness.'
19. The Lord tells of His affection for Israel. But] rather,'and.' How] i.e. In what honourable position? The children] the nations of the earth, all of them God's children, as created by Him.
22-25. An acceptable prayer of repentance.
23. The multitude of mountains] RV 'the tumult' (RM 'the noisy throng') 'on the mountains': the orgies and clamorous supplications of idolatrous crowds at the high places.
24. Shame] RV 'the shameful thing,' i.e. the god Baal: cp. Jer_11:13. Hath devoured] hath consumed in the form of sacrifices the fruits of our toil.
Jer_4:1-4. The assurance of forgiveness. 1. Then shalt, etc.] RM 'and wilt not wander.'
3. Break up, etc.] As the farmer is careful to clear the soil of weeds before sowing his seed, so with Israel. The sowing of repentance must be serious and real.
4. Circumcise] Circumcision was a dedication of self to God's service, and a removal of imperfections.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v6 The Lord said
The Lord said
The general character of the second message to Judah is:
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(1) of reproach that the example of Jehovah’s chastening of the northern kingdom 2Ki 17:1-18 had produced no effect upon Judah, e.g. Jer 3:6-10.
(2) of warning of a like chastisement impending over Judah, e.g. Jer 3:15-17.
(3) of touching appeals to return to Jehovah, e.g. Jer 3:12-14.
(4) of promises of final national restoration and blessing, e.g. Jer 3:16-18.
Israel
"Israel" and "Ephraim": names by which the northern kingdom (the ten tribes) is usually called in the prophets. When by "Israel" the whole nation is meant, it will appear from the context.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v6 The Call to Repentance and judgment Announced (3:6-6:30)
The Call to Repentance and judgment Announced (3:6-6:30)
CHAPTER 3
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1. The contrast between backslidden Israel and treacherous Judah (Jer 3:6-11)
2. The call to return and the promised glory (Jer 3:12-18)
3. The future true repentance predicted and anticipated (Jer 3:19-25)
Jer 3:6-11. The message which begins with the sixth verse was given to Jeremiah during the reign of Josiah. There is then, first of all, a contrast between Israel (the ten tribes) and her sister Judah. (Compare with Eze 23:1-49.) The house of Israel, the northern kingdom was judged first by the Lord. She played the harlot; after she had done so, the Lord said, “Turn thou to Me.” She refused, and her treacherous sister the house of Judah saw it. And when the Lord dealt with the house of Israel in judgment and they were carried away, Judah did not fear but played the harlot. The tenth verse proves conclusively that the reformation under Josiah was not a true spiritual revival: “And yet for all this her treacherous sister Judah hath not returned unto Me with her whole heart, but feignedly, saith the LORD.”
Jer 3:12-18. Here is a message to be proclaimed toward the north, calling on backsliding Israel to return. He promises mercy to them. One hundred years before, the house of Israel had gone northward as captives. The Lord knew where they dwelt and sent them this message of mercy. He knows today where the house of Israel is, the ten tribes, and at some future time the gracious offer given here will be consummated in their return. These verses are prophetic. They speak of the time when the chosen people will return. Then Jerusalem will be called “the throne of the LORD.” Israel will be converted. All the nations will be gathered unto the Name of Jehovah; the house of Judah with the house of Israel will be reunited. That will be when the King our ever blessed Lord comes back.
Jer 3:19-25. What the future true repentance of the people will be is here predicted and anticipated. There will be weeping and supplications. They will acknowledge that true salvation is in the Lord. They will confess their sins and their disobedience.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On v6 The Call to Return
The Call to Return
v. 6. The Lord said also unto me in the days of Josiah, the king, an account which the prophet here inserts on account of the application. Hast thou seen that which backsliding Israel hath done? Israel being called apostasy outright to emphasize the seriousness of her defection. She is gone up upon every high mountain and under every green tree and there hath played the harlot, in committing idolatry or spiritual adultery, the sanctuaries of idols being located in such places.
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v. 7. And I said after she had done all these things, these were the thoughts which filled the Lord’s heart. Turn thou unto Me, this being the underlying thought in all prophetic admonition. But she returned not, the northern kingdom consistently rejecting the Lord’s call. And her treacherous sister Judah saw it, being influenced by Israel’s evil example.
v. 8. And I saw, when for all the causes whereby backsliding Israel committed adultery I had put her away and given her a bill of divorce, a writing of dismissal, namely, at the time when the northern kingdom was led away into the Assyrian captivity; yet her treacherous sister Judah feared not, was not filled with a wholesome respect for the Lord’s punishment, but went and played the harlot also, was also given to idolatry.
v. 9. And it came to pass through the lightness of her whoredom, the ease with which she practiced her infamous wickedness, that she defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and with stocks, with idols of wood and stone, so that the entire land was profaned before the Lord, the entire section inhabited by the northern tribes being polluted by the idolatrous customs so readily accepted by its people.
v. 10. And yet for all this, although she had the deterring example of Israel before her eyes always, her treacherous sister Judah hath not turned unto Me with her whole heart, but feignedly, saith the Lord. The reformation in the eighteenth year of Josiah was not general or thorough; it was only a straw-fire without lasting consequences.
v. 11. And the Lord said unto me, The backsliding Israel hath justified herself more than treacherous Judah, she was righteous by comparison with the overwhelming guilt of the latter, who possessed the unusual advantages of the Temple and the center of worship in her midst.
v. 12. Go and proclaim these words toward the North, because Israel had been carried away captive in that direction, and say, Return, thou backsliding Israel, saith the Lord, a loving invitation addressed to the northern tribes, which was also to arouse the zeal of Judah, and I will not cause Mine anger to fall upon you, not continue to frown upon them in wrath and displeasure; for I am merciful, saith the Lord, preferring to show grace and mercy rather than indignation, and I will not keep anger forever. But there is one condition upon the fulfillment of which the Lord must insist:
v. 13. Only acknowledge thine iniquity, freely confessing her transgressions and her guilt, that thou hast transgressed against the Lord, thy God, against whom, in the last analysis, every sin is directed, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, wandering back and forth in her apostasy, and ye have not obeyed My voice, saith the Lord.
v. 14. Turn, O backsliding children, saith the Lord, for I am married unto you, literally, "I am Lord and Husband to you"; and I will take you one of a city and two of a family, or tribe, collecting the true Israelites from the cities and nations where they are scattered, one by one, and I will bring you to Zion, at the time of the New Testament or Messianic kingdom;
v. 15. and I will give you pastors, leaders in both the spiritual and the civil domain, as Zerubbabel and Nehemiah, according to Mine own heart, which shall feed you with knowledge and understanding, the New Testament teachers of the Gospel-message being foremost in this respect.
v. 16. And it shall come to pass, when ye be multiplied and increased in the land, in those days, saith the Lord, in the days when the spiritual Israelites would be gathered in the kingdom of the Messiah, they shall say no more, The Ark of the Covenant of the Lord, attaching the real importance of religion to the possession of this sacred vessel, neither shall it come to mind, they would, in fact, not even miss it; neither shall they remember it, neither shall they visit it, neither shall that be done any more, it would not be made again. The ark was, in fact, not restored after the Babylonian captivity, the Lord thus signifying that the time of types and shadows was soon to come to an end.
v. 17. At that time, in the Messianic period, they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the Lord, where He revealed Himself to His people, but no longer in a cloud and in a pillar of fire; and all the nations, namely, in their representatives, the true believers, shall be gathered unto it, to the name of the Lord, to Jerusalem, because the name of the Lord, the Word of His grace, would be proclaimed in the midst of His holy congregation; neither shall they walk any more after the imagination of their evil heart, in obstinacy or stubbornness.
v. 18. In those days the house of Judah shall walk with the house of Israel, all true Israelites being united in the Church of Christ, and they shall come together out of the land of the North, from all the countries of the dispersion, to the land that I have given for an inheritance unto your fathers, to enjoy the Gospel-blessings together.
v. 19. But I said, the Lord here beginning His statement of the manner in which Israel may come to the knowledge of her sins. How shall I put thee among the children, adopting those into His family once more who had forsaken Him for idols, and give thee a pleasant land, a goodly heritage of the hosts of nations? in enjoying the blessings of the Messianic era. And I said, Thou shall call Me, My Father, returning once more to the true God; and shall not turn away from Me, fully restored to the favor of Jehovah. Once more, however, the Lord sets forth the faithlessness of the people of His choice.
v. 20. Surely as a wife treacherously departeth from her husband, forsaking the companion of her youth, so have ye dealt treacherously with Me, O house of Israel, saith the Lord. Upon this final accusation of the Lord the sorrow of the people and their confession of sins is brought out with dramatic intensity.
v. 21. A voice was heard upon the high places, the very scene of their idolatries becoming the scene of their open confession of their transgressions, weeping and supplications of the children of Israel, a public proclamation of their penitence; for they have perverted their way, and they have forgotten the Lord, their God, a fact which they now acknowledge with deep sorrow. So the Lord calls to them:
v. 22. Return, ye backsliding children, and I will heal your backslidings. And they, full, of eager desire, answer: Behold, we come unto Thee; for Thou art the Lord, our God. Moreover, they now concede:
v. 23. Truly, in vain is salvation hoped for from the hills and from the multitude of mountains, it is a delusion and a snare to expect help from the priests of the mountain sanctuaries; truly, in the Lord, our God, is the salvation of Israel, He alone can bring about the deliverance of His people.
v. 24. For shame hath devoured the labor of our fathers from our youth, namely, the idols, whose worship brought shame and disgrace upon their worshipers; their flocks and their herds, their sons and their daughters, for not only did their service require a steady stream of sacrifices, but their worship also brought down upon the people the punishment of the Lord, by which their children were torn from their side.
v. 25. We lie down in our shame, as the penitent seats himself in dust and in ashes, and our confusion covereth us; for we have sinned against the Lord, our God, we and our fathers, from our youth even unto this day, and have not obeyed the voice of the Lord, our God. A full and unequivocal confession of sins, a complete acknowledgment of guilt, is the first step in true repentance. "He that covereth his sins shall not prosper; but whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall have mercy. " Pro 28:13.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On v6 Do you see what faithless Israel has done?
Do you see what faithless Israel has done?
God uses this question to draw Jeremiah's attention to Israel's faithlessness. It can be translated as a command or a statement. AT: "See how faithless Israel is to me." or "You see how faithless Israel is to me." (See: Rhetorical Question)
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She has gone up
The people of Israel are spoken of as if Israel were a woman. AT: "Israel's people have gone up" or "They have gone up" (See: Metaphor)
every high hill and under every leafy tree
The tops of hills and under shade trees were common places for people to worship idols. The word "every" is used as a generalization to show that the people were worshiping idols in many different places. (See: Hyperbole and Generalization)
she has acted like a prostitute
God speaks as of Israel worshiping idols as if she were a woman having sex with many men. AT: (See: Simile)
her faithless sister Judah saw
God speaks of Israel and Judah as if they were sisters. AT: "the people of Judah, who also did not obey me, saw" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
Josiah
king
faithless
kingdom of Israel
high place
kingdom of Judah
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv4, 6, 7 3:4-5 Instead of confessing their sins, the people tried…
3:4-5 Instead of confessing their sins, the people tried to cover them over with sweet talk. However, God saw through their deception. They were inadvertently correct that he would not be angry forever (Ps 103:9; Isa 57:16; Mal 1:6), though he promised to vent his wrath (Jer 4:7).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.