However I sent to you all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, “Oh, don’t do this abominable thing that I hate.”
Parallel Translations
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However I sent to you all my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them, saying, “Oh, don’t do this abominable thing that I hate.”
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Howbeit I sent unto you all my servants the prophets, rising early and sending them, saying, Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate.
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Howbeit I sent unto you all My servants the prophets, sending them betimes and often, saying: Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate.
Cross-references (15)
Passages linked to Jeremiah 44:4 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Jeremiah 26:5 to listen to the words of my servants the prophets, whom I send to you, even rising up early and sending them, but you have not listened;
- Jeremiah 7:13 Now, because you have done all these works,” says Yahweh, “and I spoke to you, rising up early and speaking, but you didn’t hear; and I called you, but you didn’t answer;
- Jeremiah 7:25 Since the day that your fathers came out of the land of Egypt to this day, I have sent to you all my servants the prophets, daily rising up early and sending them.
- 2 Chronicles 36:15 Yahweh, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place;
- Jeremiah 16:18 First I will recompense their iniquity and their sin double, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable things, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.”
- Jeremiah 29:19 because they have not listened to my words,” says Yahweh, “with which I sent to them my servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them; but you would not hear,” says Yahweh.
- Ezekiel 8:10 So I went in and looked, and saw every form of creeping things, abominable animals, and all the idols of the house of Israel, portrayed around on the wall.
- Ezekiel 16:47 Yet you have not walked in their ways, nor done their abominations; but soon you were more corrupt than they in all your ways.
- Zechariah 7:7 Aren’t these the words which Yahweh proclaimed by the former prophets, when Jerusalem was inhabited and in prosperity, and its cities around her, and the South and the lowland were inhabited?’ ”
- Jeremiah 25:3-4 From the thirteenth year of Josiah the son of Amon, king of Judah, even to this day, these twenty-three years, Yahweh’s word has come to me, and I have spoken to you, rising up early and speaking; but you have not listened. Yahweh has sent to you all his servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them (but you have not listened or inclined your ear to hear),
- Jeremiah 32:33 They have turned their backs to me, and not their faces. Although I taught them, rising up early and teaching them, yet they have not listened to receive instruction.
- Jeremiah 35:17 “Therefore Yahweh, the God of Armies, the God of Israel, says: ‘Behold, I will bring on Judah and on all the inhabitants of Jerusalem all the evil that I have pronounced against them; because I have spoken to them, but they have not heard; and I have called to them, but they have not answered.’ ”
- Ezekiel 16:36 ‘The Lord Yahweh says, “Because your filthiness was poured out, and your nakedness uncovered through your prostitution with your lovers; and because of all the idols of your abominations, and for the blood of your children, that you gave to them;
- 1 Peter 4:3 For we have spent enough of our past time doing the desire of the Gentiles, and having walked in lewdness, lusts, drunken binges, orgies, carousings, and abominable idolatries.
- Revelation 17:4-5 The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of the sexual immorality of the earth. And on her forehead a name was written, “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF THE PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
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John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain Now follows a circumstance by which their impiety was…
Now follows a circumstance by which their impiety was still further enhanced, that God had sent them Prophets who stretched forth their hands to them to draw them from their errors. For had they never been warned, their condemnation would have been just; for God had once shewn to them by his Law what was right. The teaching, then, of the Law ought to have been sufficient for all ages. But when God had never ceased to send Prophets, one after another, it was a sign of hopeless obstinacy to reject so many and so constant warnings. God then added this circumstance that it might appear that the Jews were wholly inexcusable, and worthy of a hundred and of a thousand deaths, because they had so perversely despised all the means of salvation.
But God says, that he had sent to them all his servants What is universal has its own peculiar importance; for if one or two Prophets had been sent, the Jews would have been proved guilty; for the law does not require more than two or three witnesses to condemn those who have done wrong. (Deuteronomy 17:6.) But God shews here that there had been a vast number of those, through whom, had they been believed, the Jews might have been preserved in safety. They might, then, have been proved guilty, not only by three or four witnesses, but even by a great number; for the Prophets had continually succeeded one another. And thus had been fulfilled what God had promised in the Law,
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“A Prophet will I raise up from the midst of thy brethren, him shalt thou hear; and every one who will not hear that Prophet shall be cut off from his people.” (Deuteronomy 18:18, 19)
For God shews in his proclaimed Law, that this would be one of his chief blessings, ever to keep the Jews in the knowledge of their duty, by never leaving them destitute of Prophets and faithful teachers, here then he shews that he had ever really performed what he had promised by Moses; for he does not say that he had only sent a few, but, as I have said, that there had been a copious abundance; for in every age there were several Prophets, and some, when it became necessary, succeeded others. But what had been the fruit? He afterwards complains that all the Prophets had been rejected.
But to render their sin still more heinous, he says, rising up early and sending Of this kind of speaking an explanation has been elsewhere given. (Jeremiah 7:13; Jeremiah 11:7) It is a metaphorical language; for God rises not nor does he change places; but here he applies to himself what peculiarly belongs to men. For he who is attentive to business, does not wait till the sun rises, but anticipates the morning dawn. So also the Prophet says, that God had been vigilant, for he had been solicitous concerning the wellbeing of the people.
We further learn from this mode of speaking how invaluable is the benefit which God bestows when he raises up honest and faithful teachers; for it is the same as when the head of a family rises early from his bed, calls up his children, and takes care of them. Let us, then, know that teaching, when it is communicated to us, is an evidence of God’s paternal solicitude, because he would not have us to perish, but comes down to us and sees what is needful, as though he were present with us, and as a father towards his children, he takes care of us and of our affairs. This is the meaning.
He now adds the substance of his message, Do not the thing of this abomination which I hate God intimates, in short, that it had not been through him that the Jews did not return from their errors to the right way, because he had stretched forth his hand to them, and had, as it were, sup-pliantly requested them to provide better for themselves, and not knowingly and willfully to seek their own destruction, having acted as though he were a husband, who, being anxious to preserve the fidelity of his wife, might thus say to her, — “Behold, thou knowest that I cannot endure unchaste-ness; beware, then, lest thou shouldest prostitute thyself to adulterers.” So God shews here that he had testified by all his servants, that all kinds of idolatry were displeasing to him, in order that the Jews might keep themselves from idolatry.
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 Read Jer. 7:25; 25:3; 36:5; 29:19 and 32:33.
Read Jer. 7:25; 25:3; 36:5; 29:19 and 32:33.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Jer 44:4 Howbeit I sent unto you all my…
Jer 44:4 Howbeit I sent unto you all my servants the prophets, rising early and sending [them], saying, Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate.
Ver. 4. Howbeit I sent unto you all my servants.] Here the badness of men and goodness of God come equally to be considered.
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Saying, O do not this abominable thing which I hate.] It were happy if this saying of God were always shrilly sounding in our ears, whenever we are about to do anything that is evil; it would surely be a notable retentive from vice.
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.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Howbeit, I sent unto you all my servants the…
Howbeit, I sent unto you all my servants the prophets,.... As many as he raised up, and employed in the work and service of prophesying; and these were many; and as many as they were, he sent them to them, one after another, to warn them of their sin and danger; but all to no purpose; which was a further aggravation of their wickedness: nay, though he was
rising early, and sending them; was very early in his messages to them; gave them timely warning, and let slip no opportunity of admonishing them; and this he did constantly; see Jer 7:13;
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saying, Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate; all sin is abominable in itself, and hateful to God, especially idolatry; and therefore should not be done; it should be abominable to men, and hateful to them, because it is so to God; and after such a remonstrance as this, to commit it must be very aggravating and provoking.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 4. O, do not this abominable thing] A…
Verse 4. O, do not this abominable thing] A strong specimen of affectionate entreaty. One of the finest figures of poetry, when judiciously managed, the anthropopathia, the ascribing human passions to God, is often used by this prophet: so God is said to grieve, to mourn, to have his bowels moved with compassion, to repent, to be angry, c. Here he is represented as tenderly expostulating: O, do not or, I entreat you, do not that abominable thing which I hate.
1. Do it not: your God commands.
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2. O, do it not: your Father entreats.
3. It is an abominable thing, and should not be done.
4. I hate it, and on that account ye should abstain from it.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Howbeit I sent - And I sent.
Howbeit I sent - And I sent.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain (Ch2 36:15).
(Ch2 36:15).
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 4. Rising early — Expressive of his personal care…
4. Rising early — Expressive of his personal care and solicitude.
This abominable thing — Literally, the thing of this abomination, idolatry. The language is emotional, and shows the intensity of God’s hatred of it.
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 4. Cp. Jer_7:25 and elsewhere. We should perhaps read…
4. Cp. Jer_7:25 and elsewhere. We should perhaps read for “you” them, although “you” implies in a significant way the continuous personality of the nation.
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 (4) Rising early and sending them . . .—The…
(4) Rising early and sending them . . .—The prophet uses the same anthropomorphic language as of old (Jer_7:25; Jer_25:4; Jer_26:5; Jer_29:19). The term “abominable thing,” or “abomination,” though common in many of the books of the Old Testament, as in the Proverbs, where it is applied to moral enormities (e.g., Pro_3:32; Pro_6:16), is specially characteristic, as applied to idolatry, of Deuteronomy (Deu_27:15; Deu_32:16), Jeremiah (here and Jer_7:10; Jer_8:12; Jer_32:35), and Ezek. (Eze_5:11, and some forty other passages).
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 The mind of God towards sin and sinners.
The mind of God towards sin and sinners.
"Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate!" Idolatry is the sin specially referred to here. And it was indeed an "abominable thing." Pollution, cruelty, degradation, were inseparably associated with it. But the words may be applied to all sin should be so applied. For what is sin? It is the acting out of that evil corrupt nature which we know to our cost lurks within us all. It is the stream that naturally flows from an evil fountain, the fruit that is sure to grow on a corrupt tree. Now, this view declares the mind of God
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I TOWARDS SIN.
1. He calls it this abominable thing. Thus he brands it. See how justly. For what do we call abominable? Is wrong done to a benefactor abominable? Is not every sin such a wrong? God does not command more than he deserves when he says, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart," etc. What do we not owe to him? and how do we requite him? Is wrong done to one who has entrusted his goods to us that we may employ them for him, who has made us his stewards that we may employ rightly that which he has committed to our care, is faithlessness to such abominable? But is not sin precisely such a wrong? Our mind, affections, will, our body with all its faculties and passions, what are they aught else but our Maker"s goods with which, as stewards, he has entrusted us? Let conscience declare the use we have made of them that sin makes of them. Is wrong done to the defenceless and innocent abominable? Do we not cry out loudly against such a one? But is not sin such a wrong? We sin not to ourselves. We entail the consequences of our actions on those who cannot defend themselves, who are utterly innocent, and who will surely suffer by what we do. No man dieth to himself. He drags down in the vortex in which he himself is engulfed children, friends, neighbours, companions, all whom he has influenced and helped to make sinful like himself. Is wrong done to vast numbers abominable, so that when we hear of how one has brought ruin upon multitudes our anger against him grows the more? Surely it is so. But where do the ever-widening circles of sin"s deadly influence stop? How wide an area do they enfold? "Jeroboam the son of Nebat... made Israel to sin." Is that which pollutes and defiles, which is sensual and unclean, abominable? But sin is guilty of all this. For all these reasons and others sin is an abominable thing.
2. He hates it. "Do not... that I hate! God hates nothing that he has made. To us some creatures are hateful and some persons. But not so to God. He does not hate even the sinner, but only his sin. It is not alone that it is abominable in its own nature that he hates it, but it works such ruin, spreads sorrow and desolation far and wide. It has opened and peoples the abodes of the lost. And it does despite and dishonour to the Son of God. How, then, can God do otherwise than hate it?
II TOWARDS THE SINNER. Note the pleading tone of this verse, "Oh, do not," etc.! What pity, what compassion, what yearning love, are all discernible in this beseeching entreaty which God addresses to the sinner! "Hear, then, God say to you, "Do it not!" Now, what are you going to do? Do you mean to tell me that you will persist in it? Do you really mean that? Now, think! Do you really mean to go on sinning in the face of such a message as this? with conscience smarting, and saying in its guilty smart, Do not that abominable thing! with memory weighted with the recollection of past transgressions, and saying by the leaden burden which it carries, Do not that abominable thing! With all this, and much more, do you mean to say that you will continue in sin? With remorse, like spiritual tempest, already springing up within your soul, and threatening to destroy all your joy and peace; with a fearful looking for of judgment and future indignation; with your miserable convictions, and with your bitter fears; with your gloomy forebodings, and with your knowledge of the results and consequences of sin; do you mean to tell me that you are determined to continue? Well, if you be determined to continue, when the offended Father comes down to you in his marvellous condescension, and cries, "Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate!" then, we fear, there is but little hope; and certainly, if this state of heart continue, we cannot have much hope concerning you. It is probable that if some of you pass by many more seasons of conviction, God will say, "He is joined to his idols; let him alone;" and you will be, in this world, left alone. You will come here, perhaps, according to your custom, but you will be left alone, I shall never have a message to you; I shall never have a prayer for you; no warning from these lips will ever reach you; you will be insensible as the very pews in which you sit, and nothing shall seem, in these ordinances, to be a voice from Heaven to your guilty and needy soul. Thus will you live until, with a seared conscience, you lie down on the bed of death, and there, perhaps, when it is too late, all your old fears will be awakened. You may send to your minister upon that bed of death, and he may come, but by your bedside he may be speechless, his very power to pray may depart from him, and in trying to ask mercy for you all his utterances may be choked; and you may go from that wretched dying bed to hell. And as you sink down into the pit, the millstone about your neck will be the abominable thing which God hates (Rev. S. Martin). C.
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 Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate.
Jer_44:4
Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate.
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The thing which God hates
I. What sin itself is.
II. God hates it.
1. Because it is contrary to His own nature.
2. Because it is unnatural in His creatures.
3. Because it transgresses holy, just, and good laws.
4. Because it defiles and injures the entire human nature. It brings a withering curse upon every stage of life, and upon every development of life, and upon every phase of life, and upon every department of life.
5. Because it makes men curses to each other.
6. Because it ignores or it rejects the Divine government.
7. Because wherever sin exists, except as it is checked by Gods mercy, it has the dominion.
8. Because wherever it is introduced, it spreads.
9. Sin requires God to inflict upon men of every class and kind, that which He assures us, upon His oath, He has no pleasure in.
10. Their continuing in sin tramples under foot the blood of Jesus. (S. Martin.)
The popular estimate of sin
I. What is sin? Theology is determined by the answer. Sin is only negation as cold is the negation of heat; darkness, of light; disease, of health. So we are told. Well, I know that I shiver to-night under the negation of heat. I grope under the negation of light, and feel a very positive thorn in the flesh. Away with this juggling of words! Sin is a fact and must be dealt with.
II. What do you mean by the new life? If Sin be easy to control, no helplessness is felt, no great change of being is accepted, no outside help is needed. If you fancy that one bad deed is cancelled by another good one, and that you are all right at heart, although often wrong in action, you will not seek salvation.
III. What disclosure does Scripture make? An abominable thing. What does sin propose to do? It defies God and would usurp His throne were it possible. The smallest infringement of the principle of honesty in social life breaks up the confidence of man in man and introduces destructive tendencies. The greater the transgression, the more destructive are the results.
IV. What about the remedy of sin? We know not all the counsels of God, but we know enough of the covenant He made with His Son Jesus Christ to say that by His vicarious atonement we are freed from the penalty of sin, and by the washing of regeneration and the renewal of the Holy Ghost we are made pure--the past and future are covered by His meritorious work. (C. S. Robinson, D. D.)
Gods expostulation with sinners
I. The description of sin here given by God.
1. We call those objects abominable which excite in us the sensations of loathing and abhorrence. That such is the nature of sin, even in its most agreeable forms, may be learned from the various figures under which it is represented in the Word of God. Whatever is revolting in corruption, loathsome in uncleanness, or hideous in deformity, is there brought forward, in order to give us some idea of its abominable nature.
2. It must be considered not only as loathsome to God, but as exciting in Him the desire of its destruction, and an inclination to execute vengeance upon all to whom it is an object of delight. From an abominable object we naturally turn away; but what we hate we seek to destroy.
(1) Sin is hateful to God, as it is the very reverse of His nature.
(2) Sin is hateful to God, as it is a transgression of His law.
(3) Sin is hateful to God, as it opposes His designs.
(4) Sin is hateful to God, as it is an expression of enmity in the heart against His very being.
II. The manner in which God beseeches us to abstain from sin.
1. We are naturally prone to wickedness.
2. God hath designs of mercy towards our guilty race.
3. The salvation of sinners is accomplished in a way perfectly consistent with their freedom as moral agents.
4. God is deeply concerned for the salvation of sinners.
III. Some considerations that ought to induce us to hearken to the voice of God, and do what He requires.
1. It is God why, expostulates with you,. and beseeches you to abstain from sin.
2. The extreme folly of sin is another consideration, that may induce you to abstain from it.
3. The fatal consequences of continuing in sin, especially after we haven been called to repentance, is a consideration that ought to induce you to hear, and do what the Lord requires. (G. Campbell.)
Argument against sinning
I. God denounces sin with abhorrence. He calls it an abominable thing. Sin is represented in the Bible as a loathsome, odious, revolting, execrable thing. All kinds of sin are an abomination. Lying lips (Pro_12:22). Pride (Pro_16:5). Wicked thoughts (Pro_15:26). Wickedness in all its forms (Pro_15:9). Sin is essentially an abomination. Three things show this:--
1. The misrepresenting conduct of the sinner. Sin has a self-hiding, self-dissimulating instinct.
2. The universal conscience of mankind. Injustice, falsehood, self-seeking impiety, with all their kindred sins, the conscience of the world abhors.
3. The history of the Divine conduct towards our world.
(1) Look at the judicial inflictions recorded in the Bible: expulsion from Eden, the deluge, the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah, the destruction of Jerusalem, &c.
(2) Merciful interpositions. How has mercy wrought, through all past ages, to sweep abominations from the world! through patriarchs, prophets, apostles, holy ministers, and Christ Himself. He came to put away sin:
II. God hates sin with intensity. He says, I hate it. The Infinite heart revolts from it with ineffable detestation.
1. He hates it, for it is deformity, and He is the God of beauty. How offensive to the artist of high aesthetic taste and culture, are figures introduced into the realm of art, unscientific in their proportions, and unrefined in their touch!
2. He hates it, for it is confusion, and He is the God of order. Order, says the poet, is Heavens first law.
3. He hates it, for it is misery, and He is the Cod of love. Every sin has in it the sting of the serpent, which, if not extracted, will rankle with fiery anguish in the soul for ever. God hates this evil, for He desires the happiness of His creatures.
III. God prohibits sin with earnestness. Oh, do not this abominable thing. What depths of fervid loving solicitude are in this Oh!
1. Do it not; you are warring against your own highest interest.
2. Do it not; you are warring against the well-being of the creation.
3. Do it not; you are warring against Me. Every sin is a war against My ideas, My feelings, My plans, My institutions. (Homilist.)
Lifes lameness: the character of sin
The church bells were ringing out a merry peal of welcome as a bride and bridegroom left the church after the marriage service. The bride was given some flowers as she passed to her carriage, and a small drop of water fell from a flower on to the brides light dress. Soon after, a slight stain was noticed there, and the remark was made: A spot of sin as small as this would shut either of us out of heaven. That remark was perfectly true. A little speck of dust on the lens of a telescope will mar its powers of vision. A tiny hair in the mainspring of a watch will suffice to stop the machinery, So one little sin, secretly cherished and wilfully indulged, will choke up our soul s communion with God and destroy our spiritual comfort. What, then, is sin? Sin is rebellion against God. Self-love is the secret of sin. The hidden principle of all sin is rejection of the will of God. None of Gods commands are grievous, and therefore the question of our obedience is made to turn precisely on the will of God. God alone is independent. He has made us for Himself; and the more we seek to bring our wills into subjection to His, and our lives into complete dependence upon Him, the happier and the holier shall we become. As a train was speeding along the railroad in the north of England the other day, a spark from the engine set fire to a shrub in a plantation near the line, and then the fire spread to a forest, where it raged for two days, doing immense damage. Who would have thought that such a result would arise, from a little spark? Yet so it is in the world of life--great results spring from the most trivial causes. Our hearts are, like those dry trees, ready to burst into a blaze when touched by the spark of sin. Therefore we must beware of sin. When Canova, the great Italian sculptor, was about to commence his famous statue of the great Napoleon, his keenly observant eye detected a tiny red line running through the upper portion of the splendid block of marble which had been brought from Paros at enormous cost. Others saw no flaw, but the great sculptor detected it, and he refused to lay chisel upon it. The very perfection he aimed at compelled him to reject the marble block. Now if there is a flaw in your life, others may not see it, but God most assuredly will. And that there is such a flaw God declares. His Word asserts, All have sinned (Rom_3:23). There is none that doeth good, no, not one (Psa_14:3). During a naval engagement off Copenhagen, Admiral Parker signalled the ships to cease action. Nelson did not wish to retire his ship. When informed of the Admirals signal, he looked through the telescope with his blind eye, and exclaimed, I see no such signal He persistently deceived himself in order that he might continue the fight. If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us (1Jn_1:8). But we deceive no one else. It is no excuse for a man to say he does not steal, does not lie, does not swear, does not covet. Neglect of known duty is sin. Man has a duty to God (Mat_22:37). Not to love God is sin. And the Bible not only charges man with not loving God, but it speaks of man as being in a state of enmity against God (Rom_8:7). Therefore he cannot restore himself. It is a stormy night by the sea-shore. The wind is howling and moaning, and ever and anon with boisterous gusts threatening violence to the shipping in the harbour. The sea is lashed into a seething foam. On the beach are scattered groups of people--men hurrying to and fro with excited determination, and women wringing their hands in mute agony and mingled prayer. You look out to sea. In the darkness of the night you can see nothing, but you can tell by the whirr and rush of the rocket apparatus, by the cries of the life boatmen, that a vessel is in danger. You know there is a ship in distress by these signs, though you may not know the extent or reality of her danger. So, when I see the Lord Jesus Christ leaving His throne in glory, living a life of anguish, and dying a cruel death, I learn that sin is a terrible reality. Oh, what a hideous, fiendish monster is sin, when it turns its cursed enmity against the blessed Son of God, and imbrues its cruel hands in His precious blood! The Emperor Arcadius and his wife Eudoxia had a very bitter feeling towards St. John Chrysostom, Bishop of Constantinople. One day, in a fit of anger, the Emperor said to some of his courtiers, I would I were avenged of this bishop! Several then proposed how this should be done. Banish him and exile him to the desert, said one. Put him in prison, said another. Confiscate his property, said a third. Let him die, said a fourth. Another courtier, whose vices Chrysostom had reproved, said maliciously, You all make a great mistake. You will never punish him by such proposals. If banished the kingdom, he will feel God as near to him in the desert as here. If you put him in prison and load him with chains, he will still pray for the poor and praise God in the prison. If you confiscate his property, you merely take away his goods from the poor, not from him. If you condemn him to death, you open heaven to him. Prince, do you wish to be revenged on him? Force him to commit sin. I know him; this man fears nothing in the world but sin. Is there no lesson here for you and me? (A. Finlayson.)
Divine pleading
If anyone suffers very keenly from nervous exhaustion, it seems sometimes almost impossible for him to bear the noise of a child who persists in running heavily overhead. He will adopt a pleading rather than an angry tone: My child, do not do this again; I cannot bear it. Let us think of Gods holy nature as more sensitive to sin than the most highly-strung nerves to noise, and hear Him saying, whenever we are on the point of committing sin, Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate. (F. B. ,Meyer, B. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain
Jeremiah
GOD’S PATIENT PLEADINGS
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Jer 44:4.
The long death-agony of the Jewish kingdom has come to an end. The frivolous levity, which fed itself on illusions and would not be sobered by facts, has been finally crushed out of the wretched people. The dreary succession of incompetent kings-now a puppet set up by Egypt, now another puppet set up by Babylon, has ended with the weak Zedekiah. The throne of David is empty, and the long line of kings, which numbered many a strong, wise, holy man, has dwindled into a couple of captives, one of them blind and both of them paupers on an idolatrous monarch’s bounty. The country is desolate, the bulk of the people exiles, and the poor handful, who had been left by the conqueror, flitting like ghosts, or clinging, like domestic animals, to their burnt homes and wasted plains, have been quarrelling and fighting among themselves, murdering the Jewish ruler whom Babylon had left them, and then in abject terror have fled en masse across the border into Egypt, where they are living wretched lives. What a history that people had gone through since they had lived on the same soil before! From Moses to Zedekiah, what a story! From Goshen till now it had been one long tragedy which seems to have at last reached its fifth act. Nine hundred years have passed, and this is the issue of them all!
The circumstances might well stir the heart of the prophet, whose doleful task it had been to foretell the coming of the storm, who had had to strip off Judah’s delusions and to proclaim its certain fall, and who in doing so had carried his life in his hand for forty years, and had never met with recognition or belief.
Jeremiah had been carried off by the fugitives to Egypt, and there he made a final effort to win them back to God. He passed before them the outline of the whole history of the nation, treating it as having accomplished one stadium-and what does he find? In all these days since Goshen there has been one monotonous story of vain divine pleadings and human indifference, God beseeching and Israel turning away-and now at last the crash, long foretold, never credited, which had been drawing nearer through all the centuries, has come, and Israel is scattered among the people.
Such are the thoughts and emotions that speak in the exquisitely tender words of our text. It suggests-
I. God’s antagonism to sin.
It is the one thing in the universe to which He is opposed. Sin is essentially antagonism to God. People shrink from the thought of God’s hatred of sin, because of-
An underestimate of its gravity. Contrast the human views of its enormity, as shown by men’s playing with it, calling it by half-jocose names and the like, with God’s thought of its heinousness.
A false dread of seeming to attribute human emotions to God. But there is in God what corresponds to our human feelings, something analogous to the attitude of a pure human mind recoiling from evil.
The divine love must necessarily be pure, and the mightier its energy of forth-going, the mightier its energy of recoil. God’s ‘hate’ is Love inverted and reverted on itself. A divine love which had in it no necessity of hating evil would be profoundly immoral, and would be called devilish more fitly than divine.
II. The great purpose of the divine pleadings.
To wean from sin is the main end of prophecy. It is the main end of all revelation. God must chiefly desire to make His creatures like Himself. Sin makes a special revelation necessary. Sin determines the form of it.
III. God’s tender and unwearied efforts.
‘Rising early’ is a strong metaphor to express persistent effort. The more obstinate is our indifference, the more urgent are His calls. He raises His voice as our deafness grows. Mark, too, the tenderness of the entreaty in this text, ‘Oh, do not this abominable thing that I hate!’ His hatred of it is adduced as a reason which should touch any heart that loves Him. He beseeches as if He, too, were saying, ‘Though I might be bold to enjoin thee’ that which is fitting, ‘yet for love’s sake I rather beseech thee.’ The manifestation of His disapproval and the appeal to our love by the disclosure of His own are the most powerful, winning and compelling dehortations from sin. Not by brandishing the whip, not by a stern law written on tables of stone, but by unveiling His heart, does God win us from our sins.
IV. The obstinate resistance to God’s tender pleadings.
The tragedy of the nation is summed up in one word, ‘They hearkened not.’
That power of neglecting God’s voice and opposing God’s will is the mystery of our nature. How strange it is that a human will should be able to lift itself in opposition to the Sovereign Will! But stranger and more mysterious and tragic still is it that we should choose to exercise that power and find pleasure, and fancy that we shall ever find advantage, in refusing to listen to His entreaties and choosing to flout His uttered will.
Such opposition was Israel’s ruin. It will be ours if we persist in it. ‘If God spared not the natural branches, neither will He spare thee.’
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 So I repeatedly sent
So I repeatedly sent
The word "I" refers to Yahweh.
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or turn from their wickedness in burning incense to other gods
To stop doing something is spoken of as if it were physically turning away from something. AT: "or to stop behaving wickedly by burning incense to other gods" (See: Metaphor)
my fury and my wrath were poured out
Becoming angry and punishing people is spoken of as if fury and wrath were liquids there could be poured on people. This can be stated in active form. AT: "I became very angry and punished them" (See: Metaphor and Active or Passive)
my fury and my wrath
The words "fury" and "wrath" mean basically the same thing and emphasize the intensity of his wrath. AT: "my terrible wrath" (See: Doublet)
kindled a fire
Yahweh becoming angry and punishing the people of Judah is spoken of as his fury and wrath were a fire. AT: "my fury and wrath were like a fire" or "my punishment was like a fire" (See: Metaphor)
they became ruins and devastations
The words "ruins" and "devastations" mean basically the same thing. Together they emphasize the complete devastation of Judah and Jerusalem. AT: "they became completely devastated" (See: Doublet)
as at this present day
This refers to the current time at which Yahweh was speaking this message.
translationWords
send
servant
prophet
abomination
turn
wrath
fire
ruin
devastate
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.