Jeremiah 10

Chap. X. Ver. 1—25. The folly and mischiefs of idolatry confessed, with an earnest plea for mercy.—The Jews being doomed to captivity, are here warned against the superstition and idolatry of that country, to which they were going. Chaldea was famous for astrology; the Prophet therefore begins with warning them against it. He then exposes the absurdity of idolatry in short but elegant satire; in the midst of which he turns, (ver. 6,) in a beautiful apostrophe, to the One great God, whose adorable attributes are contrasted with those despicable inanities, at which the ignorant heathen trembled. It is remarkable, that verse 11 is written, not in Hebrew, but in Chaldaic, as some think, both to intimate to them the country whither they were to be carried away captive, and to furnish them with a ready answer to the heathen, in their own language, if they should attempt to draw them into idolatry.

The following verses enlarge upon the power and majesty of the God of Israel; as placing him infinitely above the pretended deities of other nations. Judgments against Judah, which fill him with an agony of grief and trouble; and in the concluding verses of the chapter, in the person of a pious Israelite, he deprecates the divine vengeance, as if with a hope to turn the approaching judgments upon the heathen: as if he had said, “We indeed are frail and fallible; do thou therefore correct us leniently and in mercy; and turn thine anger against our enemies, who, after being themselves our tempters, now threaten to destroy us.” “We are continually warned to beware of resting in mere profession, and external forms and advantages.

No place is so sacred, or so fortified, as to secure the workers of iniquity: and those who do not believe that God will execute his awful threatenings, will ‘find it so,’ when their wound will be far more grievous than they can now conceive. A gracious resignation indeed will support the believer under every grief, which the Lord may allot him: but what can render the load of divine and eternal vengeance tolerable to those, who fall under it in sullen despair? Alas! that the pastors of God’s church should very often become so brutish, as to be given-up to the pursuit of worldly interests and pleasures, to the neglect of him and his service! Such men cannot prosper, and their vine judgments on guilty nations.—But ‘the way of man is not in himself:’ if the Lord has directed our steps into the ways of peace and righteousness; let us continually entreat him to enable us still to walk in them, and to ‘hold up our goings that we slip not:’ and let us lift up our prayer for others, that they may be guided and directed in the same path.—If even severe corrections lead sinners to a conviction of these salutary truths, they will have abundant cause for gratitude: they will then humble themselves before God, and seek his guidance and assistance; they will submit to his correcting rod, and only deprecate the destroying sword of his avenging justice; and they will no longer remain under the condemnation of those nations, families, or individuals, ‘who call not upon the name of the Lord.’ But whilst he visits the offences of his people with sharp corrections, and destroys hypocrites; his hot displeasure will be poured out on those who have not known and worshipped him, and especially on the persecutors of his chosen people.” T. Scott.

Notes on the verses

Chap. X. Ver. 1. Hear ye, &c.—Dahler supposes this discourse to have been delivered in the 4th year of Jehoiakim.—Bagster. Ver. 3. For the customs.—See margin.—Compare (Isaiah 40:19-20); xliv. 12—17; _xlvi. 1 7.—With the axe—or some other sharp tool. See (Isaiah 44:13), and note. Ver. 7. For to thee doth it appertain.—Blayney, “When it shall approach unto thee,” So Boothroyd. Ver. 8. Altogether brutish.—See margin.—The stock is a doctrine of vanities.—Blayney, “The very wood itself being a rebuker of vanities,” (or Ver. 9. Silver spread into plates.—Blayney, “Beaten silver;” their idols appear to have been covered with gold or silver, beaten out thin, like leaf gold, &c.: Ver. 10.

True God… Everlasting king.—See margin.—“King of eternity.” Ver. 13. Uttereth his voice.—This is plainly an allusion to a storm of thunder and lightning, and the abundance of rain which is the consequence. See on (Job 38:26).—Bagster. Ver. 14, Every man is brutish in his knowledge.—Blayney, “By acknowledging;” i.e. by owning his own work, that he hath made a god! Ver. 17. Thy wares—That is, goods, merchandise. Ver. 18, I will sling out the inhabitants—That is, throw them out of the country “at once,” as a stone from a sling. See Ver. 22. Noise of the bruit (or report) is come.—Blayney, “Hark! a noise: behold, it advanceth!”—Bruit, from the Gothic brut, signifies a rumour or Ver.

24. Lest thou bring me to nothing.—See margin.—Blayney, “Crush me to atoms.” Ver. 25. Pour out thy fury, &c.—Let the heathen, and they who acknowledge thee not, and especially they who have unwittingly been the executors of thy justice upon us, in their turn feel its scourge, and have thy fury poured out upon them. This was fulfilled in the Chaldeans: Nebuchadnezzar was punished with madness, his son was slain in his revels, the city taken and sacked by Cyrus, and the Babylonian empire finally destroyed.—Bagster. Chap. XI. Ver. 1. The word, &c.—This discourse is supposed to have been delivered in the first year of the reign of Zedekiah. See Dahler.—Bagster. The first eight verses of this chapter are rendered, by Dr.

Blayney, in prose, the rest in Hebrew metre. Ver. 10. Are turned back, &c.—Many reformation had taken place in the reign of Josiah; but under the reign of his son and successors, they turned back again to idolatry, and became worse than ever.—Bagster. Ver. 13. Shameful thing—Or, thing of shame.—Bosheth, “shame,” was a nick-name for Baal. Hence Jerubbaal was called Jerubbesheth.—Bagster. See note on (Jeremiah 3:24). Ver. 15. What hath my beloved to do in my house, seeing she, &c.—See margin. Blayney, “Whilst she practiseth wickedness?”—And the holy flesh is passed from thee.—When Israel was redeemed from Egypt, he was “holiness;” i.e. dedicated “to the Lord;” (Jeremiah 2:3); but by the practice of sin, the nation was no more holy: by “holy flesh,” however, many understand the sacrifices, which had grown into disuse, and so were “passed away.”

But Dr. Blayney and others render this interrogatively, “Shall (vows and) holy flesh be allowed to come from thee?” Ver. 16. A green olive tree—That is He had planted thee in the land of Os xxiv. 13.—With the noise of a great tumult;—i.e. the shout of the Chaldean army. Ver. 18. And the Lord, &c.—Blayney, “Jehovah also acquainted me, and I knew; then didst thou show me their proceedings.” This is understood to refer to a secret plot against the prophet’s life, by the men of Anathoth, who were not able to endure his faithful reproofs and warnings. See verses 19, 21, 23, and compare chap. i. 1. Ver. 19. Like a lamb, or an ox,—Blayney, “Like a tame lamb;” who quotes the authority of the ancient versions, particularly the LXX.—Let us destroy the tree, &c.—See margin.—(Let us kill the prophet, and burn his prophecies.)—Bagster. Ver. 20. Let me see thy vengeance, &c.—Ruther, “I shall see thy vengeance on them.” I foresee and predict that they will ruin themselves in seeking my ruin.—Bagster.