Jeremiah 7

4 these. i.e., these buildings of the Temple, to which Jeremiah would point as he spoke. The “lying words” or “deceptive phrases” (“paroles trompeuses,” French version), are not so much the statement here made, as the inference drawn from it, that God would always favour and protect the Temple and city which were called His own. A warning against relying on the mere externals of religion.

10. We are delivered. This probably means, “We are set free by this punctilious discharge of religious duties to go on sinning.”

11 a den of robbers. On the application of these words by our Lord, see Matt. xxi. 13.

12 which was in Shiloh. See note on Josh. xviii. 1; also 1 Sam. iv. 12, 22; Psa. lxxviii. 60. The fate of Shiloh is referred to in order to destroy the people’s false confidence in the possession of the Temple, and other national privileges.

13 rising up early. i.e., speaking with prompt and earnest solicitude.

16. I will not hear thee. Jeremiah is forbidden to pray, not for the reformation of the people, but for the removal of the impending chastisement; the absolute necessity for which is shown in the following description of their public and shameless idolatry.

18 the queen of heaven. Probably the goddess Ishtar or Astarte. For this goddess, see Sayce, Primer of Assyriology (1925), and Budge, Babylonian Life and History (1925).

19 [Do they] not [provoke] themselves? The sinner’s rebellion hurts not God, but it ruins himself, for he cannot live without God’s favour.

21. Put your burnt offerings, etc. Or, “Add your burnt offerings,” etc. (R.V.). The meaning is, “Multiply your sacrifices as you may, so long as you do not bring an obedient heart, they have no value in God’s sight, and therefore you may as well eat them as offer them.” By the law in Lev. i. no part of a burnt offering could be eaten.

22. I spake not unto your fathers. Jeremiah elsewhere expressly recognises sacrifice as an ordinance of God (xxxiii. 18). The phrase here rendered concerning strictly means on account of or for the sake of. The law was not given for the sake of the ritual, which indeed was enjoined after the Ten Commandments, and had no place, like them, in the Ark of the Covenant. From the outset, therefore, the legislation of Sinai made the ceremonial distinctly subordinate to the moral. Orelli’s is one of the best explanations of this verse: “We should say, ‘I have not so much given you commands in respect of sacrifice as rather enjoined you this.’”

23. Obey My voice. The fundamental principle of the whole law was obedience to all that God enjoined: see 1 Sam. xv. 22.

24 imagination. Rather, “stubbornness,” as R.V.

28. Truth is perished. Fidelity to God is extinct.

29. Cut off thine hair. Prepare thyself for mourning: see Isa. xv. 2. The “high places” here should rather be rendered “bare heights.”

31. Tophat. It is doubtful whether this is a proper name, and it may mean generally a place of uncleanness.

to burn their sons and their daughters. In honour of Moloch, the fire or sun-god. The victims were first slain (Ezek. xvi. 21), then consumed.

32. I’ll there be no place. No place to bury any more: see R.V. But some interpreters read, “for want of room elsewhere”: see R.V. marg.

33 fray. i.e., “frighten”: cp. affray, afraid.

34 desolate. A waste (R.V.). The word is used only of places once inhabited now laid waste.