The cause of this calamity is that the shepherds, i.e., the princes and leaders of the people (see on Jeremiah 2:8; Jeremiah 3:15), are become brutish, have not sought Jahveh, i.e., have not sought wisdom and guidance from the Lord. And so they could not deal wisely, i.e., rule the people with wisdom. השׂכּיל is here not merely: have prosperity, but: show wisdom, deal wisely, securing thus the blessed results of wisdom. This is shown both by the contrasted "become brutish" and by the parallel passage, Jeremiah 3:15. מרעיתם, their pasturing, equivalent to "flock of their pasturing," their flock, Jeremiah 23:1.

The calamity over which the people mourns is drawing near, Jeremiah 10:22. Already is heard the tremendous din of a mighty host which approaches from the north to make the cities of Judah a wilderness. קול שׁמוּעה is an exclamation: listen to the rumour, it is coming near. From a grammatical point of view the subject to "comes" is "rumour," but in point of sense it is that of which the rumour gives notice. Graf weakens the sense by gathering the words into one assertory clause: "They hear a rumour come." The "great commotion" is that of an army on the march, the clattering of the weapons, the stamping and neighing of the war-horses; cf. Jeremiah 6:23; Jeremiah 8:16. From the land of midnight, the north, cf. Jeremiah 1:14; Jeremiah 4:6, etc. "To make the cities," etc., cf. Jeremiah 4:7; Jeremiah 9:10. - The rumour of the enemy's approach drives the people to prayer, Jeremiah 10:23-25. The prayer of these verses is uttered in the name of the congregation. It begins with the confession: Not with man is his way, i.e., it is not within man's power to arrange the course of his life, nor in the power of the man who walks to fix his step (וbefore הכין merely marking the connection of the thought: cf. Ew. 348, a). The antithesis to לאדם and לאישׁ is ליהוה, with God; cf. Psalm 37:23; Proverbs 16:9 : Man's heart deviseth his way, but Jahveh establisheth the steps. The thought is not: it is not in man's option to walk in straight or crooked, good or evil ways, but: the directing of man, the way by which he must go, lies not in his own but in God's power. Hitz. justly finds here the wisdom that admits: "Mit unserer Macht ist nichts getan," - man's destiny is ordained not by himself, but by God. Upon this acquiescence in God's dispensation of events follows the petition: Chasten me, for I have deserved punishment, but chasten בּמשׁפּט, acc. to right, not in Thine anger; cf. Psalm 6:2; Psalm 38:2. A chastening in anger is the judgment of wrath that shall fall on obstinate sinners and destroy them. A chastening acc. to right is one such as is demanded by right (judgment), as the issue of God's justice, in order to the reclamation and conversion of the repentant sinner. "Lest Thou make me little," insignificant, puny; not merely, diminish me, make me smaller than I now am. For such a decrease of the people would result even from a gentle chastisement. There is no comparative force in the words. To make small, in other words, reduce to a small, insignificant people. This would be at variance with "right," with God's ordained plan in regard to His people. The expression is not equivalent to: not to make an utter end, Jeremiah 30:11, etc. The people had no call to pray that they might escape being made an utter end of; thus much had been promised by God, Jeremiah 4:27; Jeremiah 5:10. - God is asked to pour forth His fury upon the heathen who know not the Lord nor call upon His name, because they seek to extirpate Jacob (the people of Israel) as the people of God, at this time found in Judah alone. The several words in Jeremiah 10:25 suggest the fury with which the heathen proceed to the destruction of Israel. The present verse is reproduced in Psalm 79:6-7, a psalm written during the exile, or at least after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans; but in the reproduction the energetic expansion of the "devoured" is omitted.

Jeremiah 11:4 Parallel Commentaries

I commanded.

Jeremiah 31:32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land...

Exodus 24:3-8 And Moses came and told the people all the words of the LORD, and all the judgments: and all the people answered with one voice...

Deuteronomy 5:2,3 The LORD our God made a covenant with us in Horeb...

Deuteronomy 29:10-15 You stand this day all of you before the LORD your God; your captains of your tribes, your elders, and your officers...

Ezekiel 20:6-12 In the day that I lifted up my hand to them, to bring them forth of the land of Egypt into a land that I had espied for them...

Hebrews 8:8-10 For finding fault with them, he said, Behold, the days come, said the Lord...

iron.

Deuteronomy 4:20 But the LORD has taken you, and brought you forth out of the iron furnace, even out of Egypt, to be to him a people of inheritance...

1 Kings 8:51 For they be your people, and your inheritance, which you brought forth out of Egypt, from the middle of the furnace of iron:

Isaiah 48:10 Behold, I have refined you, but not with silver; I have chosen you in the furnace of affliction.

obey.

Jeremiah 7:22,23 For I spoke not to your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt...

Jeremiah 26:13 Therefore now amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of the LORD your God...

Exodus 20:6 And showing mercy to thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.

Exodus 23:21,22 Beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions: for my name is in him...

Leviticus 26:3,12 If you walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them...

Deuteronomy 11:27 A blessing, if you obey the commandments of the LORD your God, which I command you this day:

Deuteronomy 28:1 And it shall come to pass, if you shall listen diligently to the voice of the LORD your God...

1 Samuel 15:22 And Samuel said, Has the LORD as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the LORD? Behold...

Zechariah 6:15 And they that are far off shall come and build in the temple of the LORD, and you shall know that the LORD of hosts has sent me to you...

Matthew 28:20 Teaching them to observe all things whatever I have commanded you: and, see, I am with you always, even to the end of the world. Amen.

Hebrews 5:9 And being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey him;

ye be.

Jeremiah 24:7 And I will give them an heart to know me, that I am the LORD: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God...

Jeremiah 30:22 And you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

Jeremiah 31:31,33 Behold, the days come, said the LORD, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah...

Jeremiah 32:28 Therefore thus said the LORD; Behold, I will give this city into the hand of the Chaldeans...

Genesis 17:8 And I will give to you, and to your seed after you, the land wherein you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan...

Leviticus 26:12 And I will walk among you, and will be your God, and you shall be my people.

Ezekiel 11:20 That they may walk in my statutes, and keep my ordinances, and do them: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God.

Ezekiel 14:11 That the house of Israel may go no more astray from me, neither be polluted any more with all their transgressions...

Ezekiel 36:28 And you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers; and you shall be my people, and I will be your God.

Ezekiel 37:23,27 Neither shall they defile themselves any more with their idols, nor with their detestable things, nor with any of their transgressions...

Zechariah 8:8 And I will bring them, and they shall dwell in the middle of Jerusalem: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God...

Zechariah 13:9 And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried...

2 Corinthians 6:16 And what agreement has the temple of God with idols? for you are the temple of the living God; as God has said, I will dwell in them...

Hebrews 8:10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, said the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind...