Albert Barnes Commentary Jeremiah 17

This section (Jeremiah 17:1–4) is inseparably connected with the preceding. Judah’s sin had been described (Jeremiah 16:19) as one of which the very Gentiles will become ashamed, and for which she will shortly be punished by an intervention of God’s hand more marked than anything in her previous history. Jeremiah now dwells upon the indelible nature of her sin.

A pen of iron - that is, an iron chisel for cutting inscriptions on tablets of stone.

The point of a diamond - The ancients were well acquainted with the cutting powers of the diamond.

Altars - Not Yahweh’s one altar, but the many altars which the Jews had set up to Baalim (Jeremiah 11:13). Though Josiah had purged the land of these, yet in the eleven years of Jehoiakim’s reign they had multiplied again, and were the external proofs of Judah’s idolatry, as the table of her heart was the internal witness.

While their children remember their altars - Perhaps an allusion to their sacrifices of children to Moloch. Present, perhaps, at such a blood-stained rite, its horrors would be engraved forever on their memory.

Groves - “Asherahs,” that is, wooden images of Astarte (see Exodus 34:13 note).

O my mountain in the field - that is, Jerusalem or Zion, called the Rock of the Plain in Jeremiah 21:13. “The field” is the open unenclosed country, here contrasted with the privileged height of Zion.

Or sin - that is, because of your sin.

The verb rendered “discontinue” is that used for letting the land rest (Exodus 23:11) and for releasing creditors (Deuteronomy 15:2) in the sabbatical year. As Judah had not kept these sabbatical years, she must now discontinue the tillage of God’s inheritance until the land had had its rest. “Even yourself may mean and that through yourself,” through your own fault.

In the rest of the prophecy, Jeremiah dwells upon the moral faults which had led to Judah’s ruin.

Jeremiah 17:6: Like the heath - Or, “like a destitute man” (Psalms 102:17). The verbs “he shall see” (or fear) and “shall inhabit” plainly show that a man is meant here and not a plant.

Jeremiah 17:8: The river - Or, “water-course” (Isaiah 30:25), made for purposes of irrigation.

Shall not see - Or, “shall not fear” (Jeremiah 17:6). God’s people feel trouble as much as other people, but they do not fear it because they know:

1. that it is for their good, and
2. that God will give them strength to bear it.

Jeremiah 17:9: The train of thought is apparently this: If the man is so blessed (Jeremiah 17:7–8) who trusts in Yahweh, what is the reason why men so generally make flesh their arm? And the answer is: Because man’s heart is incapable of seeing things in a straightforward manner, but is full of shrewd guile, and ever seeking to overreach others.

Desperately wicked - Rather, mortally sick.

Jeremiah 17:10: The answer to the question, who can know it? To himself a man’s heart is an inscrutable mystery: God alone can fathom it.

Ways - Rather, way, his course of life. The “and” must be omitted, for the last clause explains what is meant by man’s way, when he comes before God for judgment. It is the fruit, the final result of his doings, that is, his real character as formed by the acts and habits of his life.

Jeremiah 17:11: Rather, As the partridge has gathered eggs which it did not lay, so ... The general sense is: the covetous man is as sure to reap finally disappointment only as is the partridge which piles up eggs not of her own laying, and is unable to hatch them.

A fool - A Nabal. (See 1 Samuel 25:25).

Jeremiah 17:12, 17:13: Or, You throne ... you place ... you hope ... Yahweh! All that forsake You etc. The prophet concludes his prediction with the expression of his own trust in Yahweh, and confidence that the divine justice will finally be vindicated by the punishment of the wicked. The throne of glory is equivalent to Him who is enthroned in glory.

Jeremiah 17:13: Shall be written in the earth - that is, their names shall quickly disappear, unlike those graven in the rock forever (Job 19:24). A board covered with sand is used in the East to this day in schools for giving lessons in writing; but writing inscribed on such materials is intended to be immediately obliterated. Equally fleeting is the existence of those who forsake God. “All men are written somewhere, the saints in heaven, but sinners upon earth” (Origen).

Jeremiah 17:15: This taunt shows that this prophecy was written before any very significant fulfillment of Jeremiah’s words had taken place, and prior therefore to the capture of Jerusalem at the close of Jehoiakim’s life. Now means “I pray,” and is ironical.

Jeremiah 17:16: I have not hastened from - that is, I have not sought to escape from.

A pastor to follow you - Rather, a shepherd after You. “Shepherd” means “ruler, magistrate” (Jeremiah 2:8 note), and belongs to the prophet not as a teacher, but as one invested with authority by God to guide and direct the political course of the nation. So Yahweh guides His people (Psalms 23:1–2), and the prophet does so after Him, following obediently His instructions.

The woeful day - literally, “the day of mortal sickness:” the day on which Jerusalem was to be destroyed, and the temple burned.

Right - Omit the word. What Jeremiah asserts is that he spoke as in God’s presence. They were no words of his own, but had the authority of Him before whom he stood. .

Jeremiah 17:17: A terror - Rather, “a cause of dismay,” or consternation (Jeremiah 1:17). By not fulfilling Jeremiah’s prediction God Himself seemed to put him to shame.

Jeremiah 17:18: Confounded - Put to shame.

Destroy them ... - Rather, break them with a double breaking: a twofold punishment, the first their general share in the miseries attendant upon their country’s fall; the second, a special punishment for their sin in persecuting and mocking God’s prophet.