Charles Ellicott Commentary Jeremiah 4:15

"For a voice declareth from Dan, and publisheth evil from the hills of Ephraim:" — Jeremiah 4:15 (ASV)

Dan ... Mount Ephraim. — The two places are chosen, not like Dan and Beer-sheba, as extreme limits, but as stages in the march of the invader: first Dan , the northernmost point (Deuteronomy 34:1; Judges 20:1) of the whole land of Israel, then Mount Ephraim, as the northern boundary of Judea. The verbs grow in strength with the imagined nearness, first announce, as of a rumor from a distance, then proclaim, as of a danger more imminent.

Affliction. — In Hebrew, it is the same word (aven) as in “thoughts of vanity.” Playing on the two aspects of the word, the prophet says that aven comes as the penalty of aven — the “nothingness” of destruction as that of the “nothingness” of the idol.