John Calvin Commentary Jeremiah 5:10

"Go ye up upon her walls, and destroy; but make not a full end: take away her branches; for they are not Jehovah`s." — Jeremiah 5:10 (ASV)

Here God, through His prophet, addresses the enemies of His people, whom He had appointed to be the agents of His vengeance. This was usual with the prophets when they sought more effectively to rouse and more sharply to touch the hearts of people, for we know how great their indifference is when God summons them to judgment.

Since Jeremiah saw that simple instruction availed little, he used this way of speaking. He then, speaking as God, addresses the Chaldeans and commands them to come to attack Jerusalem. The prophets often speak this way: "God will hiss for the Egyptians," or, "The trumpet shall sound, and He will send for the Chaldeans" (Isaiah 5:26; Isaiah 7:18). But the representation is more effective in penetrating the hearts of people when the prophet, at God’s command, assembles enemies like a celestial herald and commands them what to do—even to destroy the whole city.

He says first, You ascend her walls. By these words he intimates that the Jews boasted in vain of the height of their walls, for God would make their enemies ascend them, so that the entrance would not be difficult. They hoped indeed that they were safe, because the city was well fortified. Hence he says that they were deceived; and he exposes their folly, for their walls would not protect them.

He afterwards adds, Do not make an end. This sentence is explained in two ways. Some take it in a good sense, as if God mitigated the extremity of their punishment, according to the meaning which some attach to the words in the last chapter. For though God in that passage terrified the Jews, yet they consider that by way of mitigation this was added, I will not yet make a consummation, that is, there will be some remaining.

And the prophets are accustomed to speak this way when they intend to show that some seed will always remain, so that the Church will not be wholly destroyed. The same interpreters also explain this passage as if God had said that the ruin of Jerusalem would be such that the Church would still continue, for there would be no consummation. But others take כלה (cale) as signifying an end; and this meaning is more suitable, for God in this verse severely threatens the Jews with destruction.

It is no objection that it is said elsewhere that the consummation would not be complete, for it is quite evident that the prophets do not always adopt the same way of speaking. When they denounce vengeance on the reprobate, they leave no hope, and so this way of speaking often occurs: I will make an end. But when they address the faithful, they moderate the severity of their threatenings by saying, God will not make a consummation. I am therefore disposed to take their view, who regard consummation here as signifying an end; and כלל (calal) means to finish. The meaning then is, "Demolish the city, and let there be no end"—that is, destroy it entirely.

To the same purpose is what immediately follows: Take away her shoots (or her branches, or the teeth of her walls, as some render the word). I think, however, that the Prophet refers to the width of the walls in their foundations, for we know that walls are so built that the foundation is wider than the upper structure.

The word which the Prophet uses means shoots, which spread far and wide. Those who render it "the wings of the walls" seem to me not to understand what the Prophet means, for he speaks not here of the top of the walls, but of the foundations, as if he had said, "Overthrow or demolish from the foundation the walls of the city." And why?

They are not Jehovah’s, he adds. The Jews were inflated with this empty confidence—that they were safe under the protection of God, for they imagined that God was the guardian of the city because the sanctuary and the altar were there. Hence the Prophet declares that the walls or the foundations were not God’s.

Nor could it have been objected that it is said elsewhere that the city had been founded by the Lord. God had indeed chosen His habitation and His throne there, but on this condition: that the people should faithfully worship Him.

When Jerusalem was made a den of thieves, God departed from there, according to what is said by Ezekiel in chapter 14 (Ezekiel 14). Here then the Prophet reproves that foolish confidence by which the Jews deceived themselves when they thought that God was in a way bound never to forsake the defense of the city. He denies that their walls and foundations were God’s, for the Jews by their sins had so polluted the whole place that God could not dwell in such filth.