John Gill Commentary Jeremiah 4

If you will return, O Israel, says the Lord
To which they had been encouraged, and as they had promised they would, and said they did, (Jeremiah 3:14Jeremiah 3:22) : return unto me; with your whole heart, and not feignedly and hypocritically, as Judah did, (Jeremiah 3:10) . Some render the words (and the accents require they should be rendered so) "if you will return to me, O Israel, says the Lord, you shall return"^F12; that is, to your own land, being now in captivity; or, "you shall rest"^F13; or "have rest"; so Kimchi interprets the last word; see (Jeremiah 30:10) .

And these words may very well be considered as the words of Christ, and as spoken by him, when he entered upon his ministry, who began it with calling the people of the Jews to repentance, and promising to give them rest; and all such who return to God by repentance, and come to Christ by faith, find spiritual rest for their souls now, and shall have an eternal rest hereafter, (Matthew 4:17) (Matthew 11:28Matthew 11:29) .

And if you will put away your abominations out of my sight; not only their sins, but their self-righteousness, and dependence upon it; the rites and ceremonies of the old law abolished by Christ, together with the traditions of the elders, by which they made void the commandments of God; all which were abominations in the sight of the Lord, (Isaiah 1:13) (29:13) (65:5) (66:3) .

Then shall you not remove; from your own land again when restored, or further off, into more distant countries, for they were now in captivity; or rather the words may be rendered, not as a promise, but as a continuation of what is before said, and not move to and fro^F14.

Or be unstable and wavering, tossed to and fro with every wind of doctrine, and precept of men; but be established in the faith of the Gospel, and steadfast and immovable in every good work.

The Targum is: ``if you will return, O Israel, to my worship, says the Lord, your return shall be received before your decree is sealed; and if you will take away your abominations from before me, you shall not be moved;'' or wander about.

FOOTNOTES:

• F12: (bwvt yla hwhy Man larvy bwvt Ma) "si reverteris ad me, O Israel, dicit Jehovah, reverteris", Gataker,
• F13: (bwvt) "quiescas", Vatablus; "quiesce apud me", Calvin.
• F14: (dwnt alw) "et non vagaberis", Gatatker; "et non instabilis fueris", Cocceius,

And you shall swear, the Lord lives
Or by the living Lord, by him and him only; not by the creatures, but by the God of truth. This is sometimesput for the whole worship and service of God, (Deuteronomy 6:13) and for a confession of Christ, andprofession of faith in him, (Isaiah 45:23) , compared with (Romans 14:11) and which ought to be done,in truth, in righteousness, and in judgment ;
in sincerity, integrity, and uprightness of soul; in spirit and in, truth; in righteousness and trueholiness:

and the nations shall bless themselves in him ,
not in Israel, as the Targum, Jarchi, and Kimchi, interpret it; but in the Lord, even in the Messiah, theLord Jesus Christ, in whom all the nations of the earth were to be blessed with all spiritual blessings; withwhich being blessed, they call and count themselves happy, being pardoned through the blood of Christ,justified by his righteousness, and having peace, life, and salvation by him, (Genesis 22:18) :and in him shall they glory ;
not in themselves, nor in any creature, or creature enjoyment; but in the Lord, and in what he is to them,wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; in whom all the seed of Israel, being justified,glory; see (1 Corinthians 1:30 1 Corinthians 1:31) (Isaiah 45:25) .

The sense of the words seems to be,that upon the Gospel being preached by Christ and his apostles to the Israelites, and some of them beingconverted, and their abominations put away, and they cleaving to the Lord, and to his worship; the Gentilesshould have the Gospel sent to them, and receive it, and place all their blessedness in Christ, and glory inhim.

For thus says the Lord to the men of Judah and Jerusalem

The two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, who were at the time of this prophecy in their own land; and so are distinguished from Israel the ten tribes, who were in captivity; unless the same persons should be meant, who were called by these several names, the people of the Jews; and it was in Judea that our Lord appeared in the flesh, and to the inhabitants thereof he ministered, he was the minister of the circumcision; and so to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, whom he called to repentance, and would have gathered, (Matthew 23:37) .

break up your fallow ground ; This is ground that lies untilled, not ploughed, nor sown, on which nothing grows but the produce of nature, as weeds, thorns, briers is common to men and beasts, and is trodden upon, and, so is hard and unsusceptible of seed; which, if it accidentally falls upon it, makes no impression on it, and is not received by it; and the breaking of it up is by the plough. The "fallow ground" fitly represents the hearts of unregenerate men, which are unopened to the word, and unbroken by it; nor has they the seed of divine grace sown in them; but are destitute of faith, hope, love, fear, and the like; there is nothing grows there but the weeds of sin and corruption; and are like a common beaten road; are the common track of sin, where lusts pass to and fro, and dwell; and so are hardened and obdurate, as hard as a stone, yea, harder than the nether millstone; and who, though they may occasionally be under the word, it makes no impression on them; it has no place in them, but is like the seed that falls by the wayside, (Matthew 13:4Matthew 13:19) , unless divine power attends it.

For the Gospel is the plough, and ministers are the ploughmen; but it is the Lord alone that makes it effectual to the breaking up the fallow ground of men's hearts, (Luke 9:62) (Isaiah 61:5) (1 Corinthians 3:6 1 Corinthians 3:7 1 Corinthians 3:8 1 Corinthians 3:9) , but when the Lord puts his hand to the plough it enters within, and opens the heart; it is quick, powerful, and sharp; it cuts deep, and makes long and large furrows, even strong convictions of sin; it throws a man's inside outward, as the plough does the earth; and lays all the wicked of his heart open to him; and roots up the pride, the vanity, and boasting of the creature, and other lusts; and so makes way for the seed of divine grace to be sown there.

and sow not among thorns ; or, "that you may not sow among thorns" ^F15 ; for, unless the fallow ground is broken up, it will be no other than sowing among thorns; and unless the hearts of men are opened by the power and grace of God, they will not attend to the things that are spoken; preaching and eating the word will be like sowing among thorns.

Cares of this world, the deceitfulness of riches, the pleasures of life, and the lusts thereof, which are comparable to thorns, because pricking, perplexing, and distressing, and because vain and unprofitable, choke the word, and make it unfruitful; see (Matthew 13:7Matthew 13:22) , now this exhortation in the text does not suppose power in man to break up and open his heart; but to show his want of renewing grace; the necessity of it; and the danger he is in without it; and to awaken in him a concern for it; see (Ezekiel 18:31) (36:26) .

The words may be applied to backsliding professors, since backsliding Israel and Judah are the persons addressed; and this may be done with great propriety and pertinence to the simile; for fallow ground is that which has been broke up and sown, and laid fallow. It is usual to till and sow two years, and lay fallow a third: and backsliding Christians look very much like fallow ground; so faithless, so lukewarm, and indifferent; so inattentive to the word, and unconcerned under it; so barren and unfruitful, as if they had never had any faith, or love, or good work in them; so that they need to be renewed in the spirit of their minds; to have a new face of things put upon them: and to have a clean heart, and a right spirit, created in them.

The Targum is, ``make to yourselves good works, and seek not salvation in sins.''

FOOTNOTES:

• F15: (werzt law) "ut non seratis".

Circumcise yourselves to the Lord
Or, "be you circumcised", as the Septuagint and Vulgate Latin versions render it. This is to be understood of the circumcision of the heart, as Kimchi observes; and as appears from the following words: and take away the foreskins of your heart, you men of Judah, and
inhabitants of Jerusalem ;
this is the true spiritual circumcision; and they that are possessed of it are the circumcision, the only truly circumcised persons; and they are such who have been pricked to the heart, and thoroughly convinced of sin; who have had the hardness of their hearts removed, and the impurity of it laid open to them; which they have beheld with shame and loathing, and have felt an inward pain on account of it; and who have been enabled to deny themselves, to renounce their own righteousness, and put off the body of the sins of the flesh.

And though men are exhorted to do this themselves, yet elsewhere the Lord promises to do it for them, (Deuteronomy 30:6) , and indeed it is purely his own work; or otherwise it could not be called, as it is, "circumcision without hands", and "whose praise is not of man, but of God", (Colossians 2:11) (Romans 2:29) , and the reason of this exhortation, as before, is to convince those Jews, who were circumcised in the flesh, and rested and gloried in that, that their hearts were not circumcised, and that there was a necessity of it, and they in danger for want of it; as follows: lest my fury come forth like fire ;
to which the wrath of God is sometimes compared, (Nahum 1:6) and is sometimes signified by a furnace and lake of fire, even his eternal wrath and vengeance: and burn that none can quench it ;
such is the fire of divine wrath; it is unquenchable; it is everlasting, (Mark 9:43Mark 9:44) (Matthew 3:12) (25:41) : because of the evil of your doings ;
which are so provoking to the eyes of his glory; the sins of men are the fuel to the fire of his wrath, and cause it to burn to the lowest hell, without the least degree of mercy.

The Targum is,

``turn to the worship of the Lord, and take away the wickedness of your hearts, lest my fury burn as fire, and consume without mercy, because of the evil of your doings.''

Exhortations to repentance being without effect in general, though they might have an influence on some few particular persons, the Lord directs the prophet to lay before the people a view of their destruction as near at hand; who calls upon some persons as a sort of heralds, to publish and declare in the land of Judea, and in Jerusalem the metropolis of it, what follows: Declare you in Judah, and publish in Jerusalem, and say

blow you the trumpet in the land; as an alarm of an approaching enemy, and of an invasion by him, and of danger from him; and this was to be done, not in order to gather together, and put themselves in a posture of defence, to meet the enemy, and give him battle; but to get together, that were in the fields, and in country villages, and hide themselves from him:

cry, gather together, and say; or cry with a full mouth, with a loud voice, that all might hear; which shows imminent danger: assemble yourselves and let us go into the defenced cities; such as Jerusalem, and others, where they might think themselves safe and secure; see (Matthew 24:16) .