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11. Covenant Is Broken

¹ This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD: ² “Listen to the terms of this covenant and tell them to the people of Judah and to those who live in Jerusalem. ³ Tell them that this is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Cursed is the one who does not obey the terms of this covenant— ⁴ the terms I commanded your ancestors when I brought them out of Egypt, out of the iron-smelting furnace.’ I said, ‘Obey me and do everything I command you, and you will be my people, and I will be your God. ⁵ Then I will fulfill the oath I swore to your ancestors, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey’—the land you possess today.”

I answered, “Amen, LORD.”

⁶ The LORD said to me, “Proclaim all these words in the towns of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem: ‘Listen to the terms of this covenant and follow them. ⁷ From the time I brought your ancestors up from Egypt until today, I warned them again and again, saying, “Obey me.” ⁸ But they did not listen or pay attention; instead, they followed the stubbornness of their evil hearts. So I brought on them all the curses of the covenant I had commanded them to follow but that they did not keep.’”

⁹ Then the LORD said to me, “There is a conspiracy among the people of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem. ¹⁰ They have returned to the sins of their ancestors, who refused to listen to my words. They have followed other gods to serve them. Both Israel and Judah have broken the covenant I made with their ancestors. ¹¹ Therefore this is what the LORD says: ‘I will bring on them a disaster they cannot escape. Although they cry out to me, I will not listen to them. ¹² The towns of Judah and the people of Jerusalem will go and cry out to the gods to whom they burn incense, but they will not help them at all when disaster strikes. ¹³ You, Judah, have as many gods as you have towns; and the altars you have set up to burn incense to that shameful god Baal are as many as the streets of Jerusalem.’

¹⁴ “Do not pray for this people or offer any plea or petition for them, because I will not listen when they call to me in the time of their distress.

    ¹⁵ “What is my beloved doing in my temple
   as she, with many others, works out her evil schemes?
   Can consecrated meat avert your punishment?
When you engage in your wickedness,
   then you rejoice. Or Could consecrated meat avert your punishment? / Then you would rejoice”

    ¹⁶ The LORD called you a thriving olive tree
   with fruit beautiful in form.
But with the roar of a mighty storm
   he will set it on fire,
   and its branches will be broken.

¹⁷ The LORD Almighty, who planted you, has decreed disaster for you, because the people of both Israel and Judah have done evil and aroused my anger by burning incense to Baal.

Plot Against Jeremiah

¹⁸ Because the LORD revealed their plot to me, I knew it, for at that time he showed me what they were doing. ¹⁹ I had been like a gentle lamb led to the slaughter; I did not realize that they had plotted against me, saying,

   “Let us destroy the tree and its fruit;
   let us cut him off from the land of the living,
   that his name be remembered no more.”
²⁰ But you, LORD Almighty, who judge righteously
   and test the heart and mind,
let me see your vengeance on them,
   for to you I have committed my cause.

²¹ Therefore this is what the LORD says about the people of Anathoth who are threatening to kill you, saying, “Do not prophesy in the name of the LORD or you will die by our hands”— ²² therefore this is what the LORD Almighty says: “I will punish them. Their young men will die by the sword, their sons and daughters by famine. ²³ Not even a remnant will be left to them, because I will bring disaster on the people of Anathoth in the year of their punishment.”

We know that they were all very wicked; and though they were proved guilty, yet they were not wining to yield, to acknowledge and confess their fault; but they raged against God and rose up against the prophets. And as they dared not to vomit forth their blasphemies against God, they assailed his servants and wished to appear as though their contest was with them. And this is not the vice only of one age, but we find that it prevails at this day; for when we boldly reprove hidden vices, immediately the profane make a clamor and say, “What! these divine; but who has made these things known to them? Have they this oracle from heaven?” As though, indeed, neither the word of God nor his Spirit can shew their power, except when children become judges! But the ungodly rise up against God’s servants for this end, that they may with impunity do this and that, and everything, except what may draw them before an earthly tribunal, and be proved by clear and many evidences

For this reason the Prophet says, that made known, to him had been the vices of his own nation; as though he had said, “I see that you will be ready to raise an objection, as ye are wont proudly to resist all reproofs and threatenings, as though you contended only with men; but I testify to you now beforehand, that I bring nothing of my own, nor divine of myself what any one of you thinks within: but know ye that God, who knoweth the heart, has committed to me my office. He has then appointed me to be the herald of his vengeance, he has appointed me as a herald to denounce war on you. So I do not come nor act in my own name: there is, then, no reason for you to deceive yourselves, according to your usual manner, as though I presumptuously reproved you, when yet your vices are concealed, it being peculiar to God to know what is hid in the hearts of men. The recesses of the heart are indeed intricate, and great darkness is within; but God sees more dearly than men. Cease then to make this objection which ye are wont to raise against me, that I am presumptuous in bringing forth to light what lies hid in darkness, for God has appointed me to bring these commands to you: as he knows the heart, and as nothing escapes him, and as he penetrates into our thoughts and feelings, so he has also designed by his word which he has put in my mouth to render public what ye think is concealed.”

We now see the design of the Prophet: but some take a different view, that God had made known to his servant Jeremiah the impious conspiracy of which he afterwards speaks, and thus connect the two verses. But I doubt not that the Prophet intended here to shew what and how much weight belonged to his doctrine, the credit and authority of which the Jews thought of detracting by boastfully alleging that he, a mortal man, assumed too much, and announced uncertain divinations. Hence, to repel such calum — nies, he wished to testify that he threatened them not inconsiderately, nor spoke what he supposed or conjectured, when he exposed their sins, but that he only declared faith. — fully what had been enjoined by God and revealed also by the Holy Spirit. This is what is meant. ⁴⁸⁴⁸     Calvin connects this verse with the foregoing, but most with what follows. The first verb in the Septuagint is a prayer, “Lord, make known to me, and I shall know.” The Syriac and Arabic are the same. The Vulgate takes the verb in the second person, “O Lord, thou hast made known,” etc. Venema seems to agree in part with Calvin; he connects the first clause with the foregoing, and the second with the following verse; and this appears to be the best construction. Then the ו is “when,” as it may be rendered when followed as here by אז, “then,” —
   When Jehovah made me to know, so that I knew these things; Then thou didst shew me their doings.
   That is, when Jehovah made known to him what he had previously related, he then shewed to him also the doings, or the purposes, of the men of Anathoth, which he afterwards more particularly mentions. — Ed. It afterwards follows —