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4. Unfaithful Israel

¹ “If you, Israel, will return,
   then return to me,” declares the LORD.
“If you put your detestable idols out of my sight
   and no longer go astray,
² and if in a truthful, just and righteous way
   you swear, ‘As surely as the LORD lives,’
then the nations will invoke blessings by him
   and in him they will boast.”

³ This is what the LORD says to the people of Judah and to Jerusalem:

   “Break up your unplowed ground
   and do not sow among thorns.
⁴ Circumcise yourselves to the LORD,
   circumcise your hearts,
   you people of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem,
or my wrath will flare up and burn like fire
   because of the evil you have done—
   burn with no one to quench it.

Disaster From the North

    ⁵ “Announce in Judah and proclaim in Jerusalem and say:
   ‘Sound the trumpet throughout the land!’
Cry aloud and say:
   ‘Gather together!
   Let us flee to the fortified cities!’
⁶ Raise the signal to go to Zion!
   Flee for safety without delay!
For I am bringing disaster from the north,
   even terrible destruction.”

    ⁷ A lion has come out of his lair;
   a destroyer of nations has set out.
He has left his place
   to lay waste your land.
Your towns will lie in ruins
   without inhabitant.
⁸ So put on sackcloth,
   lament and wail,
for the fierce anger of the LORD
   has not turned away from us.

    ⁹ “In that day,” declares the LORD,
   “the king and the officials will lose heart,
the priests will be horrified,
   and the prophets will be appalled.”

¹⁰ Then I said, “Alas, Sovereign LORD! How completely you have deceived this people and Jerusalem by saying, ‘You will have peace,’ when the sword is at our throats!”

¹¹ At that time this people and Jerusalem will be told, “A scorching wind from the barren heights in the desert blows toward my people, but not to winnow or cleanse; ¹² a wind too strong for that comes from me. Now I pronounce my judgments against them.”

    ¹³ Look! He advances like the clouds,
   his chariots come like a whirlwind,
his horses are swifter than eagles.
   Woe to us! We are ruined!
¹⁴ Jerusalem, wash the evil from your heart and be saved.
   How long will you harbor wicked thoughts?
¹⁵ A voice is announcing from Dan,
   proclaiming disaster from the hills of Ephraim.
¹⁶ “Tell this to the nations,
   proclaim concerning Jerusalem:
‘A besieging army is coming from a distant land,
   raising a war cry against the cities of Judah.
¹⁷ They surround her like men guarding a field,
   because she has rebelled against me,’” declares the LORD.
¹⁸ “Your own conduct and actions
   have brought this on you.
This is your punishment.
   How bitter it is!
   How it pierces to the heart!”

    ¹⁹ Oh, my anguish, my anguish!
   I writhe in pain.
Oh, the agony of my heart!
   My heart pounds within me,
   I cannot keep silent.
For I have heard the sound of the trumpet;
   I have heard the battle cry.
²⁰ Disaster follows disaster;
   the whole land lies in ruins.
In an instant my tents are destroyed,
   my shelter in a moment.
²¹ How long must I see the battle standard
   and hear the sound of the trumpet?

    ²² “My people are fools;
   they do not know me.
They are senseless children;
   they have no understanding.
They are skilled in doing evil;
   they know not how to do good.”

    ²³ I looked at the earth,
   and it was formless and empty;
and at the heavens,
   and their light was gone.
²⁴ I looked at the mountains,
   and they were quaking;
   all the hills were swaying.
²⁵ I looked, and there were no people;
   every bird in the sky had flown away.
²⁶ I looked, and the fruitful land was a desert;
   all its towns lay in ruins
   before the LORD, before his fierce anger.

²⁷ This is what the LORD says:

   “The whole land will be ruined,
   though I will not destroy it completely.
²⁸ Therefore the earth will mourn
   and the heavens above grow dark,
because I have spoken and will not relent,
   I have decided and will not turn back.”

    ²⁹ At the sound of horsemen and archers
   every town takes to flight.
Some go into the thickets;
   some climb up among the rocks.
All the towns are deserted;
   no one lives in them.

    ³⁰ What are you doing, you devastated one?
   Why dress yourself in scarlet
   and put on jewels of gold?
Why highlight your eyes with makeup?
   You adorn yourself in vain.
Your lovers despise you;
   they want to kill you.

    ³¹ I hear a cry as of a woman in labor,
   a groan as of one bearing her first child—
the cry of Daughter Zion gasping for breath,
   stretching out her hands and saying,
“Alas! I am fainting;
   my life is given over to murderers.”

He concludes that part of his discourse, which, as we have said, he embellished with figurative terms, in order more fully to rouse slow and torpid minds: but he confirms what he said at the beginning of the last verse

(Jeremiah 4:20)
“Distress has been summoned upon distress.”

He indeed repeats in other words the same thing, How long shall I see the standard, he says, and hear the sound of the trumpet? that is, “You are greatly deceived, if ye think that your enemies, after having for a short time marched through the land, will return home: for the evil of war will for a long time afflict you, and God will protract your calamities, so that the sound of trumpets will continue, and the standard will often, and even every day, be exhibited.”

We now then perceive the Prophet’s meaning: He first shews, that though their enemies were afar off, they would yet come suddenly, and that the horses of God would be, according to what he said yesterday, swifter than eagles. He afterwards refers to the continued progress of the war; for it was necessary to shew to the Jews, that as they had long heedlessly despised God, so his vengeance would not be momentary, but would lie on them, so as to be without end.

Now we ought to know that at this day there is no less dullness than among the Jews. It is therefore not enough to summon the ungodly and the wicked before God’s tribunal, but such metaphorical language ought to be employed as may strike terror, and constrain them to fear, though they may endeavor in every way to harden their own consciences and stupefy themselves, so as to be capable of easily despising God. It is then necessary, that at the present day the servants of God should also speak more strongly and vehemently, that they may rouse hypocrites and the obstinate from their torpor. It then follows —