Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Jeremiah 3:7
And I said after she had done all these [things], Turn thou unto me. But she returned not. And her treacherous sister Judah saw [it].
7. I said ] to myself; I thought.
after she had done, etc.] mg. better, After she hath done all these things, she, etc.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Or, And I said (i. e., within myself), After she has done all these things, she will return to me. But she did not return.
Treacherous – literally, Falsehood, i. e., false, faithless. The character of the two sisters is plainly marked. Samaria is apostate; she abandons Yahwehs worship altogether. Judah maintains the form only; her secret desires are set upon the orgies of pagan worship.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 7. And I said] By the prophets Elijah, Elisha, Hosea, Amos, c. for all these prophesied to that rebellious people, and exhorted them to return to the Lord.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Turn thou unto me, viz. by repentance, Act 3:19. Although she had been so vile and abominable, yet the Lord waited in expectation of her return.
Her treacherous sister Judah: Benjamin is also here comprised, but Judah being the chief is only named, these two abiding together after the other ten revolted to Jeroboam; called Israels
sister, because they were all descended from the patriarch Jacob, Eze 16:46; compare Eze 23:2,4; and treacherous, or the treacherous one, because of her frequent revolts, 2Ch 21:6, &c.; 2Ch 24:17,18, and many other times, and after as frequent renewed covenants and promises, both in conjunction with the rest of the tribes, Deu 5:2,3,23, &c.; Deu 29:10-12, &c., and afterwards, 2Ch 13:9,10, &c.; 2Ch 15:12, &c.; 2Ch 23:16; 29:10. Saw it, i.e. they were not strangers to it, but knew it, as the word is, Psa 40:3. They could not but know how I had dealt with Israel.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
7. I said (2Ki17:13).
sister (Eze 16:46;Eze 23:2; Eze 23:4).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And I said, after she had done these things,…. All these idolatries, in the several places mentioned, after she had repeated them over and over; the Lord sent to them by the Prophets Hosea, Amos, Micah, and others, who prophesied before the captivity of the ten tribes, and entreated them, saying,
turn unto me: to my worship, as the Targum; from their idols, to him the living God; they were not without admonitions, exhortations, and declarations of grace, and so were without excuse:
but she returned not; to fear and serve the Lord, but remained in idolatry, obstinate and inflexible:
and her treacherous sister Judah saw it; her treachery and breach of covenant, as the Septuagint, Syriac, and Arabic versions add, for explanation sake; Judah, or the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin, and who were allied to the ten tribes by birth and by religion, and equally treacherous to God, the husband of them both, saw all the idolatry of Israel, and the aggravations of it, and what followed upon it, namely, their captivity in Babylon, yet did not learn and take warning hereby.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
And I said, sc. to myself, i.e., I thought. A speaking by the prophets (Rashi) is not to be thought of; for it is no summons, turn again to me, but only the thought, they will return. It is true that God caused backsliding Israel to be ever called again to repentance by the prophets, yet without effect. Meantime, however, no reference is made to what God did in this connection, only Israel’s behaviour towards the Lord being here kept in view. The Chet. is the later usage; the Keri substitutes the regular contracted form . The object, it (the whoredom of Israel), may be gathered from what precedes.
Jer 3:8 Many commentators have taken objection to the , because the sentence, “I saw that I had therefore given Israel a bill of divorce,” is as little intelligible as “and the faithless Judah saw it, and I saw it, for,” etc. Thus e.g., Graf, who proposes with Ew. and Syr. to read , “and she saw,” or with Jerome to omit the word from the text. To this we may add, that either the change or the omission destroys the natural relation to one another of the clauses. In either case we would have this connection: “and the faithless one, her sister Judah, saw that, because the backslider Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away…yet the faithless one feared not.” But thus the gist of the thing, what Judah saw, namely, the repudiation of Israel, would be related but cursorily in a subordinate clause, and the 7th verse would be shortened into a half verse; while, on the other hand, the 8th verse would be burdened with an unnaturally long protasis. Ros. is right in declaring any change to be unnecessary, provided the two halves of Jer 3:7 and Jer 3:8 are connected in this sense: vidi quod quum adulteram Israelitidem dimiseram, tamen non timeret ejus perfida soror Juda . If we compare Jer 3:7 and Jer 3:8 together, the correspondence between the two comes clearly out. In the first half of either verse Israel is spoken of, in the second Judah; while as to Israel, both verses state how God regarded the conduct of Israel, and as to Judah, how it observed and imitated Israel’s conduct. corresponds to in Jer 3:7. God thought the backsliding Israel will repent, and it did not, and this Judah saw. Thus, then, God saw that even the repudiation of the backsliding Israel for her adultery incited no fear in Judah, but Judah went and did whoredom like Israel. The true sense of Jer 3:8 is rendered obscure or difficult by the external co-ordination to one another of the two thoughts, that God has rejected Israel just because it has committed adultery, and, that Judah nevertheless feared not; the second thought being introduced by Vav. In reality, however, the first should be subordinated to the second thus: that although I had to reject Israel, Judah yet feared not. What God saw is not the adultery and rejection or divorce of Israel, but that Judah nevertheless had no fear in committing and persisting in the self-same sin. The belongs properly to , but this relation is obscured by the length of the prefixed grounding clause, and so is introduced by , ‘ . yb decud literally: that for all the reasons, because the backslider had committed adultery, I put her away and gave her a bill of divorce; yet the faithless Judah feared not. In plain English: that, in spite of all my putting away the backsliding Israel, and my giving her…because she had committed adultery, yet the faithless Judah feared not. On , cf. Deu 24:1, Deu 24:3.
Jer 3:9 In Jer 3:9 Judah’s fornication with the false gods is further described. Here ereH is rather stumbling, since ob vocem scortationis cannot well be simply tantamount to ob famosam scortationem ; for , voice, tone, sound, din, noise, is distinct from or , fame, rumour. All ancient translators have taken from , as being formed analogously to , , ; and a Masoretic note finds in the defective spelling an indication of the meaning levitas . Yet we occasionally find , vox, written defectively, e.g., Exo 4:8; Gen 27:22; Gen 45:16. And the derivation from gives no very suitable sense; neither lightness nor despisedness is a proper predicate for whoredom, by which the land is polluted; only shame or shameful would suit, as it is put by Ew. and Graf. But there is no evidence from the usage of the language that has the meaning of . Yet more inadmissible is the conjecture of J. D. Mich., adopted by Hitz., that of reading gnid a er fo taht , stock, for , a stock being the object of her unchastity; in support of which, reference is unfairly made to Hos 4:12. For there the matter in hand is rhabdomancy, with which the present passage has evidently nothing to do. The case standing thus, we adhere to the usual meaning of : for the noise or din of her whoredom, not, for her crying whoredom (de Wette). Jeremiah makes use of this epithet to point out the open riotous orgies of idolatry. is neither used in the active signification of desecrating, nor is it to be pointed ( Hiph.). On the last clause cf. Jer 2:27.
Jer 3:10 But even with all this, i.e., in spite of this deep degradation in idolatry, Judah returned not to God sincerely, but in hypocritical wise. “And yet with all this,” Ros., following Rashi, refers to the judgment that had fallen on Israel (Jer 3:8); but this is too remote. The words can bear reference only to that which immediately precedes: even in view of all these sinful horrors the returning was not “from the whole heart,” i.e., did not proceed from a sincere heart, but in falsehood and hypocrisy. For (the returning being that which began with the abolition of idolatrous public worship in Josiah’s reformation) the people had returned outwardly to the worship of Jahveh in the temple, but at heart they still calve to the idols. Although Josiah had put an end to the idol-worship, and though the people too, in the enthusiasm for the service of Jahveh, awakened by the solemn celebration of the passover, had broken in pieces the images and altars of the false gods throughout the land, yet there was imminent danger that the people, alienated in heart from the living God, should take the suppression of open idolatry for a true return to God, and, vainly admiring themselves, should look upon themselves as righteous and pious. Against this delusion the prophet takes his stand.
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
He afterwards adds, Yet I said; God here states, that he had long suspended his judgment before he punished the people of Israel. He then extols here his patience, that he had not immediately visited the Israelites as they deserved, but bore with them and for a long time waited to see whether they could be reclaimed: I said, then, after she had done all these things, Return to me If we read in the third person, the sense will be the same, “I hoped indeed that they would return to the right way, though they had thus fallen away, yea though they had denied me by an impious defection, and had become alienated from the faith and from piety.” But I am more inclined to another view, — that God here records the fact, that he had recalled to himself the ten tribes by his servants the Prophets, though they had by their many crimes provoked his wrath. Here then God shews how perverse the Israelites had been; for he had tried to restore them, if possible, to himself, but had spent all his labor in vain. I thus explain, I said, of the prophetic instruction: “Though then the Israelites had plunged themselves into impieties, I yet ceased not to try whether they could be restored to me.” He intimates, in short, that he had been unlike those husbands, who will not be reconciled to their wives, burning with jealousy, because they see that they had been exposed to so much disgrace. God then shews that though the Israelites had departed from him, he yet sent his prophets, and of his own free will sought reconciliation with them, but that they had refused to return. (78)
He then adds, See did she, that is, the whole kingdom of Judah, that, for al1 this, because the rebellious Israel had played the harlot, etc. We shall hereafter find the design of this comparison; for he amplifies the sin of the kingdom of Judah, inasmuch she had time enough to observe what he now relates, and was able to see it at a distance as it were from a watchtower; yet she saw it without any advantage. God then intended to shew how great was the hardness of the Jews, who had seen the defection of the ten tribes, and had seen how severely they had been reproved by the prophets.
(78) The difficulty at the beginning of the eighth verse may be removed either by adopting ואראה, as in two MSS., and taking the verb to be in Hiphil, or ותרא, as in one MS., as a repetition of the former verb, according to the Syriac It is left out in the Vulgate But it is most suitable to the context to take the verb to be in Hiphil. Then the passage would read thus, —
6. Hast thou not seen what she did, the apostate Israel? Go did she on every high hill and under every green tree, And play there the harlot:
7. And I said, after she had done all these things, “To me return;” but she returned not: And see this did the hypocrite, her sister Judah:
8. And I caused her to see, that on all these accounts, As adultery the apostate Israel would commit, I dismissed her, and gave to her The bill of her divorcement; Yet fear not, did the hypocrite Judah, her sister, But went and played the harlot, even herself.
“
On all these accounts,” or, for all these reasons, refers to several things-the first apostasy — God’s invitation — and Israel’s refusal. God caused Judah to see these things by his prophets, but Judah feared not. The word בגדה, hypocrite, or the perfidious one, is a feminine participle, used as a noun. It is explained in the tenth verse by “feignedly” or falsely. Hypocrites would be the correct rendering. It is rendered by the Septuagint, “ faithless — ασύνθετος,” — by the Vulgate, “ prevaricatress — praevaricatrix, “and by the Targum, “ falsifier” or cheat. — Ed
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(7) And I said . . .The call to Israel to return had been slighted, and Judah, the traitress or faithless, one with falsehood, had not taken warning from the sin or its punishment.
Turn thou unto me.The verb may be either the second or third person, I said, thou shalt return; or, I said, she will return, as expressing a hope rather than a direct return. The latter seems, on the whole, the preferable rendering.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
7. And I said, etc. The object of the verb “said” begins with after, and the verb turn is thought by most expositors to be in the third person. The reading then would be, And I said (namely, to myself = thought,) after she had done all Turn thou unto me. But she returned not.
Treacherous Better, faithless. See Ezekiel’s allegory in chapter xxiii for the character of these two sisters apostate Israel and hypocritical Judah.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jer 3:7 And I said after she had done all these [things], Turn thou unto me. But she returned not. And her treacherous sister Judah saw [it].
Ver. 7. And I said after she had done. ] Or, Yet I said; but I lost my sweet words upon her.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Turn thou unto Me: or, “Unto Me she will return”.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
Turn thou: 2Ki 17:13, 2Ki 17:14, 2Ch 30:6-12, Hos 6:1-4, Hos 14:1
her treacherous: Jer 3:8-11, Eze 16:46, Eze 23:2-4
Reciprocal: 1Ki 14:22 – Judah 2Ki 23:26 – Notwithstanding 2Ch 17:4 – not after Isa 48:8 – I knew Jer 3:12 – Return Hos 6:7 – they dealt
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Jer 3:7. Israel as the 10-Tribe kingdom is the subject of this verse and refers to the many admonishments that God gave it but all in vain. All of this was known to Judah (the 2- tribe kingdom) and it should .have been a lesson to it.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Jer 3:7. After she had done all these things For which she might justly have been abandoned; I said, Turn thou unto me Namely, and I will receive thee. Though they had forsaken both the house of David and the house of Aaron, who both had their authority from God without dispute, yet God sent his prophets among them to call them to return to him, that is, to the worship of him only, not insisting so much upon their return to the house of David as to that of Aaron. We do not read that Elijah, that great prophet, ever mentioned their returning to the former, but only to the faithful service of the true God. It is serious and genuine piety that God regards more than any ritual observances, whether with respect to matters civil or religious. But she returned not Which God observed, and with which he was much displeased; and her treacherous sister Judah saw it A sister, because descended from the same common stock, Abraham and Jacob; and as Israel had the character of a back-slider, so Judah is called treacherous, because, though she professed to keep close to God when Israel had backslidden, and adhered to the kings and priests that were of Gods own appointing, yet she proved treacherous, false, and unfaithful to her profession and promises, as is stated in the following verses.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
The Lord had expected that Israel would return to Him eventually, but she had not. Obviously Israel’s actions did not surprise God, since He knows everything before it happens. This is an anthropomorphic way of describing God’s chagrin at Israel’s behavior. Furthermore, the Southern Kingdom of Judah, Israel’s treacherous sister, observed Israel’s unrepentant harlotry. As Israel was Apostasy personified, so Judah was Treachery personified (cf. Jer 3:10-11; Jer 3:20).