Jeremiah 9:2-22

Faithlessness and its Retribution: the Dirge of Death. The humblest caravanserai would be preferable to life among these evil men, with their calumnies and the unfaithful use of power by those in authority, their mutual deceit, and their untruthfulness (Jeremiah 9:2). Yahweh will prove them in His furnace (Jeremiah 6:29), because of the wickedness of His people (so read in Jeremiah 9:7, with LXX, which continues preferably, after arrow, in Jeremiah 9:8, the words of their mouth are deceit, and omits with his mouth). Jeremiah 9:9 occurs in Jeremiah 5:9; Jeremiah 2:9 (Jeremiah 9:7). The prophet raises (Jeremiah 9:10) the mourner's dirge for the devastated country and ruined towns; it is by Yahweh's hand that they have been laid waste (rather than burnt up), as the discerning recognise (Hosea 14:9). Disobedience to the (Deuteronomic) law, seen in the worship of the local deities, brings the bitter result of exile and death (Jeremiah 9:13). Let Zion's sorrows be bewailed by the singers of dirges. Yahweh Himself supplies the dirge to be learnt and sung, i.e. Jeremiah 9:21 f. (which are in the appropriate metre of the dirge), of which Cornill well remarks that more cannot be said in eight short lines the dirge of the Reaper Death (Jeremiah 9:17).

Jeremiah 9:4. supplant: with a suggestion of the story of the supplanter (Genesis 27:36).

Jeremiah 9:10. wilderness: properly a place to which cattle are driven for pasturage, not a desert.

Jeremiah 9:11. jackals often haunt the ruins of Syrian towns; cf. Isaiah 13:22; Isaiah 34:13.

Jeremiah 9:15. wormwood: cf. Jeremiah 23:15; Proverbs 5:4 *; some bitter herb, always named figuratively.

Jeremiah 9:17. Professional singers of dirges, as still employed at Syrian funerals; cunning is an archaism for skilful; cf. Amos 5:16.

Jeremiah 9:21. without should be streets, and streets should be broad places.

Jeremiah 9:22. The words Speak, Thus saith the Lord, which interrupt the metre of the dirge, should be omitted, with LXX. This prophecy is continued in Jeremiah 10:17, the intervening sections being a later insertion; possibly Jeremiah 9:13 also is not by Jeremiah.