Jeremiah 2:17

Hast thou not procured this unto thyself, in that thou hast forsaken the LORD thy God, when he led thee by the way? THOU HAST FORSAKEN - literally, 'Has not thy forsaking the Lord, etc., procured this (calamity) to thee?' So Septuagint: the Masoretic accents make 'this' the subject of the verb, leaving the object to be understood. 'Has not this procured (literally, i:e., the impending calamity) unto thee, that thou hast forsaken?' etc. (, "Thy way and thy doings have procured these things unto thee.") LED - (). THE WAY. The article expresses the right way, the way of the Lord-namely, the moral training which they enjoyed in the Mosaic covenant....

Now follows the cause; the Prophet, after having shewn that Israel were forsaken by God, now mentions the reason why it so happened, _Has not this done it for thee? _Some read in the second person, “Hast thou not done this for thee?” but the meaning is still nearly the same. More probable, however, is the rendering which others have given, “Has not this happened to thee, because thou hast forsaken Jehovah thy God?” Jeremiah, in short, teaches us that the cause of all the evils was the defection of the people, as though he had said, “Thou hast concocted for thyself all this evil; then must thou swallow it, and know that the blame cannot be cast on God; for he would have been faithful to thee, except thine impiety had prevented him. God has not, indeed, chosen thee in vain, nor has he in vain preferred thee to other nations; but thou hast rejected his kindness. Thy condition then would hav...

14-19 Is Israel a servant? No, they are the seed of Abraham. We may apply this spiritually: Is the soul of man a slave? No, it is not; but has sold its own liberty, and enslaved itself to divers lusts and passions. The Assyrian princes, like lions, prevailed against Israel. People from Egypt destroyed their glory and strength. They brought these calamities on themselves by departing from the Lord. The use and application of this is, Repent of thy sin, that thy correction may not be thy ruin. What has a Christian to do in the ways of forbidden pleasure or vain sinful mirth, or with the pursuits of covetousness and ambition?...

THE WAY - Either, the journey through the wilderness, or the way of holiness....

EXPOSITION The second chapter forms the introduction of a group of discourses (Jeremiah 2-6), which should be read together. It is called By Ewald (and the position of the prophecy favors this view) the first oracle which Jeremiah delivered in public ("oracle" is, in fact, the nearest English equivalent to those two remarkable Hebrew synonyms, _massa_ and _neum_—especially for the latter). This would bring it into the thirteenth year of the reign of Josiah (see Jeremiah 1:3), though of course we cannot be sure that references to a later period may not have been inserted afterwards. It is, obviously, only a summary of the prophet's spoken words which we have in this most impressive discourse. In order to appreciate it, we must bear in mind the external political relations and the internal religions condition of the kingdom of Judah. These have Been already touched

HAST THOU NOT PROCURED THIS UNTO THYSELF,.... All this desolation and destruction, both from the Egyptians and the Babylonians; their sin was the cause of it, their idolatry and forsaking the Lord their God, as follows: and so the Targum, "is not this vengeance taken upon thee?'' that is, by the Lord, for their sins and transgressions; he suffered these nations to make them desolate on that account: to which agrees the Septuagint version, "hath not he done these things unto thee?" for what the Egyptians and Babylonians did were done by the will of the Lord, who suffered them for their correction: and the Arabic version renders it, "have not I done these things unto thee?" and the Syriac as a prophecy, as indeed so is the whole, "lo, so it shall be done to thee"; as is predicted in the foregoing verses, and that for the following reason: IN THAT THOU HAST FORSAKEN THE LORD THY GOD; as...

Jeremiah 2:1. _Moreover the word of the LORD came to me, saying, Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the LORD, I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown. Israel was holiness unto the LORD, and the firstfruits of his increase: all that devour him shall offend; evil shall come upon them, saith the LORD._ God remembered what Israel used to be in those good days when the Lord alone did lead them and there was no strange god among them. Now he bids them remember from whence they had fallen, and repent and do their first works lest he come unto them in wrath. Oh, beloved, if you ever lived near to God if you ever rested your head on Christ's bosom, and have now wandered away from him and are spiritually cold and dead, begin to chide yourself; for the Lord himself,

CHAPTER S 2:1-3:5 Expostulation and Impeachment _ 1. His love and kindness to Jerusalem (Jeremiah 2:1) _ 2. The unfaithful people (Jeremiah 2:4) 3. The two evils and the results (Jeremiah 2:12) 4. Impeachment (Jeremiah 2:19) 5. Expostulation (Jeremiah 2:31) 6. Jehovah waiting to show mercy (Jeremiah 3:1) Jeremiah 2

ISRAEL'S FALSE RELIGION. Israel has forfeited the privileges of a son, and incurred disaster by forsaking Yahweh for the sensuous worship of the Baalim (_cf._ Jeremiah 2:20; Jeremiah 2:28). Jeremiah 2:14 may be a later insertion, as it seems to break the connexion between Jeremiah 2:13 and Jeremiah 2:18; Jeremiah 2:15 apparently refers to the devastation of the northern kingdom by Assyria,...

HE LED THEE. Reference to Pentateuch (Deuteronomy 32:12)....