Jeremiah 9:11

Lexham English Bible

Contextual Overview

¹ Oh that my head were waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, so that I might weep day and night, for the slain of the daughter of my people. ² Oh that I had in the desert a place of overnight lodging for travelers, that I may leave my people and go from them, for all of them are adulterers, a band of traitors. ³ And they bend their tongue like their bow, for falsehood and not truth is superior in the land, for they go forth from evil to evil, and they do not know me," declares Yahweh. ⁴ "Let everyone be on your guard against his neighbor, and you must not trust in any brother, for everyone surely betrays, and every neighbor goes about with slander. ⁵ And everyone deceives his neighbor, and they do not speak the truth, they have taught their tongues to speak lies, they are tired from going astray. ⁶ Your dwelling is in the midst of deceit, upon deceit they refuse to know me," declares Yahweh. ⁷ Therefore, thus says Yahweh of hosts: "Look, I am about to refine them, and I will test them, for what else can I do, because of the presence of the daughter of my people? ⁸ Their tongue is a murderous arrow, it speaks deceit. With his mouth he speaks peace with his neighbor, but in his inner parts he sets up his ambush. ⁹ Because of these things shall I not punish them?" declares Yahweh, "On a nation that is like this shall I not take revenge? ¹⁰ For the mountains I lift up weeping and wailing, and for the pastures of the desert a lament, because they are laid waste so that no man passes through. And the sounds of cattle are not heard, from the birds of heaven to the animals they have fled, they are gone.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Jerusalem: Jeremiah 26:18, Jeremiah 51:37, Nehemiah 4:2, Psalms 79:1, Isaiah 25:2, Micah 1:6, Micah 3:12

a den: Jeremiah 10:22, Isaiah 13:22, Isaiah 34:13, Revelation 18:2

the cities: Jeremiah 34:22, Isaiah 44:26, Lamentations 2:2, Lamentations 2:7, Lamentations 2:8

desolate: Heb. desolation, Jeremiah 25:11, Jeremiah 25:18, Lamentations 3:47, Micah 6:16

Reciprocal: Leviticus 26:31 - And I will make Leviticus 26:32 - And I Deuteronomy 28:16 - in the city Joshua 8:28 - an heap Job 15:28 - which are ready Psalms 137:3 - wasted us Isaiah 24:12 - General Jeremiah 1:15 - and against Jeremiah 2:15 - his cities Jeremiah 4:7 - to Jeremiah 6:8 - lest I Jeremiah 7:20 - Behold Jeremiah 12:11 - made it Jeremiah 18:16 - make Jeremiah 22:6 - surely Jeremiah 44:2 - a desolation Jeremiah 49:33 - a dwelling Lamentations 1:1 - sit Lamentations 1:4 - all her gates Lamentations 3:11 - he hath made Lamentations 5:18 - the foxes Ezekiel 6:6 - the cities Ezekiel 12:19 - that her Ezekiel 33:28 - I will lay Zephaniah 1:13 - their goods Zephaniah 1:18 - but Malachi 1:3 - the

Cross-References

Genesis 9:21
And he drank some of the wine and became drunk, and he exposed himself in the midst of his tent.

Genesis 9:22
And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father, and he told his two brothers outside.

Genesis 9:23
Then Shem and Japheth took a garment, and the two of them put it on their shoulders and, walking backward, they covered the nakedness of their father. And their faces were turned backward, so that they did not see the nakedness of their father.

Isaiah 54:9
"For this is like the waters of Noah to me, when I swore that the waters of Noah would never again pass over the earth, so I swore that I would not be angry at you and rebuke you.

2 Peter 3:7
But by the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly people.

2 Peter 3:11
Because all these things are being destroyed in this way, what sort of people must you be in holy behavior and godliness,

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And I will make Jerusalem heaps,.... That is, the walls and houses of it shall be thrown down, and become heaps of stones and rubbish:

and a den of dragons; only inhabited by wild beasts:

and I will make the cities of Judah desolate, without inhabitant; so that the calamity would be universal; not only Jerusalem, but all the cities of the land, would be destroyed, forsaken, and uninhabited.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The punishment described in general terms in the preceding three verses is now detailed at great length.

Jeremiah 9:10

The habitations i. e - the temporary encampments of the shepherds (see Jeremiah 6:3).

So that none can ... - Or, “They are parched up, with no man to pass through them; neither do they hear the voice of cattle; from the birds of the heaven even to the beasts they “are fled, they are gone.”

Jeremiah 9:11

Dragons - Rather, jackals.

Jeremiah 9:12

For what the land perisheth ... - This is the question proposed for consideration. The prophet calls upon the wise man to explain his question; that question being, Wherefore did the land perish? He follows it by the assertion of a fact: “It is parched like the wilderness with no man to pass through.”

Jeremiah 9:13

The cause of the chastisement about to fall upon Jerusalem, was their desertion of the divine Law.

Jeremiah 9:14

Imagination - Or, as in the margin.

Which their fathers taught them - It was not the sin of one generation that brought upon them chastisement: it was a sin, which had been handed down from father to son.

Jeremiah 9:15

I will feed them ... - Rather, I am feeding them. The present participle used here, followed by three verbs in the future, shows that the judgment has beam, of which the successive stages are given in the next clause.

Wormwood - See Deuteronomy 29:18, note, and for “water of gall,” Jeremiah 8:14, note.

Jeremiah 9:16

This verse is taken from Leviticus 26:33. The fulfillment of what had been so long before appointed as the penalty for the violation of Yahweh’s covenant is one of the most remarkable proofs that prophecy was something more than human foresight.

Till I have consumed them - See Jeremiah 4:27 note. How is this “consuming” consistent with the promise to the contrary there given? Because it is limited by the terms of Jeremiah 9:7. Previously to Nebuchadnezzars destruction of Jerusalem God removed into safety those in whom the nation should revive.

Jeremiah 9:17

The mourning women - Hired to attend at funerals, and by their skilled wailings aid the real mourners in giving vent to their grief. Hence, they are called “cunning,” literally “wise” women, wisdom being constantly used in Scripture for anything in which people are trained.

Jeremiah 9:18

Take up a wailing for us - i. e., for the nation once God’s chosen people, but long spiritually dead.

Jeremiah 9:19

Forsaken - Or, left: forced to abandon the land.

Because our dwellings ... - Rather, “because they have east down our dwellings.” The whole verse is a description of their sufferings. See 2 Kings 25:1-12.

Jeremiah 9:20

The command is addressed to the women because it was more especially their part to express the general feelings of the nation. See 1 Samuel 18:6; 2 Samuel 1:24. The women utter now the death-wail over the perishing nation. They are to teach their daughters and neighbors the “lamentation, i. e., dirge,” because the harvest of death would be so large that the number of trained women would not suffice.

Jeremiah 9:21

Death is come up ... - i. e., death steals silently like a thief upon his victims, and makes such havoc that there are no children left to go “without,” nor young men to frequent the open spaces in the city.

Jeremiah 9:22

The “handful” means the little bundle of grain which the reaper gathers on his arm with three or four strokes of his sickle, and then lays down. Behind the reaper came one whose business it was to gather several of these bundles, and bind them into a sheaf. Thus, death strews the ground with corpses as thickly as these handfuls lie upon the reaped land, but the corpses lie there unheeded.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Jeremiah 9:11. A den of dragons — תנים tannim is supposed to mean here jackals; the chakal is a beast frequent in the east, an attendant on the lion, the refuse of whose prey he devours. It is an animal that seems to have been bred originally between the wolf and the dog. The original is sometimes interpreted, dragons, whales, &c.