Jeremiah 7

7:1-16 No observances, professions, or supposed revelations, will profit, if men do not amend their ways and their doings. None can claim an interest in free salvation, who allow themselves in the practice of known sin, or live in the neglect of known duty. They thought that the temple they profaned would be their protection. But all who continue in sin because grace has abounded, or that grace may abound, make Christ the minister of sin; and the cross of Christ, rightly understood, forms the most effectual remedy to such poisonous sentiments. The Son of God gave himself for our transgressions, to show the excellence of the Divine law, and the evil of sin. Never let us think we may do wickedness without suffering for it.

CHAPTER 7Jer 7:1-34. The Seventh through Ninth Chapters. Delivered in the Beginning of Jehoiakim's Reign, on the Occasion of Some Public Festival.The prophet stood at the gate of the temple in order that the multitudes from the country might hear him. His life was threatened, it appears from Jer 26:1-9, for this prophecy, denouncing the fate of Shiloh as about to befall the temple at Jerusalem. The prophecy given in detail here is summarily referred to there. After Josiah's death the nation relapsed into idolatry through Jehoiakim's bad influence; the worship of Jehovah was, however, combined with it (Jer 7:4, 10).

"\nThe word that came to Jeremiah,.... The Word of prophecy, as the Targum:\n\nfrom the Lord, saying; this begins a new prophecy. This verse, and the beginning of the next, are wanting in the Septuagint version.\n\n\n\n "

"\nStand in the gate of the Lord's house,.... That is, of the temple, and the court of it. This gate, as Kimchi says, was the eastern gate, which was the principal gate of all; see Jer 26:2:\n\nand proclaim there this word, and say; with a loud voice, as follows:\n\nhear ye the word of the Lord, all ye of Judah; the inhabitants of the several parts of Judea, which came to the temple to worship; very probably it was a feast day, as Calvin conjectures; either the passover, or pentecost, or feast of tabernacles, when all the males in Israel appeared in court:\n\nthat enter in at these gates to worship the Lord; there were seven gates belonging to the court, three on the north, three on the south, and one in the east, the chief of all, as Kimchi, Abarbinel, and Ben Melech observe; and this agrees with the account in the Misna {k}. The names of them were these; on the south side were these three, the watergate, the gate of the firstlings; or the gate of offering, and the gate of kindling; on the north were these three, the gate Nitzotz, called also the gate of the song, the gate Korban, sometimes called the gate of women, and Beth Moked; and the gate in the east was the gate Nicanor, and this gate was the most frequented; and therefore Jeremiah was ordered to stand here, and deliver his message.\n\n{k} Middot, c. 1. sect. 4, 5.\n\n\n\n "

7:2 The gate - The east gate, which was the publick place of going out and coming in, and where the people were then wont to assemble. Proclaim - Proclaiming signifies both the authority by which he spake, and the divulging of what he spake plainly and boldly; possibly, it might be at some publick time, when all the males were to meet.

"\nThus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel,.... The Lord of armies above and below in general, and the God of Israel in particular; wherefore they ought to hearken to what he was about to say, and to be obedient to him:\n\namend your ways and your doings; or, "make them good" {l}; which shows that they were bad, and were not agreeable to the law and will of God, to which they ought to have been conformed; and the way to amend them was to act according to the rule of the divine word they were favoured with:\n\nand I will cause you to dwell in this place; to continue to dwell in Jerusalem, and in Judea, the land of their nativity, and in the temple, the house of God, and place of religious worship; but, if not, it is suggested that they should not continue here, but be carried captive into a strange land.\n\n{l} \u05d4\u05d9\u05d8\u05d9\u05d1\u05d5 \u05d3\u05e8\u05db\u05d9\u05db\u05dd "bonas facite vias vestras", V. L. Munster, Pagninus, Montanus; "efficite", &c. Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.\n\n\n "

7:4 Saying - Because this was God's house, they flattered themselves that he would not suffer the Chaldeans to destroy it, therefore the prophet cautions them not to deceive themselves, trusting to the temple and its buildings, as the two courts and house, and holy of holies implied in the word these, which he doth as it were point to with his finger. The emphasis, in this threefold repetition, seems to relate to the confident, and reiterated boasts of the temple, that were in their mouths. These - The prophet standing in the gate at which the people entered, as it were, points at the several buildings pertaining to the temple.

"\nTrust ye not in lying words,.... In the words of the lying prophets, as the Targum; and to the same purpose is the Arabic version,\n\n"do not trust in lying words, for the false prophets do not profit you in anything;''\n\nthe things in which they trusted, and in which the false prophets taught them to place their confidence, were their coming up to the temple at certain times for religious exercises, and their attendance on temple service and worship, offering of sacrifices, and the like.