Whedon's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 4:23-26
23-26. I beheld, etc. Resuming the general course of thought, another group of images is brought forward to show the fearfulness of the destruction impending. And this time they are the most terrible which nature furnishes; the same which, in other passages, are employed to set forth God’s great judgment days. See Isaiah 13:10; Joel 2:10, etc., etc. The established order by which time is both created and measured here gives place to a kind of primeval chaos. The earth again becomes... read more
Wesley's Explanatory Notes - Jeremiah 4:23
I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no light.I beheld — I Jeremiah saw this in a vision.It — The land was squalid, and ruined, like the first chaos, for which reason possibly he calls Judah the earth, in allusion to Genesis 1:2.The heavens — He seems to proceed in his metaphor of the chaos. Every thing above and below seemed to be wrapped up in dismal blackness. read more