Read & Study the Bible Online - Bible Portal
Matthew Henry

Matthew Henry's Complete Commentary - Jeremiah 16:14-21

There is a mixture of mercy and judgment in these verses, and it is hard to know to which to apply some of the passages here?they are so interwoven, and some seem to look as far forward as the times of the gospel. I. God will certainly execute judgment upon them for their idolatries. Let them expect it, for the decree has gone forth. 1. God sees all their sins, though they commit them ever so secretly and palliate them ever so artfully (Jer. 16:17): My eyes are upon all their ways. They have... read more

John Gill

John Gills Exposition of the Bible Commentary - Jeremiah 16:14

Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord ,.... Or nevertheless, "notwithstanding" F4 So Noldius, Concord. Ebr. p. 507. their sins and iniquities, and the punishment brought upon them for them: or "surely", verily; for Jarchi says it is an oath, with which the Lord swore he would redeem them, though they had behaved so ill unto him: that it shall no more be said, the Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt ; this was the form of an oath... read more

John Gill

John Gills Exposition of the Bible Commentary - Jeremiah 16:15

But the Lord liveth ,.... Or they shall swear by the living Lord; or declare his power, as the Targum: "that brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north"; that is, from Babylon, which lay north of Judea. The Jews F4 T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 87. 1. gather from hence, that the land of Israel was higher than all other lands, because it is said, that "brought up", or "caused to ascend"; as out of the land of Egypt as before, so out of all other lands. The meaning is, that... read more

John Gill

John Gills Exposition of the Bible Commentary - Jeremiah 16:16

Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the Lord, and they shall fish them ,.... Which some understand of the Egyptians, who lived much on fish, and were much employed in catching them, to which the allusion is thought to be; but rather the Chaldeans are intended, whom God, by the secret instinct of his providence, brought up against the Jews; who besieged Jerusalem, and enclosed them in it, and took them as fishes in a net; see Habakkuk 1:14 , though some interpret this, and what... read more

Adam Clarke

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:14

The Lord liveth, that brought up - See Isaiah 43:18 . read more

Adam Clarke

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:15

The land of the north - Chaldea: and their deliverance thence will be as remarkable as the deliverance of their fathers from the land of Egypt. read more

Adam Clarke

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:16

I will send for many fishers - for many hunters - I shall raise up enemies against them some of whom shall destroy them by wiles, and others shall ruin them by violence. This seems to be the meaning of these symbolical fishers and hunters. read more

John Calvin

John Calvin's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:14

Verse 14 Jeremiah seems here to promise a return to the Jews; and so the passage is commonly expounded, as though a consolation is interposed, in which the faithful alone are concerned. But I consider the passage as mixed, that the Prophet, in part, speaks in severe terms of the dreadful exile which he foretells, and that he in part blends some consolation; but the latter subject seems to me to he indirectly referred to by the Prophet. I therefore think this to be an amplification of what he... read more

John Calvin

John Calvin's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:15

Verse 15 But, it will be rather said, Live does Jehovah, for he has brought his people from the land of the north; and for this reason, because there will be less hope remaining for you, when the Chaldeans shall subdue and scatter you like a body torn asunder, and when the name of Israel shall be extinguished, when the worship of God shall be subverted and the Temple destroyed. When therefore all things shall appear to be past remedy, this captivity shall be much more dreadful than that by... read more

John Calvin

John Calvin's Commentary on the Bible - Jeremiah 16:16

Verse 16 Some explain this of the apostles; but it is wholly foreign to the subject: they think that Jeremiah pursues here what he had begun to speak of; for they doubt not but that he had been speaking in the last verse of a future but a near deliverance, in order to raise the children of God into a cheerful confidence. But I have already rejected this meaning, for their exposition is not well founded. But if it be conceded that the Prophet had prophesied of the liberation of the people, it... read more

Group of Brands