--- title: "Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah" author: "Adam Clarke" languages: [en] shelf: "Commentaries" section: 887 of 914 url: https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/887/ cite: "Adam Clarke, Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah, section 887. Scriptura (scriptura.si), https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/887/" --- # Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible · Volume 1: Genesis to Jeremiah *Adam Clarke* Clarke's learned notes on the Hebrew and Greek, verse by verse, from Genesis to Revelation: volume 1 of 2. ## 887. Jeremiah · 28 of 55 Source: https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/887/ · cite a paragraph as https://scriptura.si/works/adam-clarke-commentary-volume-1-genesis-to-jeremiah/887/#p-N ### Verse 8 [¶1] And all the people - That were in company with the priests and the prophets. ### Verse 10 [¶3] The princes of Judah - The king's court; his cabinet counsellors. ### Verse 12 [¶5] The Lord sent me to prophesy - My commission is from him, and my words are his own. I sought not this painful office. I did not run before I was sent. ### Verse 13 [¶7] Therefore now amend your ways - If ye wish to escape the judgment which I have predicted, turn to God, and iniquity shall not be your ruin. ### Verse 14 [¶9] As for me, behold, I am in your hand - I am the messenger of God; you may do with me what you please; but if you slay me, you will bring innocent blood upon yourselves. ### Verse 16 [¶11] This man is not worthy to die - The whole court acquitted him. ### Verse 17 [¶13] Certain of the elders - This is really a fine defense, and the argument was perfectly conclusive. Some think that it was Ahikam who undertook the prophet's defense. ### Verse 18 [¶15] Micah the Morasthite - The same as stands among the prophets. Now all these prophesied as hard things against the land as Jeremiah has done; yet they were not put to death, for the people saw that they were sent of God. ### Verse 20 [¶17] Urijah - who prophesied - The process against Jeremiah is finished at the nineteenth verse; and the case of Urijah is next brought on, for he was also to be tried for his life; but hearing of it he fled to Egypt. He was however condemned in his absence; and the king sent to Egypt, and brought him thence and slew him, and caused him to have an ignominious burial, [Jer 26:21-23]. ### Verse 24 [¶19] The hand of Ahikam - was with Jeremiah - And it was probably by his influence that Jeremiah did not share the same fate with Urijah. The Ahikam mentioned here was probably the father of Gedaliah, who, after the capture of Jerusalem, was appointed governor of the country by Nebuchadnezzar, [Jer 40:5]. Of the Prophet Urijah, whether he was true or false, we know nothing but what we learn from this place. [¶20] That they should not give him into the hand of the people - Though acquitted in the supreme court, he was not out of danger; there was a popular prejudice against him, and it is likely that Ahikam was obliged to conceal him, that they might not put him to death. The genuine ministers of God have no favor to expect from those who are His enemies. ### Introduction [¶22] Ambassadors being come from several neighboring nations to solicit the king of Judah to join in a confederacy against the king of Babylon, Jeremiah is commanded to put bands and yokes upon his neck, (the emblems of subjection and slavery), and to send them afterwards by those ambassadors to their respective princes; intimating by this significant type that God had decreed their subjection to the Babylonian empire, and that it was their wisdom to submit. It is farther declared that all the conquered nations shall remain in subjection to the Chaldeans during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, and those of his son and grandson, even till the arrival of that period in which the Babylonians shall have filled up the measure of their iniquities; and that then the mighty Chaldean monarchy itself, for a certain period the paramount power of the habitable globe, shall be voted with a dreadful storm of Divine wrath, through the violence of which it shall be dashed to pieces like a potter's vessel, the fragments falling into the hands of many nations and great kings, [Jer 27:1-11]. Zedekiah, particularly, is admonished not to join to the revolt against Nebuchadnezzar, and warned against trusting to the suggestions of false prophets, [Jer 27:11-18]. The chapter concludes with foretelling that what still remained of the sacred vessels of the temple should be carried to Babylon, and not restored till after the destruction of the Chaldean empire, [Jer 27:19-22]. ### Verse 1 [¶24] In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim - It is most evident that his prophecy was delivered about the fourth year of Zedekiah, and not Jehoiakim, as in the text. See [Jer 28:1]. Three of Kennicott's MSS. (one in the text, a second in the margin, and the third upon a rasure) have Zedekiah; so likewise have the Syriac and the Arabic. Houbigant, Lowth, Blayney, Dahler, and others declare for this reading against that in the present text. And it is clear from the third and twelfth verses, where Zedekiah is expressly mentioned, that this is the true reading. ### Verse 2 [¶26] Make thee bonds and yokes - Probably yokes with straps, by which they were attached to the neck. This was a symbolical action, to show that the several kings mentioned below should be brought under the dominion of the Chaldeans. ### Verse 5 [¶28] I have made the earth - I am the Creator and Governor of all things, and I dispose of the several kingdoms of the world as seemeth best to me. ### Verse 6 [¶30] And now have I given - These kingdoms are at my sovereign disposal; and at present, for the punishment of their rulers and people, I shall give them into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon. ### Verse 7 [¶32] And all nations shall serve him (Nebuchadnezzar), and his son, (Evil-merodach [Jer 52:31]), and his son's son, (Belshazzar, [Dan 5:11].) All which was literally fulfilled. ### Verse 9 [¶34] Therefore hearken not ye to your prophets - Who pretend to have a revelation from heaven. [¶35] Nor to your diviners - קסמיכם kosemeychem, from קסם kasam, to presage or prognosticate. Persons who guessed at futurity by certain signs in the animate or inanimate creation. [¶36] Nor to your dreamers - חלמתיכם chalomotheychem, from חלם chalam, to break in pieces; hence חלום chalom, a dream, because it consists of broken fragments. Dream-interpreters, who, from these broken shreds patch up a meaning by their own interpolations. [¶37] Nor to your enchanters - ענניכם oneneychem, from ענן anan, a cloud - cloud-mongers. Diviners by the flight, color, density, rarity, and shape of clouds. [¶38] Nor to your sorcerers - כשפיכם cashshapheychem, from כשף kashaph, to discover; the discoverers, the finders out of hidden things, stolen goods, etc. Persons also who use incantations, and either by spells or drugs pretend to find out mysteries, or produce supernatural effects. Every nation in the world had persons who pretended to find out hidden things, or foretell future events; and such were gladly encouraged by the ignorant multitude; and many of them were mere apes of the prophets of God. Man knows that he is short-sighted, feels pain at the uncertainty of futurity, and wishes to have his doubts resolved by such persons as the above, to put an end to his uncertainty. ### Verse 13 [¶40] Why will ye die - If ye resist the king of Babylon, to whom I have given a commission against you, ye shall be destroyed by the sword and by famine; but if ye submit, ye shall escape all these evils. ### Verse 16 [¶42] The vessels of the Lord's house - Which had been carried away by Nebuchadnezzar under the reigns of Jehoiakim and Jeconiah, [2Chr 36:7-10]. [¶43] Shall now shortly be brought again - This is a lie. They shall not be restored till I bring them up, [Jer 27:22], which was after the captivity, when they were sent back by Cyrus, the Lord inclining his heart to do it, [Ezr 1:7], and [Ezr 7:19].