8:1 The Lord says, “When that time comes, the bones of the kings of Judah and its leaders, the bones of the priests and prophets and of all the other people who lived in Jerusalem will be dug up from their graves.
“When that time comes” is a prophecy of the Babylonian destruction of 586 B.C. The Babylonian soldiers would dig up the graves of the kings, governmental leaders, priests, prophets, and people for two possible reasons. First, they would want to defile their bodies. Second, they would want to find plunder.
8:2 They will be spread out and exposed to the sun, the moon and the stars. These are things they adored and served, things to which they paid allegiance, from which they sought guidance, and worshiped. The bones of these people will never be regathered and reburied. They will be like manure used to fertilize the ground.
Those who worshiped the astrological signs of the heavens would have their dead bodies dug up and exposed to these astrological signs in which they worshiped. Their bones would be spread about the Valley of Hinnom like dung on the ground.
8:3 However, I will leave some of these wicked people alive and banish them to other places. But wherever these people who survive may go, they will wish they had died rather than lived,” says the Lord who rules over all.
Some of the wicked people of Judah would want to die, but instead, God would take them as captives to Babylon. Those who go to Babylon would wish that they would have died.
8:4 The Lord said to me, “Tell them, ‘The Lord says, Do people not get back up when they fall down? Do they not turn around when they go the wrong way?
Judah’s backsliding was unnatural. Naturally, when people fall down, then they stand right back up. When people go the wrong way, then they turn around and go the right way. Israel was not recovering from her backsliding. She refused to stand up. She refused to turn around and go the right direction.
8:5 Why, then, do these people of Jerusalem continually turn away from me in apostasy? They hold fast to their deception. They refuse to turn back to me.
Judah unnaturally would not turn away from apostasy. She would rather be deceived. There are many people today in cults, isms, charismatic churches, and seeker-churches who hate the Word of God so much, that they would rather stay in these false teaching churches and be deceived than to attend a strong biblical church which teaches the entire counsel of the Word of God at the deepest level..
8:6 I have listened to them very carefully, but they do not speak honestly. None of them regrets the evil he has done. None of them says, “I have done wrong!” All of them persist in their own wayward course like a horse charging recklessly into battle.
Jehovah had listened to His people very carefully. However, they were not speaking honestly to Him. They had no regrets about the evil that they had done. They all declared that they were innocent. They continued on their path of evil. Just as a horse charges into a hopeless battle to be killed, so do those in Judah run recklessly into destruction.
8:7 Even the stork knows when it is time to move on. The turtledove, swallow, and crane recognize the normal times for their migration. But my people pay no attention to what I, the Lord, require of them.
Even the birds have enough sense to follow natural laws. Judah was simply a bunch of bird-brains who were not smart enough to recognize that their sin was unnatural.
8:8 How can you say, “We are wise! We have the law of the Lord”? The truth is, those who teach it have used their writings to make it say what it does not really mean.
Judah claimed that they were wise, because they knew how to interpret the Mosaic Law. However, their teachers were misinterpreting the Scriptures to express their human viewpoint. They were changing the Law to make it fit their own theology. This misinterpretation of the Scriptures was very similar to what the Scribes, Pharisees, Sadducees, Talmudists, liberals, cults, isms, amillennialists, and postmillennialists have done throughout history.
8:9 Your wise men will be put to shame. They will be dumbfounded and be brought to judgment. Since they have rejected the word of the Lord, what wisdom do they really have?
The scribes of Jeremiah’s day were guilty of misinterpreting the Scriptures for their own personal gain. They were supporting false prophets. When Babylon attacks, everyone will know that these false teachers were a bunch of liars and deceivers.
When Jesus returns, all of the secular humanists, evolutionists, homosexuals, lesbians, transgenders, feminists, cults, isms, charismatics, and liberals will be ashamed and frightened. Everyone will know that these liberals were just a bunch of deceivers who taught for profit.
8:10 So I will give their wives to other men and their fields to new owners. For from the least important to the most important of them, all of them are greedy for dishonest gain. Prophets and priests alike, all practice deceit.
All of the wives of these false prophets and priests would be taken and raped by the Babylonians. All of the wealth and property in which these false prophets and priests earned would be plundered by the Babylonians.
8:11 They offer only superficial help for the hurt my dear people have suffered. They say, “Everything will be all right!” But everything is not all right!
The false prophets were teaching that everything was all right when it was not. This is similar to seeker-friendly pastors who only give positive messages. They do not warn their people of their true condition before God. True pastors will not tickle the ears of their congregation.They will teach the hard truth and demand that their congregation return to the study of the entire counsel of the Word of God.
8:12 Are they ashamed because they have done such disgusting things? No, they are not at all ashamed! They do not even know how to blush! So they will die just like others have died. They will be brought to ruin when I punish them, says the Lord.
The conscience of these false teachers has been so seared, that they no longer feel shame.
8:13 I will take away their harvests, says the Lord. There will be no grapes on their vines. There will be no figs on their fig trees. Even the leaves on their trees will wither. The crops that I gave them will be taken away.’ ”
The grapes and figs would no longer grow on the trees of Judah.
8:14 The people say, “Why are we just sitting here? Let us gather together inside the fortified cities. Let us at least die there fighting, since the Lord our God has condemned us to die. He has condemned us to drink the poison waters of judgment because we have sinned against him.
The people were saying that it was time to fortify and fight the Babylonians, but it was too late. They finally realized that they had been judged by God, but it was too late.
8:15 We hoped for good fortune, but nothing good has come of it. We hoped for a time of relief, but instead we experience terror.
Judah hoped that the temple would save them, but now they realized that this hope was superstition.
8:16 The snorting of the enemy’s horses is already being heard in the city of Dan. The sound of the neighing of their stallions causes the whole land to tremble with fear. They are coming to destroy the land and everything in it! They are coming to destroy the cities and everyone who lives in them!”
Since the Babylonians would come from the north, then Dan would the first tribal region where the Babylonians would enter. The snorting of the horses in Dan would be heard in Jerusalem, because there were so many of them. It was against the Mosaic Law to multiply horses. Israel was to trust in God, not horses, to deliver her from her enemies.
8:17 The Lord says, “Yes indeed, I am sending an enemy against you that will be like poisonous snakes which cannot be charmed away. And they will inflict fatal wounds on you.”
Babylon was like poisonous snakes that could not be charmed. Instead, these snakes would bite Judah and kill her.
8:18 Then I said, “There is no cure for my grief! I am sick at heart!
Jeremiah heard the cries of Judah from her future captivity in Babylon. Judah was so sad, that her grief was incurable. She was sick at heart.
8:19 I hear my dear people crying out throughout the length and breadth of the land. They are crying, ‘Is the Lord no longer in Zion? Is her divine King no longer there?’ ” The Lord answers, “Why then do they provoke me to anger with their images, with their worthless foreign idols?”
Jeremiah heard the Jews of the future crying out from Babylon. They asked two questions. First, was God no longer the God of Judah? Second, was he no longer the King of Judah?
God answered by letting them know that they were asking the wrong questions. The question should be why did Judah provoke God to anger by worshiping idols?
8:20 “They cry, ‘Harvest time has come and gone, and the summer is over, and still we have not been delivered.’
Harvest had come and gone. The summer was over. There was no fruit. Judah’s chance of deliverance was over.
8:21 My heart is crushed because my dear people are being crushed. I go about crying and grieving. I am overwhelmed with dismay.
As Jeremiah heard the cries of the future Jews in Babylon, he was deeply crushed with compassion. He began to cry. He become known as “the weeping prophet.”
8:22 There is still medicinal ointment available in Gilead! There is still a physician there! Why then have my dear people not been restored to health?
Gilead was an Israelite city which produced ointment to cover skin wounds. When Joseph was sold into slavery to the Ishmaelites, they were carrying this ointment into Egypt. There is a Christian song named after this verse called the “Balm of Gilead.” Judah was crying out that she was wounded and she needed this ointment.