Matthew Henry on Jeremiah 7:29–end
Here is, I. A loud call to weeping and mourning. Jerusalem, that had been a joyous city, the joy of the whole earth, must now take up a lamentation on high places (Jer 7:29), the high places where they had served their idols; there must they now bemoan their misery. In token both of sorrow and slavery, Jerusalem must now cut off her hair and cast it away; the word is peculiar to the hair of the Nazarites, which was the badge and token of their dedication to God, and it is called their crown. Jerusalem had been a city which was a Nazarite to God, but now must cut off her hair, must be profaned, degraded, and separated from God, as she had been separated to him. It is time for those that have…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Jeremiah 7:33
fray--scare or frighten (Deu 28:26). Typical of the last great battle between the Lord's host and the apostasy (Rev 19:17-18, Rev 19:21).
John Gill on Jeremiah 7:33
And the carcasses of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth,.... That is, those which remain unburied, for which there will be found no place to bury them in; all places, particularly Tophet, being so full of dead bodies; not to have a burial, which is here threatened, was accounted a great judgment:
and none shall fray them away; or frighten them away; that is, drive away the fowls and the beasts from the carcasses. The sense is, either that there should be such a vast consumption of men, that there would be none left to do this, and so the fowls and beasts might prey upon the carcasses without any disturbance; or else that those that were le…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Calvin on Jeremiah 7:33
Jeremiah 7:33
33. And the carcases of this people shall be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth; and none shall fray them away.
33. Et erit cadaver populi hujus in cibum avi coelorum (avibus) et bestiae terrae (hoc est, bestiis) nec erit qui absterreat (hoc est, qui terrore abigat.)
Jeremiah threatens them with something more grievous than death itself, -- that God would impress the marks of his wrath even on their dead bodies. It is indeed true what a heathen poet says,
"That the loss of a grave is not great," (Virgil, aeneid;)
but we must on the other hand remember that burying has been held as a sacred custom in all ages; for it was a symbol of the last r…
