A. God's anger 2:1-10

"There are about forty descriptions of divine judgment, which fell upon every aspect of the Jews' life: home, religion, society, physical, mental and spiritual. Some of the blackest phrases of the book appear here . . ."²⁷

2:1 Jeremiah pictured the sovereign Lord (Heb. adonay) overshadowing Jerusalem, personified as a young woman, with a dark cloud because of His anger. The Lord had cast the city from the heights of glory to the depths of ignominy (cf. Isa. 14:12). It had been as a footstool for His feet, but He had not given it preferential treatment in His anger.²⁸

2:2 He had devoured the cities of the Judahites without sparing them and had overpowered their strongholds. He humbled the kingdom of Judah and its princes.

2:3 In His fierce anger He also broke the strength of Israel and had not restrained her enemy. He had judged Jacob severely, as when someone burns something up (cf. Deut. 4:24; Heb. 12:29).

2:4 He had also attacked His people and had slain them even though they were His favored nation. The fire of His anger had burned her habitations. He destroyed everything that they valued.

2:5 Yahweh had become like an enemy to His people consuming and destroying them and causing mourning and moaning among them.

2:6 He tore down His temple like the temporary booths that farmers erected in their fields for a short time and then demolished. He caused the ending of feasts and sabbath observances in Zion and showed no regard for the kings and priests of Judah.

2:7 He rejected the altar of burnt offerings and the temple having delivered the temple precincts to the Babylonians. Israel's enemy now made noise in the temple rather than the Judahites.

2:8 The Lord also destroyed Jerusalem's walls and broke down her defenses.

2:9 The city gates with their bars were no longer effective in keeping Jerusalem safe, and the king (Jehoiachin) and his advisers had gone into exile. The Mosaic Law now failed to govern the Israelites since they could no longer observe its cultic ordinances. Yahweh had also stopped giving His prophets revelations of His will.

". . . when Jerusalem was destroyed, Israel received no prophetic communication, . . . God the Lord did not then send them a message to comfort and sustain them."²⁹

2:10 The most respected leaders of the Israelites had suffered humiliation and now sat on the ground with dust on their heads, signs of mourning. Girding with sackcloth and bowing to the ground also expressed grief over what the Lord had done. Thus the Lord broke down the leaders of the nation as well as its walls.