Jeremiahchapter 10
25 verses · Jeremiah, written by Baruch · 7th to 6th century BC · The Prophets
This is what the LORD says: “Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by the signs in the heavens, though the nations themselves are terrified by them.
Introduction
Jeremiah, written by Baruch, The Prophets, Jeremiah Overview.
Jeremiah wrote this for a people who would soon live as a small defeated minority among nations whose gods were carried through the streets on feast days. Before they went, they needed to know what those images were made of. The chapter walks through the making of an idol step by step and sets the LORD beside it. Listen for the details of the workshop and for the farm figure that stands in a field of vegetables. Listen too for one verse written in a different language from the rest of the book. Read it as preparation for life in Babylon.
Context
- Who
- Judeans facing deportation to a country full of gods on parade
- What
- A contrast between idols made by craftsmen and the LORD who made the heavens and the earth, closing with a lament and a prayer.
- Where
- Jerusalem, with the workshops of the carvers and goldsmiths in view and the exile in Babylon ahead.
- When
- The chapter carries no date; it closes the temple sermon section and is usually placed before the deportation of 597 BC.
- Why
- To guard Judah against fear of the nations' gods and signs, and to teach them to answer idolaters.
Historical context
The chapter walks through idol manufacture as though standing in the shop. A tree is felled in the forest. A craftsman shapes it with a cutting tool. It is plated with beaten silver and gold, Tarshish and Uphaz named as the sources, the way we would name a country of origin. Then it is fastened down with hammer and nails so that it will not fall over.
Show the rest of the historical context, 3 more paragraphs
That last step is the joke. A god that has to be nailed to its stand cannot walk. The chapter finishes the picture with a scarecrow in a cucumber field: upright, human-shaped, silent, and completely unable to do anything but stand there.
The warning about the signs of the heavens is aimed at Babylon in particular. Babylonian scholars kept the most sophisticated sky records in the ancient world, watched eclipses and planetary positions, and read national omens off them. Exiles arriving in that culture would meet astrology at the level of state policy.
One line in this chapter is written not in Hebrew but in Aramaic, the everyday international language of the region. It reads like a sentence handed to exiles to say to their neighbours: the gods who did not make the heavens and the earth will perish from under these heavens.
Significance
The point for the first hearers is not that other peoples were stupid. It is that they were about to be a small, defeated minority in a magnificent city whose gods paraded through the streets on festival days, and they needed to know in advance what those images were made of.
Show the rest of the significance, 1 more paragraph
Set against the workshop is a God who made the earth by his power, whose voice is thunder and rain, and who is not the work of anybody's hands. That contrast was survival equipment for the exile that was coming.
This chapter in Jewish lifeWhat this chapter is in Jewish life and reading.
What is done
No part of this chapter is read in the synagogue. Probed for this lane, the site's own table in src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts printed parashot 0 and haftarah uses 0 for Jeremiah 10, and no festival reading for the book. Across chapters 1 to 26 of Jeremiah the same probe found a Haftarah only in chapters 1, 2, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9, 16 and 17.
How it is read
Rashi is the one commentator on this chapter whose English the corpus carries, quoted here from The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, which Sefaria reports as CC-BY.
Rashi reads the eleventh verse as a letter. "This is a letter that Jeremiah sent to Jeconiah and those exiled with him", to be the exiles' answer if the Chaldeans told them to worship idols (Rashi on Jeremiah 10:11:1). On the true God he gives the reason: He is living and King, and so He can make His words come true, where a man's plans die with him (Rashi on Jeremiah 10:10:1).
On the way of man that is not in himself Rashi gives two readings. The first puts it down to the evil inclination. The second has the prophet say that the enemy would have no power to destroy the Temple without God's command (Rashi on Jeremiah 10:23:1).
The corpus carries four further notes on this chapter without an English text, each marked linked because Sefaria holds no English version of the ref. They stand cited and unquoted at Radak on Jeremiah 10:1:1, 10:6:1, 10:16:1 and 10:22:1.
What the rabbis say
The corpus carries 40 rabbinic locators on the verses of this chapter, 5 in the Talmud and 35 in the Midrash. It carries the text of none, so each is cited by ref here and never quoted or paraphrased. The verse numbers are the Hebrew ones the corpus prints.
On verse 2 it holds Bereshit Rabbah 44:12, Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Shabbat 24:2 and Ein Yaakov, Shabbat 24:4. On verse 3 it holds Midrash Aggadah, Leviticus 18:3:3, Midrash Lekach Tov, Leviticus 18:3:1 and Midrash Tanchuma, Mishpatim 3:2. On verse 5 it holds Introductions to Tanaitic Literature, Introductions to Tractates of the Mishnah, Kelim 467, Otzar Midrashim, Baraita of Samuel HaKatan 1:38 and Otzar Midrashim, Baraita on Mazalot 1:20. On verse 6 it holds Midrash Tanchuma, Bereshit 5:13 and Midrash Tanchuma, Beshalach 11:2.
On verse 7 it holds Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Shirah 1:18 and Midrash Sekhel Tov, Shemot 15:21:6. On verse 8 it holds Bamidbar Rabbah 3:12 and Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Toldot 10. On verse 9 it holds Jerusalem Talmud Yoma 4:4:9 and Otzar Midrashim, Chuppah of Eliyahu, Seven Chupot or Eliyahu's Chuppah 4. On verse 10 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 35:1 and Avot DeRabbi Natan 34:11. On verse 11 it holds Avot DeRabbi Natan, Recension B 43:12 and Bereshit Rabbah 13:12.
On verse 12 it holds Bereshit Rabbah 13:4 and Bereshit Rabbah 5:4. On verse 13 it holds Berakhot 59a:7 and Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Megillah 1:32. On verse 14 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 13:2 and Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Shirah 1:16. On verse 15 it holds Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Sanhedrin 11:15 and Ein Yaakov (Glick Edition), Taanit 1:12. On verse 16 it holds Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Bereshit 62 and Bereshit Rabbati, Parashat Toldot 34. On verse 19 it holds Eikhah Rabbah, Petichta 2 and Pesikta DeRav Kahana 15:4.
On verse 20 it holds Pesikta Rabbati 28:1 and Tanna DeBei Eliyahu Rabbah 30:1. On verse 21 it holds Midrash Sekhel Tov, Bereshit 25:18:6. On verse 24 it holds Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, Tractate Shirah 9:11 and Midrash Tehillim 38:1. On verse 25 it holds Aggadat Bereshit 75:1 and Mekhilta DeRabbi Shimon Ben Yochai 15:2.
Sources: Rashi, Rashi on Jeremiah 10:2:1 to 10:24:1, The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg, reported CC-BY; Radak, Radak on Jeremiah 10:1:1, 10:6:1, 10:16:1 and 10:22:1, cited by ref because the corpus carries no English text; The Sefaria corpus, scripts/data/sources/sefaria/jeremiah/10.json, the 40 Talmud and Midrash locators on the verses of this chapter; The site's own files, src/lib/hebraic/readings.ts, probed for Jeremiah 10: parashot 0, haftarah uses 0, and no festival reading for the book.
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
A Tree Cut from the Forest, Fastened with Hammer and Nails
Jeremiah 10:1-5
O house of Israel: The oracle addresses the house of Israel directly, “Do not learn the ways of the nations or be terrified by the signs in the heavens”. It then gives the book's fullest account of making an idol, “shaped with a chisel”, adorned “with silver and gold”.
Jeremiah 10:1
“Hear ye the word which the Lord speaketh unto you - Dr. Dahler supposes this discourse to have been delivered in the fourth year of the reign of Jehoiakim. It contains an invective against idolatry; showing its absurdity, and that the Creator alone should be worshipped by all mankind.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
the signs in the heavens: The signs are the omens astrologers read in the sky. Clarke notes that the Chaldeans and Egyptians were devoted to astrology. He takes the warning as addressed first to the northern tribes scattered among the nations.
Jeremiah 10:2
“Learn not the way of the heathen - These words are more particularly addressed to the ten tribes scattered among the heathen by the Assyrians, who carried them away captive; they may also regard those in the land of Israel who still had the customs of the former heathen settlers before their eyes. Be not dismayed at the signs of heaven; for the heathen are dismayed - The Chaldeans and Egyptians were notoriously addicated to astrology; and the Israelites here are cautioned against it.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
the customs of the peoples are worthless: Customs renders chukkoth, the statutes and principles of the nations' religion, which Clarke calls empty and illusory. Matthew Henry notes that the Chaldeans prided themselves on wisdom, and the prophet shows their god beginning as a tree in the forest. Isaiah 44:9 mocks the same craft.
Jeremiah 10:3
“The customs of the people are vain - חקות chukkoth; the statutes and principles of the science are vain, empty, and illusory. They are founded in nonsense, ignorance, idolatry, and folly. One cutteth a tree out of the forest - See the notes on Isa 40:19 (note), and Isa 44:9 (note), etc., which are all parallel places and where this conduct is strongly ridiculed.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:3
“The Chaldeans valued themselves upon their wisdom, in which they thought that they excelled all their neighbours; but the prophet here shows that they, and all others that worshipped idols and expected help and relief from them, were brutish and sottish, and had not common sense. (1.) Consider what the idol is that is worshipped. It was a tree cut out of the forest originally.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
fasten it with hammer and nails: Barnes notes that the craftsman covered the wood with plates of silver and gold and fastened it with nails so the idol would stand. He holds that the passage is modelled on Isaiah 40 to 44, which came first. The god must be kept from falling.
Jeremiah 10:4
“They deck it - It was covered with plates of gold and silver, and then fastened with nails in its place, that it might not “more, i. e.” tumble down. The agreement in this and the following verses with the argument in Isa. 40–44 is so manifest, that no one can doubt that the one is modelled upon the other. If, therefore, Jeremiah took the thoughts and phrases from Isaiah, it is plain that the last 27 chapters of Isaiah were prior in date to Jeremiah’s time, and were not therefore written at the close of the Babylonian exile.”
Like scarecrows in a cucumber patch: The Berean follows the reading that sees scarecrows set up in a cucumber field. Barnes prefers a stiff pillar carved like a palm tree, and he notes that the ancient versions lack the scarecrow reading. Either way, the idol stands still and must be carried.
Jeremiah 10:5
“They are upright ... - Rather, “They are like a palm tree of turned work, i. e.” like one of those stiff inelegant pillars, something like a palm tree, which may be seen in oriental architecture. Some translate thus: “They are like pillar’s in a garden of cucumbers, i. e.” like the blocks set up to frighten away the birds; but none of the ancient versions support this rendering.”
Jeremiah 10:6-10
Your name is mighty in power: Against the craftsman's product stands the confession of verse 6, “You are great, and Your name is mighty in power”, a doxology inside the argument. Verse 10 answers with the title no idol can claim, “the LORD is the true God; He is the living God and eternal King”.
Jeremiah 10:6
“Men's name is often beyond their might; they are thought to be greater than they are; but God's name is great, and no greater than he really is. And therefore who would not fear thee, O King of nations? Who would not choose to worship such a God as this, that can do every thing, rather than such dead idols as the heathen worship, that can do nothing?”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
O King of nations?: King of nations claims the pagan peoples as the LORD's subjects, and Barnes points to Psalm 22:28. He renders the last line as in all their royalty, the kingship of the nations set beside his. Fear is his due.
Jeremiah 10:7
O King of nations - i. e., pagan nations. Yahweh is not the national God of the Jews only, but He reigns over all mankind Psa 22:28. It - i. e., everything. In all their kingdoms - More correctly, “in all their royalty or kingship.”
instructed by worthless idols made of wood!: Blayney, quoted by Clarke, renders the last line: the wood itself rebukes worthless things. The tree cut from the forest exposes the folly. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read it with Psalm 115:8, where the makers become as senseless as their idols.
Jeremiah 10:8
“Man divests himself of his true humanity, and sinks to the level of the brute, when he severs his connection with God (Ps 115:8; Jon 2:8). stock is a doctrine of vanities--The stock (put for the worship of all idols whatever, made out of a stock) speaks for itself that the whole theory of idolatry is vanity (Isa 44:9-11).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:8
“The stock is a doctrine of vanities - Dr. Blayney translates, - “The wood itself is a rebuker of vanities.” The very tree out of which the god is hewn demonstrates the vanity and folly of the idolaters; for, can all the art of man make out of a log of wood an animate and intelligent being?”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Gesenius takes Uphaz as a form of Ophir, as Jamieson, Fausset and Brown report. Barnes adds that the blue and the purple both came from shellfish, one with a violet tinge and the other red. Gill says the silver from Tarshish was hammered into plates.
Jeremiah 10:9
“Or, “It is a piece of wood (Jer 10:8 note); yea, beaten silver it is, which is brought from Tarshish, and gold from Uphaz: it is the work etc.” Tarshish ... Uphaz - See the marginal reference and Gen 10:4. Possibly Uphaz was a place in the neighborhood of the River Hyphasis. Blue and purple - Both colors were purple, from dyes obtained from shellfish: but the former had a violet, the latter a red tinge.”
2 more voices on this verse
Jeremiah 10:9
“Silver spread into plates is brought from Tarshish,.... In Cilicia, where the Apostle Paul was born; according to Josephus, as Jerom says, it was a country in India. The Targum renders it, from Africa, and calls it silver "rolled up", or "covered"; so the Vulgate Latin; such was beaten with a hammer into plates, and might be rolled up for better convenience of shipment; and with which they covered and decked their idols, to make them look glittering and pompous, and command some awe and reverence from the common people.”
Jeremiah 10:9
“As the Septuagint in the Syrian Hexapla in the Margin, THEODOTUS, the Syrian and Chaldee versions have "Ophir," GESENIUS thinks "Uphaz" a colloquial corruption (one letter only being changed) for "Ophir." Ophir, in Ge 10:29, is mentioned among Arabian countries. Perhaps Malacca is the country meant, the natives of which still call their gold mines Ophirs.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
the LORD is the true God: Clarke comments that the divine name should be kept as it is written, and that the true God is without beginning or end. Living God names a being whose life is his own and who gives life to all. Idols have no breath.
Jeremiah 10:10
“But the Lord - The original word should be preserved, however we agree to pronounce it: יהוה Yehovah is the true God. He is without beginning, and without end. This is true of no being else. He is the living God - His being is underived; and he gives life to all. He is the very Fountain whence all life is derived. And an everlasting king - As he has made, so he governs, all things. His sway is felt both in the heavens and in the earth.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Verse 11 alone in the book is written in Aramaic. A sentence against the nations' gods is carried in the nations' tongue, so a Babylonian captor could read his gods' doom in his own script. The exiles are given it to speak back to their captors.
Jeremiah 10:11
“This verse is (in the original) in Chaldee. It was probably a proverbial saying, which Jeremiah inserts in its popular form.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:11
“This verse is in Chaldee, Jeremiah supplying his countrymen with a formula of reply to Chaldee idolaters in the tongue most intelligible to the latter.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Jeremiah 10:12-13
He established the world by His wisdom: The LORD “made the earth by His power”, “established the world by His wisdom” and “stretched out the heavens by His understanding”. Verse 13 turns from making to governing, the lightning, rain and wind brought “from His storehouses”. Weather is an office only the true God holds.
Jeremiah 10:12
“Discretion - Or, understanding. The three attributes ascribed to the Creator are very remarkable. The creation of the earth, the material world, is an act of “power;” the “establishing,” i. e., the ordering and arranging it as a place fit for man’s abode, is the work of his “wisdom;” while the spreading out the heavens over it like a tent is an act of “understanding,” or skill. Naturally, the consideration of these attributes has led many to see here an allusion to the Holy Trinity.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:12
“It was a common saying even among the Greeks-- He that sets up to be another god ought first to make another world. While the heathen worship gods that they made, we worship the God that made us and all things. First, The earth is a body of vast bulk, has valuable treasures in its bowels and more valuable fruit on its surface.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
the waters in the heavens roar: Barnes reads the roar of the waters in the heavens as the rain that rushes down after the thunder. The rest of the verse matches Psalm 135:7, and Barnes holds that the words are Jeremiah's own, the psalm being later. Weather answers to its Maker.
Jeremiah 10:14-16
every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols: The words “every goldsmith is put to shame by his idols” make the craftsman the idol's accuser, for “there is no breath in them”. Verse 16 answers with “The Portion of Jacob”, the God who is “the Maker of all things”, and Israel is “the tribe of His inheritance”.
a work to be mocked: Gill reads the phrase with the Targum as objects worthy of laughter, the work of men in error that leads others into error. Their punishment comes on a set day. The makers fall with them.
The Portion of Jacob: Each nation claimed a guardian god as its portion, Clarke notes, and Deuteronomy 4:19 speaks of the sun, moon and stars allotted to the peoples. Israel's portion is the LORD, and Deuteronomy 32:9 calls his people his portion in return. The belonging runs both ways.
Gather Up Thy Wares: the Way of Man Is Not in Himself
Jeremiah 10:17-18
Gather up your belongings from this land: The tone breaks from doxology to siege warning without a transition, “Gather up your belongings from this land, you who live under siege”. Verse 18 gives the reason as the LORD's own act, “I will sling out the inhabitants of the land and bring distress upon them”.
Jeremiah 10:17
“Gather up thy wares out of the land,.... Or thy merchandise, as the Targum; or thy substance, as the Septuagint; all valuable effects and goods that are movable, which might be carried from place to place. The meaning is, that the Jews would gather up their riches from the several parts of the land of Judea, and bring them to Jerusalem, a fortified place; or they would be in danger of falling into the hands of the enemy.”
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:17
“The prophet now returns to the main subject of his sermon, the conquest of Judaea. Thy wares - Rather, thy bundle, which could contain a few articles for necessary use, and be carried in the hand. They are going into exile. O inhabitant of the fortress - i. e., thou that art besieged, that inhabitest a besieged town.”
sling out the inhabitants of the land: The LORD will throw the inhabitants of the land out like stones from a sling. Wesley reads the figure as the speed and ease with which the land would be emptied at this time. Clarke dates the words to the eleventh year of Jehoiakim.
Jeremiah 10:18
“I will sling out the inhabitants of the land - I will project you with violence from your country. I will send you all into captivity. This discourse, from Jer 10:17, is supposed to have been delivered in the eleventh year of Jehoiakim.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:18
“The fortress - The inhabitants of Jerusalem, the chief place of security in Judea. Sing out - It denotes with how much violence and ease the Chaldeans shall hurry away the people into Babylon. And therefore it is said at this once, I will make one thorough quick work of it.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Jeremiah 10:19-21
Woe to me because of my brokenness: The prophet speaks in the city's voice and pictures a nomad's home undone, “My tent is destroyed, and all its ropes are snapped”. Verse 21 names the cause the book returns to in its shepherd oracles, “the shepherds have become senseless; they do not seek the LORD”.
Jeremiah 10:19
“Judea bewails its calamity. wound--the stroke I suffer under. I must bear--not humble submission to God's will (Mic 7:9), but sullen impenitence. Or, rather, it is prophetical of their ultimate acknowledgment of their guilt as the cause of their calamity (La 3:39).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:19
“The lamentation of the daughter of Zion, the Jewish Church, at the devastation of the land, and her humble prayer to God for mercy. Jer 10:19 Grievous - Rather, “mortal,” i. e., fatal, incurable. A grief - Or, “my grief.” Jer 10:20 tabernacle - i. e., “tent.” Jerusalem laments that her tent is plundered and her children carried into exile, and so “are not,” are dead Mat 2:18, either absolutely, or dead to her in the remote land of their captivity.”
My tent is destroyed: Barnes hears Jerusalem speaking as a mother whose tent is destroyed and whose sons are carried into exile. The words are no more return at Jeremiah 31:15, where Rachel weeps for her children. Jerome notes that the Greek has sheep for sons.
Jeremiah 10:20
“My tabernacle is spoiled - The city is taken, and all our villages ruined and desolated.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
the shepherds have become senseless: The Targum takes the shepherds as the kings of Judah, and Gill widens the word to every ruler of the people. Clarke points to the king and his counsellors, whose refusal of tribute to Babylon brought on the war. The flock was scattered.
Jeremiah 10:21
“For the pastors are become brutish,.... The "kings" of Judah, so the Targum, Jarchi, and Kimchi, as Jehoiakim and Zedekiah; though it need not be restrained to these only, but may include all inferior civil magistrates, and even all ecclesiastical rulers, who were the shepherds of the people; but these being like the brute beasts, and without understanding of civil and religious things, and not knowing how to govern the people either in a political or ecclesiastical way, were the cause of their ruin.”
2 more voices on this verse
Jeremiah 10:21
“The pastors are become brutish - The king and his counselors, who, by refusing to pay the promised tribute to Nebuchadnezzar, had kindled a new war.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Jeremiah 10:21
“But it is sad indeed with a people when their pastors, that should feed them with knowledge and understanding, are themselves thus brutish. Therefore they shall not prosper; none of their attempts for the public safety shall succeed. Note, Those cannot expect to prosper who do not by faith and prayer take God along with them in all their ways.”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
a great commotion from the land to the north: The report of “a great commotion from the land to the north” is the boiling pot of the call vision at 1:13 arriving as fact. The north has stood as an unnamed direction across nine chapters. For the first time in this stretch, the invasion is spoken of as present.
Jeremiah 10:22
“The noise of the bruit is come - How this silly French word bruit, which signifies noise, got in here, I cannot imagine. The simple translation is this: “The voice of the report! behold, it is come; yea, great commotion from the land of the north; (Chaldea); to make the cities of Judea a desolation, a habitation of wild beasts.” That is, the report we had heard of the projected invasion of Judea by Nebuchadnezzar is confirmed. He has entered the land; the Chaldeans are at the doors, and the total desolation of Judea is their sole object.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
1 more voice on this verse
Jeremiah 10:22
“It now proves too true: A great commotion arises out of the north country, which threatens to make all the cities of Judah desolate and a den of dragons; for they must all expect to be sacrificed to the avarice and fury of the Chaldean army. And what else can that place expect but to be made a den of dragons which has by sin made itself a den of thieves?”
Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Jeremiah 10:23-25
a man’s way is not his own: The chapter closes with Jeremiah's prayer, “a man’s way is not his own; no one who walks directs his own steps”. The plea “Correct me, O LORD, but only with justice” asks for discipline without destruction. The last plea turns outward against the nations, “For they have devoured Jacob”.
Jeremiah 10:23
“I know, O Jehovah, that the march of the Babylonian conqueror against me (Jeremiah identifying himself with his people) is not at his own discretion, but is overruled by Thee (Isa 10:5-7; compare Jer 10:19). that walketh--when he walketh, that is, sets out in any undertaking. direct . . . steps--to give a prosperous issue to (Ps 73:23).”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown · Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Jerome sets the prayer beside Psalm 6:1, where David asks the LORD to rebuke him without anger. Wesley reads it as the plea that punishment come in measure, as correction. Jeremiah speaks for the people.
Jeremiah 10:24
“Correct me - Seeing thou wilt punish us, let it be a correction only, not a destruction. Let it be in measure; in the midst of judgment remember mercy.”
John Wesley · Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
Pour out Your wrath on the nations: Clarke notes the nations carrying out judgment on Jacob would feel it in their turn, and he sees the prayer fulfilled on the Chaldeans. Henry reasons that wrath beginning with the house of God reaches the families that do not call on his name. The chapter ends on that plea.
Jeremiah 10:25
“Pour out thy fury upon the heathen - Even those who are now the executors of thy justice upon us will, in their turn, feel its scourge; for if judgment begins at us, who have been called thy house and thy people, shall they who have not acknowledged thee escape? It is impossible. The families and tribes which invoke thee not shall have thy fury poured out upon them, and especially they who “have eaten up Jacob and consumed him, and have made his habitation desolate.” This was fulfilled in the Chaldeans.”
Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
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Sources for this chapter
The summary
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.
The exposition
Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Carl Friedrich Keil, The Prophecies of Jeremiah; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Jeremiah; John Calvin, Commentary on Jeremiah and Lamentations; John Gill; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.