A summons to real repentance: 'Break up your fallow ground, and sow not among thorns' (4:3); circumcise the foreskins of your heart. Then the alarm. Blow the trumpet, flee into the fortified cities, for evil comes from the north like a lion out of his thicket, like clouds, with chariots as the whirlwind. The chapter's astonishing center is an un-creation vision: 'I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was waste and void; and the heavens, and they had no light' (4:23). Mountains trembling, no man left, the birds fled. Yet mercy holds the line: 'yet will I not make a full end.'

Drawn from Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory, Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary, John Wesley, Notes on the Old Testament and John Calvin, Commentaries.

Context

Prophecy · Jeremiah — Jeremiah overview

A. 1–9 Break Up Your Fallow Ground; Circumcise Your Hearts
B. 10–18 A Hot Wind from the Bare Heights of the Wilderness
C. 19–31 My Anguish, My Anguish! The Earth Waste and Void Again

Top cross-references8 chapters ▾

Jeremiah 56 verses
- Jeremiah 5:10Go ye up upon her walls, and destroy; but make not a full end: take away her battlements; for they are not the Lord’s.
- Jeremiah 5:12They have belied the Lord, and said, It is not he; neither shall evil come upon us; neither shall we see sword nor famine:
- Jeremiah 5:15Lo, I will bring a nation upon you from far, O house of Israel, saith the Lord: it is a mighty nation, it is an ancient nation, a nation whose language thou knowest not, neither understandest what they say.
- Jeremiah 5:18Nevertheless in those days, saith the Lord, I will not make a full end with you.
- Jeremiah 5:21Hear now this, O foolish people, and without understanding; which have eyes, and see not; which have ears, and hear not:
- Jeremiah 5:23But this people hath a revolting and a rebellious heart; they are revolted and gone.
- Read Jeremiah 5 →
Isaiah 223 verses
- Isaiah 22:3All thy rulers are fled together, they are bound by the archers: all that are found in thee are bound together, which have fled from far.
- Isaiah 22:4Therefore said I, Look away from me; I will weep bitterly, labour not to comfort me, because of the spoiling of the daughter of my people.
- Isaiah 22:12And in that day did the Lord God of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:
- Read Isaiah 22 →
Lamentations 13 verses
- Lamentations 1:2She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks: among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies.
- Lamentations 1:17Zion spreadeth forth her hands, and there is none to comfort her: the Lord hath commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him: Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them.
- Lamentations 1:19I called for my lovers, but they deceived me: my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.
- Read Lamentations 1 →
Jeremiah 92 verses
- Jeremiah 9:10For the mountains will I take up a weeping and wailing, and for the habitations of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none can pass through them; neither can men hear the voice of the cattle; both the fowl of the heavens and the beast are fled; they are gone.
- Jeremiah 9:24But let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth me, that I am the Lord which exercise lovingkindness, judgment, and righteousness, in the earth: for in these things I delight, saith the Lord.
- Read Jeremiah 9 →

4 more chapters this one speaks with

Luke 82 verses
- Luke 8:7And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up with it, and choked it.
- Luke 8:14And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection.
- Read Luke 8 →
Jeremiah 82 verses
- Jeremiah 8:14Why do we sit still? assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the defenced cities, and let us be silent there: for the Lord our God hath put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against the Lord.
- Jeremiah 8:16The snorting of his horses was heard from Dan: the whole land trembled at the sound of the neighing of his strong ones; for they are come, and have devoured the land, and all that is in it; the city, and those that dwell therein.
- Read Jeremiah 8 →
Jeremiah 62 verses
- Jeremiah 6:1O ye children of Benjamin, gather yourselves to flee out of the midst of Jerusalem, and blow the trumpet in Tekoa, and set up a sign of fire in Beth–haccerem: for evil appeareth out of the north, and great destruction.
- Jeremiah 6:26O daughter of my people, gird thee with sackcloth, and wallow thyself in ashes: make thee mourning, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation: for the spoiler shall suddenly come upon us.
- Read Jeremiah 6 →
Jeremiah 12 verses
- Jeremiah 1:13And the word of the Lord came unto me the second time, saying, What seest thou? And I said, I see a seething pot; and the face thereof is toward the north.
- Jeremiah 1:16And I will utter my judgments against them touching all their wickedness, who have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, and worshipped the works of their own hands.
- Read Jeremiah 1 →

Cross-references from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge and OpenBible.info.