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Jeremiah 14:7

in Jeremiah 14

Although our iniquities testify against us, O LORD, act for the sake of Your name. Indeed, our rebellions are many; we have sinned against You.

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾

ASV

Though our iniquities testify against us, work thou for thy name’s sake, O Jehovah; for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against thee.

KJV

O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us, do thou it for thy name’s sake: for our backslidings are many; we have sinned against thee.

This verse in Jeremiah 14

Commentary

8 notes on this verse
Do thou it - Rather, “deal thou, act thou for Thy Name’s sake, i. e., not according to the strict measure of right and wrong, but as a God merciful and gracious.

This site's exposition

Although our iniquities testify against us

on Jeremiah 14:7-9

The people’s prayer names its own guilt, “our rebellions are many”, and asks the LORD to act “for the sake of Your name”. It calls him the Hope of Israel and its Savior. Verse 10 shows that this honest prayer still falls short of the turning the LORD requires.

The record, by era

The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices

A commentator

Matthew Henry

1662–1714

Commentary on the Whole Bible (1710)

proposed

"Lord, do it, that they mercy may be magnified, thy promise fulfilled, and thy interest in the world kept up; we have nothing to plead in ourselves, but every thing in thee." There is another petition in this prayer, and it is a very modest one (

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — unbalanced-parens

O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us,.... That we deserve such judgments to be inflicted on us; and that God is righteous in bringing them; and we are altogether undeserving of the favour now about to be asked.

The Nineteenth Century3 voices

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

proposed

Jeremiah pleads in the name of his nation (Ps 109:21). So "work for us," absolutely used (1Sa 14:6). for thy name's sake--"for our backslidings are so many" that we cannot urge Thee for the sake of our doings, but for the glory of Thy name; lest, if Thou give us not aid, it should be said it was owing to Thy want of power (Jos 7:9;

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — unbalanced-parens

THIS passionate appeal for mercy was forced from the people by extreme misery. There was a famine in the land until men fell in the streets of the city exhausted with hunger. Drought had long prevailed and lack of water was terribly felt. Meanwhile, invasion kept them in perpetual fear, so that the Prophet lamented, "If I go forth into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! And if I enter into the city, then, behold, them that are sick with famine!" Such judgment had God inflicted on a guilty nation for her sin.
THIS passionate appeal for mercy was forced from the people by extreme misery. There was a famine in the land until men fell in the streets of the city exhausted with hunger. Drought had long prevailed and lack of water was terribly felt. Meanwhile, invasion kept them in perpetual fear, so that the Prophet lamented, "If I go forth into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! And if I enter into the city, then, behold, them that are sick with famine!" Such judgment had God inflicted on a guilty nation for her sin. No springs were bubbling up from the earth and no rain dropped down from Heaven. This dire privation had produced universal distress. "Judah mourns, and the gates thereof languish; they are black unto the ground; and the cry of Jerusalem is gone up." As the calamity, like a river of lava, burned its dreadful way, an eyewitness, in his heart's anguish, describes a few common scenes which forcefully tell the tale of utter desolation. Princes and peasants are seized with the same consternation—the Prophet paints them both with their heads covered in token of a common grief. Here in the city the children are coming back from the place of pools and fountains with empty pitchers, for they find not a drop of water in the pits. Out yonder in the fields the ground is chapped and cleft by the scorching sun in the absence of dew or rain. The plow is of no use in that parched soil! Farmers are sitting down ashamed, confounded, utterly dejected—it is vain for them to lift the hand of labor. Down in the valleys the dumb cattle express their feeling with throes of anguish—the hind calves and forsakes her young. And up on the mountain heights the wild asses prove their share in the universal distress.
1 more voice on this verse

The Nineteenth Century1 voice

A commentator

Adam Clarke

1762–1832

Commentary on the Bible · Written before 1832.

proposed

O Lord, though our iniquities testify against us - We deeply acknowledge that we have sinned, and deserve nothing but death. Yet act for thy name’s sake - work in our behalf, that we perish not.

The words behind it

13 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • אִם־though

    ʾim-H518 →1069 times

  • עֲוֹנֵ֙ינוּ֙iniquities our

    ʾavoneinuH5771 →233 times

  • עָ֣נוּthey have testified

    ʾanuH6030 →331 times

  • בָ֔נוּagainst <the> us

    vanu

  • יְהוָ֕הO Yahweh

    yahwehH3068 →6520 times

  • עֲשֵׂ֖הact

    ʾasehH6213 →2628 times

  • לְמַ֣עַןfor [the] sake of

    lemaanH4616 →272 times

  • שְׁמֶ֑ךָname your

    shemekhaH8034 →864 times

  • כִּֽי־for

    ki-H3588 →4482 times

  • רַבּ֥וּthey are many

    rabuH7231 →21 times

  • מְשׁוּבֹתֵ֖ינוּapostasies our

    meshuvoteinuH4878 →12 times

  • לְךָ֥to <the> you

    lekha

  • חָטָֽאנוּ׃we have sinned

    chatanuH2398 →238 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

The walk

8 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Psalms 25:11

    For the sake of Your name, O LORD, forgive my iniquity, for it is great.

    it leads to

    • 1 John 2:12

      I am writing to you, little children, because your sins have been forgiven through His name.

    • Psalms 79:9

      Help us, O God of our salvation, for the glory of Your name; deliver us and atone for our sins, for the sake of Your name.

    • Isaiah 43:25

      I, yes I, am He who blots out your transgressions for My own sake and remembers your sins no more.

    • Psalms 31:3

      For You are my rock and my fortress; lead me and guide me for the sake of Your name.

    • Romans 5:20–21

      The law came in so that the trespass would increase; but where sin increased, grace increased all the more,

  • Through

    Hosea 5:5

    Israel’s arrogance testifies against them; Israel and Ephraim stumble in their iniquity; even Judah stumbles with them.

    it leads to

    • Hosea 7:10

      Israel’s arrogance testifies against them, yet they do not return to the LORD their God; despite all this, they do not seek Him.

  • Through

    Jeremiah 5:6

    Therefore a lion from the forest will strike them down, a wolf from the desert will ravage them. A leopard will lie in wait near their cities, and everyone who ventures out will be…

    it leads to

    • Habakkuk 1:8

      Their horses are swifter than leopards, fiercer than wolves of the night. Their horsemen charge ahead, and their cavalry comes from afar. They fly like a vulture, swooping down to devour.

    • Jeremiah 4:7

      A lion has gone up from his thicket, and a destroyer of nations has set out. He has left his lair to lay waste your land. Your cities will be reduced to ruins and…

Where this verse is studied

About Jeremiah

Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem, Rembrandt, 1630. Public domain.
Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem, Rembrandt, 1630. Public domain.

This page draws on 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; Charles Spurgeon, The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, Sermon No. 1661: “Praying and Pleading” (lightly modernized text, CCEL edition); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Calvin, Commentary on Jeremiah and Lamentations; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.