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Jeremiah 7: What the Passage Says

133 claims across 34 verses, in the order the chapter makes them.

Not a sermon outline. What Jeremiah 7 says, and what its hard words meant. The reading of it is yours.

The Chapter in a Sentence

God tells Jeremiah to stand at the gate of the temple and speak to the people of Judah coming in to worship. The message is that the temple building will not protect them while they steal, murder, commit adultery, swear falsely, and burn incense to other gods; God points to Shiloh, which he destroyed, as proof of what he will do to this house. God tells Jeremiah not to pray for the people, because he will not listen, and describes their offerings to the queen of heaven and the burning of their children at Topheth in the Valley of Hinnom. The chapter ends with the announcement that the place will be called the Valley of Slaughter and that all sounds of joy will stop in Judah and Jerusalem.

Claim by Claim

  1. 7:1
    • A word came to Jeremiah from the LORD.
  2. 7:2
    • The LORD told Jeremiah to stand in the gate of the LORD's house.
    • The LORD told Jeremiah to proclaim this word there.
    • The LORD told Jeremiah to say: Hear the word of the LORD, all Judah.
    • The people addressed enter in at these gates to worship the LORD.
  3. 7:3
    • The LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, says this.
    • The LORD commands them to amend their ways and their doings.
    • The LORD says that if they do, he will cause them to dwell in this place.
  4. 7:4
    • The LORD tells them not to trust in lying words.
    • The lying words are the saying: The temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, the temple of the LORD, are these.
  5. 7:5
    • The condition is that they thoroughly amend their ways and their doings.
    • The condition is that they thoroughly execute justice between a man and his neighbor.
  6. 7:6
    • The condition is that they not oppress the resident foreigner, the fatherless, and the widow.
    • The condition is that they not shed innocent blood in this place.
    • The condition is that they not walk after other gods.
    • Walking after other gods is to their own hurt.
  7. 7:7
    • Then the LORD will cause them to dwell in this place.
    • This place is in the land that the LORD gave to their fathers.
    • The dwelling would be for ever and ever.
  8. 7:8
    • They are trusting in lying words.
    • Those words cannot profit.
  9. 7:9
    • The LORD asks whether they will steal.
    • The LORD asks whether they will murder.
    • The LORD asks whether they will commit adultery.
    • The LORD asks whether they will swear falsely.
    • The LORD asks whether they will burn offerings to Baal.
    • The LORD asks whether they will walk after other gods they have not known.
  10. 7:10
    • The LORD asks whether they will then come and stand before him in this house.
    • This house is called by the LORD's name.
    • The LORD asks whether they will say, We are delivered.
    • They say this in order to go on doing all these abominations.
  11. 7:11
    • The LORD asks whether this house, called by his name, has become a den of robbers in their eyes.
    • The LORD says that he himself has seen it.
    • This is the declaration of the LORD.
  12. 7:12
    • The LORD tells them to go to his place which was in Shiloh.
    • The LORD caused his name to dwell at Shiloh at the first.
    • The LORD tells them to see what he did to it.
    • The LORD did that because of the wickedness of his people Israel.
  13. 7:13
    • They have done all these works.
    • This is the declaration of the LORD.
    • The LORD spoke to them, rising up early and speaking.
    • They did not hear.
    • The LORD called them.
    • They did not answer.
  14. 7:14
    • The LORD will do to this house as he did to Shiloh.
    • This house is called by the LORD's name.
    • They trust in this house.
    • The LORD will do the same to the place he gave to them and to their fathers.
  15. 7:15
    • The LORD will cast them out of his sight.
    • The LORD has cast out all their brethren.
    • Those cast out are the whole seed of Ephraim.
  16. 7:16
    • The LORD tells Jeremiah not to pray for this people.
    • The LORD tells Jeremiah not to lift up cry or prayer for them.
    • The LORD tells Jeremiah not to make intercession to him.
    • The LORD will not hear Jeremiah.
  17. 7:17
    • The LORD asks Jeremiah whether he does not see what they do in the cities of Judah.
    • The LORD asks whether he does not see what they do in the streets of Jerusalem.
  18. 7:18
    • The children gather wood.
    • The fathers kindle the fire.
    • The women knead dough.
    • The dough is for making cakes to the queen of heaven.
    • They pour out drink offerings to other gods.
    • This is done to provoke the LORD to anger.
  19. 7:19
    • The LORD asks whether it is him they provoke to anger.
    • This is the declaration of the LORD.
    • The LORD asks whether it is not themselves they provoke.
    • The result is the shame of their own faces.
  20. 7:20
    • The Lord GOD says this.
    • The LORD's anger and fury will be poured out upon this place.
    • It will be poured out upon man.
    • It will be poured out upon beast.
    • It will be poured out upon the trees of the field.
    • It will be poured out upon the fruit of the ground.
    • It will burn.
    • It will not be quenched.
  21. 7:21
    • The LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, says this.
    • He tells them to add their burnt offerings to their sacrifices.
    • He tells them to eat flesh.
  22. 7:22
    • The LORD did not speak to their fathers concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.
    • The LORD did not command them concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.
    • This was in the day that he brought them out of the land of Egypt.
  23. 7:23
    • The LORD commanded them this thing instead.
    • The command was to obey his voice.
    • The LORD said he would be their God.
    • The LORD said they would be his people.
    • The LORD commanded them to walk in all the way he commanded them.
    • The purpose was that it might be well with them.
  24. 7:24
    • They did not hearken.
    • They did not incline their ear.
    • They walked in the counsels of their evil heart.
    • They walked in the stubbornness of their evil heart.
    • They went backward and not forward.
  25. 7:25
    • The period runs from the day their fathers came out of the land of Egypt until this day.
    • The LORD sent to them all his servants the prophets.
    • The LORD sent them daily, rising up early and sending.
  26. 7:26
    • They did not hearken to the LORD.
    • They did not incline their ear.
    • They hardened their neck.
    • They did worse than their fathers.
  27. 7:27
    • Jeremiah is to speak all these words to them.
    • They will not hearken to him.
    • Jeremiah is to call to them.
    • They will not answer him.
  28. 7:28
    • Jeremiah is to say to them that this is a nation that does not obey the voice of the LORD its God.
    • This nation does not receive correction.
    • Truth has perished.
    • Truth is cut off from their mouth.
  29. 7:29
    • The command is to cut off the hair of consecration and cast it away.
    • The command is to take up a lamentation on the bare heights.
    • The LORD has rejected the generation of his wrath.
    • The LORD has forsaken the generation of his wrath.
  30. 7:30
    • The children of Judah have done evil in the LORD's sight.
    • This is the declaration of the LORD.
    • They have set their detestable things in the house called by the LORD's name.
    • They did this to pollute it.
  31. 7:31
    • They have built the high places of Tophet.
    • Tophet is in the valley of the son of Hinnom.
    • The high places were built to burn their sons and their daughters in the fire.
    • The LORD did not command this.
    • This did not come into the LORD's heart.
  32. 7:32
    • Days are coming.
    • This is the declaration of the LORD.
    • It will no longer be called Tophet or the valley of the son of Hinnom.
    • It will be called the valley of slaughter.
    • They will bury in Tophet until there is no place left.
  33. 7:33
    • The carcasses of this people will be food for the birds of the heavens.
    • The carcasses will be food for the beasts of the earth.
    • No one will frighten the birds and beasts away.
  34. 7:34
    • The LORD will cause to cease from the cities of Judah and from the streets of Jerusalem the voice of mirth.
    • He will cause the voice of gladness to cease.
    • He will cause the voice of the bridegroom to cease.
    • He will cause the voice of the bride to cease.
    • The land will become a waste.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

7:1
Jeremiah was a prophet, a messenger who spoke God's words out loud to the people. He lived in Judah about 600 years before Jesus.
7:2
The temple in Jerusalem stood inside a walled courtyard, and its gateways were the ordinary public place for making announcements, since everyone entering to worship had to pass through them. Jeremiah is placed where the whole worshiping crowd must hear him.
7:3
"LORD of Armies" renders the Hebrew title *YHWH Tseva'ot*, traditionally "LORD of hosts", the hosts being armies, whether Israel's fighting men or the heavenly forces. It is a title of overwhelming military command. Also note the printing convention: "LORD" in small capitals stands for God's personal name in Hebrew, which the text spells with four consonants and which Jews traditionally do not pronounce aloud; "God" and "Lord" in ordinary type render different Hebrew words.
7:4
The threefold repetition is a slogan or chant, quoted mockingly. The temple was the one place where God was held to be present among his people, and many concluded from this that Jerusalem could never fall while the building stood.
7:5
"Throughly" is the old spelling of thoroughly, meaning completely. To "execute judgment" is to settle people's arguments fairly, the way a good judge does.
7:6
The foreigner (a resident outsider with no clan to defend him), the fatherless child and the widow are a standard trio in Israelite law: the three categories of person with no male relative to protect their interests in court or in the marketplace, and so the people most easily cheated. "Shedding innocent blood" is legal language for judicial murder as much as private killing, condemning the blameless.
7:9
The list runs closely parallel to the Ten Commandments (theft, murder, adultery, false swearing) as if reciting a charge sheet. Baal was the Canaanite storm and fertility god, worshiped widely in the region; burning incense was a routine act of devotion at his shrines.
7:10
"Carries my name" is a legal-sounding phrase for ownership: the house is God's property and under his protection, the way a marked seal or a stamped jar identifies its owner. "We are safe" translates a word meaning rescued or delivered, the people claim the temple visit has already secured them, whatever they do next.
7:11
A robbers' hideout is not where bandits commit their crimes but the cave they retreat to afterwards, where they feel untouchable. That is the force of the image: the temple treated as a safe house.
7:12
Shiloh, about twenty miles north of Jerusalem, was the central sanctuary in the period before the monarchy, housing the tent-shrine and the ark. It was destroyed, apparently by the Philistines, and left in ruins, a well-known precedent for a holy place that God did not defend.
7:13
"Again and again" renders a Hebrew idiom that literally reads "rising up early and speaking." To rise early to do something is to do it urgently and repeatedly, from the first light of day.
7:15
Ephraim was the largest tribe of the northern kingdom of Israel, and its name was used for that kingdom as a whole. Assyria destroyed it and deported its population about a century before Jeremiah spoke; the southern kingdom of Judah, his audience, is being told it is not exempt.
7:16
Praying for the people was a core part of a prophet's job; Moses, Samuel and Amos all argue with God on Israel's behalf. Being ordered not to pray is a reversal of the role itself, which is why the command is stated three different ways in a single verse.
7:18
The "queen of heaven" is a goddess, most likely the Mesopotamian Ishtar or a related figure worshiped as Astarte, associated with the planet Venus. The cakes were baked in molds, apparently in her shape. A drink offering is wine poured out on the ground or an altar rather than drunk. What is being described is a whole household (children, fathers, women) cheerfully working together at it.
7:19
"The confusion of their own faces" means shame, the look on your face when you are caught doing wrong.
7:20
The King James prints "Lord GOD" with the second word in capitals to mark two different Hebrew words: a title meaning master, followed by the personal name of God. Wherever you see LORD in capitals, the underlying Hebrew is that name rather than the ordinary word for a god.
7:21
This is sarcasm, and it depends on a distinction in the sacrificial system. A burnt offering was consumed entirely on the altar and no part of it was eaten; other sacrifices were shared, with portions cooked and eaten by the worshipers. God tells them to throw the whole burnt offerings onto the pile with the rest and make a meal of the lot: they may as well, since he is not receiving any of it.
7:22
The Hebrew reads flatly, "I did not speak to your fathers... concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices," and readers have long disputed the force of it: either an outright denial that the sacrificial system originated at the exodus, or a comparative statement, sacrifice was not the point, obedience was. The wording will support either reading.
7:24
"Hearkened" means listened. To "incline the ear" is to lean in toward a speaker so you catch every word.
7:25
A prophet is someone who tells people what God says.
7:26
"They were stubborn" translates the idiom "they hardened their neck," drawn from a plow ox that braces its neck against the yoke and refuses to be steered.
7:28
"Truth is perished" means truth has died. Truth is spoken of here as a person who is dead and gone from people's mouths.
7:29
Shaving the head and throwing the hair away was a public gesture of mourning and disgrace. The Hebrew word used for the hair here is the one for the long consecrated hair of someone under a religious vow, so the image is of a sacred mark being cut off and discarded. The commands are addressed to a woman, the city personified. The "bare hilltops" are treeless heights, exposed places where a wail carries.
7:30
"Disgusting idols" renders a word for objects that are ritually revolting; "made it filthy" is the language of ceremonial defilement, meaning the building has been rendered unfit for its purpose rather than merely dirtied.
7:31
"High places" were raised open-air worship platforms, usually with an altar. Topheth was an installation in the Valley of Ben Hinnom ("the valley of the son of Hinnom"), which ran along the south side of Jerusalem; the name may derive from a word for a fireplace or hearth, and in Hebrew it is written with the vowels of the word for "shame." The Greek form of the valley's name, Gehenna, later became a standard word for hell. Child sacrifice by fire is attested here under two Judean kings.
7:32
A place-name is being replaced by a description of what happens there, from "Topheth" to "the Valley of Slaughter." Burying corpses in the valley would itself make the site permanently unclean.
7:33
To be left unburied and eaten by scavengers was regarded as the worst possible end, a final humiliation beyond death; "no one to scare them off" means there is nobody left alive to drive the birds away.
7:34
The songs and shouting of a wedding procession were the loudest ordinary noise a town produced. Their absence is a standard shorthand for a place emptied of normal life.

Read Jeremiah 7