Jeremiah 17:15-18 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Behold, they say unto me Scoffing at me, as if I had denounced threatenings in thy name, without any order or direction from thee: Where is the word of the Lord? Like the scoffers, mentioned by St. Peter, 2 Peter 3:4, saying, Where is the promise of his coming? This has been the practice of all wicked men, hardened in their sinful courses, and resolved to go on in them: they put the evil day far from them, and scoff at all denunciations of divine wrath. Let it come now So said these scoffers, daring the vengeance of God, and challenging him to execute the judgments he had threatened. As for me, I have not hastened, &c. Dr. Waterland translates this clause, “But as for me, I have not forced or intruded myself upon thee for a pastor.” To the same sense the Geneva translation interprets the words. According to which reading the prophet solemnly appeals to God that he had not intruded himself into the office of a prophet, nor had been desirous of an employment that foreboded so much evil to others, and brought a great deal of trouble upon himself. The words in the Hebrew, however, are literally as our translation expresses them, and may be paraphrased thus, “As I did not seek the office of a prophet, so when thou wast pleased to call me to it I did not decline it.” The LXX, render it, εγω δε ουκ εκοπιασα κατακολουθων οπισω σου, I have not been weary of following thee. Neither have I desired the woful day Namely, the day of the accomplishment of his prophecies. Though, when it came, it would prove him to have been a true prophet, which they had questioned, and would be the avenging of him upon his persecutors, and therefore, on those accounts, he might have been tempted to desire it; yet, as it would be a woful day to Jerusalem, he deprecated it, and could appeal to God that he wished it might never come. That which came out of my lips was right before thee That is, it exactly agreed with what I had received from thee. Be not a terror unto me Amidst all the terrors, with which mine adversaries threaten me, let me still find comfort in thee; and let not any apprehension of being forsaken by thee be added to my other fears. Let them be confounded, &c. See notes on Jeremiah 11:20; Jeremiah 16:18.