Jeremiah 2:31,32 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

O generation O wicked generation; see ye the word of the Lord Consider what I say to you from the mouth of God. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? Have ye not been plentifully provided for by me? Have I been backward in bestowing favours upon you? Have I not accommodated you with all necessaries? A land of darkness Hebrew, ארצ מאפליה, rendered by the Vulgate, terra serotina, a land backward or late in producing its fruits. Our translation of the clause, however, a land of darkness, seems preferable, as darkness is often used to denote calamity and distress: see Jeremiah 13:16; Isaiah 5:30; Isaiah 8:22. “The meaning of the passage,” says Blaney, “is, Have I been wanting to you, while ye have been under my guidance, in providing you with good things, or have I brought you unto the gloom of trouble and distress?” Wherefore say my people, We are lords, &c. We are our own masters, and will no more acknowledge thee as Lord over us, nor obey thy laws. This was the language, probably, not of the lips, but of the hearts and lives of the idolatrous Jews, who would not return to the worship and service of the true God. Can a maid forget her ornaments How seldom is it, and unlikely, that a maid should forget her ornaments? or a bride her attire? On which her thoughts and affections are placed? Yet my people have forgotten me Their chief glory and ornament, on whose favour and protection they were wont justly to value themselves, and whereby they were distinguished from all other nations. Such was the folly and wickedness of God's ancient people, called by his name, rescued from bondage and misery by his power, enriched with all temporal and spiritual blessings by his bounty, and guarded as the apple of his eye. Strange infatuation and weakness this, we are ready to exclaim, of the Jews! But are not multitudes of persons called Christians equally weak and foolish? Do not things of very small worth, and short duration, frequently occupy their thoughts, and even possess their hearts; things of as little value as the ornaments which vain women delight in, while things of the highest excellence and greatest necessity, things far superior to every visible and temporal object, such as salvation, grace, and glory, God, and Christ, and heaven, are overlooked and neglected? Reader, is not this thy practice? does not thy conscience accuse thee of this wickedness and folly?