This is the prayer of a man in bitter grief, whose human nature cannot at present submit to the divine will. God’s long-suffering toward the wicked seemed to the prophet to be the abandonment of himself to death; justice itself required that one who was suffering contumely for God’s sake should be delivered.
Rebuke - i. e., reproach, contumely.
Thy words were found - Jeremiah’s summons to the prophetic office had not been expected or sought for by him.
I did eat them - i. e., I received them with joy. This eating of the divine words expresses also the close union between that which came from God and the prophet’s own being.
I am called by thy name - i. e., I am consecrated to Thy service, am ordained to be Thy prophet.
Rather, “I sat not in the assembly of the laughers, and was merry.” From the time God’s words came to Jeremiah he abstained from things innocent, and a gravity came over him beyond his years.
I sat alone because of thy hand - As a person consecrated to God he would also be “separated.” See Jeremiah 1:5; compare Acts 13:2.
With indignation - The prophet thus taught of God sees the sins of the people as offences against God, and as involving the ruin of His Church.
Why is my pain perpetual - i. e., Are all my labors to be in vain?
As a liar ... - Really, “as a deceitful brook,” a brook which flows only in the winter, the opposite of the “perennial stream” of Amos 5:24. Jeremiah had expected that there would be a perpetual interference of Providence in his behalf, instead whereof things seemed to take only their natural course.