Cut off thine hair. — Literally, as in 2 Samuel 1:10; 2 Kings 11:12, thy crown or diadem; but the verb determines the meaning. The word Netzer (“consecration” in the Authorised version) is applied to the unshorn locks of the Nazarite (Numbers 6:7), and from it he took his name. As the Nazarite was to shave his head if he came in contact with a corpse, as cutting the hair close was generally among Semitic races the sign of extremest sorrow (Job 1:20; Micah 1:16), so Jerusalem was to sit as a woman rejected by her husband, bereaved of her children. (Comp. the picture in Lamentations 1:1-3.) The word is applied also to the “crown” of the high priest in Exodus 29:6, the “crown” of the anointing oil in Leviticus 21:12.
O Jerusalem. — The italics show that the words are not in the Hebrew, but the insertion of some such words was rendered necessary by the fact that the verb “cut off” is in the feminine. Those who heard or read the words of the prophet, who so often spoke of “the daughter of Zion” (Jeremiah 6:2), of “the daughter of his people” (Jeremiah 6:14; Jeremiah 8:11), of “the betrothed of Jehovah” (Jeremiah 2:3), would be at no loss to understand his meaning.