Jeremiah 11
Jeremiah 11 returns to the foundation under everything else the prophet says: the covenant. The LORD sends him to repeat its terms in the streets of Jerusalem and the cities of Judah - the agreement made at Sinai by which Israel became God's people and He became their God. Obey my voice, and do them… so shall ye be my people, and I will be your God (v. 4). It was never a cold contract; it was the bond that held a whole relationship together. But Jeremiah is not sent to celebrate it. He is sent to pronounce the curse written into it long ago: Cursed be the man that obeyeth not the words of this covenant (v. 3).3
The reason is plain and grievous. The people have broken faith. They are turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers… and they went after other gods to serve them (v. 10), with idols as numerous as the cities of Judah and altars to Baal on every street of Jerusalem (v. 13). The LORD names it a conspiracy (v. 9) - a settled, shared rebellion - and tells Jeremiah to stop praying for them, for the judgment is now fixed. The green olive tree the LORD once planted, fair, and of goodly fruit, is set on fire and its branches broken (v. 16). Worship at the temple cannot cover a covenant betrayed in the heart.
Then, without warning, the chapter turns from the nation to the prophet himself. Jeremiah learns that the men of his own home town - Anathoth, where he was born - have devised devices against him, plotting to silence him for good: let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered (v. 19). He compares himself to a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter, an innocent who never saw it coming. And he answers not with vengeance of his own but with a cry to the only Judge who sees the heart: O LORD of hosts, that judgest righteously… for unto thee have I revealed my cause (v. 20).2
Tap any highlighted phrase to jump to the commentary that unpacks it.
Jeremiah 11:1-10Cursed Be the Man That Obeyeth Not
1The word that came to Jeremiah from the LORD, saying, 2Hear ye the words of this covenant, and speak unto the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem; 3And say thou unto them, Thus saith the LORD God of Israel; Cursed be the man that obeyeth not the words of this covenant, 4Which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying, Obey my voice, and do them, according to all which I command you: so shall ye be my people, and I will be your God: 5That I may perform the oath which I have sworn unto your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day. Then answered I, and said, So be it, O LORD.
The chapter opens as a fresh word from the LORD with a clear assignment: Hear ye the words of this covenant, and speak unto the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem (vv. 1-2). Jeremiah is to take the people back to the founding terms of their life with God - the covenant sworn when the LORD brought them forth out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace (v. 4). That phrase, iron furnace, is no small image. Egypt was a smelting-furnace of bondage, and their rescue from it was the great act of grace on which everything else rested. The terms themselves are simply stated: Obey my voice, and do them… so shall ye be my people, and I will be your God. Here is the heart of it - not a list of demands for their own sake, but the shape of a relationship. Obedience was the door into belonging. And tied to it was a promise: that the LORD would perform the oath sworn to the fathers and give them a land flowing with milk and honey (v. 5). Jeremiah hears all this and answers with one quiet word of assent - So be it, O LORD. He stands with the covenant before he ever has to announce its breach.3
6Then the LORD said unto me, Proclaim all these words in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem, saying, Hear ye the words of this covenant, and do them. 7For I earnestly protested unto your fathers in the day that I brought them up out of the land of Egypt, even unto this day, rising early and protesting, saying, Obey my voice. 8Yet they obeyed not, nor inclined their ear, but walked every one in the imagination of their evil heart: therefore I will bring upon them all the words of this covenant, which I commanded them to do; but they did them not. 9And the LORD said unto me, A conspiracy is found among the men of Judah, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 10They are turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers, which refused to hear my words; and they went after other gods to serve them: the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant which I made with their fathers.
The LORD presses the same charge twice, and the repetition is the point. Proclaim all these words… Hear ye the words of this covenant, and do them (v. 6). Then He looks back across the whole history of the nation and describes His own persistence: I earnestly protested unto your fathers… rising early and protesting, saying, Obey my voice (v. 7). The picture is of a God who would not give up - up before dawn, as it were, calling and warning generation after generation. And the answer, just as persistently, was refusal: Yet they obeyed not, nor inclined their ear, but walked every one in the imagination of their evil heart (v. 8). Notice how the breach is described. It is not that they tried and failed; it is that they would not even incline their ear - would not bend toward the voice enough to listen. Each one followed instead the imagination of his own evil heart, the inward drift toward whatever he himself wanted. That is the anatomy of covenant-breaking: not a single dramatic crime, but a settled refusal to listen, a thousand small turnings of the ear away from God toward the self.
Now the charge is named for what it is: A conspiracy is found among the men of Judah, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem (v. 9). The word is startling. A conspiracy is a thing plotted in secret, a binding-together against someone - and the LORD says the whole people have, in effect, banded together against Him. What looked like ordinary national life was in truth a shared rebellion. Verse 10 lays it bare: They are turned back to the iniquities of their forefathers… and they went after other gods to serve them. They had not invented a new sin; they had circled back to the oldest one, the same idolatry that had always pulled at the nation. And the verdict is plain: the house of Israel and the house of Judah have broken my covenant which I made with their fathers. The bond is severed - not by God, who kept rising early to call them, but by a people who chose other gods over the One who brought them out of the iron furnace. The tragedy is not that the covenant was too hard. It is that the love behind it was refused.
Jeremiah 11:11-17A Green Olive Tree Set on Fire
11Therefore thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them. 12Then shall the cities of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem go, and cry unto the gods unto whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all in the time of their trouble. 13For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have ye set up altars to that shameful thing, even altars to burn incense unto Baal. 14Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up a cry or prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time that they cry unto me for their trouble.
The sentence falls: Behold, I will bring evil upon them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry unto me, I will not hearken unto them (v. 11). There is a terrible symmetry here. The people would not incline their ear to the LORD (v. 8); now, the LORD says, when they cry to Him in the day of trouble He will not hearken. This is not divine pettiness but the bitter harvest of long refusal - a heart that will not listen, left at last to its own deafness. Then comes a stroke of irony as sharp as any in the prophets: Then shall the cities of Judah… cry unto the gods unto whom they offer incense: but they shall not save them at all (v. 12). Let them try the gods they preferred. Let the idols answer, if they can. Verse 13 measures the scale of the betrayal with a devastating line: according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Judah - a god for every town, an altar to Baal on every street. The idolatry was not a fringe; it was everywhere. And so the LORD gives Jeremiah the hardest command a prophet can receive: pray not thou for this people (v. 14). The intercessor is told to lower his hands. The time for pleading has run out; judgment is now fixed.
15What hath my beloved to do in mine house, seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many, and the holy flesh is passed from thee? when thou doest evil, then thou rejoicest. 16The LORD called thy name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit: with the noise of a great tumult he hath kindled fire upon it, and the branches of it are broken. 17For the LORD of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee, for the evil of the house of Israel and of the house of Judah, which they have done against themselves to provoke me to anger in offering incense unto Baal.
The LORD speaks now in the voice of a wounded love: What hath my beloved to do in mine house, seeing she hath wrought lewdness with many…? (v. 15). Judah is still my beloved, still coming to the temple with her offerings - but she has been unfaithful, and the worship of a betrayer cannot stand in for fidelity. The holy flesh of her sacrifices cannot avert what her conduct has earned; she even rejoiceth in her evil. Then comes one of the saddest images in the book: The LORD called thy name, A green olive tree, fair, and of goodly fruit (v. 16). This is what Judah was meant to be - an olive tree planted by God Himself, flourishing, beautiful, heavy with fruit. The olive was the very emblem of settled blessing in the land. But now, with the noise of a great tumult he hath kindled fire upon it, and the branches of it are broken. The tree God planted and named is set ablaze; the lovely thing is reduced to charred and broken wood. And verse 17 drives home who is doing this and why: the LORD of hosts, that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee. The same hand that planted now judges - and the wound, the text insists, is self-inflicted: they have done this against themselves by turning to Baal. Judgment here is not the failure of God's love but its grief.
Jeremiah 11:18-23A Lamb Brought to the Slaughter
18And the LORD hath given me knowledge of it, and I know it: then thou shewedst me their doings. 19But I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me, saying, Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered. 20But, O LORD of hosts, that judgest righteously, that triest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I revealed my cause.
The chapter now turns from the nation to the prophet, and the danger comes from the last place Jeremiah would have expected. And the LORD hath given me knowledge of it, and I know it: then thou shewedst me their doings (v. 18). He would have walked straight into the trap had not the LORD opened his eyes to it. And then the famous, wounded confession: But I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter; and I knew not that they had devised devices against me (v. 19). The image is of pure, trusting innocence - an animal led along, with no notion that the path ends at the knife. Jeremiah had been going about his calling, faithful and unsuspecting, while behind his back a plot was being laid. And the plot was total. Let us destroy the tree with the fruit thereof - cut down the whole tree, fruit and all - and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his name may be no more remembered. They did not merely want him silenced; they wanted him erased, his very memory blotted out. As the next verses reveal, these were the men of Anathoth (v. 21) - Jeremiah's own home town, his own kin and neighbors, the priestly village where he was born. The hardest opposition came not from strangers but from his own.3
What Jeremiah does with the plot is as important as the plot itself. He does not arm himself; he does not scheme in return; he does not flee. He turns to God: But, O LORD of hosts, that judgest righteously, that triest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I revealed my cause (v. 20). Every clause matters. He appeals to the LORD as the one that judgest righteously - the Judge whose verdicts are never wrong. He appeals to the one that triest the reins and the heart - who sees past the surface to the hidden springs of motive, the inmost self (the reins, the kidneys, were to the Hebrew mind the seat of the deepest feelings). And his closing line is the key to the whole posture: unto thee have I revealed my cause. He has handed the case up. He is not the prosecutor, judge, and executioner of his own grievance; he has laid the matter before the only One fit to weigh it and left it there. The cry let me see thy vengeance is not personal spite but a plea for God's justice to be done - the appeal of a man who refuses to take justice into his own hands precisely because he trusts that God will not let evil have the last word.
21Therefore thus saith the LORD of the men of Anathoth, that seek thy life, saying, Prophesy not in the name of the LORD, that thou die not by our hand: 22Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, I will punish them: the young men shall die by the sword; their sons and their daughters shall die by famine: 23And there shall be no remnant of them: for I will bring evil upon the men of Anathoth, even the year of their visitation.
The LORD answers His prophet, and He answers by name. Therefore thus saith the LORD of the men of Anathoth, that seek thy life (v. 21). The conspirators are identified, and so is their demand: Prophesy not in the name of the LORD, that thou die not by our hand. There is the real offense laid bare. They could not abide the word Jeremiah carried, so they tried to silence the messenger - stop speaking in that name, or die. It is the oldest move against an unwelcome truth: not to answer it, but to destroy the one who speaks it. The LORD's verdict on Anathoth is severe - their young men by the sword, their children by famine, no remnant of them in the year of their visitation (vv. 22-23). Whatever else is hard about these closing lines, the central thing is plain: the cause Jeremiah committed to God was not ignored. The Judge who triest the reins and the heart heard him, took up his case, and answered. The prophet who would not avenge himself did not need to. He had revealed his cause to the One who judges righteously, and the One who judges righteously took it from there. That is the resting place the whole chapter has been moving toward.
Further study
- The Hebrew text of Jeremiah 11 with Rashi, Radak, and other classical commentators side by side - useful for berit (vv. 2-3, 6, 8, 10, the “covenant”), for the curse formula of verse 3, and for the much-discussed phrase in verse 19, keves la-tevach, “a lamb to the slaughter.”
- Jeremiah 11 ↔ Isaiah 53 · Acts 8 · 1 Peter 2 · Galatians 3Intertextual BibleTraces the threads tying Jeremiah 11 to the rest of Scripture - the prophet led as a lamb… to the slaughter (v. 19) read alongside the Servant brought as a lamb to the slaughter (Isa. 53:7), the passage the Ethiopian was reading when he was told of Jesus (Acts 8:32), and the curse of the broken covenant (v. 3) answered in made a curse for us (Gal. 3:13).
- Jeremiah 11 - Translators' NotesNET BibleThe NET Bible's detailed footnotes on Jeremiah 11 - the covenant-lawsuit setting of verses 1-8, the word rendered “conspiracy” in verse 9, the difficult olive-tree oracle of verses 15-16, and the plot of the men of Anathoth against the prophet in verses 18-23.
Where this echoes in Scripture
Cursed Be the Man That Obeyeth Not
- Deuteronomy 27:26Cursed be he that confirmeth not all the words of this law to do them. And all the people shall say, Amen.The curse of verse 3 in its original place - the sanction written into the covenant at the start.
- Exodus 19:5if ye will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then ye shall be a peculiar treasure unto me above all people.The terms recalled in verses 4-5 - obedience as the door into belonging to God.
- Galatians 3:13Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us.The curse of the broken covenant (v. 3) borne and answered in Christ.
- Jeremiah 31:31-33I will make a new covenant... I will put my law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts.The hope beyond the broken berit (v. 10) - a covenant God Himself would keep.
- Nehemiah 9:30Yet many years didst thou forbear them, and testifiedst against them by thy spirit in thy prophets.The long patience of verses 7-8 - God rising early to warn a people who would not hear.
A Green Olive Tree Set on Fire
- Romans 11:17and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them... partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree.The olive-tree image of verse 16 taken up again - branches broken off, others grafted in.
- Psalm 52:8But I am like a green olive tree in the house of God: I trust in the mercy of God for ever and ever.What Judah was named to be in verse 16 - a flourishing olive, secure in God’s house.
- Isaiah 1:13-15Bring no more vain oblations... when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you.The same verdict as verses 14-15 - worship refused when the heart behind it is false.
- Jeremiah 7:16Therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me.The command of verse 14 sounded earlier - the intercessor told to lower his hands.
- Hosea 8:11Because Ephraim hath made many altars to sin, altars shall be unto him to sin.The multiplied altars of verse 13 - idolatry spread to every city and street.
A Lamb Brought to the Slaughter
- Isaiah 53:7he is brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so he openeth not his mouth.The image of verse 19 carried to its fullest depth - the Servant led unresisting to death.
- Acts 8:32-35He was led as a sheep to the slaughter... Philip... began at the same scripture, and preached unto him Jesus.The lamb-to-slaughter passage (v. 19; Isa. 53:7) opened and shown to speak of Jesus.
- John 1:29Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.The Lamb of verse 19 named in person - the one led to the slaughter for the sin of the world.
- 1 Peter 2:23who, when he was reviled, reviled not again... but committed himself to him that judgeth righteously.Jeremiah’s posture in verse 20 fulfilled - the cause committed to the righteous Judge, not avenged.
- Luke 4:24And he said, Verily I say unto you, No prophet is accepted in his own country.The plot of the men of Anathoth (v. 21) as a pattern - the prophet rejected by his own.