¶“Why do you contend with Me? You have all revolted against Me,” declares the Lord.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Why will you contend with me? You all have transgressed against me,” says Yahweh.
- KJV Wherefore will ye plead with me? ye all have transgressed against me, saith the LORD.
- BSB Why do you bring a case against Me? You have all rebelled against Me,” declares the LORD.
- NKJV “Why will you plead with Me? You all have transgressed against Me,” says the Lord.
- NLT Why do you accuse me of doing wrong? You are the ones who have rebelled,” says the Lord.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
God asks why they dispute with Him when they have all transgressed. Their complaint against God is groundless.
Overview
Yahweh questions why the people would bring a case against Him when they have all rebelled. The accused presume to accuse their Judge, reversing the proper order. The verse confronts the human tendency to blame God rather than confess our own transgression.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Dan 9:11Yes, all Israel have transgressed your law, turning aside, that they should not obey your voice: therefore the curse and the oath written in the law of Moses the servant of God has been poured out on us; for we have sinned against him.
- Jer 6:13“For from their least even to their greatest, everyone is given to covetousness; and from the prophet even to the priest, everyone deals falsely.
- Jer 5:1“Run back and forth through the streets of Jerusalem, and see now, and know, and seek in its wide places, if you can find a man, if there are any who does justly, who seeks truth; and I will pardon her.
- Rom 3:19Now we know that whatever things the law says, it speaks to those who are under the law, that every mouth may be closed, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God.
- Jer 2:23“How can you say, ‘I am not defiled. I have not gone after the Baals’? See your way in the valley. Know what you have done. You are a swift dromedary traversing her ways;
- Jer 3:2“Lift up your eyes to the bare heights, and see! Where have you not been lain with? You have sat waiting for them by the road, as an Arabian in the wilderness. You have polluted the land with your prostitution and with your wickedness.
- Jer 2:35“Yet you said, ‘I am innocent. Surely his anger has turned away from me.’ “Behold, I will judge you, because you say, ‘I have not sinned.’
- Jer 9:2–6Oh that I had in the wilderness a lodging place of wayfaring men; that I might leave my people, and go from them! For they are all adulterers, an assembly of treacherous men.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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Christ at the center
Against the failure of false shepherds Jeremiah promises the Righteous Branch, 'The LORD our righteousness,' and the new covenant written on the heart and sealed in the blood of Christ.
How Jeremiah 2:29 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.