Therefore now thus saith the LORD, the God of hosts, the God of Israel; Wherefore commit ye this great evil against your souls, to cut off from you man and woman, child and suckling, out of Judah, to leave you none to remain;
Parallel translations
- WEB “Therefore now Yahweh, the God of Armies, the God of Israel, says: ‘Why do you commit great evil against your own souls, to cut off from yourselves man and woman, infant and nursing child out of the middle of Judah, to leave yourselves no one remaining;
- BSB So now, this is what the LORD God of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: Why are you doing such great harm to yourselves by cutting off from Judah man and woman, child and infant, leaving yourselves without a remnant?
- NKJV “Now therefore, thus says the Lord, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: ‘Why do you commit this great evil against yourselves, to cut off from you man and woman, child and infant, out of Judah, leaving none to remain,
- NASB Now then, this is what the Lord God of armies, the God of Israel says: “Why are you doing great harm to yourselves, to eliminate from yourselves man and woman, child and infant from among Judah, leaving yourselves without a remnant,
- NLT “And now the Lord God of Heaven’s Armies, the God of Israel, asks you: Why are you destroying yourselves? For not one of you will survive—not a man, woman, or child among you who has come here from Judah, not even the babies in your arms.
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 commit such great evil against their own souls, cutting off their entire community. Their sin is self-destructive folly.
Overview
The Lord frames idolatry as harm the people inflict on themselves, threatening to leave none remaining from man to nursing child. Sin is portrayed not merely as offense against God but as suicidal rebellion. This appeal exposes the irrationality of choosing destruction over life, the very choice the gospel reverses by calling sinners from death to life in Christ.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 23
- Hab 2:10Thou hast consulted shame to thy house by cutting off many people, and hast sinned against thy soul.
- Jer 51:22With thee also will I break in pieces man and woman; and with thee will I break in pieces old and young; and with thee will I break in pieces the young man and the maid;
- Ezek 33:11Say unto them, As I live, saith the Lord GOD, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked; but that the wicked turn from his way and live: turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?
- Num 16:38The censers of these sinners against their own souls, let them make them broad plates for a covering of the altar: for they offered them before the LORD, therefore they are hallowed: and they shall be a sign unto the children of Israel.
- Jer 44:14So that none of the remnant of Judah, which are gone into the land of Egypt to sojourn there, shall escape or remain, that they should return into the land of Judah, to the which they have a desire to return to dwell there: for none shall return but such as shall escape.
- Lam 2:11Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people; because the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.
- Prov 15:32He that refuseth instruction despiseth his own soul: but he that heareth reproof getteth understanding.
- Jer 9:21For death is come up into our windows, and is entered into our palaces, to cut off the children from without, and the young men from the streets.
- 1 Sam 15:3Now go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
- Josh 6:21And they utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword.
- Deut 32:25The sword without, and terror within, shall destroy both the young man and the virgin, the suckling also with the man of gray hairs.
- Jer 7:19Do they provoke me to anger? saith the LORD: do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces?
- Prov 5:22His own iniquities shall take the wicked himself, and he shall be holden with the cords of his sins.
- Judg 21:11And this is the thing that ye shall do, Ye shall utterly destroy every male, and every woman that hath lain by man.
- Jer 44:27–28Behold, I will watch over them for evil, and not for good: and all the men of Judah that are in the land of Egypt shall be consumed by the sword and by the famine, until there be an end of them.
- Jer 26:19Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him at all to death? did he not fear the LORD, and besought the LORD, and the LORD repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against them? Thus might we procure great evil against our souls.
- Prov 1:18And they lay wait for their own blood; they lurk privily for their own lives.
- Jer 25:7Yet ye have not hearkened unto me, saith the LORD; that ye might provoke me to anger with the works of your hands to your own hurt.
- Jer 44:8In that ye provoke me unto wrath with the works of your hands, burning incense unto other gods in the land of Egypt, whither ye be gone to dwell, that ye might cut yourselves off, and that ye might be a curse and a reproach among all the nations of the earth?
- Prov 8:36But he that sinneth against me wrongeth his own soul: all they that hate me love death.
- Jer 44:11–12Therefore thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will set my face against you for evil, and to cut off all Judah.
- Jer 42:20For ye dissembled in your hearts, when ye sent me unto the LORD your God, saying, Pray for us unto the LORD our God; and according unto all that the LORD our God shall say, so declare unto us, and we will do it.
- 1 Sam 22:19And Nob, the city of the priests, smote he with the edge of the sword, both men and women, children and sucklings, and oxen, and asses, and sheep, with the edge of the sword.
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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 44:7 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
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