When I led your ancestors out of Egypt, it was not burnt offerings and sacrifices I wanted from them.
Parallel translations
- WEB For I didn’t speak to your fathers, nor command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:
- KJV For I spake not unto your fathers, nor commanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices:
- BSB For when I brought your fathers out of the land of Egypt, I did not merely command them about burnt offerings and sacrifices,
- NKJV For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.
- NASB For I did not speak to your fathers, or command them on the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings and sacrifices.
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 says that when He brought Israel from Egypt, His primary concern was not burnt offerings and sacrifices. Ritual was never meant to stand on its own apart from obedience.
Overview
This verse uses a Hebrew way of stating priority: God's first and chief command was not sacrifice but obedient relationship. It does not deny that God gave sacrificial laws, but insists they were always secondary to a heart that obeys. The point clarifies in the next verse, where 'listen to my voice' is named as the core command.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- Hos 6:6For I desire mercy, and not sacrifice; and the knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.
- 1 Sam 15:22Samuel said, “Has Yahweh as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices, as in obeying Yahweh’s voice? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, and to listen than the fat of rams.
- Ps 51:16–17For you don’t delight in sacrifice, or else I would give it. You have no pleasure in burnt offering.
- Matt 9:13But you go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice,’ for I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”
- Ps 40:6Sacrifice and offering you didn’t desire. You have opened my ears. You have not required burnt offering and sin offering.
- Ps 50:8–17I don’t rebuke you for your sacrifices. Your burnt offerings are continually before me.
- Mark 12:33and to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, with all the soul, and with all the strength, and to love his neighbor as himself, is more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices.”
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Commentaries & study tools
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Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.
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 7:22 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.