Jeremiah 12:13

They have sown wheat, but shall reap thorns: they have put themselves to pain, but shall not profit: and they shall be ashamed of your revenues because of the fierce anger of the LORD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(13) But shall reap thorns.—Better, have reaped thorns; and so in the next clause they have profited nothing. This which is truer to the Hebrew is also truer to the Prophet’s meaning. The sentence of failure is already written on everything. The best plans are marred, the “wheat” turned to “thorns.” The words are obviously of the nature of a proverbial saying, of the same type as that of Haggai 1:6.

They shall be ashamed.—The word is imperative, be ashamed.

Revenues.—The word had not acquired, at the time of the translation of 1611, the exclusively financial sense which now attaches to it, and was used as equivalent to increase or “produce” generally. By some commentators the words are referred to the conquerors, who are to be ashamed of their scanty spoil; by others to the conquered, who are to find all their hopes of increase disappointed. The latter seems preferable.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

12:7-13 God's people had been the dearly-beloved of his soul, precious in his sight, but they acted so, that he gave them up to their enemies. Many professing churches become like speckled birds, presenting a mixture of religion and the world, with its vain fashions, pursuits, and pollutions. God's people are as men wondered at, as a speckled bird; but this people had by their own folly made themselves so; and the beasts and birds are called to prey upon them. The whole land would be made desolate. But until the judgments were actually inflicted, none of the people would lay the warning to heart. When God's hand is lifted up, and men will not see, they shall be made to feel. Silver and gold shall not profit in the day of the Lord's anger. And the efforts of sinners to escape misery, without repentance and works answerable thereto, will end in confusion.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Shall reap ... shall not profit - Rather, have reaped ... have profited nothing. The force of the proverb is that all their labors had ended only in disappointment.

And they shall be ashamed of your revenues - Or, yea, be ashamed of your produce - the produce of the fields.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

13. Description in detail of the devastation of the land (Mic 6:15).

they shall be ashamed of your—The change of persons, in passing from indirect to direct address, is frequent in the prophets. Equivalent to, "Ye shall be put to the shame of disappointment at the smallness of your produce."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

They have sown wheat, but shall reap thorns: if these words be understood literally, they only signify that God would blast the labours of the husbandman, and curse them in the field. The earth’s bringing forth thorns and thistles was part of the curse for the first transgression of man, Genesis 3:18. God’s blasting the labours of husbandmen is often threatened as a punishment of sin. See Leviticus 26:16 Deu 28:38. If it be taken metaphorically, it is expounded by the next words.

They have put themselves to pain, but shall not profit; that they should labour in vain, all the works of their hands, all their counsels and deliberations, should be of no profit or avail unto them.

They shall be ashamed of your revenues because of the fierce anger of the Lord; the fierce anger of God against them shall be so showed, that the returns of their labours or estates, the profits of their trades, &c., shall be so small that they shall be ashamed of them.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They have sown wheat, but shall reap thorns,.... Which may be understood literally, the land of Judea being cursed for their sins, and become barren and unfruitful, as the earth originally was for the sin of the first man, Genesis 3:19, or rather figuratively, which some interpret of the prophets as Kimchi, sowing the good seed of the word among the Jews; but it did not take place in them, and bring forth fruit; instead thereof thorns sprung up, or evil works were done by them, comparable thereunto; but it seems better to understand it of the people; not, as Jarchi, of their prayers, which were not accepted, because unattended with repentance and good works; but of their schemes, which they thought were prudently laid, in forming an alliance with Egypt, and sending thither for help against the Chaldeans, but all in vain; these proved in the issue like thorns, grievous and vexatious to them. The Septuagint version reads imperatively, "sow ye": and Jarchi makes mention of a copy, in which the word was pointed as to be so read, as in Hosea 10:12, and may be understood ironically. The Targum is,

"be ye not like those who sow wheat in untilled land, and can gather nothing but thorns.''

They have put themselves to pain, but shall not profit; were at a great deal of pains and trouble to make Egypt their ally, and send thither for assistance, and all to no purpose. Kimchi's father interprets this of their uneasiness and grief, at parting with so much money to the king of Egypt, without having any advantage by it; which is to be preferred to the sense Jarchi gives, of the people crying to God, and grieving because not regarded by him. Some render the words, "they have got an inheritance", as the Vulgate Latin; the land of Canaan, but they will not be able to keep it; it shall no longer be theirs, or any advantage to them.

And they shall be ashamed of your revenues; not the prophets of the evil works of the people, but rather the people of their own evil works; and, particularly, of their schemes, counsels, and preparations, to secure themselves against the enemy; of their alliances with other nations, and of vain confidences; the success not answering to the pains and expense they had been at; but these failing and disappointing them, would fill them with shame and confusion.

Because of the fierce anger of the Lord; against which there was no standing; this being infinitely more powerful than the Chaldean army, by the means of which it came upon them, and from which no schemes and alliances could protect them.

Geneva Study Bible

{m} They have sown wheat, but shall reap thorns: they {n} have put themselves to pain, but shall not profit: and they shall be ashamed of {o} your revenues because of the fierce anger of the LORD.

(m) That is, the prophets.

(n) They lamented the sins of the people.

(o) For instead of amendment, you grew worse and worse, as God's plagues testified.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

13. The v., at least in its present context, is obscure. The subject is either (a) the spoilers, whose disasters, however, belong not to this but to the following paragraph, or (b) Judah, in which case the expressions are unsuited to the previous description of their attitude. Co. suggests that it should follow immediately on Jeremiah 12:4, but even so its connexion with that v. is not obvious.

ye … your] Read they … their.

ashamed] See on Jeremiah 2:26.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 13. - A description in proverbial language of the absence of "peace" (literally, soundness, i.e. prosperity, security), from which "all flesh" in Judah at this time shall suffer. The trouble of sowing has been in vain, for they have reaped thorns (so we must render grammatically, and not shall reap, and in the next clause shall not profit ought to be have not profited). And they shall be ashamed of your revenues; rather, be ashamed then of your produce; but it is more natural to emend the pronominal suffix, and render, and are ashamed of their produce (the Authorized Version seems to have very nearly taken this easy step). It is, of course, the produce of husbandry which is referred to. Jeremiah 12:13

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

They reap the contrary of what they have sowed. The words: wheat they have sown, thorns they reap, are manifestly of the nature of a saw or proverb; certainly not merely with the force of meliora exspectaverant et venerunt pessima (Jerome); for sowing corresponds not to hoping or expecting, but to doing and undertaking. Their labour brings them the reverse of what they aimed at or sought to attain. To understand the words directly of the failure of the crop, as Ven., Ros., Hitz., Graf, Ng. prefer to do, is fair neither to text nor context. To reap thorns is not equals to have a bad harvest by reason of drought, blight, or the ravaging of enemies. The seed: wheat, the noblest grain, produces thorns, the very opposite of available fruit. And the context, too, excludes the thought of agriculture and "literal harvesting." The thought that the crop turned out a failure would be a very lame termination to a description of how the whole land was ravaged from end to end by the sword of the Lord. The verse forms a conclusion which sums up the threatening of Jeremiah 12:7-12, to the effect that the people's sinful ongoings will bring them sore suffering, instead of the good fortune they hoped for. נחלוּ, they have worn themselves out, exhausted their strength, and secured no profit. Thus shall ye be put to shame for your produce, ignominiously disappointed in your hopes for the issue of your labour.