Jeremiah 2:33

Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(33) Why trimmest thou thy way . . .?—The verb is the same as that rendered “amend” in Jeremiah 7:3; Jeremiah 7:5, and was probably often on the lips of those who made a show of reformation. Here it is used with a scornful irony, “What means this reform, this show of amendment of thy ways, which leads only to a further indulgence in adulterous love?”

Hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.—Better, hast thou also taught thy ways wickednesses. The professed change for the better was really for the worse.

Benson Commentary

Jeremiah 2:33-34. Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love — “The prophet,” says Lowth, “alludes to the practices of common harlots, who deck themselves, and use all inveigling arts, that they may recommend themselves to their gallants; in like manner,” the prophet intimates, “the Jews tried all methods to gain the friendship and assistance of foreign idolaters, who are called their lovers:” see Jeremiah 3:1; Jeremiah 22:22. Houbigant’s translation of this verse is, “Why dost thou strew thy way, that thou mayest find lovers; and teachest thy ways to thy companions?” The original word, rendered trimmest, תישׂבי, properly means, to make good, right, or agreeable. Noldius expounds the clause, “Why dost thou justify thy ways, or insist upon thy innocence?” And the French interpret the verse, “Why wouldest thou justify thy conduct, to enter into favour with me? so long as thou hast taught to others the evil which thou hast done; and while (Jeremiah 2:34) in thy skirts,” &c. Also in thy skirts is found the blood of the souls, &c. — This would be better rendered, Also in thy skirts is found the blood of poor and innocent persons, for by souls is meant persons; and by the blood being found in their skirts, the prophet means their committing murders and oppressions, secretly, perhaps; but their guilt was as manifest as though the blood of the persons slain had been found sprinkled upon their garments. The LXX. render the clause εν ταις χερσι σου ευρεθησαν αιματα ψυχων αθωων, in thy hands have been found the blood of innocent souls, or persons. Their sacrificing of their little children to their idols, as well as their oppressing and murdering of adult persons, is intended to be comprised here. I have not found it by secret search — The LXX., with whom all the ancient versions agree, render the clause ουκ εν διορυγμασιν ευρον αυτους, I have not found them in digged holes, or ditches, but upon all these. The LXX. and Syriac render על כל אלה, here, upon every oak. “The meaning of which,” says Blaney, “is this: In the law it is commanded, (Leviticus 17:13,) that the blood of animals killed in hunting should be covered with dust, in order, no doubt, to create a horror at the sight of blood. In allusion to this command, it is urged against Jerusalem, (Ezekiel 24:7,) that she had not only shed blood in the midst of her, but that she had set it upon the top of a rock, and poured it not upon the ground to cover it with dust; that is, she had seemed to glory in the crime, by doing it in the most open and audacious manner, so as to challenge God’s vengeance. In like manner it is said here, that God had not discovered the blood that was shed in holes under ground, but that it was sprinkled upon every oak before which their inhuman sacrifices had been performed.”

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

2:29-37 The nation had not been wrought upon by the judgements of God, but sought to justify themselves. The world is, to those who make it their home and their portion, a wilderness and a land of darkness; but those who dwell in God, have the lines fallen to them in pleasant places. Here is the language of presumptuous sinners. The Jews had long thrown off serious thoughts of God. How many days of our lives pass without suitable remembrance of him! The Lord was displeased with their confidences, and would not prosper them therein. Men employ all their ingenuity, but cannot find happiness in the way of sin, or excuse for it. They may shift from one sin to another, but none ever hardened himself against God, or turned from him, and prospered.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Why trimmest thou thy way - literally, "Why makest thou thy way good," a phrase used here of the pains taken by the Jews to learn the idolatries of foreign nations.

The wicked ones ... - Or, "therefore thou hast taught" thy ways wickednesses."

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

33. Why trimmest—Maurer translates, "How skilfully thou dost prepare thy way," &c. But see 2Ki 9:30. "Trimmest" best suits the image of one decking herself as a harlot.

way—course of life.

therefore—accordingly. Or else, "nay, thou hast even," &c.

also … wicked ones—even the wicked harlots, that is, (laying aside the metaphor) even the Gentiles who are wicked, thou teachest to be still more so [Grotius].

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Why trimmest, or deckest, Ezekiel 23:40, thinking thereby to entice others to thy help? thus is the word used, Jeremiah 4:30. Or, Why dost thou use so much art and skill, and take so much pains, to go and send here and there to contract a friendship with foreign people, and to bring them to thy embraces, Isaiah 57:9,10, or thinking to set a good face or gloss upon the matter, and excuse thyself, as if thou couldst delude God, whereas all thou dost is to get acquaintance with other idolaters?

To seek love, i.e. to commit filthiness with thy idols; a synecdoche of the kind.

Therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones, i.e. thou art become so vile, that even strumpets themselves may come to learn of thee, 2 Chronicles 33:9. Or by thy example; nations that have been vile enough of themselves, by thy example are become more vile.

Thy ways, i.e. thy actions; a metaphor.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Why trimmest thou thy way to seek love?.... To seek the love, and gain the affections and esteem, of the idolatrous nations; as a lascivious woman dresses herself out in the best manner to excite the lust and move the affections of her lovers; and as Jezebel, who painted her face, and tired her head, 2 Kings 9:30 or dressed it in the best manner, where the same word is used as here; so the Targum,

"why dost thou make thy way beautiful, to procure loves (or lovers) to be joined to the people?''

or the sense is, why art thou so diligent and industrious to make thy way, which is exceeding bad, look a good one, by sacrifices and ceremonies, oblations and ablutions, in order to seek and obtain my love and favour, which is all in vain? it is not to be gained by such methods:

therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways; the wicked idolatrous nations, to whom they joined themselves; these they taught their ways of sacrificing, their rites, ceremonies, and superstitions; or, as Jarchi interprets it, thou hast taught thyself the worst way among them all; that is, thou hast used thyself to it: there is a double reading in this clause. The Cetib, or writing, is "I have taught"; as if they were the words of God, saying, "wherefore I have taught"; or, "will teach"; that is, by punishing thee;

that thy ways are evil; or, as Kimchi explains it,

"I have taught thee by thy ways that they are evil, and evil shall come unto thee because of them.''

The Keri, or reading, is "thou hast taught"; which is confirmed by the Targum; and is followed by the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and other versions. It is by some rendered, "seeing thou hast taught others thy evil ways" (p); not content to sin themselves, but taught others to do so, and yet would be thought good.

(p) "Quandoquidem etiam (alios) malas docuisti vias tuas", Noldius, p. 507. vid. No. 1998.

Geneva Study Bible

Why trimmest thou thy way to {u} seek love? therefore hast thou also taught the wicked ones thy ways.

(u) With strangers.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

33. How trimmest thou thy way] lit. How thou makest thy way good! i.e. How cleverly thou goest about (to reach an immoral object)!

even the wicked women, etc.] even experts in immorality can learn fresh wickedness from thee. LXX (“thou hast done wickedly in corrupting thy ways”) very possibly represents a text superior to MT.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 33. - Why trimmest thou thy way I rather, How well thou contrivest thy way, etc.? Therefore hast thou also taught, etc. The meaning which floated before our trans-labors seems to be this: "so utterly immoral is thy course of life, that even the worst of women ['wicked ones' is in the feminine] have been able to learn something from thee" (so the great Dutch scholar, De Dieu,in 1548). But a more natural rendering is, "Therefore [i.e. to gain thine ends] thou hast accustomed thy ways to those evil things." Nemo repente fuit tupissimus. It required a deliberate "accustoming," or "training" (such is the literal meaning of limad), to produce such a habit (ἕξις) as is here rebuked. Jeremiah 2:33

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

In Jeremiah 2:33 the style of address is ironical. How good thou makest thy way! i.e., how well thou knowest to choose out and follow the right way to seek love. היטיב דּרך sig. usually: strive after a good walk and conversation; cf. Jeremiah 7:3, Jeremiah 7:5; Jeremiah 18:11, etc.; here, on the other hand, to take the right way for gaining the end in view. "Love" here is seen from the context to be love to the idols, intrigues with the heathen and their gods. Seek love equals strive to gain the love of the false gods. To attain this end thou hast taught thy ways misdeeds, i.e., accustomed thy ways to misdeeds, forsaken the commandments of thy God which demand righteousness and the purifying of one's life, and accommodated thyself to the immoral practices of the heathen. הרעות, with the article as in Jeremiah 3:5, the evil deeds which are undisguisedly visible; not: the evils, the misfortunes which follow thee closely, as Hitz. interprets in the face of the context. For in Jeremiah 2:34 we have indisputable evidence that the matter in hand is not evils and misfortunes, but evil deeds or misdemeanours; since there the cleaving of the blood of innocent souls to the hems of the garments is mentioned as one of the basest "evils," and as such is introduced by the גּם of gradation. The "blood of souls" is the blood of innocent murdered men, which clings to the skirts of the murderers' clothes. כּנפים are the skirts of the flowing garment, Ezekiel 5:3; 1 Samuel 15:27; Zechariah 8:23. The plural נמצאוּ before דּם is explained by the fact that נפשׁות is the principal idea. אביונים are not merely those who live in straitened circumstances, but pious oppressed ones as contrasted with powerful transgressors and oppressors; cf. Psalm 40:18; Psalm 72:13., Psalm 86:1-2, etc. By the next clause greater prominence is given to the fact that they were slain being innocent. The words: not בּמּחתּרת, at housebreaking, thou tookest them, contain an allusion to the law in Exodus 22:1 and onwards; according to which the killing of a thief caught in the act of breaking in was not a cause of blood-guiltiness. The thought runs thus: The poor ones thou hast slain were no thieves or robbers whom thou hadst a right to slay, but guiltless pious men; and the killing of them is a crime worthy of death. Exodus 21:12. The last words כּי על כּל־אלּה are obscure, and have been very variously interpreted. Changes upon the text are not to the purpose. For we get no help from the reading of the lxx, of the Syr. and Arab., which seem to have read אלּה as אלה, and which have translated δρυΐ́ oak or terebinth; since "upon every oak" gives no rational meaning. Nor from the connection of the words with the next verse (Venem., Schnur., Ros., and others): yet with all this, or in spite of all this, thou saidst; since neither does כּי mean yet, nor can the ו before תאמרי, in this connection, introduce the sequel thought. The words manifestly belong to what goes before, and contain a contrast: not in breaking in by night thou tookest them, but upon, or on account of all this. על in the sig. upon gives a suitable sense only if, with Abarb., Ew., Ng., we refer אלּה to בּכנפיך and take מצאתים as 1st:pers.: I found it (the blood of the slain souls) not on the place where the murder took place, but upon all these, sc. lappets of the clothes, i.e., borne openly for display. But even without dwelling on the fact that מחתּרת does not mean the scene of a murder or breaking in, this explanation is wrecked on the unmistakeably manifest allusion to the law, אם בּמּחתּרת ימּצא הגּנּב, Exodus 21:1, which is ignored, or at least obscured, by that view. The allusion to this passage of the law shows that מצאתים is not 1st but 2nd pers., and that the suffix refers to the innocent poor who were slain. Therefore, with Hitz. and Graf, we take על כּל־ אלּה in the sig. "on account of all this," and refer the "all this" to the idolatry before mentioned. Consequently the words bear this meaning: Not for a crime thou killedst the poor, but because of thine apostasy from God and thy fornication with the idols, their blood cleaves to thy raiment. the words seem, as Calv. surmised, to point to the persecution and slaying of the prophets spoken of in Jeremiah 2:30, namely, to the innocent blood with which the godless king Manasseh filled Jerusalem, 2 Kings 21:16; 2 Kings 24:4; seeking as he did to crush out all opposition to the abominations of idolatry, and finding in his way the prophets and the godly of the land, who by their words and their lives lifted up their common testimony against the idolaters and their abandoned practices.