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Jeremiah 16

KJV · Chapter 16/52

1The word of the Lord came also unto me, saying,

2Thou shalt not take thee a wife, neither shalt thou have sons or daughters in this place.

3For thus saith the Lord concerning the sons and concerning the daughters that are born in this place, and concerning their mothers that bare them, and concerning their fathers that begat them in this land;

4They shall die of grievous deaths; they shall not be lamented; neither shall they be buried; but they shall be as dung upon the face of the earth: and they shall be consumed by the sword, and by famine; and their carcases shall be meat for the fowls of heaven, and for the beasts of the earth.

5For thus saith the Lord, Enter not into the house of mourning, neither go to lament nor bemoan them: for I have taken away my peace from this people, saith the Lord, even lovingkindness and mercies.

6Both the great and the small shall die in this land: they shall not be buried, neither shall men lament for them, nor cut themselves, nor make themselves bald for them:

7Neither shall men tear themselves for them in mourning, to comfort them for the dead; neither shall men give them the cup of consolation to drink for their father or for their mother.

8Thou shalt not also go into the house of feasting, to sit with them to eat and to drink.

9For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will cause to cease out of this place in your eyes, and in your days, the voice of mirth, and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride.

10And it shall come to pass, when thou shalt shew this people all these words, and they shall say unto thee, Wherefore hath the Lord pronounced all this great evil against us? or what is our iniquity? or what is our sin that we have committed against the Lord our God?

11Then shalt thou say unto them, Because your fathers have forsaken me, saith the Lord, and have walked after other gods, and have served them, and have worshipped them, and have forsaken me, and have not kept my law;

12And ye have done worse than your fathers; for, behold, ye walk every one after the imagination of his evil heart, that they may not hearken unto me:

13Therefore will I cast you out of this land into a land that ye know not, neither ye nor your fathers; and there shall ye serve other gods day and night; where I will not shew you favour.

14Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that it shall no more be said, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt;

15But, The Lord liveth, that brought up the children of Israel from the land of the north, and from all the lands whither he had driven them: and I will bring them again into their land that I gave unto their fathers.

16Behold, I will send for many fishers, saith the Lord, and they shall fish them; and after will I send for many hunters, and they shall hunt them from every mountain, and from every hill, and out of the holes of the rocks.

17For mine eyes are upon all their ways: they are not hid from my face, neither is their iniquity hid from mine eyes.

18And first I will recompense their iniquity and their sin double; because they have defiled my land, they have filled mine inheritance with the carcases of their detestable and abominable things.

19O Lord, my strength, and my fortress, and my refuge in the day of affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto thee from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely our fathers have inherited lies, vanity, and things wherein there is no profit.

20Shall a man make gods unto himself, and they are no gods?

21Therefore, behold, I will this once cause them to know, I will cause them to know mine hand and my might; and they shall know that my name is The Lord.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

God forbids Jeremiah from marrying or having children, and from taking part in funerals or celebrations, as a prophetic sign that the ordinary joys of life would be cut off in Judah by the coming judgment.

Explanation

The restrictions placed on Jeremiah — not marrying, not having children, not attending funerals or feasts — functioned as a living sermon: his very life became a visible sign of what was coming. This shows the high personal cost of the prophetic calling, going far beyond simply speaking hard messages. Despite the weight of the judgment announced, the chapter ends on a note of hope: one day the people will remember God not only as the one who brought Israel out of Egypt, but as the one who brought them back from the land of the north — foreshadowing restoration after the exile.

Fun facts

  • The prohibition against taking part in mourning rituals (v.5-7) included Canaanite practices of self-mutilation and head-shaving that the Mosaic law already condemned (Leviticus 19:28), reinforcing that Jeremiah was to distance himself completely from the popular customs of the time.
  • The promise that God would send 'fishermen' and then 'hunters' (v.16) vividly describes how the scattered people would be tracked down and brought back — first drawn in, then pursued more intensely.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Jeremiah 16:1A transition formula introducing a new set of unusual instructions given to Jeremiah, beginning with the prohibition against marrying.
  2. Jeremiah 16:2God forbids Jeremiah to marry and have children. A shocking enacted sign in a culture where family was everything: the message is that the coming disaster is so great it isn’t worth starting a family in a land about to become a graveyard.
  3. Jeremiah 16:3God explains why He forbade Jeremiah’s marriage: the fate of the families still to be born in Judah will be so tragic that it is better not to have children there at all.
  4. Jeremiah 16:4Describes the shocking fate awaiting these future families: painful deaths followed by the dishonor of not receiving a proper burial.
  5. Jeremiah 16:5Another unusual order: Jeremiah is forbidden to attend funerals, a hugely important social gesture at the time, signaling that God has withdrawn His peace and compassion from the people.
  6. Jeremiah 16:6Describes traditional mourning rituals, like cutting the body or shaving the head, that simply will not happen — death will be too widespread for the normal customs of mourning.
  7. Jeremiah 16:7Mentions customs of comfort for mourners, like sharing food or a cup of consolation, which will also disappear given the scale of the tragedy.
  8. Jeremiah 16:8Jeremiah is also forbidden to take part in celebrations and banquets — his whole personal life becomes a prophetic sign of isolation in the face of the coming judgment.
  9. Jeremiah 16:9Confirms that these prohibitions placed on Jeremiah are a foretaste: soon, all the sounds of feasting and marriage will truly disappear from the life of the nation.
  10. Jeremiah 16:10God anticipates that the people will react with surprise and perhaps outrage, asking why they deserve such a great judgment — the answer comes in the next verse.
  11. Jeremiah 16:11God’s answer: the root cause comes from past generations who abandoned the covenant and served other gods, and the current one has kept walking that same path.
  12. Jeremiah 16:12God makes clear that Jeremiah’s generation is not a passive victim of the past: they made it even worse, following their own impulses instead of correcting course.
  13. Jeremiah 16:13Directly announces exile as the consequence — and says the people will keep serving other gods there too, since that was their choice even with the true God available to them.
  14. Jeremiah 16:14The exodus from Egypt was the founding event of Israel, cited constantly in prayers; here Jeremiah promises an even greater new milestone. The return from Babylonian captivity will replace Egypt as the story the people tell about their own salvation.
  15. Jeremiah 16:15After the harsh announcement of exile comes a promise of hope: one day, the return from captivity will replace even the exodus from Egypt itself as the great story of deliverance.
  16. Jeremiah 16:16Uses images of fishing and hunting to describe how the scattered people will be pursued and brought back, whether by the enemies who capture them or later in the promised restoration.
  17. Jeremiah 16:17God states that nothing of the people’s behavior went unnoticed — all their wickedness was visible to Him the whole time, even when it seemed hidden.
  18. Jeremiah 16:18Before any restoration, a double payment for sin will come — the land was defiled with idols, treated here as the “carcases” of detestable things, with no real life in them.
  19. Jeremiah 16:19In the midst of so much judgment, a surprising vision arises: even foreign nations will come to acknowledge that the very gods they inherited from their ancestors were nothing but empty lies.
  20. Jeremiah 16:20A rhetorical question that sums up the central irony of idolatry: how can a human being manufacture something and then call it a god, when the thing made was never truly divine?
  21. Jeremiah 16:21Closes the chapter with the promise that, through judgment, the people will finally come to know God’s real power — punishment also serves as a harsh form of revelation.

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