Jeremiah Chapter 2 verse 31 Holy Bible

ASV Jeremiah 2:31

O generation, see ye the word of Jehovah. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? or a land of thick darkness? wherefore say my people, We are broken loose; we will come no more unto thee?
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BBE Jeremiah 2:31

O generation, see the word of the Lord. Have I been a waste land to Israel? or a land of dark night? why do my people say, We have got loose, we will not come to you again?
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DARBY Jeremiah 2:31

O generation, mark ye the word of Jehovah. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel, or a land of thick darkness? Wherefore say my people, We have dominion; we will come no more unto thee?
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KJV Jeremiah 2:31

O generation, see ye the word of the LORD. Have I been a wilderness unto Israel? a land of darkness? wherefore say my people, We are lords; we will come no more unto thee?
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WBT Jeremiah 2:31


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WEB Jeremiah 2:31

Generation, see the word of Yahweh. Have I been a wilderness to Israel? or a land of thick darkness? why say my people, We are broken loose; we will come no more to you?
read chapter 2 in WEB

YLT Jeremiah 2:31

O generation, see ye the word of Jehovah: A wilderness have I been to Israel? A land of thick darkness? Wherefore have My people said, `We mourned, We come not in again unto Thee.'
read chapter 2 in YLT

Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 31. - O generation, see ye. It is doubtful whether generation here means "contemporaries" (equivalent to "men of this generation"), or, like γενεά sometimes in the New Testament, a class of men united by moral affinity (comp. Psalm 14:5; Psalm 78:8). In the latter case we should rather attach the pronoun in "see ye" to "O generation," and render "O (evil) generation that ye are!" So Hitzig, Keil, and Payne Smith; Ewald and Delitzsch adopt the first rendering. Have I been a wilderness, etc.? "Have I not been the source of light and happiness to my people, and of all temporal blessings?" (comp. Jeremiah 2:6). So the Divine speaker in Isaiah 45:19, "I said not unto the seed of Jacob, Seek ye me in vain," or more literally, "in chaos" (same word as in Genesis 1:2); "chaos" and "the wilderness" are both images of that which is utterly unremunerative. A land of darkness. This is, of course, not literally accurate as a description of the Arabian desert. "Darkness" is here used as a synonym for "misery." Cloud and rain occupy precisely opposite places in the estimation of nomadic and agricultural peoples respectively. "The Bedouins," says an Arabic scholast, "always follow the rain and the places where raindrops fall;" whereas a townsman of Mecca calls himself "child of the sun." So Indra and Varuna, originally belonging to the cloudy and rainy sky, are in the Vedic hymns endowed with solar traits. It should be added here that it is an old problem, and too difficult a one for us to investigate, whether we should render "the darkness of Jah" (Jehovah) or (as Authorized Version) simply "darkness." The former rendering will mean very great darkness, such as Jehovah sends in judgment (e.g. to the Egyptians, Exodus 10:21-23). On this question, see Dr. Ginsburg on Song of Solomon 8:6 (where a similar doubt exists), Geiger's 'Urschrift und Uebersetzungen der Bibel,' p. 276; Ewald, 'Lehrbuch der Hebraischen Sprache,' § 270 e. We are lords; rather, we have broken loose. It is, however, a difficult word, which only occurs elsewhere in Genesis 26:40; Hosea 12:1; Psalm 55:3.

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(31) O generation, see ye.--The pronoun occupies a different position in the Hebrew, "O generation, you, I mean, see ye." The prophet speaks to the men who are actually his contemporaries. They are to look to the word of the Lord. Has He been to them as a waste land, a land of thick darkness (literally, according to one interpretation, darkness of Jah, in the sense of intensity), that they are thus unmindful of Him? So in Song of Solomon 8:6 we have "flame of Jah," as representing the Hebrew, in the margin, and "very vehement flame" in the text, of the Authorised version.We are lords.--Better, We rove at will, as in Genesis 27:40, where, however, the Authorised version gives "when thou shalt have the dominion." The sense is practically the same. Israel claims the power to do as she likes.