Jeremiah 10:12

He hath made the earth by his power,.... The Targum considers these words as a continuation of the answer of the Jews to the Chaldeans, paraphrasing them thus, "and so shall ye say unto them, `we

He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion. No JFB commentary on this verse.

In this and the next verse the prophet enumerates some particulars wherein he is transcendently above all creatures which he hath made, much more above idols, which are the works of man’ s hands. The earth, , i.e. the whole globe, consisting of waters as well as earth. By his power: it must needs speak an almighty power to make such a vast body; where would the idols have found materials of which to have composed such a body and bulk? the true God was not at a loss, he drew them out of nothing, and commanded them into a being by the word of his power, . He hath established the world by his wisdom; either he hath made it firm, solid, and unmovable, i.e. off from its basis, or rather centre; (for it is out of our sphere and province here to meddle either with the fixation or the motion of it, that is left to the old and new philosophers to dispute among themselves;) or else by establishing we understand he hath appointed it its use, or hath prepared it to be every way subservient to the inhabitants thereof, both as to delight in prospect, and varieties of recreation, by its ornamental parts in mountains, little hills, woods, meadows, fields, &c., and necessity to accommodate man and beast with all things useful, both for habitation and provision, to sustain the natural life, and to praise and magnify the founder of it, ,12; all which cannot choose but greatly manifest the unsearchable wisdom of God. And hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion: these are stretched out, i.e. expanded and spread over our head, through the whole circumference of the earth, with all their glorious furniture, and varieties of motions, moving regularly in their several orbs, i.e. not varying the least degree, either in time or space, from the order and law that God hath set them, even in those which are more eccentric and erratic; which must needs argue an unparalleled skill and understanding in God, which the word discretion doth here properly signify, ; all which are his handiwork, and do declare his glory, .

Jeremiah 10:12 He hath made the earth by his power, he hath established the world by his wisdom, and hath stretched out the heavens by his discretion.Ver. 12. He hath made the earth by his power.] Here we have the true philosophy and right origin of things: Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas. Almighty God made the earth, the main bulk and body of it. He alone is the powerful Creator, the provident Disposer, the prudent Preserver of all things both in heaven and in earth; therefore the only true God.

(12) He hath made . . . he hath established.—The words are participial in form, making . . . establishing, and complete the list of divine attributes in Jeremiah 10:10, contrasting the creative might of Jehovah with the impotence of the gods of the heathen. The world.—As contrasted with the material earth, the inhabited world, the world considered in its relation to man, as in Proverbs 8:31. Discretion.—Better, skill.

Ch. Jeremiah 10:1-16. The folly of idolatry It is now generally recognised that this passage is a later insertion, for (a) it breaks the connexion between Jeremiah 9:1-22 and Jeremiah 10:17 ff.; while by its omission the train of thought in the former is carried on smoothly in the latter; (b) elsewhere the people have been rebuked for being already devoted to idolatry (Jeremiah 7:18; Jeremiah 7:31), but here they are addressed as sincere and convinced worshippers of Jehovah, and are warned against imagining that idols are possessed of any real power, a warning which would be well adapted to the circumstances of the exiles in Babylon, surrounded as they were with its elaborate idol worship; (c) elsewhere Jeremiah’s argument is, “Expect no help from vain gods; they cannot save you” (Jeremiah 2:28, Jeremiah 11:12); here the argument is, “Do not fear them, they cannot harm you.” See LOT. p. 254. This does not indeed preclude the possibility that the passage is one which the prophet himself addressed at a later date to his brethren in captivity, and in fact it contains certain of his expressions, viz. vain, vanity, as applied to idols (Jeremiah 10:3; Jeremiah 10:15), in the time of their visitation (Jeremiah 10:15). But the style generally is not that of Jeremiah, and resembles that of the second Isaiah (chs. 40–66), so that it may at any rate be attributed to that period. The MT. is an expansion of the original form of the Hebrew. This is shewn both by the superiority in logical sequence exhibited on the whole (but see on Jeremiah 10:10) by the text of the LXX in the way of omission as well as change of order (see on Jeremiah 10:5-8; Jeremiah 10:10), and by the smoothness of metre which results from the adoption of the Greek form of text. Co. points out that we then have from Jeremiah 10:2 onwards a series of clauses arranged in triplets, presenting a clear and well articulated connexion of thought. So too Gi. (in Jeremias Metrik) with slight differences in detail. Du. shortens the passage still further. We may add that Baruch, ch. 6 (The Epistle of Jeremy) is partly an amplification of this passage by one who was very familiar with particulars of the idolatry as practised at Babylon. The passage may be summarized thus. (i) Jeremiah 10:1-5. Be not led away by heathen beliefs. The phenomena seen in the sky have no element of divinity about them. The gods are nothing beyond the materials put together by workmen. They are speechless, and incapable of movement. They are powerless both for good and for harm. (ii) Jeremiah 10:6-16. Jehovah is not as these. He is the supreme God, Creator of the heavens and of the world, and Wielder of the powers of nature. The peoples of the earth may well tremble before Him, who has created all things and has chosen Israel for His own.

Discretion - Or, understanding. The three attributes ascribed to the Creator are very remarkable. The creation of the earth, the material world, is an act of “power;” the “establishing,” i.

OF JEHOVAH’S , Jeremiah 10:12-16. 12. Power… wisdom… discretion — This enumeration of the natural attributes of God as exhibited in the material creation is interesting. They are graded one above the other in true logical order.