Jeremiah 8

“LORD,” usually printed in all capital letters, is a name of God that appears around 7,000 times in many English editions of the Christian Bible. That makes it the most common way of referring to God. The lower-case “Lord” is often a translation of the Hebrew word Adonai. It refers to God as our master, our life coach, or the boss. He’s in charge of us, and we try to obey him. “LORD” is the spelling most Bibles use when the writer refers to the name of God. Moses asked God what his name was, and God said Moses should tell the Hebrew ancestors of the Jews that his name is “I AM” (Exodus 3:14). In the original Hebrew language, the name is spelled with only consonants—no vowels. It’s an ancient shorthand, to save hides used to make scrolls. The name is YHWH. Without knowing which vowels, most scholars have settled on YAHWEH, pronounced YAH-way. God’s name is so sacred to many Jews that they refuse to speak it. Instead, they’ll use names that describe the character of God, such as Adonai, which means “my Lord.” They won’t even write the name. In English, they’ll spell the name G-d.

Babylonian invaders deported many survivors to what is now Iraq.

This is one of the title’s of God, often translated “LORD of hosts,” or “Yahweh of Hosts.”

Perhaps some scribes insisted that the laws they had from Moses—and their take on those laws—was all the words God had planned on speaking to his people. So, they had no confidence that Jeremiah spoke for God with new insight. A modern parallel could be the elevation of the Bible above God, as though a minister’s take on the messages in this collection of ancient writings is all the inspiration God has to offer.

Shekels were coins in ancient Israel’s currency. Shekels came in different kinds of metal and different weights. There was a heavy shekel that weighed about 11.5 grams or .4 ounces. That’s a little more than a 7-gram American quarter or an 8-gram Euro coin. This was sometimes called the King’s Shekel or the Royal Shekel. Some scholars say this was also the weight used in the Jerusalem Temple. The lighter shekel weighed about 9.5 grams or .33 ounces.

They broke their contract with God. Their part of an ancient covenant was to obey God in return for safety and prosperity in this land of what is now Israel and Palestinian Territory. So, God would kick them off his property, deporting them to what is now Iraq.

Dan was an Israelite town on the northern border, at the foot of Mount Hermon. Babylonian invaders, like Assyrians before them, charged into Israel from the north.

“Zion” is a nickname—a term of endearment for Jerusalem and the ridge on which the city rests.

It’s hard to know who’s doing the talking here. Is it God, Jeremiah, or a narrator speaking for God? But perhaps the “who” doesn’t matter as much as the “what” is said.

More literally, the medicine is the “balm of Gilead.” Gilead was east of Israel’s Sea of Galilee. Even in the times of Genesis, when Israel’s founding father and tribal leader’s lived, people used balm creams from Gilead (Genesis 37:25). Jacob told his sons, headed on a trading venture to Egypt, “Be sure to take some healing balm cream” (Genesis 43:11).