Jeremiah 7:24

24 But they did not obey or pay any attention. Instead, they did whatever their stubborn and evil hearts told them to do, and they became worse instead of better.

Jeremiah 7:24 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 7:24

But they hearkened not, nor inclined their ear
Neither to the law that was given them, nor to the promises that were made unto them, this was the case of the Jewish fathers, and also of their posterity, to whom belonged the law, and the promises, and the service of God: but walked in the counsels and in the imagination of their evil heart;
what their evil heart imagined, advised and directed to, that they attended to, walked in, and pursued after. The heart of man is evil; it is desperately wicked, even wickedness itself; and so is every thought and every imagination of the thoughts of it and all its counsels, machinations and contrivances; and therefore the consequence of walking in these, or steering the course of life according to them, must be bad: and went backward, and not forward;
they went backwards from the ways of God, and walked not in them. The Targum is,

``they turned the back in my worship, and did not put my fear before their face;''

or else this may design, not their sin, but their punishment, as Kimchi interprets it; they did not prosper, but suffered adversity; a curse, and not a blessing, attended the works of their hands.

Jeremiah 7:24 In-Context

22 I gave your ancestors no commands about burnt offerings or any other kinds of sacrifices when I brought them out of Egypt.

23 But I did command them to obey me, so that I would be their God and they would be my people. And I told them to live the way I had commanded them, so that things would go well for them.

24 But they did not obey or pay any attention. Instead, they did whatever their stubborn and evil hearts told them to do, and they became worse instead of better.

25 From the day that your ancestors came out of Egypt until this very day I have kept on sending to you my servants, the prophets.

26 Yet no one listened or paid any attention. Instead, you became more stubborn and rebellious than your ancestors.