Jeremiah 9:12

12 Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom has the mouth of ADONAI spoken, so that he can proclaim it? Why has the land perished and been laid waste like a desert, so that no one passes through?

Jeremiah 9:12 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 9:12

Who is the wise man that may understand this?
&c.] Not the calamity, but the cause of it; a man of wisdom would inquire into it, find it out, and understand it; but the intimation is, that there was not a wise man among them, at least very few; there were scarce any that took any notice of these things, or were concerned about them: and who is he to whom the mouth of the Lord hath spoken;
and foretold this desolation and destruction; meaning a prophet: that he may declare it;
as from the Lord, namely, what follows: for what the land perisheth, and is burnt like a wilderness, that none
passeth through?
that is, what were the sins of the inhabitants of the land, which brought such distress upon it, and for which it became such a ruinous heap, and like the heath in the wilderness, so that it had no inhabitant, nor even a passenger: they must be some very great and abominable iniquities that were the cause of all this.

Jeremiah 9:12 In-Context

10 I weep and wail for the mountains and lament over the desert pastures, because they have been burned up; no one passes through; they no longer hear the sound of cattle; the birds and wild animals have fled, are gone.

11 "I will make Yerushalayim a heap of ruins, turn it into a lair for jackals, and make the cities of Y'hudah desolate, with no one living there."

12 Who is wise enough to understand this? To whom has the mouth of ADONAI spoken, so that he can proclaim it? Why has the land perished and been laid waste like a desert, so that no one passes through?

13 ADONAI answers: "Because they abandoned my Torah, which I set before them, and neither listened to what I said nor lived accordingly,

14 but have lived by their own hearts' stubbornness and by the ba'alim, as their ancestors taught them