Therefore this is what the LORD God of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘Behold, I will bring to Judah and to all the residents of Jerusalem all the disaster I have pronounced against them, because I have spoken to them but they have not obeyed, and I have called to them but they have not answered.’”
The Prophet, after having shewn that the Jews were so condemned by the example of the Rechabites, that there was no defense for them, now adds, — that as the word of God had been to them useless, it would now be efficacious against them. This is the purport of the verse.
The trial of the Rechabites' constancy was intended but for a sign; now here we have the application of it. I. The Rechabites' observance of their father's charge to them is made use of as an aggravation of the disobedience of the Jews to God. Let them see it and be ashamed. The prophet asks them, in God's name, "Will you not at length receive instruction? Jer 35:13.
Commenting on Jeremiah 35:12-19
Therefore thus saith the Lord God of hosts, the God of Israel,.... Provoked by such ill usage: behold, I will bring upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, all the evil that I have pronounced against them: which Abarbinel interprets of all the threatenings and curses in the law and the prophets respecting the Jews, until the times of Jeremiah; though it may...