Bible Strands
Jeremiah 2:6
They did not ask, ‘Where is the LORD who brought us up from the land of Egypt, who led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and pits, a land of drought and darkness, a land where no one travels and no one lives?’
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Yahweh speaks through Jeremiah to Israel, delivering a covenant indictment at the moment their ancestors abandoned Him for idols. The prophet confronts the people with their collective failure to acknowledge God's past deliverance.
The words — אַיֵּ֣ה ('ai.Yeh) literally means "where?" and הַ/מַּעֲלֶ֥ה (ha./ma.'a.Leh) means "who brought up." The text uses these terms to highlight the people's refusal to inquire about the God who extracted them from Egypt.
The thread — The failure to remember the Lord who led Israel out of Egypt and through the wilderness appears in Deuteronomy 8:14, Deuteronomy 32:10, and Isaiah 63:11. These references consistently tie wilderness guidance to covenant loyalty and warn against spiritual amnesia.
Why it lands — The verse demands a reader to verify whether they actively seek God's presence and direction or merely assume His past actions guarantee present favor. It requires honest self-examination regarding whether one's life reflects gratitude for divine deliverance or active neglect.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
Neither said they, Where is the Lord that brought us up out of the land of Egypt, that led us through the wilderness, through a land of deserts and of pits, through a land of drought, and of the shadow of death, through a land that no man passed through, and where no man dwelt?
Cross-references
- Deuteronomy 32:10 He found him in a desert land, in a barren, howling wilderness; He surrounded him, He instructed him, He guarded him as the apple of His eye.
- Deuteronomy 8:14 then your heart will become proud, and you will forget the LORD your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
- Isaiah 63:11 Then His people remembered the days of old, the days of Moses. Where is He who brought them through the sea with the shepherds of His flock? Where is the One who set His Holy Spirit among them,
- Hosea 13:4 Yet I am the LORD your God ever since the land of Egypt; you know no God but Me, for there is no Savior besides Me.
- Exodus 14:1 Then the LORD said to Moses,
- Judges 6:13 “Please, my Lord,” Gideon replied, “if the LORD is with us, why has all this happened to us? And where are all His wonders of which our fathers told us, saying, ‘Has not the LORD brought us up out of Egypt?’ But now the LORD has forsaken us and delivered us into the hand of Midian.”
- 2 Kings 2:14 Then he took the cloak of Elijah that had fallen from him and struck the waters. “Where now is the LORD, the God of Elijah?” he asked. And when he had struck the waters, they parted to the right and to the left, and Elisha crossed over.
- Job 3:5 May darkness and gloom reclaim it, and a cloud settle over it; may the blackness of the day overwhelm it.
- Job 10:21 before I go—never to return—to a land of darkness and gloom,
- Job 35:10 But no one asks, ‘Where is God my Maker, who gives us songs in the night,