Bible Strands
Jeremiah 2:7
I brought you into a fertile land to eat its fruit and bounty, but you came and defiled My land and made My inheritance detestable.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Yahweh addresses Israel, recounting His past deliverance and provision as they face impending judgment for covenant unfaithfulness. The speaker identifies Himself as the one who brought the people into a fertile land to consume its fruit and goodness.
The words — The phrase הַכַּרְמֶל (ha.karmel) literally means "the orchard" or "fertile land," while טוּבָהּ (tuvah) denotes its "goodness" or "bounty." These terms ground the covenant promise in tangible agricultural provision rather than abstract blessing.
The thread — The motif of God bringing Israel into a fertile land echoes Deuteronomy 8:7, while their defilement of that inheritance parallels the warning in Jeremiah 16:18. The same land that sustains becomes the site of ritual corruption when the people abandon Yahweh.
Why it lands — The text states that divine provision does not excuse covenant violation, requiring immediate repentance before inherited blessings become grounds for judgment. A reader must acknowledge that receiving grace without maintaining fidelity transforms blessing into indictment.
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
And I brought you into a plentiful country, to eat the fruit thereof and the goodness thereof; but when ye entered, ye defiled my land, and made mine heritage an abomination.
Cross-references
- Deuteronomy 8:7 For the LORD your God is bringing you into a good land, a land of brooks and fountains and springs that flow through the valleys and hills;
- Jeremiah 16:18 And I will first repay them double their iniquity and their sin, because they have defiled My land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and they have filled My inheritance with their abominations.”
- Numbers 13:27 And they gave this account to Moses: “We went into the land to which you sent us, and indeed, it is flowing with milk and honey. Here is some of its fruit!
- Ezekiel 36:17 “Son of man, when the people of Israel lived in their land, they defiled it by their own ways and deeds. Their behavior before Me was like the uncleanness of a woman’s impurity.
- Psalms 106:38 They shed innocent blood—the blood of their sons and daughters, whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan, and the land was polluted with blood.
- Jeremiah 3:1 “If a man divorces his wife and she leaves him to marry another, can he ever return to her? Would not such a land be completely defiled? But you have played the harlot with many lovers—and you would return to Me?” declares the LORD.
- Jeremiah 3:9 Indifferent to her own infidelity, Israel had defiled the land and committed adultery with stones and trees.
- Leviticus 18:24 Do not defile yourselves by any of these practices, for by all these things the nations I am driving out before you have defiled themselves.
- Numbers 14:7 and said to the whole congregation of Israel, “The land we passed through and explored is an exceedingly good land.
- Numbers 35:33 Do not pollute the land where you live, for bloodshed pollutes the land, and no atonement can be made for the land on which the blood is shed, except by the blood of the one who shed it.