Jeremias 6:20
To what purpose do you bring me frankincense from Saba, and the sweet smelling cane from a far country? your holocausts are not acceptable, nor are your sacrifices pleasing to me.
Open Jeremias 6:20 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Ut quid mihi thus de Saba affertis, et calamum suave olentem de terra longinqua ? Holocautomata vestra non sunt accepta, et victimæ vestræ non placuerunt mihi.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- ἵνα τί μοι λίβανον ἐκ Σαβὰ φέρετε καὶ κιννάμωμον ἐκ γῆς μακρόθεν; τὰ ὁλοκαυτώματα ὑμῶν οὐκ εἰσὶν δεκτά, καὶ αἱ θυσίαι ὑμῶν οὐχ ἥδυνάν μοι.
- Hebrew (WLC)
- לָמָּה זֶּ֨ה לִ֤י לְבוֹנָה֙ מִשְּׁבָ֣א תָב֔וֹא וְקָנֶ֥ה הַטּ֖וֹב מֵאֶ֣רֶץ מֶרְחָ֑ק עֹלֽוֹתֵיכֶם֙ לֹ֣א לְרָצ֔וֹן וְזִבְחֵיכֶ֖ם לֹא עָ֥רְבוּ לִֽי
Haydock's commentary
To me. For want of proper dispositions; otherwise the offerings of the best things were enjoined, and commendable. The Jews are taught not to depend on external observances, while they neglect the heart. (Calmet)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Irenaeus Against Heresies: Book IV, Chapter XVII. Proof that God did not
2. For it was not because He was angry, like a man, as many venture to say, that He rejected their sacrifices; but out of compassion to their blindness, and with the view of suggesting to them the true sacrifice, by offering which they shall appease God, that they may receive life from Him. As He elsewhere declares: “The sacrifice to God is an afflicted heart: a sweet savour to God is a heart glorifying Him who formed it.” For if, when angry, He had repudiated these sacrifices of theirs, as if they were persons unworthy to obtain His compassion, He would not certainly have urged these same things upon them as those by which they might be saved. But inasmuch as God is merciful, He did not cut them off from good counsel. …
Pseudo-Tertullian Appendix, Book IV
With swarm of sin? Does He, the truthful, bid,
The Apostolic Constitutions Book VI, Sec. IV. Of the Law
XXII . You therefore are blessed who are delivered from the curse, For Christ, the Son of God, by His coming has confirmed and completed the law, but has taken away the additional precepts, although not all of them, yet at least the more grievous ones; having confirmed the former, and abolished the latter, and has again set the free-will of man at liberty, not subjecting him to the penalty of a temporal death, but giving laws to him according to another constitution. Wherefore He says: “If any man will come after me, let him come.” And again: “Will ye also go away?” And besides, before His coming He refused the sacrifices of the people, while they frequently offered them, when they sinned against Him, and thought He was to be appeased by sacrifices, but not by repentance. …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Hebrews, Hebrews 6.13-16
These sacrifices one may see in the Old [Testament] also, shadowed out beforehand. “Offer to God,” it is said, “a sacrifice of righteousness” ( Ps. iv. 5 ); “Offer a sacrifice of praise” ( Ps. l. 14 ); and, “a sacrifice of praise shall glorify Me” ( Ps. l. 23 ), and, “the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit” ( Ps. li. 17 ); and “what doth the Lord require of thee but” to hearken to Him? ( Mic. vi. 8 .) “Burnt-offerings and sacrifices for sin Thou hast had no pleasure in: then I said, Lo I come to do Thy will, O God!” ( Ps. xl. 6, 7 ), and again, “To what purpose do ye bring the incense from Sheba?” ( Jer. vi. 20 .) “Take thou away from Me the noise of thy songs, for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.” ( Amos v. 23 .) But instead of these “I will have mercy and not sacrifice.” ( Hosea vi. 6 .) Thou seest with what kind of “sacrifices God is well pleased.” ( c. xiii. …