What Does Jeremiah 7:29 Mean in the King James?
Cut off thine hair, O Jerusalem, and cast it away, and take up a lamentation on high places; for the LORD hath rejected and forsaken the generation of his wrath.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Jerusalem’s hair is called her נֵזֶר (nēzer, “crown” or “consecration”), so cutting it off turns the visible sign of being set apart into a sign of grief.
THE MEANING
This word lets you see consecration turned into grief: the crown is cut away, cast aside, and lament rises where it can be heard. It names the LORD’s rejection and forsaking of a whole generation without softening the rupture.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
A sign of being set apart does not make a generation immune to rejection.
THE ROOT
נִזְרֵךְ
nizrekh
GROWS FROM
נזר
To set apart or dedicate; the root also carries the sense of consecration.
Jeremiah calls the hair a נֵזֶר (nēzer, “crown” or “consecration”), a word that holds together a visible crown and the idea of being set apart. Cutting it off makes the sign of consecration itself part of the lament.
ALSO GROWS
nāzîr: One set apart; a Nazirite.
נָזִיר
The shared root links Jerusalem’s hair with the visible sign of a person’s consecration.
nēzer: Consecration; crown or diadem.
נֵזֶר
The verse’s word for hair echoes both crown and consecration, so its removal signifies more than a change in appearance.
עֶבְרָתוֹ
ʿevrāṯô
GROWS FROM
עבר
To pass over, cross, or go beyond; עֶבְרָה (ʿevrāh) can mean fury or overflowing anger.
The KJV’s “wrath” belongs to a word family whose basic movement is crossing or going beyond, and whose noun עֶבְרָה (ʿevrāh, “fury”) can suggest anger overflowing. Here that word describes the condition of a whole generation.
ALSO GROWS
ʿāvar: To pass over or cross.
עָבַר
This basic motion gives the wrath word its sense of going beyond or overflowing.
ʿăvērah: Transgression; a crossing or violation.
עֲבֵרָה
The shared root preserves the image of crossing a boundary, while Jeremiah applies its fury-related form to an entire generation.
THE PATTERN
When devastation is named, Scripture lets grief become visible in the body and in lament.
And in that day did the Lord GOD of hosts call to weeping, and to mourning, and to baldness, and to girding with sackcloth:They shall also gird themselves with sackcloth, and horror shall cover them; and shame shall be upon all faces, and baldness upon all their heads.Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.THE THREAD
All the days of the vow of his separation there shall no razor come upon his head: until the days be fulfilled, in the which he separateth himself unto the LORD, he shall be holy, and shall let the locks of the hair of his head grow.Numbers ties נֵזֶר (nēzer, “consecration”) to a vow of separation and to hair left uncut. Jeremiah uses that same word-family for Jerusalem’s hair, then commands its removal, making the sign of being set apart carry the verse’s lament.
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