God’s Word Translation
Jeremiah 15:12
12(No one can break iron, iron from the north, or bronze.)
Jeremiah 15:12 in other versions
- King James Version (KJV)Shall iron break the northern iron and the steel?
- New International Version (NIV)“Can a man break iron— iron from the north—or bronze?
- English Standard Version (ESV)Can one break iron, iron from the north, and bronze?
- New King James Version (NKJV)Can anyone break iron, The northern iron and the bronze?
Context of Jeremiah 15:12
10I’m so miserable! Why did my mother give birth to me? I am a man who argues and quarrels with the whole earth. I have never lent or borrowed anything. Yet, everyone curses me. 11The Lord said, “I will certainly rescue you for a good reason. I will certainly make your enemies plead with you in times of disaster and in times of distress. (No one can break iron, iron from the north, or bronze.) 13I will give away your wealth and treasures as loot as the price for all the sins that you have committed throughout your territory. 14I will make you serve your enemies in a land that you haven’t heard of, because my anger has started a fire. It will burn you.”
Read all of Jeremiah 15Jeremiah 15:12 word by word
הֲיָרֹ֨עַ בַּרְזֶ֧ל׀ בַּרְזֶ֛ל מִצָּפ֖וֹן וּנְחֹֽשֶׁת׃Read the interlinear
Words taken from the KJV.
Cross-references for Jeremiah 15:12
- Jeremiah 1:18Today I have made you like a fortified city, an iron pillar, and a bronze wall. You will be able to stand up to the whole land. You will be able to stand up to Judah’s kings, its officials, its priests, and ⌞all⌟ the common people.
- Jeremiah 21:4‘This is what the Lord God of Israel says: I’m going to take your weapons away from you. You are using these weapons to fight the king of Babylon as well as the Babylonians who are now blockading you outside the wall. I will bring the Babylonians inside this city.
- Job 40:9Do you have power like God’s? Can you thunder with a voice like his?
- Isaiah 45:9How horrible it will be for the one who quarrels with his maker. He is pottery among other earthenware pots. Does the clay ask the one who shapes it, “What are you making?” Does your work say to you, “There are no handles”?
- Habakkuk 1:5Look among the nations and watch. Be amazed and astonished. I am going to do something in your days that you would not believe even if it were reported to you.
Commentaries on Jeremiah 15:12
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary · v. 12Shall iron break the northern iron and the steel? - Shall our weak forces be able to oppose and overcome the powers of the Chaldeans? נחשת nechasheth, which we here translate steel, property signifies brass or copper united with tin, which gives it much hardness, and enables it to bear a good edge.Read the comment
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible · v. 12The steel - “brass,” i. e., bronze. By the “iron” is meant Jeremiah‘s intercession; but this cannot alter the divine purpose to send Judah into exile, which is firm as steel and brass. For “brass” see Exodus 25:3 note. The alloy of copper and zinc now called brass was entirely unknown to the ancients.Read the comment
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary · v. 10-14Verses 10-14 Jeremiah met with much contempt and reproach, when they ought to have blessed him, and God for him. It is a great and sufficient support to the people of God, that however troublesome their way may be, it shall be well with them in their latter end. God turns to the people. Shall the most hardy and vigorous of their efforts be able to contend with the counsel of God, or with the army of the Chaldeans? Let them hear their doom. The enemy will…Read the comment
- Tyndale Open Study Notes · v. 12Iron and bronze symbolize the strong will that the Lord would give to Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:18).Read the comment
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary · v. 1212. steel--rather, brass or copper, which mixed with "iron" (by the Chalybes near the Euxine Pontus, far north of Palestine), formed the hardest metal, like our steel. Can the Jews, hardy like common iron though they be, break the still hardier Chaldees of the north (Jr 1:14), who resemble the Chalybian iron hardened with copper? Certainly not [Calvin]. Henderson translates. "Can one break iron, (even) the northern iron, and brass," on the ground that…Read the comment
Topics related to Jeremiah 15:12
In the dictionaries
Commentaries on Jeremiah 15
- Adam Clarke Bible Commentary
- Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
- Matthew Henry Concise Commentary
- Tyndale Open Study Notes
- Jamieson–Fausset–Brown Commentary
- Rashi on Tanakh
- Calvin’s Commentaries
- Keil & Delitzsch Commentary
- John Wesley’s Notes
- Darby Translation Notes
- Geneva Bible Translation Notes
- Kingcomments
- Matthew Henry’s Complete Commentary
- Matthew Henry’s Modern English Commentary
- Scofield Reference Notes, 1917 Edition
- Original Douay–Rheims Annotations
- Seventh-day Adventist Bible Commentary
- EGW Writings
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