(4) The ground is chapt.--The word is so vivid as describing the long fissures of the soil in a time of drought that one admits with reluctance that no such meaning is found in the Hebrew word, which simply means is struck with terror. The translators apparently followed Luther, who gives lechzet--"languishes for thirst," "gapes open with exhaustion," and so applied to the earth, "is cracked or chapt."

As the "gates" in Jeremiah 14:2 stood for the people of the city, so the "ground" stands here as in visible sympathy with the tillers of the soil, the "plowmen" of the next clause.

They covered their heads.--There is a singular, almost awful, pathos in the iteration of this description. Cities and country alike are plunged into the utter blackness of despair.

Verse 4. - The ground is chapt. Perhaps: but it is more obvious to render, is dismayed, according to the usual meaning of the word. Words which properly belong to human beings are often, by a "poetic fallacy," applied to inanimate objects (as in Ver. 2). In the earth; rather, in the land.

14:1-9 The people were in tears. But it was rather the cry of their trouble, and of their sin, than of their prayer. Let us be thankful for the mercy of water, that we may not be taught to value it by feeling the want of it. See what dependence husbandmen have upon the Divine providence. They cannot plough nor sow in hope, unless God water their furrows. The case even of the wild beasts was very pitiable. The people are not forward to pray, but the prophet prays for them. Sin is humbly confessed. Our sins not only accuse us, but answer against us. Our best pleas in prayer are those fetched from the glory of God's own name. We should dread God's departure, more than the removal of our creature-comforts. He has given Israel his word to hope in. It becomes us in prayer to show ourselves more concerned for God's glory than for our own comfort. And if we now return to the Lord, he will save us to the glory of his grace.Because the ground is chapt,.... Through the violent heat of the sun, and want of rain; or, is broken (y); and crumbles into dust. The Targum is,

"because of sins, the inhabitants of the earth are broken:''

for there was no rain in the earth; this was the reason of the dearth, and of the famine, and why there was no water in the pits, and the ground was parched. It is to be understood of the land of Judea only, not of the whole earth:

the ploughmen were ashamed; because they could not work the earth with their plough; were obliged to sit still, could do no work, or go on with their husbandry; nothing could be done for want of rain: they covered their heads; as before; See Gill on Jeremiah 14:3.

(y) "confracta", Schmidt; "attritam", Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.