Did God say sacrifices were never commanded? Study Jeremiah 7 with context, apologetic analysis, and cross-references.
Dr. Lucas D. Shallua Commentary · JEREMIAH 7 — THE TEMPLE SERMON AND THE DEN OF ROBBERS
Verse 22 uses rhetorical priority: at the exodus covenant's heart stood obedient relationship, within which sacrificial legislation functioned. Jeremiah does not contradict Leviticus; he rejects ritual treated as a substitute for listening.
The ban concerns averting a fixed national catastrophe after generations of refusal. It does not make intercession generally wrong or imply that repentant individuals could not seek mercy.
No. Torah explicitly forbids it. Commands concerning firstborn dedication required redemption, not killing. Jeremiah's emphatic denial exposes pagan corruption rather than a contradiction in God's character.
God's Davidic and Zion promises remain, but no promise authorized persistent evil or guaranteed the survival of one building in every generation. Judgment on the first temple did not cancel God's redemptive purpose.
He invokes Jeremiah's whole temple-sermon logic. His concern includes corrupt commerce, but more deeply exposes leaders who use sacred space as security while resisting justice and God's Messiah.
Jeremiah 7 introduces the temple sermon, with related material continuing through chapter 10 and a narrative setting in chapter 26, probably early in Jehoiakim's reign. Worshipers apparently used Josiah's reform, the Davidic promise, and Jerusalem's earlier deliverance from Assyria to support an unconditional security slogan. Jeremiah does not attack the temple as God-given; he attacks covenant presumption that separates liturgy from life.
Shiloh is commonly identified with Khirbet Seilun, where archaeological remains show long occupation and major disruption in the Iron Age, though archaeology cannot specify every biblical event there. The site's remembered decline made Jeremiah's comparison publicly testable. Evidence from Phoenician and Punic contexts confirms that child sacrifice existed in parts of the ancient Mediterranean, while the precise interpretation of every excavated “tophet” remains debated. Biblical texts consistently condemn the practice. The Valley of Hinnom is a real Jerusalem location; its later association with Gehenna helps explain its New Testament use as judgment imagery. Jeremiah 26 independently preserves the temple sermon controversy and the threat to execute Jeremiah, strengthening the historical setting without duplicating chapter 7 word for word.
This study preserves the hard questions, explanations, context, apologetic note, and references from Dr. Shallua's Commentary.