Jeremiah 3:6, commentary and pictures

God stands as husband to His people, and playing the harlot is spiritual fornication, which is apostasy from His law and worship into idolatry and unlawful union with idolatrous sects in breach of the covenant. Going up upon every high mountain and under every green tree is resorting to the places of pagan altars and false worship in growing fellowship with heathen religion. Though Israel turned away in willing and wicked departure, God still calls the backslider to return and acknowledge iniquity, promising to heal backsliding with mercy, forgiveness and cleansing. The unfaithful woman explains the harlot as a corrupt, fallen, apostate church that turns from God toward the nations and their ways and worldly powers. The church, espoused in purity to Christ alone, commits adultery when it adopts the ways of the world and seeks the aid and support of the State instead of God, a union that brings persecution, now seen in efforts to secure Sunday laws by civil power.

Israel's Spiritual Adultery

The verse presents God as husband to His people, with marriage picturing His tender love for them, so that taking His name signifies belonging to Him and receiving the protection and blessings bound up with that name. In her purity the church is a chaste virgin espoused to Him alone, and the harlot figure expresses His repugnance to shameless unfaithfulness to her vow. That illicit joining of the church to another is both adopting the ways of the world and seeking its aid, especially seeking worldly power and State aid to enforce religious dogmas such as Sunday.

To play the harlot is spiritual fornication, which is apostasy in breach of the covenant relationship with the Lord. It is departure from the law and the testimony and the worship of Jehovah into idolatry and into unlawful connection with idolatrous sects and false religious sects of every kind. It is turning from God to idolatry and mixing devotion to Him with worldly practices, pursued as an unfaithful wife turning from her husband.

Going up upon every high mountain and under every green tree is resorting to the settings for pagan altars and false worship. Israel's participation in that worship at high places and beneath green trees marked her growing association with heathen religion. The mountains also picture kingdoms, so that in departing from God and joining herself to the world and turning to earthly powers and forms of worship, the church leaves the mountain of God, His kingdom, for the mountains of earthly kingdoms. Israel's apostasy in this form serves as a prototype for an apostate church that turns from God and joins itself to the world, depicted as a church joined to the world committing fornication and adultery. The fornication so charged has no reference to conforming to the laws of civil government for regulation of temporal concerns.

Her backsliding idolatry was a willing and wicked departure from Him, worse in its wickedness than that of the heathen. The prophecies in this setting denounce sin and express sorrow over the people's transgression and their failure to respond to appeals to return. Yet the same setting records His appeal for the backsliding people to return, showing that this backsliding does not by itself put return beyond reach or make restoration and forgiveness impossible. He invites the backslidden to come back and promises to heal their backsliding, revealing merciful love that still pleads with them to return, acknowledge iniquity and sin, and be healed, so that a backslider who gives up cherished sin and returns with all the heart, even the thousandth time, will find a loving Father and be accepted as already redeemed.

Pardon for the Backslider

Jeremiah 3:6 describes Israel as having turned from God to idolatry, going up upon every high mountain and under every green tree to commit spiritual adultery as a wife unfaithful to her husband, in a willing and wicked departure, yet God continued to call His wandering people to return to Him. His dealings with them show that those who have wandered away can repent and receive forgiveness and cleansing, and their departure does not make restoration impossible.

The chapter containing this account makes strong pleas to backsliders that show there is hope for them. Backsliding Israel is portrayed as a wife who has forsaken her husband for spiritual unfaithfulness at high places and under green trees, but that unfaithfulness does not rule out pardon and does not by itself mean forgiveness is impossible. The call to return in Jeremiah 3:22 shows that even this backsliding into idolatry does not put return beyond reach.

As a husband may take back an unfaithful wife if she repents, God invites backsliders to return, acknowledge their iniquity and sin, and He promises to heal their backsliding and give mercy, forgiveness and cleansing. His feeling toward backsliders is merciful love that still pleads with them to return, acknowledge iniquity, and be healed, though their backsliding idolatry was wicked and worse than that of the heathen. A backslider who gives up cherished sin and returns to God with all the heart, even the thousandth time, will find a loving Father and be accepted as already redeemed by Christ.

Symbol of Apostate Church

In Jeremiah 3 the woman stands for God's people, and backsliding Israel is shown as an unfaithful woman turned harlot by turning from God to the nations and their ways and to worldly powers. That corrupt, licentious woman is the symbol of a corrupt, fallen, apostate church. Israel became a harlot by turning from God and joining herself to the world, her worship on every high mountain and under every green tree expressing that apostasy, and this supplies the parallel for the symbolic harlot as a corrupt church that forsakes loyalty to God through unlawful worldly alliances. The church is espoused to God alone, and in purity is a chaste virgin, but becomes adulterous when it joins itself to the world. Faithless Israel turning from God to the nations commits spiritual adultery, showing how God's people become an unfaithful religious power when they seek the world's support instead of God. That illicit joining is both adopting the world's ways and seeking its aid, and backsliding Israel going up upon every high mountain and under every green tree and playing the harlot means God's church uniting with the world, which God calls fornication and adultery.

Such union with the world or the State is spiritual fornication and departure from God. As an unfaithful wife Israel turned from God to other lovers, pictured as worship at high places and beneath green trees, and so the church turns from God's instruction and seeks worldly powers or nations, a union promising help but leading to ruin. It is departure from God into union with kings of the earth in their idolatry, their errors, and their power, which is Babylon's fornication and her wine. The harlot symbol expresses God's repugnance to this shameless unfaithfulness to her vow. Israel's spiritual unfaithfulness as adultery, expressed through worship at high places and beneath green trees, serves as the prototype for an apostate church that turns from God and joins itself to the world. Harlotry, whoredom and fornication mean spiritual fornication, which is apostasy, departure from the law and the testimony and the worship of Jehovah into unlawful connection with idolatrous sects and false religious sects of every kind, and Babylon is an apostate church marked by that departure. The fornication charged against Babylon has no reference to the church conforming to the laws of civil government for regulation of temporal concerns.

The only legitimate union for the church is with Jesus Christ, and to have or hold communion with another power is spiritual fornication. That illicit connection is especially seeking worldly power and State aid to enforce religious dogmas such as Sunday. From this union of church and state comes persecution of the people of God, now beginning in worldwide Catholic and Protestant efforts to secure effective Sunday laws in fulfillment of prophecy, chosen by those who refuse to worship God by keeping all His commandments. The church repeats Israel's unfaithfulness when, like an unfaithful wife turning from her covenant Lord to other lovers and wandering to high places and beneath green trees to commit spiritual adultery, it forsakes Christ for riches, worldly pride and pleasure, human favor, ease, or earthly cares, making these things rivals to its Lord.