Jeremiah 8:8
How do ye say, We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us? Lo, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain. How do ye say, We are wise, and the law of the LORD is with us? Lo, certainly in vain made he it; the pen of the scribes is in vain.
Jeremiah 8:8 rebukes a people in perpetual backsliding who hold fast to deceit and refuse to return and repent. No one repents of wickedness or asks what has been done, but all rush onward like the horse rushing into battle. They do not know the judgment of the Lord, even though the stork in the heaven knows her appointed times and the turtle and the crane and the swallow observe the time of their coming.
The boast, We are wise, and the law of the Lord is with us, is a claim to wisdom and to possession of the law while rejecting the word of the Lord. It is turning away from hearing the Word to avoid being disturbed by its plainly specified requirements. It is opposing the Word, and ignoring, despising and rejecting the law in its true significance and divine authority as no longer binding upon the human family.
Because the word has been rejected, the law has been made empty and the pen of the scribes is in vain. There is no true wisdom in them, and the wise men are ashamed, dismayed and taken. The verse thus exposes the false wisdom and presents things truly as they are.
The false shepherds set aside the commandments of God and put their own words in place of the Word of the Lord, making it of no effect. In interpreting Scripture they teach human commandments as doctrines, which proves ignorance of the Scriptures and of the power of God. Their guilt also appears in healing the hurt slightly by saying peace where there is no peace, and in committing abominations without shame or blushing, so they shall fall among them that fall and in the time of their visitation be cast down.
The verse describes the religious world in the present age near the close of earth's history just as it described the scribes and teachers and rulers in the time of Christ. It is now being fulfilled to the letter by those who claim to be teachers of the people while refusing obedience to the Word and leading them astray. They refuse obedience yet say the law of the Lord is with us.
The fulfillment centers especially on the original Sabbath of Jehovah, the memorial Sabbath, the day God blessed and sanctified. Instead of observing it, they honor a spurious sabbath, a heathen idol sabbath, and exalt it by man-made theories. While declaring the law of the Lord is with them, they enforce Sunday by human laws and threaten that all who violate it will be dealt with according to their laws.
By this apostasy from truth they encourage wickedness and bring the sin and violence now filling the world. All who follow that practice of the scribes and teachers come under the condemnation of the heavenly universe. Their course deepens darkness in the earth.