Jeremiah 8:8

"How do ye say, We are wise, and the law of Jehovah is with us? But, behold, the false pen of the scribes hath wrought falsely."

The existence of the order of The Scribes in the days of Jeremiah proves conclusively that the Law of Jehovah, not a single book, such as Deuteronomy, but all of it, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy, commonly referred to as the Pentateuch, did exist in those days, else there could not possibly have been such an order as that of the Scribes whose duty it was to copy, study, distribute, and expound the teachings of that very law.

Any person with ordinary intelligence needs no scholar to explain this to him. In addition to the incontrovertible evidence we have in this very chapter, there are countless references throughout Jeremiah to every single one of the man-made divisions in the Law of Moses, that law, from the beginning, not being five books but only one, the Book of Moses.

We consider the meaning of this verse to be so important that we would like to support the position which we have taken with the opinion of a number of dependable, able scholars, who are honest enough and conservative enough to point out what is really said here.

"The Torah (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy) must have existed in writing before there could have been an order of men whose special business it was to study it.[10] ... The presence of scribes demands that there must have been a law by this time, contrary to the view of some Old Testament scholars.[11] ... Behold the false pen of the scribes ... (Jeremiah 8:8) The scribes studied and copied the Law; this is the first mention of them in the Bible. Already, they were beginning to make the Law of God void by their tradition (Matthew 15:6).[12] ... These verses are a strong argument in favor of the belief that the Book of the Law even at that time had well-grounded claims to antiquity.[13] ... These verses teach that "The written law is with us," This is the Law of Jahweh recorded in the Pentateuch; and this is not to be understood as merely the outward possession of it, but also as the inwardly appropriated knowledge and mastery of it.[14] ... Jeremiah's whole argument here depends upon the fact that there existed in his day men who claimed to be wise on account of their study of the Pentateuch; and this is utterly inconsistent with assumptions that Jeremiah wrote Deuteronomy.[15] ... Ash identified the "law" mentioned in Jeremiah 8:7 as "the Torah."[16] ... Kuist noted that, "The scribes interpreting the Law (Torah or `instructions') found sanctions for their actions in false interpretations."[17] ... Even Wheeler Robinson in Peake's Commentary, while accepting the usual critical view, which he asserted "might be correct," he also stated that, "A strong case can be made out," for the view which we take here.[18] ... This teaches that in the seventh century B.C. Israel possessed a written Torah which it was the ostensible duty of the scribes to study and expound."[19]