Jeremiah 3:9 - Exposition

Through the lightness of her whoredom ; i . e . through the slight importance which she attached to her whoredom. So apparently the ancient versions. The only sense, however, which the word kol ever has in Hebrew is not "lightness," but "sound," "voice," and perhaps "rumor" ( Genesis 45:16 ). Hence it is more strictly accurate to render "through the cry." etc. (comp. Genesis 4:10 ; Genesis 19:13 ), or "through the fame," etc.. But neither of these seems quite suitable to the context, and if, as King James's translators seem to have felt it necessary to do, we desert the faithful translation, and enter on the path of conjecture, why not emend kol into klon (there is no vav , and such fragments of true readings are not altogether uncommon in the Hebrew text), which at once yields a good meaning—"through the disgrace of her whoredom ?" Ewald thinks that kol may be taken in the sense of k'lon ; but this is really more arbitrary than emending the text. With stones , etc. (see Jeremiah 2:27 ).