BibleDaily Readings
cog

Settings

OLD TESTAMENTNEW TESTAMENT
Genesis
1234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829303132333435363738394041424344454647484950
Exodus
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940
Leviticus
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627
Numbers
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536
Deuteronomy
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334
Joshua
123456789101112131415161718192021222324
Judges
123456789101112131415161718192021
Ruth
1234
1 Samuel
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031
2 Samuel
123456789101112131415161718192021222324
1 Kings
12345678910111213141516171819202122
2 Kings
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425
1 Chronicles
1234567891011121314151617181920212223242526272829
2 Chronicles
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536
1 Esdras
123456789
Ezra
12345678910
Nehemiah
12345678910111213
Tobit
1234567891011121314
Judith
12345678910111213141516
Esther
12345678910111213141516
Maccabees 1
12345678910111213141516
Maccabees 2
123456789101112131415
Psalms
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748495051525354555657585960616263646566676869707172737475767778798081828384858687888990919293949596979899100101102103104105106107108109110111112113114115116117118119120121122123124125126127128129130131132133134135136137138139140141142143144145146147148149150
Job
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142
Proverbs
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031
Ecclesiastes
123456789101112
Song of Songs
12345678
Wisdom of Solomon
12345678910111213141516171819
Wisdom of Sirach
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748495051
Hosea
1234567891011121314
Amos
123456789
Micah
1234567
Joel
123
Obadiah
1
Jonah
1234
Nahum
123
Habakkuk
123
Zephaniah
123
Haggai
12
Zechariah
1234567891011121314
Malachi
1234
Isaiah
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748495051525354555657585960616263646566
Jeremiah
12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849505152
Baruch
12345
Lamentations
12345
Epistle of Jeremiah
1
Ezekiel
123456789101112131415161718192021222324252627282930313233343536373839404142434445464748
Daniel
1234567891011121314
Prayer of Manasseh
1

Jeremiah 1:5

Before I formed you in the womb I knew you; and before you came forth out of the womb I sanctified you, and I ordained you a prophet unto the nations.
Read Chapter 1

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
To show them, however, the weakness and transparency of their objection, though it has no real relation to any truth, divine or human, I will prove to them that people have existed before they were born. Let them show that Jacob had not been appointed and ordained, even before he was born. While yet hidden in the secret chamber of his mother’s womb, he supplanted his brother. Let them show that Jeremiah had not likewise been so, before his birth, “Before I formed you in your mother’s womb, I knew you; and before you came forth from the belly, I sanctified you, and appointed you for a prophet amongst the nations.” … What do you [Arians] mean by your principle that “before he was begotten he did not exist”? Was the Father engaged for some time in conception, so that certain epochs passed away before the Son was begotten? - "On the Christian Faith 4.9.113, 116"
1 min1/14
Go to Commentary

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
“The bosom of the Father” is to be understood in a spiritual sense, as a kind of innermost dwelling of the Father’s love and of his nature, in which the Son always dwells. Even so, the Father’s womb is the spiritual womb of an inner sanctuary, from which the Son has proceeded just as from a generative womb.… The Father speaks of that womb through the prophet Jeremiah: “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” Therefore, the prophet showed that there was a twofold nature in Christ, the divine and the fleshly, the former from the Father, the latter from a virgin, but in such a way that Christ was not deprived of his divinity when he was born from a virgin and was in the body. - "On the Patriarchs 11.51"
1 min2/14
Go to Commentary

Athanasius the Apostolic

AD 373
Concerning Jeremiah, God says, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.” … If such terms are used in Scripture of things created, but the term ever is used of the Word, then it follows, O enemies of God, that the Son did not come out of nothing, nor is he to be numbered at all among created things, but he is the Father’s image and eternal word, never having not existed, but never existing as the eternal radiance. - "Discourses Against the Arians 1.4.13"
< 1 min3/14
Go to Commentary

Augustine of Hippo

AD 430
Moreover, this calling, which works through the opportune circumstances of history, whether this calling is in individuals or in peoples or in humankind itself, comes from a decree both lofty and profound. To this relates the following passage: “In the womb have I sanctified you.” - "On Eighty-Three Varied Questions 68.6"
< 1 min4/14
Go to Commentary

Cyril of Jerusalem

AD 386
He is not ashamed to assume flesh, who is the creator of those very parts. Who tells us this? The Lord said to Jeremiah: “Before I formed you in the belly, I knew you. Before you came forth out of the womb, I made you holy.” If, then, in making humanity he was not ashamed of the contact, was he ashamed in making for his own sake the holy flesh, the veil of his Godhead? It is God who even now creates children in the womb, as it is written in Job, “Didn’t you pour me out as milk and curdled me like cheese? You have clothed me with skin and flesh and have knit me together with bones and sinews.” There is nothing polluted in the human frame unless a person defiles it with fornication and adultery. God, who made Adam, also made Eve. Both male and female were formed by God’s hands. None of the parts of the body as formed from the beginning are polluted. - "Catechetical Lectures 12.26"
1 min5/14
Go to Commentary

George Leo Haydock

AD 1849
Knew, with affection, and designed thee for this office from eternity. Many think (Calmet) that Jeremias was purified from original sin before his birth. (St. Augustine) He had this privilege, and was also a priest, prophet, virgin, and martyr. (Worthington) Yet to sanctify, often means only to set aside, Exodus xiii. 2., and Ecclesiasticus xlix. 9. Nations, whose overthrow he points out, chap. xxv. 27, 44 (Calmet)
< 1 min6/14
Go to Commentary

Irenaeus of Lyons

AD 202
The Word of God is the one who forms us in the womb, as he says to Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you. Before you came forth from the belly, I sanctified you and appointed you to be a prophet among the nations.” And Paul, too, says this in the same way, “But when it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, that I might declare him among the nations.” - "Against Heresies 5.15.3"
< 1 min7/14
Go to Commentary

Jerome

AD 420
It was not that Jeremiah existed before he was conceived, as some heretics suppose, but that the Lord foreknew Jeremiah to be coming, the Lord to whom what does not yet exist is already present, in accordance with what the apostle said of him: “who calls that which is not as though it were.” But we also ought to understand Jeremiah’s consecration in the womb according to the apostle’s word: “When it pleased him, he set me apart from my mother’s womb and called me by his grace, to reveal his Son in me, that I might proclaim him to the nations.” John the Baptist similarly was consecrated in the womb, where he received the Holy Spirit and leaped and spoke through his mother’s mouth. Furthermore, when the Lord says, “I appointed you a prophet to the nations,” he wants it to be understood that we will eventually read in him the prophet who will prophesy not only to Jerusalem but also to a multitude in the entire company of nations. Some understand this as referring to the Savior, who was hi...
1 min8/14
Go to Commentary

Leo of Rome

AD 461
Through the Holy Spirit we are reborn the children of promise, not in the mother’s womb but in the power of baptism. For this reason David, who certainly was a son of promise, says to God, “Your hands have made and fashioned me.” And to Jeremiah the Lord says, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” - "Letter 15.10"
< 1 min9/14
Go to Commentary

Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius

AD 320
In the first place we testify that he was born twice: first, in the spirit, later in the flesh. It is said in Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.” And again, “who was blessed before he was born,” which happened to no other besides Christ. - "Divine Institutes 4.8"
< 1 min10/14
Go to Commentary

Maximus of Turin

AD 423
This, too, seems unworthy to pass over in silence in praise of John. Although he was not yet born, yet already he prophesies and, while still in the enclosure of his mother’s womb, confesses the coming of Christ with movements of joy since he could not do so with his voice.… In this regard I think that the prophetic phrase is appropriate that says, “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you.” We ought not to marvel that after he was put in prison by Herod, from his confinement he continued to announce Christ to his disciples, when even confined in the womb he preached the same Lord by his movements. - "Sermon 5.4"
1 min11/14
Go to Commentary

Methodius of Olympus

AD 311
So, if God still forms human beings, shall we not be guilty of audacity if we think of the generation of children as something offensive when even the Almighty is not ashamed to make use of them in working with his undefiled hands. - "Banquet of the Ten Virgins 2.2"
< 1 min12/14
Go to Commentary

Tertullian of Carthage

AD 220
The embryo therefore becomes a human being in the womb from the moment that its form is completed. The law of Moses, indeed, punishes with due penalties the one who shall cause an abortion, inasmuch as there exists already the rudiment of a human being that has imputed to it even now the condition of life and death, since it is already liable to the issues of both, although, by living still in the mother, it for the most part shares its own state with the mother. - "On the Soul 37"
< 1 min13/14
Go to Commentary

Tertullian of Carthage

AD 220
Read the word of God that was spoken to Jeremiah, “Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.” God not only forms us in the womb; he also breathes on us as he did at the first creation, when “the Lord God formed man and breathed into him the breath of life.” And God could not have known a person in the womb, except in his entire nature: “And before you came forth out of the womb, I sanctified you.” Well, was it then a dead body at that early stage? Certainly not. For “God is not the God of the dead but of the living.” - "On the Soul 26"
1 min14/14
Go to Commentary
About Privacy Policy Donate

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation - 2 Peter 1:20

App Store LogoPlay Store Logo