“I have made you a tester.
You are a refiner among my people.
Thus you may know their ways.
You may test their ways.
They are all stubbornly rebellious.
They go about with slanders.
They are bronze.
They are iron.
All of them act corruptly.
The bellows blow fiercely.
The lead is consumed by the fire.
In vain,
The refining goes on.
The wicked are not removed.
They are called
‘Rejected silver.’
Yahweh has rejected them.”
Jeremiah was to be the tester for Yahweh. He was going to test the faithfulness of the people. Thus there is a comparison with testing metals. Jeremiah found that they were all rebellious corrupt slanderous people. He was going to test them as if they were iron or bronze. The lead was consumed in the fire but no precious metals were to be found. The wicked were not removed, so that they came up as rejected silver. Thus Yahweh has rejected these wicked people.
Eugene Finnegan Bible Project 