Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
Take heed to yourselves—literally, "to your souls." MAURER explains, "as ye love your lives"; a phrase used here to give the greater weight to the command.
sabbath—The non-observance of it was a chief cause of the captivity, the number of years of the latter, seventy, being exactly made to agree with the number of Sabbaths which elapsed during the four hundred ninety years of their possession of Canaan from Saul to their removal (Leviticus 26:34-35; II Chronicles 36:21). On the restoration, therefore, stress was especially laid on Sabbath observance (Nehemiah 13:19).
Jerusalem—It would have been scandalous anywhere; but in the capital, Jerusalem, it was an open insult to God. Sabbath-hallowing is intended as a symbol of holiness in general (Ezekiel 20:12); therefore much stress is laid on it; the Jews' gross impiety is manifested in their setting God's will at naught, in the case of such an easy and positive command.
Delivered in the reign of Jehoiakim, who undid the good effected by Josiah's reformation, especially as to the observance of the Sabbath [EICHORN].
gate of . . . children of . . . people—The gate next the king's palace, called the gate of David, and the gate of the people, from its being the principal thoroughfare: now the Jaffa gate. It is probably the same as "the gate of the fountain" at the foot of Zion, near which were the king's garden and pool (Jeremiah 39:4; II Kings 25:4; Nehemiah 2:14; Nehemiah 3:15; Nehemiah 12:37).
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Jeremiah 17:21:
John 5:10-16
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