It is, indeed, difficult to see how Jeremiah or any of his
predecessors could have done otherwise than take for granted the
established modes of public worship, and the traditional holy places.
The prophets do not seek to alter or abolish the externals of religion
as such; they are not so unreasonable as to demand that stated
rites and traditional sanctuaries should be disregarded, and that
men should worship in the spirit only, without the aid of outward
symbolism of any sort, however innocent and appropriate to its object
it might seem. They knew very well that rites and ceremonies were
necessary to public worship; what they protested against was the
fatal tendency of their time to make these the whole of religion, to
suppose that Iahvah's claims could be satisfied by a due performance
of these, without regard to those higher moral requirements of His
law which the ritual worship might fitly have symbolized but could
not rightly supersede. It was not a question with Hosea, Amos, Micah,
Isaiah, Jeremiah, whether or not Iahvah could be better honoured
with or without temples and priests and sacrifices. The question
was whether these traditional institutions actually served as an
outward expression of that devotion to Him and His holy law, of that
righteousness and holiness of life, which is the only true worship, or
whether they were looked upon as in themselves comprising the whole of
necessary religion. Since the people took this latter view, Jeremiah
declares that their system of public worship is futile.