Turning the Back

Verterunt ad me tergum et non faciem. Qui projiciunt sermones Dei retrorsum, ipsi vertunt contra eum tergum et non faciem. Quando enim magister praecipit, obedientis indicium est si demisso contra audiat capite. Sin autem vertat tergum, signum est contemnentis; ut in alio loco scriptum est: 'Et verterunt ad me scapulam recedentem. 2 In tantum, inquit Deus, mea contempsere praecepta, ut ne audire quidem voluerint, sed tumorem animi, gestu corporis indicarint. Sanctus Hieronymus, Commentariorum In Jeremiam Propheta, Liber I, Cap II

'They turned their back to me and not their face.'  1 They who cast the words of God behind them, 2 turn their backs to Him and not their face. For when a teacher commands, it is a sign of obedience if the pupil listens with head lowered before him. But when he turns the back it is a sign of contempt, and so in another place it is written, 'And they turned to me a stubborn shoulder.' 3 They disdain my teachings so much, says the Lord, that they do not even wish to hear them, but the bloated nature of their souls they show by the posture of the body. Saint Jerome, Commentary on Jeremiah, Book 1, Chap 2 1  Jer 2.27 2 cf Ps 49.17 2 Zach 7.11