Jeremiah 8:8
NKJV - 8 How can you say, 'We are wise, And the law of the LORD is with us'? Look, the false pen of the scribe certainly works falsehood.
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To my knowledge, the position of a scribe was not originally a part of the Aaronic priesthood that God established. Scribes were added in connection with copying and preserving the written Law that God had given to Israel through Moses, which gave them a great deal of involvement and influence in the religious life of Israel. In the process of performing their function, the scribes over time used their position to add requirements to the Law that God had not commanded, but that were human inventions or traditions, as Jeremiah noted in the verse cited in the question; as noted (and condemned) elsewhere in the Old Testament in passages such as Isaiah 29:13; and as reiterated by Jesus (hundreds of years later) (Matthew 15:9; Mark 7:7). It was through this practice that they "worked falsehood" -- not by eliminating the original Law as such, but by adding provisions to it that contradicted the Law's intent, and then claiming that those additions had the sanction of God's approval or authority.
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