Expositor's Bible: The Book of Jeremiah, Chapters XXI.-LII.
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Title: Expositor's Bible: The Book of Jeremiah, Chapters XXI.-LII.
Author: W. H. Bennett
Editor: Sir W. Robertson Nicoll
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE: THE BOOK OF JEREMIAH, CHAPTERS XXI.-LII. ***
THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE
EDITED BY THE REV.
W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D.
_Editor of "The Expositor"_
THE BOOK OF JEREMIAH
CHAPTERS XXI.-LII.
BY
W. H. BENNETT, M.A.
=London=
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
27, PATERNOSTER ROW
MDCCCXCV
THE EXPOSITOR'S BIBLE.
_Crown 8vo, cloth, price 7s. 6d, each vol._
FIRST SERIES, 1887-8.
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By A. MACLAREN, D.D.
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Isaiah XL.-LXVI.
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Daniel.
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The Song of Solomon and
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Ezekiel.
By Prof. JOHN SKINNER, M.A.
The Minor Prophets.
By Prof. G. A. SMITH, D.D.
Two Vols.
THE
BOOK OF JEREMIAH
CHAPTERS XXI.-LII.
BY
W. H. BENNETT, M.A.
PROFESSOR OF OLD TESTAMENT LANGUAGES AND LITERATURE
HACKNEY AND NEW COLLEGES
=London=
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
27, PATERNOSTER ROW
MDCCCXCV
_Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury._
PREFACE
The present work deals primarily with Jeremiah xxi.-lii., thus forming
a supplement to the volume of the _Expositor's Bible_ on Jeremiah by
the Rev. C. J. Ball, M.A. References to the earlier chapters are only
introduced where they are necessary to illustrate and explain the
later sections.
I regret that two important works, Prof. Skinner's _Ezekiel_ in this
series, and Cornill's _Jeremiah_ in Dr. Haupt's _Sacred Books of the
Old Testament_, were published too late to be used in the preparation
of this volume.
I have again to acknowledge my indebtedness to the Rev. T. H. Darlow,
M.A., for a careful reading and much valuable criticism of my MS.
INDEX
(_The larger figures in black type are the chief references. Passages
in i.-xx. are only noticed by way of illustration of later sections_)
CHAP. PAGE
i. 7 295
10 295, 308
10-12 340
15 295
18 82
ii. 10, 11 51
27 290
34 272
iii. 14 352
15 324
iv. 19 327
21 302
v. 31 15
vi. 28 275
vii. 4 20
5-9 272
12-14 14
ix. 11, x. 22 306
xi. 19 6
xii. 14 323
xiii. 18 90
xiv. 8 308
xv. 1 296
1-4 240
4 202
xvi. 1 6
10 274
13 308
14, 15 320
xvii. 1 353
23 291
xix. 4 272
15 304
xx. 2 272
xxi. 1-10 141
3-6 303
xxii. 1-9 295
10-12 3
13-19 63
17 272
20-30 80
xxiii., xxiv. 96
xxiii. 3-8 319
12 299, 302
14 272
25-27 288
25-32 340
33, 34 304
40 307
xxiv. 99
6, 7 319
xxv. 5 297
9 215
10 306, 307
12 316
15-38 211
34-38 101
xxvi. 10
3 298
6 307
xxvii., xxviii. 115
xxvii. 9 340
xxix. 131
8 340
10 316
4-14 259
23 273
xxx., xxxi. 319
xxxi. 31-38 346
xxxii. 308
26-35 274
34, 35 285
xxxiii. 319
xxxiv. 141
2 305
21 304
22 305
xxxv. 44
15 297
17 304
xxxvi. 28
2 298
30, 31 63
31 83, 304
xxxvii. 1-10 141
8 305
11-21 155
12 309
xxxviii. 155
xxxix. 172
15-18 155
xl. 172
xli. 172
xlii., xliii. 187
8-13 220
xliv. 197
30 220, 229
xlv. 54
xlvi. 220
25 229
xlvii. 230
xlviii. 234
xlix. 1-6 242
7-22 243
23-27 248
28-33 251
34-39 255
l., li. 258
lii. 172
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE
In the present stage of investigation of Old Testament Chronology,
absolute accuracy cannot be claimed for such a table as the following.
Hardly any, if any, of these dates are supported by a general
consensus of opinion. On the other hand, the range of variation is,
for the most part, not more than three or four years, and the table
will furnish an approximately accurate idea of sequences and
synchronisms. In other respects also the data admit of alternative
interpretations, and the course of events is partly a matter of
theory--hence the occasional insertion of (?).
------------+----------------------+-----------------+---------------+
CLASSICAL | JUDAH AND JEREMIAH | ASSYRIA | EGYPT |
SYNCHRONISMS| | | |
------------+----------------------+-----------------+---------------+
Traditional | | | |
date of the | MANASSEH (?) | | |
foundation | |=Esarhaddon=, 681| |
of Rome, 753| |=Assurbanipal=, | |
| | 668 |XXVIth Dynasty |
| | | Psammetichus |
| Jeremiah born, | | I., 666 |
| probably between 655 | | |
| and 645 | | |
| AMON, 640 | | |
| JOSIAH, 638 | | |
| |Last kings of | |
|Jeremiah's call in the| Assyria, number | =Psammetichus=|
| 13th year of Josiah, | and names |besieges Ashdod|
| 626 | uncertain, |for twenty-nine|
| Scythian inroad| 626-607-6 |years |
| into Western Asia| | |
|Habakkuk |-----------------| |
|Zephaniah | BABYLON. | |
| Publication of |=Nabopolassar=, | |
| Deuteronomy, 621 | 626 | |
|Josiah slain at | | =Necho=, |
| Megiddo, 608 | | 612 |
|JEHOAHAZ, 608 |_FALL OF | |
|(xxii. 10-12, Ch. I.) | NINEVEH,_ | |
| | 607-6 | |
|Deposed by Necho, who | | |
| appoints | | |
|JEHOIAKIM, | | |
| 608 | | |
|(xxii. 13-19, xxxvi. | | |
| 30, 31, VI.) | | |
|Jeremiah predicts ruin| | |
| of Judah and is | | |
| tried for blasphemy | | |
| (xxvi., II.) | | |
| | | |
|_FOURTH YEAR OF_ | _BATTLE OF CARCHEMISH_ |
|_JEHOIAKIM_, 605-4 | (xlvi., XVII.) |
| | | |
|Nebuchadnezzar[1] | | |
| advances into Syria,| | |
| is suddenly recalled|=Nebuchadnezzar,=| |
| to Babylon-- | 604 | |
| _before_ | | |
| subduing Judah (?) | | |
| | | |
|Baruch writes | | |
| Jeremiah's prophecies| | |
| in a roll, which is | | |
| read successively to | | |
| the people, the | | |
| nobles, and | | |
| Jehoiakim, and | | |
| destroyed by the king| | |
| (xxxvi., III.; xlv., | | |
| V.) | | |
| | | |
|Nebuchadnezzar invades| | |
| Judah (?), the | | |
| Rechabites take | | |
| refuge in | | |
| Jerusalem (?), the | | |
| Jews rebuked by their| | |
| example (xxxv., IV.) | | |
| | | |
|Jehoiakim submits to | | |
| Nebuchadnezzar, | | |
| revolts after three | | |
| years, is attacked by| | |
| various "bands," but | | |
| dies before | | |
| Nebuchadnezzar | | |
| arrives | | |
|JEHOIACHIN, 597 | | |
| (xxii. 20-30, VII.)| | |
| | | |
|Continues revolt, but | | |
| surrenders to | | |
| Nebuchadnezzar on his| | |
| arrival; is deposed | | |
| and carried to | | |
| Babylon with many of | | |
| his subjects. | | |
| Nebuchadnezzar | | |
| appoints | | |
| | | |
|ZEDEKIAH, 596 | |=Psammetichus= |
| | |=II.=, 596 |
|Jeremiah attempts to | | |
| keep Zedekiah loyal | | |
| to Nebuchadnezzar, | Ezekiel | |
| and contends with | | |
| priests and prophets | | |
| who support Egyptian | | |
| party (xxiii., xxiv.,| | |
| VIII.) | | |
| | | |
Solon's |Proposed confederation| | |
legislation,| against | | |
594 | Nebuchadnezzar | | |
| denounced by | |=Hophra=, |
| Jeremiah, but | | 591 |
| supported by | | |
| Hananiah; proposal | | |
| abandoned; Hananiah | | |
| dies (xxvii., | | |
| xxviii., IX.), 593-2 | | |
| | | |
|Controversy by letter | | |
| with hostile prophets| | |
| at Babylon (xxix., | | |
| X.) | | |
| | | |
|Judah revolts, | | |
| encouraged by Hophra.| | |
| Jerusalem is besieged| | |
| by Chaldeans. There | | |
| being no prospect of | | |
| relief by Egypt, | | |
| Jeremiah regains his | | |
| influence and pledges| | |
| the people by | | |
| covenant to release | | |
| their slaves. | | |
| | | |
|On the news of | | |
| Hophra's advance, the| | |
| Chaldeans raise the | | |
| siege; the Egyptian | | |
| party again become | | |
| supreme and annul the| | |
| covenant (xxi. 1-10, | | |
| xxxiv., xxxvii. 1-10,| | |
| XI.) | | |
| | | |
|Jeremiah attempts to | | |
| leave the city, is | | |
| arrested and | | |
| imprisoned | | |
|Hophra retreats into | | |
| Egypt and the | | |
| Chaldeans renew the | | |
| siege (xxxvii. 11-21,| | |
| xxxviii., xxxix. | | |
| 15-18, XII.) | | |
| | | |
|While imprisoned | | |
| Jeremiah buys his | | |
| kinsman's inheritance| | |
| (xxxii., XXX.) | | |
| | | |
|_DESTRUCTION OF | Siege of Tyre | |
| JERUSALEM_, 586 | | |
| | | |
|Jeremiah remains for a| | |
| month a prisoner | | |
| amongst the other | | |
| captives. Nebuzaradan| | |
| arrives; arranges for| | |
| deportation of bulk | | |
| of population; | | |
| appoints Gedaliah | | |
| governor of residue; | | |
| releases Jeremiah, | | |
| who elects to join | | |
| Gedaliah at Mizpah. | | |
| Gedaliah murdered. | | |
| Jeremiah carried off,| | |
| but rescued by | | |
| Johanan (xxxix.-xli.,| | |
| lii., XIII.) | | |
| | | |
|Johanan, in spite of | | |
| Jeremiah's protest, | | |
| goes down to Egypt | | |
| and takes Jeremiah | | |
| with him (xlii., | | |
| xliii., XIV.) | | |
| | | |
|Jews in Egypt hold | | |
| festival in honour of| | |
| Queen of Heaven. | |=Amasis=, |
| Ineffectual protest | | 570 |
| of Jeremiah (xliv., | | |
| XV.) | | |
| |Nebuchadnezzar invades Egypt, (?)|
| | 568 |
Pistratus, | |=Evil-Merodach=, | |
560-527 |Release of Jehoiachin | 561 | |
| | | |
|_CYRUS CONQUERS BABYLON AND GIVES_ | |
|_THE JEWS PERMISSION TO RETURN,_ | |
|_538_ | |
FOOTNOTE:
[1] For spelling see note, page 4
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE v
INDEX OF CHAPTERS vii
CHRONOLOGICAL TABLE ix
BOOK I
_PERSONAL UTTERANCES AND
NARRATIVES_
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY: JEHOAHAZ. xxii. 10-12 3
"Weep ye not for the dead, neither bemoan him: but weep sore for
him that goeth away: for he shall return no more."--xxii, 10
CHAPTER II
A TRIAL FOR HERESY. xxvi.: cf. vii.-x. 10
"When Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that Jehovah had
commanded him to speak unto all the people, the priests and the
prophets and all the people laid hold on him, saying, Thou shalt
surely die."--xxvi. 8
CHAPTER III
THE ROLL. xxxvi. 28
"Take thee a roll of a book, and write therein all the words that
I have spoken unto thee."--xxxvi. 2
CHAPTER IV
THE RECHABITES. xxxv. 44
"Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before Me
for ever."--xxxv. 19
CHAPTER V
BARUCH. xlv. 54
"Thy life will I give unto thee for a prey."--xlv. 5
CHAPTER VI
THE JUDGMENT ON JEHOIAKIM. xxii. 13-19, xxxvi. 30, 31 63
"Jehoiakim ... slew him (Uriah) with the sword, and cast his dead
body into the graves of the common people."--xxvi. 23
"Therefore thus saith Jehovah concerning Jehoiakim, ... He shall
be buried with the burial of an ass, drawn and cast forth beyond
the gates of Jerusalem."--xxii. 18, 19
Jehoiakim ... did that which was evil in the sight of Jehovah,
according to all that his fathers had done.--2 KINGS xxiii. 36, 37
CHAPTER VII
JEHOIACHIN. xxii. 20-30 80
"A despised broken vessel."--xxii. 28
"A young lion. And he went up and down among the lions, he became
a young lion and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured
men."--EZEK. xix. 5, 6
"Jehoiachin ... did evil in the sight of Jehovah, according to all
that his father had done."--2 KINGS xxiv. 8, 9
CHAPTER VIII
BAD SHEPHERDS AND FALSE PROPHETS. xxiii.; xxiv. 96
"Woe unto the shepherds that destroy and scatter the sheep of My
pasture!"--xxii. 1
"Of what avail is straw instead of grain?... Is not My word like
fire, ... like a hammer that shattereth the rocks?"--xxiii. 28, 29
CHAPTER IX
HANANIAH. xxvii., xxviii. 115
"Hear now, Hananiah; Jehovah hath not sent thee, but thou makest
this people to trust in a lie."--xxviii. 15
CHAPTER X
CORRESPONDENCE WITH THE EXILES. xxix. 131
"Jehovah make thee like Zedekiah and Ahab, whom the king of
Babylon roasted in the fire."--xxix. 22
CHAPTER XI
A BROKEN COVENANT. xxi. 1-10, xxxiv.; xxxvii. 1-10 141
"All the princes and people ... changed their minds and reduced to
bondage again all the slaves whom they had set free."--xxxiv. 10,
11
CHAPTER XII
JEREMIAH'S IMPRISONMENT. xxxvii. 11-21, xxxviii.,
xxxix. 15-18 155
"Jeremiah abode in the court of the guard until the day that
Jerusalem was taken."--xxxviii. 28
CHAPTER XIII
GEDALIAH. xxxix.-xli., lii. 172
"Then arose Ishmael ben Nethaniah, and the ten men that were with
him, and smote with the sword and slew Gedaliah ben Ahikam ben
Shaphan, whom the king of Babylon had made king over the
land."--xli. 2
CHAPTER XIV
THE DESCENT INTO EGYPT. xlii., xliii. 187
"They came into the land of Egypt, for they obeyed not the voice
of Jehovah."--xliii. 7
CHAPTER XV
THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN. xliv. 197
"Since we left off burning incense and offering libations to the
Queen of Heaven, we have been in want of everything, and have been
consumed by the sword and the famine."--xliv. 18
BOOK II
_PROPHECIES CONCERNING FOREIGN
NATIONS_
CHAPTER XVI
JEHOVAH AND THE NATIONS. xxv. 15-38 211
"Jehovah hath a controversy with the nations."--xxv. 31
CHAPTER XVII
EGYPT. xliii. 8-13, xliv. 30, xlvi. 220
"I will visit Amon of No, and Pharaoh, and Egypt, with their gods
and their kings; even Pharaoh, and all them that trust in
him."--xlvi. 25
CHAPTER XVIII
THE PHILISTINES. xlvii. 230
"O sword of Jehovah, how long will it be ere thou be quiet? put up
thyself into thy scabbard; rest, and be still."--xlvii. 6
CHAPTER XIX
MOAB. xlviii. 234
"Moab shall be destroyed from being a people, because he hath
magnified himself against Jehovah."--xlviii. 42
"Chemosh said to me, Go, take Nebo against Israel ... and I took
it ... and I took from it the vessels of Jehovah, and offered them
before Chemosh."--MOABITE STONE.
"Yet will I bring again the captivity of Moab in the latter
days."--xlviii. 47
CHAPTER XX
AMMON. xlix. 1-6 242
"Hath Israel no sons? hath he no heir? why then doth Moloch
possess Gad, and his people dwell in the cities thereof?"--xlix. 1
CHAPTER XXI
EDOM. xlix. 7-22 243
"Bozrah shall become an astonishment, a reproach, a waste, and a
curse."--xlix. 13
CHAPTER XXII
DAMASCUS. xlix. 23-27 248
"I will kindle a fire in the wall of Damascus, and it shall devour
the palaces of Benhadad."--xlix. 27
CHAPTER XXIII
KEDAR AND HAZOR. xlix. 28-33 251
"Concerning Kedar, and the kingdoms of Hazor which Nebuchadnezzar
king of Babylon smote."--xlix. 28
CHAPTER XXIV
ELAM. xlix. 34-39 255
"I will break the bow of Elam, the chief of their might."--xlix.
35
CHAPTER XXV
BABYLON. l., li. 258
"Babylon is taken, Bel is confounded, Merodach is broken in
pieces."--l. 2
BOOK III
_JEREMIAH'S TEACHING CONCERNING
ISRAEL AND JUDAH_
CHAPTER XXVI
INTRODUCTORY 267
"I will be the God of all the families of Israel, and they shall
be My people."--xxxi. 1
CHAPTER XXVII
SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS CORRUPTION 270
"Very bad figs, ... too bad to be eaten."--xxiv. 2, 8, xxix. 17
CHAPTER XXVIII
PERSISTENT APOSTASY 283
"They have forsaken the covenant of Jehovah their God, and
worshipped other gods, and served them."--xxii. 9
"Every one that walketh in the stubbornness of his heart."--xxiii.
17
CHAPTER XXIX
RUIN. xxii. 1-9, xxvi. 14 295
"The sword, the pestilence, and the famine."--xxi, 9 _and passim_.
"Terror on every side."--vi. 25, xx. 10, xlvi. 5, xlix. 29; _also
as proper name_, MAGOR-MISSABIB, xx. 3
CHAPTER XXX
RESTORATION--I. THE SYMBOL. xxxii. 308
"And I bought the field of Hanameel."--xxxii. 9
CHAPTER XXXI
RESTORATION--II. THE NEW ISRAEL. xxiii. 3-8, xxiv.
6, 7, xxx., xxxi., xxxiii. 319
"In those days shall Judah be saved, and Jerusalem shall dwell
safely: and this is the name whereby she shall be called, Jehovah
our Righteousness."--xxxiii. 16
CHAPTER XXXII
RESTORATION--III. REUNION. xxxi. 329
"I will sow the house of Israel and the house of Judah with the
seed of man, and with the seed of beast."--xxxi. 27
CHAPTER XXXIII
RESTORATION--IV. THE NEW COVENANT. xxxi. 31-38:
cf. Hebrews viii. 346
"I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house
of Judah."--xxxi. 31
CHAPTER XXXIV
RESTORATION--V. REVIEW. xxx.-xxxiii. 357
EPILOGUE
CHAPTER XXXV
JEREMIAH AND CHRIST 367
"Jehovah thy God will raise up unto thee a prophet from amongst
thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him shall ye
hearken."--DEUT. xviii. 15
"Jesus ... asked His disciples, saying, Who do men say that the
Son of Man is? And they said, Some say John the Baptist; some,
Elijah: and others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets."--MATT. xvi.
13, 14
BOOK I
_PERSONAL UTTERANCES AND NARRATIVES_
CHAPTER I
_INTRODUCTORY:_[2] _JEHOAHAZ_
xxii. 10-12.
"Weep ye not for the dead, neither bemoan him: but weep sore for
him that goeth away: for he shall return no more."--JER. xxii. 10.
As the prophecies of Jeremiah are not arranged in the order in which
they were delivered, there is no absolute chronological division
between the first twenty chapters and those which follow. For the most
part, however, chapters xxi.-lii. fall in or after the fourth year of
Jehoiakim (B.C. 605). We will therefore briefly consider the situation
at Jerusalem in this crisis. The period immediately preceding B.C. 605
somewhat resembles the era of the dissolution of the Roman Empire or
of the Wars of the French Revolution. An old-established international
system was breaking in pieces, and men were quite uncertain what form
the new order would take. For centuries the futile assaults of the
Pharaohs had only served to illustrate the stability of the Assyrian
supremacy in Western Asia. Then in the last two decades of the seventh
century B.C. the Assyrian Empire collapsed, like the Roman Empire
under Honorius and his successors. It was as if by some swift
succession of disasters modern France or Germany were to become
suddenly and permanently annihilated as a military power. For the
moment, all the traditions and principles of European statesmanship
would lose their meaning, and the shrewdest diplomatist would be
entirely at fault. Men's reason would totter, their minds would lose
their balance at the stupendous spectacle of so unparalleled a
catastrophe. The wildest hopes would alternate with the extremity of
fear; everything would seem possible to the conqueror.
Such was the situation in B.C. 605, to which our first great group of
prophecies belongs. Two oppressors of Israel--Assyria and Egypt--had
been struck down in rapid succession. When Nebuchadnezzar[3] was
suddenly recalled to Babylon by the death of his father, the Jews
would readily imagine that the Divine judgment had fallen upon Chaldea
and its king. Sanguine prophets announced that Jehovah was about to
deliver His people from all foreign dominion, and establish the
supremacy of the Kingdom of God. Court and people would be equally
possessed with patriotic hope and enthusiasm. Jehoiakim, it is true,
was a nominee of Pharaoh Necho; but his gratitude would be far too
slight to override the hopes and aspirations natural to a Prince of
the House of David.
In Hezekiah's time, there had been an Egyptian and an Assyrian party
at the court of Judah; the recent supremacy of Egypt had probably
increased the number of her partisans. Assyria had disappeared, but
her former adherents would retain their antipathy to Egypt, and their
personal feuds with Jews of the opposite faction; they were as tools
lying ready to any hand that cared to use them. When Babylon succeeded
Assyria in the overlordship of Asia, she doubtless inherited the
allegiance of the anti-Egyptian party in the various Syrian states.
Jeremiah, like Isaiah, steadily opposed any dependence upon Egypt; it
was probably by his advice that Josiah undertook his ill-fated
expedition against Pharaoh Necho. The partisans of Egypt would be the
prophet's enemies; and though Jeremiah never became a mere dependent
and agent of Nebuchadnezzar, yet the friends of Babylon would be his
friends, if only because her enemies were his enemies.
We are told in 2 Kings xxiii. 37 that Jehoiakim did evil in the sight
of Jehovah according to all that his father had done. Whatever other
sins may be implied by this condemnation, we certainly learn that the
king favoured a corrupt form of the religion of Jehovah in opposition
to the purer teaching which Jeremiah inherited from Isaiah.
When we turn to Jeremiah himself, the date "the fourth year of
Jehoiakim" reminds us that by this time the prophet could look back upon
a long and sad experience; he had been called in the thirteenth year of
Josiah, some twenty-four years before. With what sometimes seems to our
limited intelligence the strange irony of Providence, this lover of
peace and quietness was called to deliver a message of ruin and
condemnation, a message that could not fail to be extremely offensive
to most of his hearers, and to make him the object of bitter hostility.
Much of this Jeremiah must have anticipated, but there were some from
whose position and character the prophet expected acceptance, even of
the most unpalatable teaching of the Spirit of Jehovah. The personal
vindictiveness with which priests and prophets repaid his loyalty to
the Divine mission and his zeal for truth came to him with a shock of
surprise and bewilderment, which was all the greater because his most
determined persecutors were his sacerdotal kinsmen and neighbours at
Anathoth. "Let us destroy the tree," they said, "with the fruit
thereof, and let us cut him off from the land of the living, that his
name may be no more remembered."[4]
He was not only repudiated by his clan, but also forbidden by Jehovah
to seek consolation and sympathy in the closer ties of family life:
"Thou shalt not take a wife, thou shalt have no sons or daughters."[5]
Like Paul, it was good for Jeremiah "by reason of the present
distress" to deny himself these blessings. He found some compensation
in the fellowship of kindred souls at Jerusalem. We can well believe
that, in those early days, he was acquainted with Zephaniah, and that
they were associated with Hilkiah and Shaphan and King Josiah in the
publication of Deuteronomy and its recognition as the law of Israel.
Later on Shaphan's son Ahikam protected Jeremiah when his life was in
imminent danger.
The twelve years that intervened between Josiah's Reformation and his
defeat at Megiddo were the happiest part of Jeremiah's ministry. It is
not certain that any of the extant prophecies belong to this period.
With Josiah on the throne and Deuteronomy accepted as the standard of
the national life, the prophet felt absolved for a season from his
mission to pluck up and break down, and perhaps began to indulge in
hopes that the time had come to build and to plant. Yet it is
difficult to believe that he had implicit confidence in the permanence
of the Reformation or the influence of Deuteronomy. The silence of
Isaiah and Jeremiah as to the ecclesiastical reforms of Hezekiah and
Josiah stands in glaring contrast to the great importance attached to
them by the Books of Kings and Chronicles. But, in any case, Jeremiah
must have found life brighter and easier than in the reigns that
followed. Probably, in these happier days, he was encouraged by the
sympathy and devotion of disciples like Baruch and Ezekiel.
But Josiah's attempt to realise a Kingdom of God was short-lived; and,
in a few months, Jeremiah saw the whole fabric swept away. The king
was defeated and slain; and his religious policy was at once reversed
either by a popular revolution or a court intrigue. The people of the
land made Josiah's son Shallum king, under the name of Jehoahaz. This
young prince of twenty-three only reigned three months, and was then
deposed and carried into captivity by Pharaoh Necho; yet it is
recorded of him, that he did evil in the sight of Jehovah, according
to all that his fathers had done.[6] He--or, more probably, his
ministers, especially the queen-mother[7]--must have been in a hurry
to undo Josiah's work. Jeremiah utters no condemnation of Jehoahaz; he
merely declares that the young king will never return from his exile,
and bids the people lament over his captivity as a more grievous fate
than the death of Josiah:--
"Weep not for the dead,
Neither lament over him:
But weep sore for him that goeth into captivity;
For he shall return no more,
Neither shall he behold his native land."[8]
Ezekiel adds admiration to sympathy: Jehoahaz was a young lion skilled
to catch the prey, he devoured men, the nations heard of him, he was
taken in their pit, and they brought him with hooks into the land of
Egypt.[9] Jeremiah and Ezekiel could not but feel some tenderness
towards the son of Josiah; and probably they had faith in his personal
character, and believed that in time he would shake off the yoke of
evil counsellors and follow in his father's footsteps. But any such
hopes were promptly disappointed by Pharaoh Necho, and Jeremiah's
spirit bowed beneath a new burden as he saw his country completely
subservient to the dreaded influence of Egypt.
Thus, at the time when we take up the narrative, the government was in
the hands of the party hostile to Jeremiah, and the king, Jehoiakim,
seems to have been his personal enemy. Jeremiah himself was somewhere
between forty and fifty years old, a solitary man without wife or
child. His awful mission as the herald of ruin clouded his spirit with
inevitable gloom. Men resented the stern sadness of his words and
looks, and turned from him with aversion and dislike. His unpopularity
had made him somewhat harsh; for intolerance is twice curst, in that
it inoculates its victims with the virus of its own bitterness. His
hopes and illusions lay behind him; he could only watch with
melancholy pity the eager excitement of these stirring times. If he
came across some group busily discussing the rout of the Egyptians at
Carchemish, or the report that Nebuchadnezzar was posting in hot haste
to Babylon, and wondering as to all that this might mean for Judah,
his countrymen would turn to look with contemptuous curiosity at the
bitter, disappointed man who had had his chance and failed, and now
grudged them their prospect of renewed happiness and prosperity.
Nevertheless Jeremiah's greatest work still lay before him. Jerusalem
was past saving; but more was at stake than the existence of Judah and
its capital. But for Jeremiah the religion of Jehovah might have
perished with His Chosen People. It was his mission to save Revelation
from the wreck of Israel. Humanly speaking, the religious future of
the world depended upon this stern solitary prophet.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] Cf. Preface.
[3] We know little of Nebuchadnezzar's campaigns. In 2 Kings xxiv. 1
we are told that Nebuchadnezzar "came up" in the days of Jehoiakim,
and Jehoiakim became his servant three years. It is not clear whether
Nebuchadnezzar "came up" immediately after the battle of Carchemish,
or at a later time after his return to Babylon. In either case the
impression made by his hasty departure from Syria would be the same.
Cf. Cheyne, _Jeremiah_ (Men of the Bible), p. 132. I call the Chaldean
king Nebuchadnezzar--not Nebuchadrezzar--because the former has been
an English household word for centuries.
[4] xi. 19.
[5] xvi. 2.
[6] 2 Kings xxiii. 30-32.
[7] Cf. xxii. 26.
[8] xxii. 10-12.
[9] Ezek. xix. 3, 4.
CHAPTER II
_A TRIAL FOR HERESY_
xxvi.: cf. vii.-x.
"When Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that Jehovah had
commanded him to speak unto all the people, the priests and the
prophets and all the people laid hold on him, saying, Thou shalt
surely die."--JER. xxvi. 8.
The date of this incident is given, somewhat vaguely, as the beginning
of the reign of Jehoiakim. It was, therefore, earlier than B.C. 605,
the point reached in the previous chapter. Jeremiah could offer no
political resistance to Jehoiakim and his Egyptian suzerain; yet it
was impossible for him to allow Josiah's policy to be reversed without
a protest. Moreover, something, perhaps much, might yet be saved for
Jehovah. The king, with his court and prophets and priests, was not
everything. Jeremiah was only concerned with sanctuaries, ritual, and
priesthoods as means to an end. For him the most important result of
the work he had shared with Josiah was a pure and holy life for the
nation and individuals. Renan--in some passages, for he is not always
consistent--is inclined to minimise the significance of the change
from Josiah to Jehoiakim; in fact, he writes very much as a cavalier
might have done of the change from Cromwell to Charles II. Both the
Jewish kings worshipped Jehovah, each in his own fashion: Josiah was
inclined to a narrow puritan severity of a life; Jehoiakim was a
liberal, practical man of the world. Probably this is a fair modern
equivalent of the current estimate of the kings and their policy,
especially on the part of Jehoiakim's friends; but then, as unhappily
still in some quarters, "narrow puritan severity" was a convenient
designation for a decent and honourable life, for a scrupulous and
self-denying care for the welfare of others. Jeremiah dreaded a
relapse into the old half-heathen ideas that Jehovah would be pleased
with homage and service that satisfied Baal, Moloch, and Chemosh. Such
a relapse would lower the ethical standard, and corrupt or even
destroy any beginnings of spiritual life. Our English Restoration is
an object-lesson as to the immoral effects of political and
ecclesiastical reaction; if such things were done in sober England,
what must have been possible to hot Eastern blood! In protesting
against the attitude of Jehoiakim, Jeremiah would also seek to save
the people from the evil effects of the king's policy. He knew from
his own experience that a subject might trust and serve God with his
whole heart, even when the king was false to Jehovah. What was
possible for him was possible for others. He understood his countrymen
too well to expect that the nation would continue to advance in paths
of righteousness which its leaders and teachers had forsaken; but,
scattered here and there through the mass of the people, was Isaiah's
remnant, the seed of the New Israel, men and women to whom the
Revelation of Jehovah had been the beginning of a higher life. He
would not leave them without a word of counsel and encouragement.
At the command of Jehovah, Jeremiah appeared before the concourse of
Jews, assembled at the Temple for some great fast or festival. No
feast is expressly mentioned, but he is charged to address "all the
cities of Judah"[10]; _all_ the outlying population would only meet at
the Temple on some specially holy day. Such an occasion would
naturally be chosen by Jeremiah for his deliverance, just as Christ
availed Himself of the opportunities offered by the Passover and the
Feast of Tabernacles, just as modern philanthropists seek to find a
place for their favourite topics on the platform of May Meetings.
The prophet was to stand in the court of the Temple and repeat once
more to the Jews his message of warning and judgment, "all that I have
charged thee to speak unto them, thou shalt not keep back a single
word." The substance of this address is found in the various
prophecies which expose the sin and predict the ruin of Judah. They
have been dealt with in the former volume[11] on Jeremiah in this
series, and are also referred to in Book III.
According to the universal principle of Hebrew prophecy, the
predictions of ruin were conditional; they were still coupled with the
offer of pardon to repentance, and Jehovah did not forbid his prophet
to cherish a lingering hope that "perchance they may hearken and turn
every one from his evil way, so that I may repent Me of the evil I
purpose to inflict upon them because of the evil of their doings."
Probably the phrase "every one from his evil way" is primarily
collective rather than individual, and is intended to describe a
national reformation, which would embrace all the individual citizens;
but the actual words suggest another truth, which must also have been
in Jeremiah's mind. The nation is, after all, an aggregate of men and
women; there can be no national reformation, except through the
repentance and amendment of individuals.
Jeremiah's audience, it must be observed, consisted of worshippers on
the way to the Temple, and would correspond to an ordinary congregation
of church-goers, rather than to the casual crowd gathered round a street
preacher, or to the throngs of miners and labourers who listened to
Whitfield and Wesley. As an acknowledged prophet, he was well within his
rights in expecting a hearing from the attendants at the feast, and men
would be curious to see and hear one who had been the dominant influence
in Judah during the reign of Josiah. Moreover, in the absence of evening
newspapers and shop-windows, a prophet was too exciting a distraction to
be lightly neglected. From Jehovah's charge to speak all that He had
commanded him to speak and not to keep back a word, we may assume that
Jeremiah's discourse was long: it was also avowedly an old sermon[12];
most of his audience had heard it before, all of them were quite
familiar with its main topics. They listened in the various moods of a
modern congregation "sitting under" a distinguished preacher. Jeremiah's
friends and disciples welcomed the ideas and phrases that had become
part of their spiritual life. Many enjoyed the speaker's earnestness and
eloquence, without troubling themselves about the ideas at all. There
was nothing specially startling about the well-known threats and
warnings; they had become
"A tale of little meaning tho' the words were strong."
Men hardened their hearts against inspired prophets as easily as they
do against the most pathetic appeals of modern evangelists. Mingled
with the crowd were Jeremiah's professional rivals, who detested both
him and his teaching--priests who regarded him as a traitor to his own
caste, prophets who envied his superior gifts and his force of
passionate feeling. To these almost every word he uttered was
offensive, but for a while there was nothing that roused them to very
vehement anger. He was allowed to finish what he had to say, "to make
an end of speaking all that Jehovah had commanded him." But in this
peroration he had insisted on a subject that stung the indifferent
into resentment and roused the priests and prophets to fury.
"Go ye now unto My place which was in Shiloh, where I caused My name
to dwell at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of
My people Israel. And now, because ye have done all these works, saith
Jehovah, and I spake unto you, rising up early and speaking, but ye
heard not; and I called you, but ye answered not: therefore will I do
unto the house, that is called by My name, wherein ye trust, and unto
the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to
Shiloh."[13]
The Ephraimite sanctuary of Shiloh, long the home of the Ark and its
priesthood, had been overthrown in some national catastrophe.
Apparently when it was destroyed it was no mere tent, but a
substantial building of stone, and its ruins remained as a permanent
monument of the fugitive glory of even the most sacred shrine.
The very presence of his audience in the place where they were met
showed their reverence for the Temple: the priests were naturally
devotees of their own shrine; of the prophets Jeremiah himself had said,
"The prophets prophesy falsely, and the priests rule in accordance with
their teaching."[14] Can we wonder that "the priests and the prophets
and all the people laid hold on him, saying, Thou shalt surely die"? For
the moment there was an appearance of religious unity in Jerusalem; the
priests, the prophets, and the pious laity on one side, and only the
solitary heretic on the other. It was, though on a small scale, as if
the obnoxious teaching of some nineteenth-century prophet of God had
given an unexpected stimulus to the movement for Christian reunion; as
if cardinals and bishops, chairmen of unions, presidents of conferences,
moderators of assemblies, with great preachers and distinguished laymen,
united to hold monster meetings and denounce the Divine message as
heresy and blasphemy. In like manner Pharisees, Sadducees, and Herodians
found a basis of common action in their hatred of Christ, and Pilate and
Herod were reconciled by His cross.
Meanwhile the crowd was increasing: new worshippers were arriving, and
others as they left the Temple were attracted to the scene of the
disturbance. Doubtless too the mob, always at the service of
persecutors, hurried up in hope of finding opportunities for mischief
and violence. Some six and a half centuries later, history repeated
itself on the same spot, when the Asiatic Jews saw Paul in the Temple
and "laid hands on him, crying out, Men of Israel, help: This is the
man, that teacheth all men everywhere against the people and the law
and this place, ... and all the city was moved, and the people ran
together and laid hold on Paul."[15]
Our narrative, as it stands, is apparently incomplete: we find Jeremiah
before the tribunal of the princes, but we are not told how he came
there; whether the civil authorities intervened to protect him, as
Claudius Lysias came down with his soldiers and centurions and rescued
Paul, or whether Jeremiah's enemies observed legal forms, as Annas and
Caiaphas did when they arrested Christ. But, in any case, "the princes
of Judah, when they heard these things, came up from the palace into the
Temple, and took their seats as judges at the entry of the new gate of
the Temple." The "princes of Judah" play a conspicuous part in the last
period of the Jewish monarchy: we have little definite information about
them, and are left to conjecture that they were an aristocratic
oligarchy or an official clique, or both; but it is clear that they were
a dominant force in the state, with recognised constitutional status,
and that they often controlled the king himself. We are also ignorant as
to the "new gate"; it may possibly be the upper gate built by
Jotham[16] about a hundred and fifty years earlier.
Before these judges, Jeremiah's ecclesiastical accusers brought a
formal charge; they said, almost in the very words which the high
priest and the Sanhedrin used of Christ, "This man is worthy of death,
for he hath prophesied against this city, as ye have heard with your
ears"--_i.e._ when he said, "This house shall be like Shiloh, and this
city shall be desolate without inhabitant." Such accusations have been
always on the lips of those who have denounced Christ and His
disciples as heretics. One charge against Himself was that He said, "I
will destroy this Temple that is made with hands, and in three days I
will build another that is made without hands."[17] Stephen was
accused of speaking incessantly against the Temple and the Law, and
teaching that Jesus of Nazareth would destroy the Temple and change
the customs handed down from Moses. When he asserted that "the Most
High dwelleth not in temples made with hands," the impatience of his
audience compelled him to bring his defence to an abrupt
conclusion.[18] Of Paul we have already spoken.
How was it that these priests and prophets thought that their princes
might be induced to condemn Jeremiah to death for predicting the
destruction of the Temple? A prophet would not run much risk nowadays
by announcing that St. Paul's should be made like Stonehenge, or St.
Peter's like the Parthenon. Expositors of Daniel and the Apocalypse
habitually fix the end of the world a few years in advance of the
date at which they write, and yet they do not incur any appreciable
unpopularity. It is true that Jeremiah's accusers were a little afraid
that his predictions might be fulfilled, and the most bitter
persecutors are those who have a lurking dread that their victims are
right, while they themselves are wrong. But such fears could not very
well be evidence or argument against Jeremiah before any court of law.
In order to realise the situation we must consider the place which the
Temple held in the hopes and affections of the Jews. They had always
been proud of their royal sanctuary at Jerusalem, but within the last
hundred and fifty years it had acquired a unique importance for the
religion of Israel. First Hezekiah, and then Josiah, had taken away
the other high places and altars at which Jehovah was worshipped, and
had said to Judah and Jerusalem, "Ye shall worship before this
altar."[19] Doubtless the kings were following the advice of Isaiah
and Jeremiah. These prophets were anxious to abolish the abuses of the
local sanctuaries, which were a continual incentive to an extravagant
and corrupt ritual. Yet they did not intend to assign any supreme
importance to a priestly caste or a consecrated building. Certainly
for them the hope of Israel and the assurance of its salvation did not
consist in cedar and hewn stones, in silver and gold. And yet the
unique position given to the Temple inevitably became the
starting-point for fresh superstition. Once Jehovah could be
worshipped not only at Jerusalem, but at Beersheba and Bethel and many
other places where He had chosen to set His name. Even then, it was
felt that the Divine Presence must afford some protection for His
dwelling-places. But now that Jehovah dwelt nowhere else but at
Jerusalem, and only accepted the worship of His people at this single
shrine, how could any one doubt that He would protect His Temple and
His Holy City against all enemies, even the most formidable? Had He
not done so already?
When Hezekiah abolished the high places, did not Jehovah set the seal
of approval upon his policy by destroying the army of Sennacherib? Was
not this great deliverance wrought to guard the Temple against
desecration and destruction, and would not Jehovah work out a like
salvation in any future time of danger? The destruction of Sennacherib
was essential to the religious future of Israel and of mankind; but it
had a very mingled influence upon the generations immediately
following. They were like a man who has won a great prize in a
lottery, or who has, quite unexpectedly, come into an immense
inheritance. They ignored the unwelcome thought that the Divine
protection depended on spiritual and moral conditions, and they clung
to the superstitious faith that at any moment, even in the last
extremity of danger and at the eleventh hour, Jehovah might, nay, even
_must_, intervene. The priests and the inhabitants of Jerusalem could
look on with comparative composure while the country was ravaged, and
the outlying towns were taken and pillaged; Jerusalem itself might
seem on the verge of falling into the hands of the enemy, but they
still trusted in their Palladium. Jerusalem could not perish, because
it contained the one sanctuary of Jehovah; they sought to silence
their own fears and to drown the warning voice of the prophet by
vociferating their watchword: "The Temple of Jehovah! the Temple of
Jehovah! The Temple of Jehovah is in our midst!"[20]
In prosperous times a nation may forget its Palladium, and may
tolerate doubts as to its efficacy; but the strength of the Jews was
broken, their resources were exhausted, and they were clinging in an
agony of conflicting hopes and fears to their faith in the
inviolability of the Temple. To destroy their confidence was like
snatching away a plank from a drowning man. When Jeremiah made the
attempt, they struck back with the fierce energy of despair. It does
not seem that at this time the city was in any immediate danger; the
incident rather falls in the period of quiet submission to Pharaoh
Necho that preceded the battle of Carchemish. But the disaster of
Megiddo was fresh in men's memories, and in the unsettled state of
Eastern Asia no one knew how soon some other invader might advance
against the city. On the other hand, in the quiet interval, hopes
began to revive, and men were incensed when the prophet made haste to
nip these hopes in the bud, all the more so because their excited
anticipations of future glory had so little solid basis. Jeremiah's
appeal to the ill-omened precedent of Shiloh naturally roused the
sanguine and despondent alike into frenzy.
Jeremiah's defence was simple and direct: "Jehovah sent me to prophesy
all that ye have heard against this house and against this city. Now
therefore amend your ways and your doings, and hearken unto the voice
of Jehovah your God, that He may repent Him of the evil that He hath
spoken against you. As for me, behold, I am in your hands: do unto me
as it seems good and right unto you. Only know assuredly that, if ye
put me to death, ye will bring the guilt of innocent blood upon
yourselves, and upon this city and its inhabitants: for of a truth
Jehovah sent me unto you to speak all these words in your ears." There
is one curious feature in this defence. Jeremiah contemplates the
possibility of two distinct acts of wickedness on the part of his
persecutors: they may turn a deaf ear to his appeal that they should
repent and reform, and their obstinacy will incur all the
chastisements which Jeremiah had threatened; they may also put him to
death and incur additional guilt. Scoffers might reply that his
previous threats were so awful and comprehensive that they left no
room for any addition to the punishment of the impenitent. Sinners
sometimes find a grim comfort in the depth of their wickedness; their
case is so bad that it cannot be made worse, they may now indulge
their evil propensities with a kind of impunity. But Jeremiah's
prophetic insight made him anxious to save his countrymen from further
sin, even in their impenitence; the Divine discrimination is not taxed
beyond its capabilities even by the extremity of human wickedness.
But to return to the main feature in Jeremiah's defence. His accusers'
contention was that his teaching was so utterly blasphemous, so
entirely opposed to every tradition and principle of true
religion--or, as we should say, so much at variance with all
orthodoxy--that it could not be a word of Jehovah. Jeremiah does not
attempt to discuss the relation of his teaching to the possible limits
of Jewish orthodoxy. He bases his defence on the bare assertion of his
prophetic mission--Jehovah had sent him. He assumes that there is no
room for evidence or discussion; it is a question of the relative
authority of Jeremiah and his accusers, whether he or they had the
better right to speak for God. The immediate result seemed to justify
him in this attitude. He was no obscure novice, seeking for the first
time to establish his right to speak in the Divine name. The princes
and people had been accustomed for twenty years to listen to him, as
to the most fully acknowledged mouthpiece of Heaven; they could not
shake off their accustomed feeling of deference, and once more
succumbed to the spell of his fervid and commanding personality. "Then
said the princes and all the people unto the priests and the prophets,
This man is not worthy of death; for he hath spoken to us in the name
of Jehovah our God." For the moment the people were won over and the
princes convinced; but priests and prophets were not so easily
influenced by inspired utterances; some of these probably thought that
they had an inspiration of their own, and their professional
experience made them callous.
At this point again the sequence of events is not clear; possibly the
account was compiled from the imperfect recollections of more than one
of the spectators. The pronouncement of the princes and the people
seems, at first sight, a formal acquittal that should have ended the
trial, and left no room for the subsequent intervention of "certain of
the elders," otherwise the trial seems to have come to no definite
conclusion, and the incident simply terminated in the personal
protection given to Jeremiah by Ahikam ben Shaphan. Possibly, however,
the tribunal of the princes was not governed by any strict rules of
procedure; and the force of the argument used by the elders does not
depend on the exact stage of the trial at which it was introduced.
Either Jeremiah was not entirely successful in his attempt to get the
matter disposed of on the sole ground of his own prophetic authority, or
else the elders were anxious to secure weight and finality for the
acquittal, by bringing forward arguments in its support. The elders were
an ancient Israelite institution, and probably still represented the
patriarchal side of the national life; nothing is said as to their
relation to the princes, and this might not be very clearly defined. The
elders appealed, by way of precedent, to an otherwise unrecorded
incident of the reign of Hezekiah. Micah the Morasthite had uttered
similar threats against Jerusalem and the Temple: "Zion shall be
ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain
of the house as the high places of the forest."[21] But Hezekiah and his
people, instead of slaying Micah, had repented, and the city had been
spared. They evidently wished that the precedent could be wholly
followed in the present instance; but, at any rate, it was clear that
one of the most honoured and successful of the kings of Judah had
accepted a threat against the Temple as a message from Jehovah.
Therefore the mere fact that Jeremiah had uttered such a threat was
certainly not _primâ facie_ evidence that he was a false prophet. We are
not told how this argument was received, but the writer of the chapter,
possibly Baruch, does not attribute Jeremiah's escape either to his
acquittal by the princes or to the reasoning of the elders. The people
apparently changed sides once more, like the common people in the New
Testament, who heard Christ gladly and with equal enthusiasm clamoured
for His crucifixion. At the end of the chapter we find them eager to
have the prophet delivered into their hands that they may put him to
death. Apparently the prophets and priests, having brought matters into
this satisfactory position, had retired from the scene of action; the
heretic was to be delivered over to the secular arm. The princes, like
Pilate, seemed inclined to yield to popular pressure; but Ahikam, a son
of the Shaphan who had to do with the finding of Deuteronomy, stood by
Jeremiah, as John of Gaunt stood by Wyclif, and the Protestant Princes
by Luther, and the magistrates of Geneva by Calvin; and Jeremiah could
say with the Psalmist:--
"I have heard the defaming of many,
Terror on every side:
While they took counsel together against me,
They devised to take away my life.
But I trusted in Thee, O Jehovah:
I said, Thou art my God.
My times are in Thy hand:
Deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that
persecute me.
* * * * *
Let the lying lips be dumb,
Which speak against the righteous insolently,
With pride and contempt.
Oh, how great is Thy goodness, which Thou hast laid up for
them that fear Thee,
Which Thou hast wrought for them that put their trust in
Thee, before the sons of men."[22]
We have here an early and rudimentary example of religious toleration,
of the willingness, however reluctant, to hear as a possible Divine
message unpalatable teaching, at variance with current theology; we
see too the fountain-head of that freedom which since has "broadened
down from precedent to precedent."
But unfortunately no precedent can bind succeeding generations, and both
Judaism and Christianity have sinned grievously against the lesson of
this chapter. Jehoiakim himself soon broke through the feeble restraint
of this new-born tolerance. The writer adds an incident that must have
happened somewhat later,[23] to show how real was Jeremiah's danger, and
how transient was the liberal mood of the authorities. A certain Uriah
ben Shemaiah of Kirjath Jearim had the courage to follow in Jeremiah's
footsteps and speak against the city "according to all that Jeremiah had
said." With the usual meanness of persecutors, Jehoiakim and his
captains and princes vented upon this obscure prophet the ill-will which
they had not dared to indulge in the case of Jeremiah, with his
commanding personality and influential friends. Uriah fled into Egypt,
but was brought back and slain, and his body cast out unburied into the
common cemetery. We can understand Jeremiah's fierce and bitter
indignation against the city where such things were possible.
This chapter is so full of suggestive teaching that we can only touch
upon two or three of its more obvious lessons. The dogma which shaped
the charge against Jeremiah and caused the martyrdom of Uriah was the
inviolability of the Temple and the Holy City. This dogma was a
perversion of the teaching of Isaiah, and especially of Jeremiah
himself,[24] which assigned a unique position to the Temple in the
religion of Israel. The carnal man shows a fatal ingenuity in sucking
poison out of the most wholesome truth. He is always eager to discover
that something external, material, physical, concrete--some building,
organisation, ceremony, or form of words--is a fundamental basis of
the faith and essential to salvation. If Jeremiah had died with
Josiah, the "priests and prophets" would doubtless have quoted his
authority against Uriah. The teaching of Christ and His apostles, of
Luther and Calvin and their fellow-reformers, has often been twisted
and forged into weapons to be used against their true followers. We
are often tempted in the interest of our favourite views to lay undue
stress on secondary and accidental statements of great teachers. We
fail to keep the due proportion of truth which they themselves
observed, and in applying their precepts to new problems we sacrifice
the kernel and save the husk. The warning of Jeremiah's persecutors
might often "give us pause." We need not be surprised at finding
priests and prophets eager and interested champions of a perversion of
revealed truth. Ecclesiastical office does not necessarily confer any
inspiration from above. The hereditary priest follows the traditions
of his caste, and even the prophet may become the mouthpiece of the
passions and prejudices of those who accept and applaud him. When men
will not endure sound doctrine, they heap to themselves teachers
after their own lusts; having itching ears, they turn away their ears
from the truth and turn unto fables.[25] Jeremiah's experience shows
that even an apparent consensus of clerical opinion is not always to
be trusted. The history of councils and synods is stained by many foul
and shameful blots; it was the Œcumenical Council at Constance that
burnt Huss, and most Churches have found themselves, at some time or
other, engaged in building the tombs of the prophets whom their own
officials had stoned in days gone by. We forget that _Athanasius
contra mundum_ implies also _Athanasius contra ecclesiam_.
FOOTNOTES:
[10] The expression is curious; it usually means all the cities of
Judah, except Jerusalem; the LXX. reading varies between "all the
Jews" and "all Judah."
[11] See especially the exposition of chaps. vii.-x., which are often
supposed to be a reproduction of Jeremiah's utterance on this occasion.
[12] The Hebrew apparently implies that the discourse was a repetition
of former prophecies.
[13] vii. 12-14. Even if chaps. vii.-x. are not a report of Jeremiah's
discourse on this occasion, the few lines in xxvi. are evidently a
mere summary, and vii. will best indicate the substance of his
utterance. The verses quoted occur towards the beginning of vii.-x.,
but from the emphatic reference to Shiloh in the brief abstract in
xxvi., Jeremiah must have dwelt on this topic, and the fact that the
outburst followed his conclusion suggests that he reserved this
subject for his peroration.
[14] v. 31.
[15] Acts xxi. 27-30.
[16] 2 Kings xv. 35.
[17] Mark xiv. 58.
[18] Acts vi. 13, 14, vii. 48.
[19] 2 Kings xviii. 4, xxiii.; Isa. xxxvi. 7.
[20] vii. 4.
[21] Micah iii. 12. As the quotation exactly agrees with the verse in
our extant Book of Micah, we may suppose that the elders were
acquainted with his prophecies in writing.
[22] Psalm xxxi. 13-15, 18, 19. The Psalm is sometimes ascribed to
Jeremiah, because it can be so readily applied to this incident. The
reader will recognise his characteristic phrase "Terror on every side"
(Magor-missabib).
[23] This incident cannot be part of the speech of the elders; it would
only have told against the point they were trying to make. The various
phases--prophesy, persecution, flight, capture, and execution--must have
taken some time, and can scarcely have preceded Jeremiah's utterance "at
the beginning of the reign of King Jehoiakim."
[24] Assuming his sympathy with Deuteronomy.
[25] 2 Tim. iv. 3.
CHAPTER III
THE ROLL
xxxvi.
"Take thee a roll of a book, and write therein all the words that
I have spoken unto thee."--JER. xxxvi. 2.
The incidents which form so large a proportion of the contents of our
book do not make up a connected narrative; they are merely a series of
detached pictures: we can only conjecture the doings and experiences
of Jeremiah during the intervals. Chapter xxvi. leaves him still
exposed to the persistent hostility of the priests and prophets, who
had apparently succeeded in once more directing popular feeling
against their antagonist. At the same time, though the princes were
not ill-disposed towards him, they were not inclined to resist the
strong pressure brought to bear upon them. Probably the attitude of
the populace varied from time to time, according to the presence among
them of the friends or enemies of the prophet; and, in the same way,
we cannot think of "the princes" as a united body, governed by a
single impulse. The action of this group of notables might be
determined by the accidental preponderance of one or other of two
opposing parties. Jeremiah's only real assurance of safety lay in the
personal protection extended to him by Ahikam ben Shaphan. Doubtless
other princes associated themselves with Ahikam in his friendly
action on behalf of the prophet.
Under these circumstances, Jeremiah would find it necessary to restrict
his activity. Utter indifference to danger was one of the most ordinary
characteristics of Hebrew prophets, and Jeremiah was certainly not
wanting in the desperate courage which may be found in any Mohammedan
dervish. At the same time he was far too practical, too free from morbid
self-consciousness, to court martyrdom for its own sake. If he had
presented himself again in the Temple when it was crowded with
worshippers, his life might have been taken in a popular tumult, while
his mission was still only half accomplished. Possibly his priestly
enemies had found means to exclude him from the sacred precincts.
Man's extremity was God's opportunity; this temporary and partial
silencing of Jeremiah led to a new departure, which made the influence
of his teaching more extensive and permanent. He was commanded to
commit his prophecies to writing. The restriction of his active
ministry was to bear rich fruit, like Paul's imprisonment, and
Athanasius' exile, and Luther's sojourn in the Wartburg. A short time
since there was great danger that Jeremiah and the Divine message
entrusted to him would perish together. He did not know how soon he
might become once more the mark of popular fury, nor whether Ahikam
would still be able to protect him. The roll of the book could speak
even if he were put to death.
But Jeremiah was not thinking chiefly about what would become of his
teaching if he himself perished. He had an immediate and particular end
in view. His tenacious persistence was not to be baffled by the
prospect of mob violence, or by exclusion from the most favourable
vantage-ground. Renan is fond of comparing the prophets to modern
journalists; and this incident is an early and striking instance of the
substitution of pen, ink, and paper for the orator's tribune. Perhaps
the closest modern parallel is that of the speaker who is howled down at
a public meeting and hands his manuscript to the reporters.
In the record of the Divine command to Jeremiah, there is no express
statement as to what was to be done with the roll; but as the object
of writing it was that "perchance the house of Judah might hear and
repent," it is evident that from the first it was intended to be read
to the people.
There is considerable difference of opinion[26] as to the contents of
the roll. They are described as: "All that I have spoken unto thee
concerning[27] Jerusalem[28] and Judah, and all the nations, since I
(first) spake unto thee, from the time of Josiah until now." At first
sight this would seem to include all previous utterances, and therefore
all the extant prophecies of a date earlier than B.C. 605, _i.e._ those
contained in chapters i.-xii. and some portions of xiv.-xx. (we cannot
determine which with any exactness), and probably most of those dated in
the fourth year of Jehoiakim, _i.e._ xxv. and parts of xlv.-xlix.
Cheyne,[29] however, holds that the roll simply contained the striking
and comprehensive prophecy in chapter xxv. The whole series of chapters
might very well be described as dealing with Jerusalem, Judah, and the
nations; but at the same time xxv. might be considered equivalent, by
way of summary, to all that had been spoken on these subjects. From
various considerations which will appear as we proceed with the
narrative, it seems probable that the larger estimate is the more
correct, _i.e._ that the roll contained a large fraction of our Book of
Jeremiah, and not merely one or two chapters. We need not, however,
suppose that every previous utterance of the prophet, even though still
extant, must have been included in the roll; the "all" would of course
be understood to be conditioned by relevancy; and the narratives of
various incidents are obviously not part of what Jehovah had spoken.
Jeremiah dictated his prophecies, as St. Paul did his epistles, to an
amanuensis; he called his disciple Baruch[30] ben Neriah, and dictated
to him "all that Jehovah had spoken, upon a book, in the form of a
roll."
It seems clear that, as in xxvi., the narrative does not exactly
follow the order of events,[31] and that verse 9, which records the
proclamation of a fast in the ninth month of Jehoiakim's fifth year,
should be read before verse 5, which begins the account of the
circumstances leading up to the actual reading of the roll. We are not
told in what month of Jehoiakim's fourth year Jeremiah received this
command to write his prophecies in a roll, but as they were not read
till the ninth month of the fifth year, there must have been an
interval of at least ten months or a year between the Divine command
and the reading by Baruch. We can scarcely suppose that all or nearly
all this delay was caused by Jeremiah and Baruch's waiting for a
suitable occasion. The long interval suggests that the dictation took
some time, and that therefore the roll was somewhat voluminous in its
contents, and that it was carefully compiled, not without a certain
amount of revision.
When the manuscript was ready, its authors had to determine the right
time at which to read it; they found their desired opportunity in the
fast proclaimed in the ninth month. This was evidently an extraordinary
fast, appointed in view of some pressing danger; and, in the year
following the battle of Carchemish, this would naturally be the advance
of Nebuchadnezzar. As our incident took place in the depth of winter,
the months must be reckoned according to the Babylonian year, which
began in April; and the ninth month, Kisleu, would roughly correspond to
our December. The dreaded invasion would be looked for early in the
following spring, "at the time when kings go out to battle."[32]
Jeremiah does not seem to have absolutely determined from the first
that the reading of the roll by Baruch was to be a substitute for his
own presence. He had probably hoped that some change for the better in
the situation might justify his appearance before a great gathering in
the Temple. But when the time came he was "hindered"[33]--we are not
told how--and could not go into the Temple. He may have been
restrained by his own prudence, or dissuaded by his friends, like Paul
when he would have faced the mob in the theatre at Ephesus; the
hindrance may have been some ban under which he had been placed by the
priesthood, or it may have been some unexpected illness, or legal
uncleanness, or some other passing accident, such as Providence often
uses to protect its soldiers till their warfare is accomplished.
Accordingly it was Baruch who went up to the Temple. Though he is said
to have read the book "in the ears of all the people," he does not
seem to have challenged universal attention as openly as Jeremiah had
done; he did not stand forth in the court of the Temple,[34] but
betook himself to the "chamber" of the scribe,[35] or secretary of
state, Gemariah ben Shaphan, the brother of Jeremiah's protector
Ahikam. This chamber would be one of the cells built round the upper
court, from which the "new gate"[36] led into an inner court of the
Temple. Thus Baruch placed himself formally under the protection of
the owner of the apartment, and any violence offered to him would have
been resented and avenged by this powerful noble with his kinsmen and
allies. Jeremiah's disciple and representative took his seat at the
door of the chamber, and, in full view of the crowds who passed and
repassed through the new gate, opened his roll and began to read aloud
from its contents. His reading was yet another repetition of the
exhortations, warnings, and threats which Jeremiah had rehearsed on
the feast day when he spake to the people "all that Jehovah had
commanded him"; and still both Jehovah and His prophet promised
deliverance as the reward of repentance. Evidently the head and front
of the nation's offence had been no open desertion of Jehovah for
idols, else His servants would not have selected for their audience
His enthusiastic worshippers as they thronged to His Temple. The fast
itself might have seemed a token of penitence, but it was not accepted
by Jeremiah, or put forward by the people, as a reason why the
prophecies of ruin should not be fulfilled. No one offers the very
natural plea: "In this fast we are humbling ourselves under the mighty
hand of God, we are confessing our sins, and consecrating ourselves
afresh to service of Jehovah. What more does He expect of us? Why does
He still withhold His mercy and forgiveness? Wherefore have we fasted,
and Thou seest not? Wherefore have we afflicted our soul, and Thou
takest no knowledge?" Such a plea would probably have received an
answer similar to that given by one of Jeremiah's successors: "Behold,
in the day of your fast ye find your own pleasure, and oppress all
your labourers. Behold, ye fast for strife and contention, and to
smite with the fist of wickedness: ye fast not this day so as to make
your voice to be heard on high. Is such the fast that I have chosen?
the day for a man to afflict his soul? Is it to bow down his head as a
rush, and to spread sackcloth and ashes under him? wilt thou call this
a fast, and a day acceptable to Jehovah?"
"Is not this the fast that I have chosen? to loose the bonds of
wickedness, to undo the bands of the yoke, and to let the oppressed go
free, and that ye break every yoke? Is it not to deal thy bread to the
hungry, and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thy house?
when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him; and that thou hide not
thyself from thine own flesh? Then shall thy light break forth as the
morning, and thy healing shall spring forth speedily: and thy
righteousness shall go before thee; the glory of Jehovah shall be thy
rearward."[37]
Jeremiah's opponents did not grudge Jehovah His burnt-offerings and
calves of a year old; He was welcome to thousands of rams, and ten
thousands of rivers of oil. They were even willing to give their
firstborn for their transgression, the fruit of their body for the sin
of their soul; but they were not prepared "to do justly, and to love
mercy, and to walk humbly with their God."[38]
We are not told how Jeremiah and the priests and prophets formulated the
points at issue between them, which were so thoroughly and universally
understood that the record takes them for granted. Possibly Jeremiah
contended for the recognition of Deuteronomy, with its lofty ideals of
pure religion and a humanitarian order of society. But, in any case,
these incidents were an early phase of the age-long struggle of the
prophets of God against the popular attempt to make ritual and sensuous
emotion into excuses for ignoring morality, and to offer the cheap
sacrifice of a few unforbidden pleasures, rather than surrender the
greed of grain, the lust of power, and the sweetness of revenge.
When the multitudes caught the sound of Baruch's voice and saw him
sitting in the doorway of Gemariah's chamber, they knew exactly what
they would hear. To them he was almost as antagonistic as a Protestant
evangelist would be to the worshippers at some great Romanist feast;
or perhaps we might find a closer parallel in a Low Church bishop
addressing a ritualistic audience. For the hearts of these hearers
were not steeled by the consciousness of any formal schism. Baruch and
the great prophet whom he represented did not stand outside the
recognised limits of Divine inspiration. While the priests and
prophets and their adherents repudiated his teaching as heretical,
they were still haunted by the fear that, at any rate, his threats
might have some Divine authority. Apart from all theology, the prophet
of evil always finds an ally in the nervous fears and guilty
conscience of his hearer.
The feelings of the people would be similar to those with which they had
heard the same threats against Judah, the city and the Temple, from
Jeremiah himself. But the excitement aroused by the defeat of Pharaoh
and the hasty return of Nebuchadnezzar to Babylon had died away. The
imminence of a new invasion made it evident that this had not been the
Divine deliverance of Judah. The people were cowed by what must have
seemed to many the approaching fulfilments of former threatenings; the
ritual of a fast was in itself depressing; so that they had little
spirit to resent the message of doom. Perhaps too there was less to
resent: the prophecies were the same, but Baruch may have been less
unpopular than Jeremiah, and his reading would be tame and ineffective
compared to the fiery eloquence of his master. Moreover the powerful
protection which shielded him was indicated not only by the place he
occupied, but also by the presence of Gemariah's son, Micaiah.
The reading passed off without any hostile demonstration on the part of
the people, and Micaiah went in search of his father to describe to him
the scene he had just witnessed. He found him in the palace, in the
chamber of the secretary of state, Elishama, attending a council of the
princes. There were present, amongst others, Elnathan ben Achbor, who
brought Uriah back from Egypt, Delaiah ben Shemaiah, and Zedekiah ben
Hananiah. Micaiah told them what he had heard. They at once sent for
Baruch and the roll. Their messenger, Jehudi ben Nethaniah, seems to
have been a kind of court-usher. His name signifies "the Jew," and as
his great-grandfather was Cushi, "the Ethiopian," it has been suggested
that he came of a family of Ethiopian descent, which had only attained
in his generation to Jewish citizenship.[39]
When Baruch arrived, the princes greeted him with the courtesy and even
deference due to the favourite disciple of a distinguished prophet. They
invited him to sit down and read them the roll. Baruch obeyed; the
method of reading suited the enclosed room and the quiet, interested
audience of responsible men, better than the swaying crowd gathered
round the door of Gemariah's chamber. Baruch now had before him
ministers of state who knew from their official information and
experience how extremely probable it was that the words to which they
were listening would find a speedy and complete fulfilment. Baruch must
almost have seemed to them like a doomster who announces to a condemned
criminal the ghastly details of his coming execution. They exchanged
looks of dismay and horror, and when the reading was over, they said to
one another,[40] "We must tell the king of all these words." First,
however, they inquired concerning the exact circumstances under which
the roll had been written, that they might know how far responsibility
in this matter was to be divided between the prophet and his disciple,
and also whether all the contents rested upon the full authority of
Jeremiah. Baruch assured them that it was simply a case of dictation:
Jeremiah had uttered every word with his own mouth, and he had
faithfully written it down; everything was Jeremiah's own.[41]
The princes were well aware that the prophet's action would probably be
resented and punished by Jehoiakim. They said to Baruch: "Do you and
Jeremiah go and hide yourselves, and let no one know where you are."
They kept the roll and laid it up in Elishama's room; then they went to
the king. They found him in his winter room, in the inner court of the
palace, sitting in front of a brasier of burning charcoal. On this
fast-day the king's mind might well be careful and troubled, as he
meditated on the kind of treatment that he, the nominee of Pharaoh
Necho, was likely to receive from Nebuchadnezzar. We cannot tell whether
he contemplated resistance or had already resolved to submit to the
conqueror. In either case he would wish to act on his own initiative,
and might be anxious lest a Chaldean party should get the upper hand in
Jerusalem and surrender him and the city to the invader.
When the princes entered, their number and their manner would at once
indicate to him that their errand was both serious and disagreeable. He
seems to have listened in silence while they made their report of the
incident at the door of Gemariah's chamber and their own interview with
Baruch.[42] The king sent for the roll by Jehudi, who had accompanied
the princes into the presence chamber; and on his return the same
serviceable official read its contents before Jehoiakim and the princes,
whose number was now augmented by the nobles in attendance upon the
king. Jehudi had had the advantage of hearing Baruch read the roll, but
ancient Hebrew manuscripts were not easy to decipher, and probably
Jehudi stumbled somewhat; altogether the reading of prophecies by a
court-usher would not be a very edifying performance, or very gratifying
to Jeremiah's friends. Jehoiakim treated the matter with deliberate and
ostentatious contempt. At the end of every three or four columns,[43] he
put out his hand for the roll, cut away the portion that had been read,
and threw it on the fire; then he handed the remainder back to Jehudi,
and the reading was resumed till the king thought fit to repeat the
process. It at once appeared that the audience was divided into two
parties. When Gemariah's father, Shaphan, had read Deuteronomy to
Josiah, the king rent his clothes; but now the writer tells us, half
aghast, that neither Jehoiakim nor any of his servants were afraid or
rent their clothes, but the audience, including doubtless both court
officials and some of the princes, looked on with calm indifference. Not
so the princes who had been present at Baruch's reading: they had
probably induced him to leave the roll with them, by promising that it
should be kept safely; they had tried to keep it out of the king's hands
by leaving it in Elishama's room, and now they made another attempt to
save it from destruction. They entreated Jehoiakim to refrain from open
and insolent defiance of a prophet who might after all be speaking in
the name of Jehovah. But the king persevered. The alternate reading and
burning went on; the unfortunate usher's fluency and clearness would not
be improved by the extraordinary conditions under which he had to read;
and we may well suppose that the concluding columns were hurried over in
a somewhat perfunctory fashion, if they were read at all. As soon as the
last shred of parchment was shrivelling on the charcoal, Jehoiakim
commanded three of his officers[44] to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch. But
they had taken the advice of the princes and were not to be found:
"Jehovah hid them."
Thus the career of Baruch's roll was summarily cut short. But it had
done its work; it had been read on three separate occasions, first
before the people, then before the princes, and last of all before the
king and his court. If Jeremiah had appeared in person, he might have
been at once arrested, and put to death like Uriah. No doubt this
threefold recital was, on the whole, a failure; Jeremiah's party among
the princes had listened with anxious deference, but the appeal had
been received by the people with indifference and by the king with
contempt. Nevertheless it must have strengthened individuals in the
true faith, and it had proclaimed afresh that the religion of Jehovah
gave no sanction to the policy of Jehoiakim: the ruin of Judah would
be a proof of the sovereignty of Jehovah and not of His impotence. But
probably this incident had more immediate influence over the king than
we might at first sight suppose. When Nebuchadnezzar arrived in
Palestine, Jehoiakim submitted to him, a policy entirely in accordance
with the views of Jeremiah. We may well believe that the experiences
of this fast-day had strengthened the hands of the prophet's friends,
and cooled the enthusiasm of the court for more desperate and
adventurous courses. Every year's respite for Judah fostered the
growth of the true religion of Jehovah.
The sequel showed how much more prudent it was to risk the existence
of a roll rather than the life of a prophet. Jeremiah was only
encouraged to persevere. By the Divine command, he dictated his
prophecies afresh to Baruch, adding besides unto them many like words.
Possibly other copies were made of the whole or parts of this roll,
and were secretly circulated, read, and talked about. We are not told
whether Jehoiakim ever heard this new roll; but, as one of the many
like things added to the older prophecies was a terrible personal
condemnation of the king,[45] we may be sure that he was not allowed
to remain in ignorance, at any rate, of this portion of it.
The second roll was, doubtless, one of the main sources of our
present Book of Jeremiah, and the narrative of this chapter is of
considerable importance for Old Testament criticism. It shows that a
prophetic book may not go back to any prophetic autograph at all; its
most original sources may be manuscripts written at the prophet's
dictation, and liable to all the errors which are apt to creep into
the most faithful work of an amanuensis. It shows further that, even
when a prophet's utterances were written down during his lifetime, the
manuscript may contain only his recollections[46] of what he said
years before, and that these might be either expanded or abbreviated,
sometimes even unconsciously modified, in the light of subsequent
events. Verse 32 shows that Jeremiah did not hesitate to add to the
record of his former prophecies "many like words": there is no reason
to suppose that these were all contained in an appendix; they would
often take the form of annotations.
The important part played by Baruch as Jeremiah's secretary and
representative must have invested him with full authority to speak for
his master and expound his views; such authority points to Baruch as
the natural editor of our present book, which is virtually the "Life
and Writings" of the prophet. The last words of our chapter are
ambiguous, perhaps intentionally. They simply state that many like
words were added, and do not say by whom; they might even include
additions made later on by Baruch from his own reminiscences.
In conclusion, we may notice that both the first and second copies of
the roll were written by the direct Divine command, just as in the
Hexateuch and the Book of Samuel we read of Moses, Joshua, and Samuel
committing certain matters to writing at the bidding of Jehovah. We
have here the recognition of the inspiration of the scribe, as
ancillary to that of the prophet. Jehovah not only gives His word to
His servants, but watches over its preservation and transmission.[47]
But there is no inspiration to _write_ any new revelation: the spoken
word, the consecrated life, are inspired; the book is only a record of
inspired speech and action.
FOOTNOTES:
[26] See Cheyne, Giesebrecht, Orelli, etc.
[27] R.V. "against." The Hebrew is ambiguous.
[28] So Septuagint. The Hebrew text has Israel, which is a less
accurate description of the prophecies, and is less relevant to this
particular occasion.
[29] _Jeremiah_ (Men of the Bible), p. 132.
[30] Cf. Chap. V. on "Baruch."
[31] Verses 5-8 seem to be a brief alternative account to 9-26.
[32] 1 Chron. xx. i.
[33] _'ĀCÛR_: A.V., R.V., "shut up"; R.V. margin, "restrained." The
term is used in xxxiii. 1, xxxix. 15, in the sense of "imprisoned,"
but here Jeremiah appears to be at liberty. The phrase _'ĀC̦ÛR W
ĀZÛBH_, A.V. "shut up or left" (Deut. xxxii. 36, etc.), has been
understood, those under the restraints imposed upon ceremonial
uncleanness and those free from these restraints, _i.e._ everybody;
the same meaning has been given to _'ĀC̦ÛR_ here.
[34] xxvi. 2.
[35] So Cheyne; the Hebrew does not make it clear whether the title
"scribe" refers to the father or the son. Giesebrecht understands it
of Shaphan, who appears as scribe in 2 Kings xxii. 8. He points out
that in verse 20 Elishama is called the scribe, but we cannot assume
that the title was limited to a single officer of state.
[36] Cf. xxvi. 10.
[37] Isa. lviii. 3-8.
[38] Micah vi. 6-8.
[39] So Orelli, _in loco_.
[40] Hebrew text "to Baruch," which LXX. omits.
[41] In verse 18 the word "with ink" is not in the LXX., and may be an
accidental repetition of the similar word for "his mouth."
[42] The A.V. and R.V. "all the words" is misleading: it should rather
be "everything"; the princes did not recite all the contents of the
roll.
[43] The English tenses "cut," "cast," are ambiguous, but the Hebrew
implies that the "cutting" and "casting on the fire" were repeated
again and again.
[44] One is called Jerahmeel the son of Hammelech (A.V.), or "the
king's son" (R.V.); if the latter is correct we must understand merely
a prince of the blood-royal and not a son of Jehoiakim, who was only
thirty.
[45] For verses 29-31 see Chap. VI., where they are dealt with in
connection with xxii. 13-19.
[46] The supposition that Jeremiah had written notes of previous
prophecies is not an impossible one, but it is a pure conjecture.
[47] Cf. Orelli, _in loco_.
CHAPTER IV
_THE RECHABITES_
xxxv.
"Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before Me
for ever."--JER. xxxv. 19.
This incident is dated "in the days of Jehoiakim." We learn from verse
11 that it happened at a time when the open country of Judah was
threatened by the advance of Nebuchadnezzar with a Chaldean and Syrian
army. If Nebuchadnezzar marched into the south of Palestine
immediately after the battle of Carchemish, the incident may have
happened, as some suggest, in the eventful fourth year of Jehoiakim;
or if he did not appear in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem till after
he had taken over the royal authority at Babylon, Jeremiah's interview
with the Rechabites may have followed pretty closely upon the
destruction of Baruch's roll. But we need not press the words
"Nebuchadnezzar ... came up into the land"; they may only mean that
Judah was invaded by an army acting under his orders. The mention of
Chaldeans and Assyrians suggests that this invasion is the same as
that mentioned in 2 Kings xxiv. 1, 2, where we are told that Jehoiakim
served Nebuchadnezzar three years and then rebelled against him,
whereupon Jehovah sent against him bands of Chaldeans, Syrians,
Moabites, and Ammonites, and sent them against Judah to destroy it.
If this is the invasion referred to in our chapter it falls towards
the end of Jehoiakim's reign, and sufficient time had elapsed to allow
the king's anger against Jeremiah to cool, so that the prophet could
venture out of his hiding-place.
The marauding bands of Chaldeans and their allies had driven the
country people in crowds into Jerusalem, and among them the nomad clan
of the Rechabites. According to 1 Chron. ii. 55, the Rechabites traced
their descent to a certain Hemath, and were a branch of the Kenites,
an Edomite tribe dwelling for the most part in the south of Palestine.
These Kenites had maintained an ancient and intimate alliance with
Judah, and in time the allies virtually became a single people, so
that after the Return from the Captivity all distinction of race
between Kenites and Jews was forgotten, and the Kenites were reckoned
among the families of Israel. In this fusion of their tribe with
Judah, the Rechabite clan would be included. It is clear from all the
references both to Kenites and to Rechabites that they had adopted the
religion of Israel and worshipped Jehovah. We know nothing else of the
early history of the Rechabites. The statement in Chronicles that the
father of the house of Rechab was Hemath perhaps points to their
having been at one time settled at some place called Hemath near Jabez
in Judah. Possibly too Rechab, which means "rider," is not a personal
name, but a designation of the clan as horsemen of the desert.
These Rechabites were conspicuous among the Jewish farmers and
townsfolk by their rigid adherence to the habits of nomad life; and it
was this peculiarity that attracted the notice of Jeremiah, and made
them a suitable object-lesson to the recreant Jews. The traditional
customs of the clan had been formulated into positive commands by
Jonadab, the son of Rechab, _i.e._ the Rechabite. This must be the
same Jonadab who co-operated with Jehu in overthrowing the house of
Omri and suppressing the worship of Baal. Jehu's reforms concluded the
long struggle of Elijah and Elisha against the house of Omri and its
half-heathen religion. Hence we may infer that Jonadab and his
Rechabites had come under the influence of these great prophets, and
that their social and religious condition was one result of Elijah's
work. Jeremiah stood in the true line of succession from the northern
prophets in his attitude towards religion and politics; so that there
would be bonds of sympathy between him and these nomad refugees.
The laws or customs of Jonadab, like the Ten Commandments, were
chiefly negative: "Ye shall drink no wine, neither ye nor your sons
for ever: neither shall ye build houses, nor sow seed, nor plant
vineyards, nor have any: but all your days ye shall dwell in tents;
that ye may live many days in the land wherein ye are strangers."
Various parallels have been found to the customs of the Rechabites. The
Hebrew Nazarites abstained from wine and strong drink, from grapes and
grape juice and everything made of the vine, "from the kernels even to
the husk."[48] Mohammed forbade his followers to drink any sort of wine
or strong drink. But the closest parallel is one often quoted from
Diodorus Siculus,[49] who, writing about B.C. 8, tells us that the
Nabatean Arabs were prohibited under the penalty of death from sowing
corn or planting fruit trees, using wine or building houses. Such
abstinence is not primarily ascetic; it expresses the universal contempt
of the wandering hunter and herdsman for tillers of the ground, who are
tied to one small spot of earth, and for burghers, who further imprison
themselves in narrow houses and behind city walls. The nomad has a not
altogether unfounded instinct that such acceptance of material
restraints emasculates both soul and body. A remarkable parallel to the
laws of Jonadab ben Rechab is found in the injunctions of the dying
highlander, Ranald of the Mist, to his heir: "Son of the Mist! be free
as thy forefathers. Own no lord--receive no law--take no hire--give no
stipend--build no hut--enclose no pasture--sow no grain."[50] The
Rechabite faith in the higher moral value of their primitive habits had
survived their alliance with Israel, and Jonadab did his best to protect
his clan from the taint of city life and settled civilisation.
Abstinence from wine was not enjoined chiefly, if at all, to guard
against intoxication, but because the fascinations of the grape might
tempt the clan to plant vineyards, or, at any rate, would make them
dangerously dependent upon vine-dressers and wine-merchants.
Till this recent invasion, the Rechabites had faithfully observed
their ancestral laws, but the stress of circumstances had now driven
them into a fortified city, possibly even into houses, though it is
more probable that they were encamped in some open space within the
walls.[51] Jeremiah was commanded to go and bring them into the
Temple, that is, into one of the rooms in the Temple buildings, and
offer them wine. The narrative proceeds in the first person, "I took
Jaazaniah," so that the chapter will have been composed by the prophet
himself. In somewhat legal fashion he tells us how he took "Jaazaniah
ben Jeremiah, ben Habaziniah, and his brethren, and all his sons, and
all the clan of the Rechabites." All three names are compounded of the
Divine name Iah, Jehovah, and serve to emphasise the devotion of the
clan to the God of Israel. It is a curious coincidence that the
somewhat rare name Jeremiah[52] should occur twice in this connection.
The room to which the prophet took his friends is described as the
chamber of the disciples of the man of God[53] Hanan ben Igdaliah,
which was by the chamber of the princes, which was above the chamber
of the keeper of the threshold, Maaseiah ben Shallum. Such minute
details probably indicate that this chapter was committed to writing
while these buildings were still standing and still had the same
occupants as at the time of this incident, but to us the topography is
unintelligible. The "man of God" or prophet Hanan was evidently in
sympathy with Jeremiah, and had a following of disciples who formed a
sort of school of the prophets, and were a sufficiently permanent body
to have a chamber assigned to them in the Temple buildings. The
keepers of the threshold were Temple officials of high standing. The
"princes" may have been the princes of Judah, who might very well have
a chamber in the Temple courts; but the term is general, and may
simply refer to other Temple officials. Hanan's disciples seem to have
been in good company.
These exact specifications of person and place are probably designed
to give a certain legal solemnity and importance to the incident, and
seem to warrant us in rejecting Reuss' suggestion that our narrative
is simply an elaborate prophetic figure.[54]
After these details Jeremiah next tells us how he set before his
guests bowls of wine and cups, and invited them to drink. Probably
Jaazaniah and his clansmen were aware that the scene was intended to
have symbolic religious significance. They would not suppose that the
prophet had invited them all, in this solemn fashion, merely to take a
cup of wine; and they would welcome an opportunity of showing their
loyalty to their own peculiar customs. They said: "We will drink no
wine: for our father Jonadab the son of Rechab commanded us, saying,
Ye shall drink no wine, neither ye nor your sons for ever." They
further recounted Jonadab's other commands and their own scrupulous
obedience in every point, except that now they had been compelled to
seek refuge in a walled city.
Then the word of Jehovah came unto Jeremiah; he was commanded to make
yet another appeal to the Jews, by contrasting their disobedience with
the fidelity of the Rechabites. The Divine King and Father of Israel had
been untiring in His instruction and admonitions: "I have spoken unto
you, rising up early and speaking." He had addressed them in familiar
fashion through their fellow-countrymen: "I have sent also unto you all
My servants the prophets, rising up early and sending them." Yet they
had not hearkened unto the God of Israel or His prophets. The Rechabites
had received no special revelation; they had not been appealed to by
numerous prophets. Their Torah had been simply given them by their
father Jonadab; nevertheless the commands of Jonadab had been regarded
and those of Jehovah had been treated with contempt.
Obedience and disobedience would bring forth their natural fruit. "I
will bring upon Judah, and upon all the inhabitants of Jerusalem, all
the evil that I have pronounced against them: because I have spoken
unto them, but they have not heard; and I have called unto them, but
they have not answered." But because the Rechabites obeyed the
commandment of their father Jonadab, "Therefore thus saith Jehovah
Sabaoth, Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand
before Me for ever."
Jehovah's approval of the obedience of the Rechabites is quite
independent of the specific commands which they obeyed. It does not
bind us to abstain from wine any more than from building houses and
sowing seed. Jeremiah himself, for instance, would have had no more
hesitation in drinking wine than in sowing his field at Anathoth. The
tribal customs of the Rechabites had no authority whatever over him.
Nor is it exactly his object to set forth the merit of obedience and
its certain and great reward. These truths are rather touched upon
incidentally. What Jeremiah seeks to emphasise is the gross, extreme,
unique wickedness of Israel's disobedience. Jehovah had not looked for
any special virtue in His people. His Torah was not made up of
counsels of perfection. He had only expected the loyalty that Moab
paid to Chemosh, and Tyre and Sidon to Baal. He would have been
satisfied if Israel had observed His laws as faithfully as the nomads
of the desert kept up their ancestral habits. Jehovah had spoken
through Jeremiah long ago and said: "Pass over the isles of Chittim,
and see; and send unto Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if
there be any such thing. Hath a nation changed their gods, which are
yet no gods? but My people have changed their glory for that which
doth not profit."[55] Centuries later Christ found Himself constrained
to upbraid the cities of Israel, "wherein most of His mighty works
were done": "Woe unto thee, Chorazin! woe unto thee, Bethsaida! for if
the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and
Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.... It
shall be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon at the day of judgment than
for you."[56] And again and again in the history of the Church the
Holy Spirit has been grieved because those who profess and call
themselves Christians, and claim to prophesy and do many mighty works
in the name of Christ, are less loyal to the gospel than the heathen
to their own superstitions.
Buddhists and Mohammedans have been held up as modern examples to
rebuke the Church, though as a rule with scant justification. Perhaps
material for a more relevant contrast may be found nearer home.
Christian societies have been charged with conducting their affairs by
methods to which a respectable business firm would not stoop; they are
said to be less scrupulous in their dealings and less chivalrous in
their honour than the devotees of pleasure; at their gatherings they
are sometimes supposed to lack the mutual courtesy of members of a
Legislature or a Chamber of Commerce. The history of councils and
synods and Church meetings gives colour to such charges, which could
never have been made if Christians had been as jealous for the Name of
Christ as a merchant is for his credit or a soldier for his honour.
And yet these contrasts do not argue any real moral and religious
superiority of the Rechabites over the Jews or of unbelievers over
professing Christians. It was comparatively easy to abstain from wine
and to wander over wide pasture lands instead of living cooped up in
cities--far easier than to attain to the great ideals of Deuteronomy
and the prophets. It is always easier to conform to the code of
business and society than to live according to the Spirit of Christ.
The fatal sin of Judah was not that it fell so far short of its
ideals, but that it repudiated them. So long as we lament our own
failures and still cling to the Name and Faith of Christ, we are not
shut out from mercy; our supreme sin is to crucify Christ afresh, by
denying the power of His gospel, while we retain its empty form.
The reward promised to the Rechabites for their obedience was that
"Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before Me for
ever"; to stand before Jehovah is often used to describe the exercise
of priestly or prophetic ministry. It has been suggested that the
Rechabites were hereby promoted to the status of the true Israel, "a
kingdom of priests"; but this phrase may merely mean that their clan
should continue in existence. Loyal observance of national law, the
subordination of individual caprice and selfishness to the interests
of the community, make up a large part of that righteousness that
establisheth a nation.
Here, as elsewhere, students of prophecy have been anxious to discover
some literal fulfilment; and have searched curiously for any trace of
the continued existence of the Rechabites. The notice in Chronicles
implies that they formed part of the Jewish community of the
Restoration. Apparently Alexandrian Jews were acquainted with
Rechabites at a still later date. Psalm lxxi. is ascribed by the
Septuagint to "the sons of Jonadab." Eusebius[57] mentions "priests of
the sons of Rechab," and Benjamin of Tudela, a Jewish traveller of the
twelfth century, states that he met with them in Arabia. More recent
travellers have thought that they discovered the descendants of Rechab
amongst the nomads in Arabia or the Peninsula of Sinai that still
practised the old ancestral customs.
But the fidelity of Jehovah to His promises does not depend upon our
unearthing obscure tribes in distant deserts. The gifts of God are
without repentance, but they have their inexorable conditions; no
nation can flourish for centuries on the virtues of its ancestors. The
Rechabites may have vanished in the ordinary stream of history, and
yet we can hold that Jeremiah's prediction has been fulfilled and is
still being fulfilled. No scriptural prophecy is limited in its
application to an individual or a race, and every nation possessed by
the spirit of true patriotism shall "stand before Jehovah for ever."
FOOTNOTES:
[48] Num. vi. 2.
[49] xix. 94.
[50] Scott, _Legend of Montrose_, chap. xxii.
[51] The term "house of the Rechabites" in verse 2 means "family" or
"clan," and does not refer to a building.
[52] Eight Jeremiahs occur in O.T.
[53] Literally "sons of Hanan."
[54] Jeremiah, according to this view, had no interview with the
Rechabites, but made an imaginary incident a text for his discourse.
[55] ii. 10, 11.
[56] Matt. xi. 21, 22.
[57] _Ch. Hist._, ii. 23.
CHAPTER V
_BARUCH_
xlv.
"Thy life will I give unto thee for a prey."--JER. xlv. 5.
The editors of the versions and of the Hebrew text of the Old Testament
have assigned a separate chapter to this short utterance concerning
Baruch; thus paying an unconscious tribute to the worth and importance
of Jeremiah's disciple and secretary, who was the first to bear the
familiar Jewish name, which in its Latinised form of Benedict has been a
favourite with saints and popes. Probably few who read of these great
ascetics and ecclesiastics give a thought to the earliest recorded
Baruch, nor can we suppose that Christian Benedicts have been named
after him. One thing they may all have in common: either their own faith
or that of their parents ventured to bestow upon a "man born unto
trouble as the sparks fly upward" the epithet "Blessed." We can scarcely
suppose that the life of any Baruch or Benedict has run so smoothly as
to prevent him or his friends from feeling that such faith has not been
outwardly justified and that the name suggested an unkind satire.
Certainly Jeremiah's disciple, like his namesake Baruch Spinoza, had to
recognise his blessings disguised as distress and persecution.
Baruch ben Neriah is said by Josephus[58] to have belonged to a most
distinguished family, and to have been exceedingly well educated in his
native language. These statements are perhaps legitimate deductions from
the information supplied by our book. His title "scribe"[59] and his
position as Jeremiah's secretary imply that he possessed the best
culture of his time; and we are told in li. 59 that Seraiah ben Neriah,
who must be Baruch's brother, was chief chamberlain (R.V.) to Zedekiah.
According to the Old Latin Version of the Apocryphal Book of Baruch (i.
1) he was of the tribe of Simeon, a statement by no means improbable in
view of the close connection between Judah and Simeon, but needing the
support of some better authority.
Baruch's relation to Jeremiah is not expressly defined, but it is
clearly indicated in the various narratives in which he is referred
to. We find him in constant attendance upon the prophet, acting both
as his "scribe," or secretary, and as his mouthpiece. The relation was
that of Joshua to Moses, of Elisha to Elijah, of Gehazi to Elisha, of
Mark to Paul and Barnabas, and of Timothy to Paul. It is described in
the case of Joshua and Mark by the term "minister," while Elisha is
characterised as having "poured water on the hands of Elijah." The
"minister" was at once personal attendant, disciple, representative,
and possible successor of the prophet. The position has its analogue
in the service of the squire to the mediæval knight, and in that of an
unpaid private secretary to a modern cabinet minister. Squires
expected to become knights, and private secretaries hope for a seat in
future cabinets. Another less perfect parallel is the relation of the
members of a German theological "seminar" to their professor.
Baruch is first[60] introduced to us in the narrative concerning the
roll. He appears as Jeremiah's amanuensis and representative, and is
entrusted with the dangerous and honourable task of publishing his
prophecies to the people in the Temple. Not long before, similar
utterances had almost cost the master his life, so that the disciple
showed high courage and devotion in undertaking such a commission. He
was called to share with his master at once the same cup of
persecution--and the same Divine protection.
We next hear of Baruch in connection with the symbolic purchase of the
field at Anathoth.[61] He seems to have been attending on Jeremiah
during his imprisonment in the court of the guard, and the documents
containing the evidence of the purchase were entrusted to his care.
Baruch's presence in the court of the guard does not necessarily imply
that he was himself a prisoner. The whole incident shows that
Jeremiah's friends had free access to him; and Baruch probably not
only attended to his master's wants in prison, but also was his
channel of communication with the outside world.
We are nowhere told that Baruch himself was either beaten or
imprisoned, but it is not improbable that he shared Jeremiah's
fortunes even to these extremities. We next hear of him as carried
down to Egypt[62] with Jeremiah, when the Jewish refugees fled thither
after the murder of Gedaliah. Apparently he had remained with Jeremiah
throughout the whole interval, had continued to minister to him
during his imprisonment, and had been among the crowd of Jewish
captives whom Nebuchadnezzar found at Ramah. Josephus probably makes a
similar conjecture[63] in telling us that, when Jeremiah was released
and placed under the protection of Gedaliah at Mizpah, he asked and
obtained from Nebuzaradan the liberty of his disciple Baruch. At any
rate Baruch shared with his master the transient hope and bitter
disappointment of this period; he supported him in dissuading the
remnant of Jews from fleeing into Egypt, and was also compelled to
share their flight. According to a tradition recorded by Jerome,
Baruch and Jeremiah died in Egypt. But the Apocryphal Book of Baruch
places him at Babylon, whither another tradition takes him after the
death of Jeremiah in Egypt.[64] These legends are probably mere
attempts of wistful imagination to supply unwelcome blanks in history.
It has often been supposed that our present Book of Jeremiah, in some
stage of its formation, was edited or compiled by Baruch, and that
this book may be ranked with biographies--like Stanley's Life of
Arnold--of great teachers by their old disciples. He was certainly the
amanuensis of the roll, which must have been the most valuable
authority for any editor of Jeremiah's prophecies. And the amanuensis
might very easily become the editor. If an edition of the book was
compiled in Jeremiah's lifetime, we should naturally expect him to use
Baruch's assistance; if it first took shape after the prophet's death,
and if Baruch survived, no one would be better able to compile the
"Life and Works of Jeremiah" than his favourite and faithful
disciple. The personal prophecy about Baruch does not occur in its
proper place in connection with the episode of the roll, but is
appended at the end of the prophecies,[65] possibly as a kind of
subscription on the part of the editor. These data do not constitute
absolute proof, but they afford strong probability that Baruch
compiled a book, which was substantially our Jeremiah. The evidence is
similar in character to, but much more conclusive than, that adduced
for the authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews by Apollos.
Almost the final reference to Baruch suggests another aspect of his
relation to Jeremiah. The Jewish captains accused him of unduly
influencing his master against Egypt and in favour of Chaldea. Whatever
truth there may have been in this particular charge, we gather that
popular opinion credited Baruch with considerable influence over
Jeremiah, and probably popular opinion was not far wrong. Nothing said
about Baruch suggests any vein of weakness in his character, such as
Paul evidently recognised in Timothy. His few appearances upon the scene
rather leave the impression of strength and self-reliance, perhaps even
self-assertion. If we knew more about him, possibly indeed if any one
else had compiled these "Memorabilia," we might discover that much in
Jeremiah's policy and teaching was due to Baruch, and that the master
leaned somewhat heavily upon the sympathy of the disciple. The qualities
that make a successful man of action do not always exempt their
possessor from being directed or even controlled by his followers. It
would be interesting to discover how much of Luther is Melanchthon. Of
many a great minister, his secretaries and subordinates might say
safely, in private, _Cujus pars magna fuimus_.
The short prophecy which has furnished a text for this chapter shows
that Jeremiah was not unaware of Baruch's tendency to self-assertion,
and even felt that sometimes it required a check. Apparently chapter
xlv. once formed the immediate continuation of chapter xxxvi., the
narrative of the incident of the roll. It was "the word spoken by
Jeremiah the prophet to Baruch ben Neriah, when he wrote these words
in a book at the dictation of Jeremiah in the fourth year of
Jehoiakim." The reference evidently is to xxxvi. 32, where we are told
that Baruch wrote, at Jeremiah's dictation, all the words of the book
that had been burnt, and many like words.
Clearly Baruch had not received Jeremiah's message as to the sin and
ruin of Judah without strong protest. It was as distasteful to him as
to all patriotic Jews and even to Jeremiah himself. Baruch had not yet
been able to accept this heavy burden or to look beyond to the
brighter promise of the future. He broke out into bitter complaint:
"Woe is me now! for Jehovah hath added sorrow to my pain; I am weary
with my groaning, and find no rest."[66] Strong as these words are,
they are surpassed by many of Jeremiah's complaints to Jehovah, and
doubtless even now they found an echo in the prophet's heart. Human
impatience of suffering revolts desperately against the conviction
that calamity is inevitable; hope whispers that some unforeseen
Providence will yet disperse the storm-clouds, and the portents of
ruin will dissolve like some evil dream. Jeremiah had, now as always,
the harsh, unwelcome task of compelling himself and his fellows to
face the sad and appalling reality. "Thus saith Jehovah, Behold, I am
breaking down that which I built, I am plucking up that which I
planted."[67] This was his familiar message concerning Judah, but he
had also a special word for Baruch: "And as for thee, dost thou seek
great things for thyself?" What "great things" could a devout and
patriotic Jew, a disciple of Jeremiah, seek for himself in those
disastrous times? The answer is at once suggested by the renewed
prediction of doom. Baruch, in spite of his master's teaching, had
still ventured to look for better things, and had perhaps fancied that
he might succeed where Jeremiah had failed and might become the
mediator who should reconcile Israel to Jehovah. He may have thought
that Jeremiah's threats and entreaties had prepared the way for some
message of reconciliation. Gemariah ben Shaphan and other princes had
been greatly moved when Baruch read the roll. Might not their emotion
be an earnest of the repentance of the people? If he could carry on
his master's work to a more blessed issue than the master himself had
dared to hope, would not this be a "great thing" indeed? We gather
from the tone of the chapter that Baruch's aspirations were unduly
tinged with personal ambition. While kings, priests, and prophets were
sinking into a common ruin from which even the most devoted servants
of Jehovah would not escape, Baruch was indulging himself in visions
of the honour to be obtained from a glorious mission, successfully
accomplished. Jeremiah reminds him that he will have to take his
share in the common misery. Instead of setting his heart upon "great
things" which are not according to the Divine purpose, he must be
prepared to endure with resignation the evil which Jehovah "is
bringing upon all flesh." Yet there is a word of comfort and promise:
"I will give thee thy life for a prey in all places whither thou
goest." Baruch was to be protected from violent or premature death.
According to Renan,[68] this boon was flung to Baruch
half-contemptuously, in order to silence his unworthy and unseasonable
importunity:--
"Dans une catastrophe qui va englober l'humanité tout entière, il est
beau de venir réclamer de petites faveurs d'exception! Baruch aura la
vie sauve partout où il ira; qu'il s'en contente!"
We prefer a more generous interpretation. To a selfish man, unless
indeed he clung to bare life in craven terror or mere animal tenacity,
such an existence as Baruch was promised would have seemed no boon at
all. Imprisonment in a besieged and starving city, captivity and exile,
his fellow-countrymen's ill-will and resentment from first to
last--these experiences would be hard to recognise as privileges
bestowed by Jehovah. Had Baruch been wholly self-centred, he might well
have craved death instead, like Job, nay, like Jeremiah himself. But
life meant for him continued ministry to his master, the high privilege
of supporting him in his witness to Jehovah. If, as seems almost
certain, we owe to Baruch the preservation of Jeremiah's prophecies,
then indeed the life that was given him for a prey must have been
precious to him as the devoted servant of God. Humanly speaking, the
future of revealed religion and of Christianity depended on the survival
of Jeremiah's teaching, and this hung upon the frail thread of Baruch's
life. After all, Baruch was destined to achieve "great things," even
though not those which he sought after; and as no editor's name is
prefixed to our book, he cannot be accused of self-seeking. So too for
every faithful disciple, his life, even if given for a prey, even if
spent in sorrow, poverty, and pain, is still a Divine gift, because
nothing can spoil its opportunity of ministering to men and glorifying
God, even if only by patient endurance of suffering.
We may venture on a wider application of the promise, "Thy life shall
be given thee for a prey." Life is not merely continued existence in
the body: life has come to mean spirit and character, so that Christ
could say, "He that loseth his life for My sake shall find it." In
this sense the loyal servant of God wins as his prey, out of all
painful experiences, a fuller and nobler life. Other rewards may come
in due season, but this is the most certain and the most sufficient.
For Baruch, constant devotion to a hated and persecuted master,
uncompromising utterance of unpopular truth, had their chief issue in
the redemption of his own inward life.
FOOTNOTES:
[58] _Antt._, x. 9, 1.
[59] xxxvi. 26, 32.
[60] In order of time, ch. xxxvi.
[61] xxxii.
[62] xliii.
[63] _Antt._, x. 9, 1.
[64] Bissell's Introduction to Baruch in Lange's Commentary.
[65] So LXX., which here probably gives the true order.
[66] The clause "I am weary with my groaning" also occurs in Psalm vi.
6.
[67] The concluding clause of the verse is omitted by LXX., and is
probably a gloss added to indicate that the ruin would not be confined
to Judah, but would extend "over the whole earth." Cf. Kautzsch.
[68] _Hist. of Israel_, iii., 293.
CHAPTER VI
_THE JUDGMENT ON JEHOIAKIM_
xxii. 13-19, xxxvi. 30, 31.
"Jehoiakim ... slew him (Uriah) with the sword, and cast his dead
body into the graves of the common people."--JER. xxvi. 23.
"Therefore thus saith Jehovah concerning Jehoiakim, ... He shall be
buried with the burial of an ass, drawn and cast forth beyond the
gates of Jerusalem."--JER. xxii. 18, 19.
"Jehoiakim ... did that which was evil in the sight of Jehovah,
according to all that his fathers had done."--2 KINGS xxiii. 36, 37.
Our last four chapters have been occupied with the history of Jeremiah
during the reign of Jehoiakim, and therefore necessarily with the
relations of the prophet to the king and his government. Before we
pass on to the reigns of Jehoiachin and Zedekiah, we must consider
certain utterances which deal with the personal character and career
of Jehoiakim. We are helped to appreciate these passages by what we
here read, and by the brief paragraph concerning this reign in the
Second Book of Kings. In Jeremiah the king's policy and conduct are
specially illustrated by two incidents, the murder of the prophet
Uriah and the destruction of the roll. The historian states his
judgment of the reign, but his brief record[69] adds little to our
knowledge of the sovereign.
Jehoiakim was placed upon the throne as the nominee and tributary of
Pharaoh Necho; but he had the address or good fortune to retain his
authority under Nebuchadnezzar, by transferring his allegiance to the
new suzerain of Western Asia. When a suitable opportunity offered, the
unwilling and discontented vassal naturally "turned and rebelled
against" his lord. Even then his good fortune did not forsake him;
although in his latter days Judah was harried by predatory bands of
Chaldeans, Syrians, Moabites, and Ammonites, yet Jehoiakim "slept with
his fathers" before Nebuchadnezzar had set to work in earnest to
chastise his refractory subject. He was not reserved, like Zedekiah,
to endure agonies of mental and physical torture, and to rot in a
Babylonian dungeon.
Jeremiah's judgment upon Jehoiakim and his doings is contained in the
two passages which form the subject of this chapter. The utterance in
xxxvi. 30, 31, was evoked by the destruction of the roll, and we may
fairly assume that xxii. 13-19 was also delivered after that incident.
The immediate context of the latter paragraph throws no light on the
date of its origin. Chapter xxii. is a series of judgments on the
successors of Josiah, and was certainly composed after the deposition
of Jehoiachin, probably during the reign of Zedekiah; but the section
on Jehoiakim must have been uttered at an earlier period. Renan indeed
imagines[70] that Jeremiah delivered this discourse at the gate of the
royal palace at the very beginning of the new reign. The nominee of
Egypt was scarcely seated on the throne, his "new name" Jehoiakim--"He
whom Jehovah establisheth"--still sounded strange in his ears, when
the prophet of Jehovah publicly menaced the king with condign
punishment. Renan is naturally surprised that Jehoiakim tolerated
Jeremiah, even for a moment. But, here as often elsewhere, the French
critic's dramatic instinct has warped his estimate of evidence. We
need not accept the somewhat unkind saying that picturesque anecdotes
are never true, but, at the same time, we have always to guard against
the temptation to accept the most dramatic interpretation of history
as the most accurate. The contents of this passage, the references to
robbery, oppression, and violence, clearly imply that Jehoiakim had
reigned long enough for his government to reveal itself as hopelessly
corrupt. The final breach between the king and the prophet was marked
by the destruction of the roll, and xxii. 13-19, like xxxvi. 30, 31,
may be considered a consequence of this breach.
Let us now consider these utterances. In xxxvi. 30_a_ we read,
"Therefore thus saith Jehovah concerning Jehoiakim king of Judah, He
shall have none to sit upon the throne of David." Later on,[71] a like
judgment was pronounced upon Jehoiakim's son and successor Jehoiachin.
The absence of this threat from xxii. 13-19 is doubtless due to the
fact that the chapter was compiled when the letter of the prediction
seemed to have been proved to be false by the accession of Jehoiachin.
Its spirit and substance were amply satisfied by the latter's
deposition and captivity after a brief reign of a hundred days.
The next clause in the sentence on Jehoiakim runs: "His dead body
shall be cast out in the day to the heat, and in the night to the
frost." The same doom is repeated in the later prophecy:--
"They shall not lament for him,
Alas my brother! Alas my brother!
They shall not lament for him,
Alas lord! Alas lord![72]
He shall be buried with the burial of an ass,
Dragged forth and cast away without the gates of Jerusalem."
Jeremiah did not need to draw upon his imagination for this vision of
judgment. When the words were uttered, his memory called up the murder
of Uriah ben Shemaiah and the dishonour done to his corpse. Uriah's
only guilt had been his zeal for the truth that Jeremiah had
proclaimed. Though Jehoiakim and his party had not dared to touch
Jeremiah or had not been able to reach him, they had struck his
influence by killing Uriah. But for their hatred of the master, the
disciple might have been spared. And Jeremiah had neither been able to
protect him, nor allowed to share his fate. Any generous spirit will
understand how Jeremiah's whole nature was possessed and agitated by a
tempest of righteous indignation, how utterly humiliated he felt to be
compelled to stand by in helpless impotence. And now, when the tyrant
had filled up the measure of his iniquity, when the imperious impulse
of the Divine Spirit bade the prophet speak the doom of his king,
there breaks forth at last the long pent-up cry for vengeance:
"Avenge, O Lord, Thy slaughtered saint"--let the persecutor suffer the
agony and shame which he inflicted on God's martyr, fling out the
murderer's corpse unburied, let it lie and rot upon the dishonoured
grave of his victim.
Can we say, Amen? Not perhaps without some hesitation. Yet surely, if
our veins run blood and not water, our feelings, had we been in
Jeremiah's place, would have been as bitter and our words as fierce.
Jehoiakim was more guilty than our Queen Mary, but the memory of the
grimmest of the Tudors still stinks in English nostrils. In our own
days, we have not had time to forget how men received the news of
Hannington's murder at Uganda, and we can imagine what European
Christians would say and feel if their missionaries were massacred in
China.
And yet, when we read such a treatise as Lactantius wrote _Concerning
the Deaths of Persecutors_, we cannot but recoil. We are shocked at the
stern satisfaction he evinces in the miserable ends of Maximin and
Galerius, and other enemies of the true faith. Discreet historians have
made large use of this work, without thinking it desirable to give an
explicit account of its character and spirit. Biographers of Lactantius
feel constrained to offer a half-hearted apology for the _De Morte
Persecutorum_. Similarly we find ourselves of one mind with Gibbon,[73]
in refusing to derive edification from a sermon in which Constantine the
Great, or the bishop who composed it for him, affected to relate the
miserable end of all the persecutors of the Church. Nor can we share the
exultation of the Covenanters in the Divine judgment which they saw in
the death of Claverhouse; and we are not moved to any hearty sympathy
with more recent writers, who have tried to illustrate from history the
danger of touching the rights and privileges of the Church. Doubtless
God will avenge His own elect; nevertheless _Nemo me impune lacessit_ is
no seemly motto for the Kingdom of God. Even Greek mythologists taught
that it was perilous for men to wield the thunderbolts of Zeus. Still
less is the Divine wrath a weapon for men to grasp in their differences
and dissensions, even about the things of God. Michael the Archangel,
even when contending with the devil he disputed about the body of Moses,
durst not bring against him a railing judgment, but said, The Lord
rebuke thee.[74]
How far Jeremiah would have shared such modern sentiment, it is hard
to say. At any rate his personal feeling is kept in the background; it
is postponed to the more patient and deliberate judgment of the Divine
Spirit, and subordinated to broad considerations of public morality.
We have no right to contrast Jeremiah with our Lord and His
proto-martyr Stephen, because we have no prayer of the ancient prophet
to rank with, "Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do,"
or again with, "Lord, lay not this sin to their charge." Christ and
His disciple forgave wrongs done to themselves: they did not condone
the murder of their brethren. In the Apocalypse, which concludes the
English Bible, and was long regarded as God's final revelation, His
last word to man, the souls of the martyrs cry out from beneath the
altar: "How long, O Master, the holy and true, dost Thou not judge and
avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?"[75]
Doubtless God will avenge His own elect, and the appeal for justice
may be neither ignoble nor vindictive. But such prayers, beyond all
others, must be offered in humble submission to the Judge of all. When
our righteous indignation claims to pass its own sentence, we do well
to remember that our halting intellect and our purblind conscience
are ill qualified to sit as assessors of the Eternal Justice.
When Saul set out for Damascus, "breathing out threatening and
slaughter against the disciples of the Lord," the survivors of his
victims cried out for a swift punishment of the persecutor, and
believed that their prayers were echoed by martyred souls in the
heavenly Temple. If that ninth chapter of the Acts had recorded how
Saul of Tarsus was struck dead by the lightnings of the wrath of God,
preachers down all the Christian centuries would have moralised on the
righteous Divine judgment. Saul would have found his place in the
homiletic Chamber of Horrors with Ananias and Sapphira, Herod and
Pilate, Nero and Diocletian. Yet the Captain of our salvation,
choosing His lieutenants, passes over many a man with blameless
record, and allots the highest post to this blood-stained persecutor.
No wonder that Paul, if only in utter self-contempt, emphasised the
doctrine of Divine election. Verily God's ways are not our ways and
His thoughts are not our thoughts.
Still, however, we easily see that Paul and Jehoiakim belong to two
different classes. The persecutor who attempts in honest but misguided
zeal to make others endorse his own prejudices, and turn a deaf ear
with him to the teaching of the Holy Spirit, must not be ranked with
politicians who sacrifice to their own private interests the
Revelation and the Prophets of God.
This prediction which we have been discussing of Jehoiakim's shameful
end is followed in the passage in chapter xxxvi. by a general
announcement of universal judgment, couched in Jeremiah's usual
comprehensive style:--
"I will visit their sin upon him and upon his children and upon his
servants, and I will bring upon them and the inhabitants of Jerusalem
and the men of Judah all the evil which I spake unto them and they did
not hearken."
In chapter xxii. the sentence upon Jehoiakim is prefaced by a
statement of the crimes for which he was punished. His eyes and his
heart were wholly possessed by avarice and cruelty; as an
administrator he was active in oppression and violence.[76] But
Jeremiah does not confine himself to these general charges; he
specifies and emphasises one particular form of Jehoiakim's
wrong-doing, the tyrannous exaction of forced labour for his
buildings. To the sovereigns of petty Syrian states, old Memphis and
Babylon were then what London and Paris are to modern Ameers,
Khedives, and Sultans. Circumstances, indeed, did not permit a Syrian
prince to visit the Egyptian or Chaldean capital with perfect comfort
and unrestrained enjoyment. Ancient Eastern potentates, like mediæval
suzerains, did not always distinguish between a guest and a hostage.
But the Jewish kings would not be debarred from importing the luxuries
and imitating the vices of their conquerors.
Renan says[77] of this period: "L'Egypte était, à cette époque, le
pays où les industries de luxe étaient le plus développées. Tout le
monde raffolaient, en particulier, de sa carrosserie et de ses meubles
ouvragés. Joiaquin et la noblesse de Jérusalem ne songeaient qu'à se
procurer ces beaux objets, qui réalisaient ce qu'on avait vu de plus
exquis en fait de goût jusque-là."
The supreme luxury of vulgar minds is the use of wealth as a means of
display, and monarchs have always delighted in the erection of vast
and ostentatious buildings. At this time Egypt and Babylon vied with
one another in pretentious architecture. In addition to much useful
engineering work, Psammetichus I. made large additions to the temples
and public edifices at Memphis, Thebes, Sais, and elsewhere, so that
"the entire valley of the Nile became little more than one huge
workshop, where stone-cutters and masons, bricklayers and carpenters,
laboured incessantly."[78] This activity in building continued even
after the disaster to the Egyptian arms at Carchemish.
Nebuchadnezzar had an absolute mania for architecture. His numerous
inscriptions are mere catalogues of his achievements in building. His
home administration and even his extensive conquests are scarcely
noticed; he held them of little account compared with his temples and
palaces--"this great Babylon, which I have built for the royal
dwelling-place, by the might of my power and for the glory of my
majesty."[79] Nebuchadnezzar created most of the magnificence that
excited the wonder and admiration of Herodotus a century later.
Jehoiakim had been moved to follow the notable example of Chaldea and
Egypt. By a strange irony of fortune, Egypt, once the cynosure of
nations, has become in our own time the humble imitator of Western
civilisation, and now boulevards have rendered the suburbs of Cairo "a
shabby reproduction of modern Paris." Possibly in the eyes of Egyptians
and Chaldeans Jehoiakim's efforts only resulted in a "shabby
reproduction" of Memphis or Babylon. Nevertheless these foreign luxuries
are always expensive; and minor states had not then learnt the art of
trading on the resources of their powerful neighbours by means of
foreign loans. Moreover Judah had to pay tribute first to Pharaoh Necho,
and then to Nebuchadnezzar. The times were bad, and additional taxes for
building purposes must have been felt as an intolerable oppression.
Naturally the king did not pay for his labour; like Solomon and all
other great Eastern despots, he had recourse to the _corvee_, and for
this in particular Jeremiah denounced him.
"Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness
And his chambers by injustice;
That maketh his neighbour toil without wages,
And giveth him no hire;
That saith, 'I will build me a wide house
And spacious chambers,'
And openeth out broad windows, with woodwork of cedar
And vermilion painting."
Then the denunciation passes into biting sarcasm:--
"Art thou indeed a king,
Because thou strivest to excel in cedar?"[80]
Poor imitations of Nebuchadnezzar's magnificent structures could not
conceal the impotence and dependence of the Jewish king. The
pretentiousness of Jehoiakim's buildings challenged a comparison which
only reminded men that he was a mere puppet, with its strings pulled now
by Egypt and now by Babylon. At best he was only reigning on sufferance.
Jeremiah contrasts Jehoiakim's government both as to justice and
dignity with that of Josiah:--
"Did not thy father eat and drink?"[81]
(He was no ascetic, but, like the Son of Man, lived a full, natural,
human life.)
"And do judgment and justice?
Then did he prosper.
He judged the cause of the poor and needy,
Then was there prosperity.
Is not this to know Me?
Jehovah hath spoken it."
Probably Jehoiakim claimed by some external observance, or through
some subservient priest or prophet, to "know Jehovah"; and Jeremiah
repudiates the claim.
Josiah had reigned in the period when the decay of Assyria left Judah
dominant in Palestine, until Egypt or Chaldea could find time to
gather up the outlying fragments of the shattered empire. The wisdom
and justice of the Jewish king had used this breathing space for the
advantage and happiness of his people; and during part of his reign
Josiah's power seems to have been as extensive as that of any of his
predecessors on the throne of Judah. And yet, according to current
theology, Jeremiah's appeal to the prosperity of Josiah as a proof of
God's approbation was a startling anomaly. Josiah had been defeated
and slain at Megiddo in the prime of his manhood, at the age of
thirty-nine. None but the most independent and enlightened spirits
could believe that the Reformer's premature death, at the moment when
his policy had resulted in national disaster, was not an emphatic
declaration of Divine displeasure. Jeremiah's contrary belief might be
explained and justified. Some such justification is suggested by the
prophet's utterance concerning Jehoahaz: "Weep not for the dead,
neither bemoan him: but weep sore for him that goeth away." Josiah had
reigned with real authority, he died when independence was no longer
possible; and therein he was happier and more honourable than his
successors, who held a vassal throne by the uncertain tenure of
time-serving duplicity, and were for the most part carried into
captivity. "The righteous was taken away from the evil to come."[82]
The warlike spirit of classical antiquity and of Teutonic chivalry
welcomed a glorious death upon the field of battle:--
"And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds,
For the ashes of his fathers,
And the temples of his Gods?"
No one spoke of Leonidas as a victim of Divine wrath. Later Judaism
caught something of the same temper. Judas Maccabæus, when in extreme
danger, said, "It is better for us to die in battle, than to look upon
the evils of our people and our sanctuary"; and later on, when he
refused to flee from inevitable death, he claimed that he would leave
behind him no stain upon his honour.[83] Islam also is prodigal in its
promises of future bliss to those soldiers who fall fighting for its
sake.
But the dim and dreary Sheôl of the ancient Hebrews was no glorious
Valhalla or houri-peopled Paradise. The renown of the battle-field was
poor compensation for the warm, full-blooded life of the upper air.
When David sang his dirge for Saul and Jonathan, he found no comfort
in the thought that they had died fighting for Israel. Moreover the
warrior's self-sacrifice for his country seems futile and inglorious,
when it neither secures victory nor postpones defeat. And at Megiddo
Josiah and his army perished in a vain attempt to come
"Between the pass and fell incensed points
Of mighty opposites."
We can hardly justify to ourselves Jeremiah's use of Josiah's reign as
an example of prosperity as the reward of righteousness; his
contemporaries must have been still more difficult to convince. We
cannot understand how the words of this prophecy were left without any
attempt at justification, or why Jeremiah did not meet by anticipation
the obvious and apparently crushing rejoinder that the reign
terminated in disgrace and disaster.
Nevertheless these difficulties do not affect the terms of the
sentence upon Jehoiakim, or the ground upon which he was condemned. We
shall be better able to appreciate Jeremiah's attitude and to discover
its lessons if we venture to reconsider his decisions. We cannot
forget that there was, as Cheyne puts it, a duel between Jeremiah and
Jehoiakim; and we should hesitate to accept the verdict of Hildebrand
upon Henry IV. of Germany, or of Thomas à Becket on Henry II. of
England. Moreover the data upon which we have to base our judgment,
including the unfavourable estimate in the Book of Kings, come to us
from Jeremiah or his disciples. Our ideas about Queen Elizabeth would
be more striking than accurate if our only authorities for her reign
were Jesuit historians of England. But Jeremiah is absorbed in lofty
moral and spiritual issues; his testimony is not tainted with that
sectarian and sacerdotal casuistry which is always so ready to
subordinate truth to the interests of "the Church." He speaks of facts
with a simple directness which leaves us in no doubt as to their
reality; his picture of Jehoiakim may be one-sided, but it owes
nothing to an inventive imagination.
Even Renan, who, in Ophite fashion, holds a brief for the bad
characters of the Old Testament, does not seriously challenge
Jeremiah's statements of fact. But the judgment of the modern critic
seems at first sight more lenient than that of the Hebrew prophet: the
former sees in Jehoiakim "un prince libéral et modéré,"[84] but when
this favourable estimate is coupled with an apparent comparison with
Louis Philippe, we must leave students of modern history to decide
whether Renan is really less severe than Jeremiah. Cheyne, on the
other hand, holds[85] that "we have no reason to question Jeremiah's
verdict upon Jehoiakim, who, alike from a religious and a political
point of view, appears to have been unequal to the crisis in the
fortunes of Israel." No doubt this is true; and yet perhaps Renan is
so far right that Jehoiakim's failure was rather his misfortune than
his fault. We may doubt whether any king of Israel or Judah would have
been equal to the supreme crisis which Jehoiakim had to face. Our
scanty information seems to indicate a man of strong will, determined
character, and able statesmanship. Though the nominee of Pharaoh
Necho, he retained his sceptre under Nebuchadnezzar, and held his own
against Jeremiah and the powerful party by which the prophet was
supported. Under more favourable conditions he might have rivalled
Uzziah or Jeroboam II. In the time of Jehoiakim, a supreme political
and military genius would have been as helpless on the throne of Judah
as were the Palæologi in the last days of the Empire at
Constantinople. Something may be said to extenuate his religious
attitude. In opposing Jeremiah he was not defying clear and
acknowledged truth. Like the Pharisees in their conflict with Christ,
the persecuting king had popular religious sentiment on his side.
According to that current theology which had been endorsed in some
measure even by Isaiah and Jeremiah, the defeat at Megiddo proved that
Jehovah repudiated the religious policy of Josiah and his advisers.
The inspiration of the Holy Spirit enabled Jeremiah to resist this
shallow conclusion, and to maintain through every crisis his unshaken
faith in the profounder truth. Jehoiakim was too conservative to
surrender at the prophet's bidding the long-accepted and fundamental
doctrine of retribution, and to follow the forward leading of
Revelation. He "stood by the old truth" as did Charles V. at the
Reformation. "Let him that is without sin" in this matter "first cast
a stone at" him.
Though we extenuate Jehoiakim's conduct, we are still bound to condemn
it; not however because he was exceptionally wicked, but because he
failed to rise above a low spiritual average: yet in this judgment we
also condemn ourselves for our own intolerance, and for the prejudice
and self-will which have often blinded our eyes to the teachings of
our Lord and Master.
But Jeremiah emphasises one special charge against the king--his
exaction of forced and unpaid labour. This form of taxation was in
itself so universal that the censure can scarcely be directed against
its ordinary and moderate exercise. If Jeremiah had intended to
inaugurate a new departure, he would have approached the subject in a
more formal and less casual fashion. It was a time of national danger
and distress, when all moral and material resources were needed to
avert the ruin of the state, or at any rate to mitigate the sufferings
of the people; and at such a time Jehoiakim exhausted and embittered
his subjects--that he might dwell in spacious halls with woodwork of
cedar. The Temple and palaces of Solomon had been built at the expense
of a popular resentment, which survived for centuries, and with which,
as their silence seems to show, the prophets fully sympathised. If
even Solomon's exactions were culpable, Jehoiakim was altogether
without excuse.
His sin was that common to all governments, the use of the authority of
the state for private ends. This sin is possible not only to sovereigns
and secretaries of state, but to every town councillor and every one who
has a friend on a town council, nay, to every clerk in a public office
and to every workman in a government dockyard. A king squandering public
revenues on private pleasures, and an artisan pilfering nails and iron
with an easy conscience because they only belong to the state, are
guilty of crimes essentially the same. On the one hand, Jehoiakim as the
head of the state was oppressing individuals; and although modern states
have grown comparatively tender as to the rights of the individual, yet
even now their action is often cruelly oppressive to insignificant
minorities. But, on the other hand, the right of exacting labour was
only vested in the king as a public trust; its abuse was as much an
injury to the community as to individuals. If Jeremiah had to deal with
modern civilisation, we might, perchance, be startled by his passing
lightly over our religious and political controversies to denounce the
squandering of public resources in the interests of individuals and
classes, sects and parties.
FOOTNOTES:
[69] 2 Kings xxiii. 34-xxiv. 7.
[70] iii. 274.
[71] xxii. 30.
[72] R.V., "Ah my brother! or Ah sister!... Ah lord! or Ah his glory!"
The text is based on an emendation of Graetz, following the Syriac.
(Giesebrecht.)
[73] Chap. xiii.
[74] Jude 9.
[75] Apc. vi. 10.
[76] xxii. 17. The exact meaning of the word translated "violence" (so
A.V., R.V.) is very doubtful.
[77] _Hist._, etc., iii. 266.
[78] Rawlinson, _Ancient Egypt_ (Story of the Nations).
[79] Dan. iv. 30.
[80] I have followed R.V., but the text is probably corrupt. Cheyne
follows LXX. (A) in reading "because thou viest with Ahab": LXX. (B) has
"Ahaz" (so Ewald). Giesebrecht proposes to neglect the accents and
translate, "viest in cedar buildings with thy father" (_i.e._ Solomon).
[81] According to Giesebrecht (cf. however the last note) this clause
is an objection which the prophet puts into the mouth of the king. "My
father enjoyed the good things of life--why should not I?" The prophet
rejoins, "Nay, but he did judgment," etc.
[82] Isa. lvii. (English Versions).
[83] Macc. ii. 59, ix. 10.
[84] iii. 269.
[85] P. 142.
CHAPTER VII
_JEHOIACHIN_[86]
xxii. 20-30.
"A despised broken vessel,"--JER. xxii. 28.
"A young lion. And he went up and down among the lions, he became
a young lion and he learned to catch the prey, he devoured
men."--EZEK. xix. 5, 6.
"Jehoiachin ... did evil in the sight of Jehovah, according to all
that his father had done."--2 KINGS xxiv. 8, 9.
We have seen that our book does not furnish a consecutive biography of
Jeremiah; we are not even certain as to the chronological order of the
incidents narrated. Yet these chapters are clear and full enough to
give us an accurate idea of what Jeremiah did and suffered during the
eleven years of Jehoiakim's reign. He was forced to stand by while the
king lent the weight of his authority to the ancient corruptions of
the national religion, and conducted his home and foreign policy
without any regard to the will of Jehovah, as expressed by His
prophet. His position was analogous to that of a Romanist priest under
Elizabeth or a Protestant divine in the reign of James II. According
to some critics, Nebuchadnezzar was to Jeremiah what Philip of Spain
was to the priest and William of Orange to the Puritan.
During all these long and weary years, the prophet watched the ever
multiplying tokens of approaching ruin. He was no passive spectator,
but a faithful watchman to the house of Israel; again and again he
risked his life in a vain attempt to make his fellow-countrymen aware
of their danger.[87] The vision of the coming sword was ever before
his eyes, and he blew the trumpet and warned the people; but they
would not be warned, and the prophet knew that the sword would come
and take them away in their iniquity. He paid the penalty of his
faithfulness; at one time or another he was beaten, imprisoned,
proscribed, and driven to hide himself; still he persevered in his
mission, as time and occasion served. Yet he survived Jehoiakim,
partly because he was more anxious to serve Jehovah than to gain the
glorious deliverance of martyrdom; partly because his royal enemy
feared to proceed to extremities against a prophet of Jehovah, who was
befriended by powerful nobles, and might possibly have relations with
Nebuchadnezzar himself. Jehoiakim's religion--for like the Athenians
he was probably "very religious"--was saturated with superstition, and
it was only when deeply moved that he lost the sense of an external
sanctity attaching to Jeremiah's person. In Israel prophets were
hedged by a more potent divinity than kings.
Meanwhile Jeremiah was growing old in years and older in experience.
When Jehoiakim died, it was nearly forty years since the young priest
had first been called "to pluck up and to break down, and to destroy
and to overthrow; to build and to plant"; it was more than eleven
since his brighter hopes were buried in Josiah's grave. Jehovah had
promised that He would make His servant into "an iron pillar and
brasen walls."[88] The iron was tempered and hammered into shape
during these days of conflict and endurance, like--
" ... iron dug from central gloom,
And heated hot with burning fears
And dipt in baths of hissing tears,
And battered with the shocks of doom,
To shape and use."
He had long lost all trace of that sanguine youthful enthusiasm which
promises to carry all before it. His opening manhood had felt its happy
illusions, but they did not dominate his soul and they soon passed away.
At the Divine bidding, he had surrendered his most ingrained prejudices,
his dearest desires. He had consented to be alienated from his brethren
at Anathoth, and to live without home or family; although a patriot, he
accepted the inevitable ruin of his nation as the just judgment of
Jehovah; he was a priest, imbued by heredity and education with the
religious traditions of Israel, yet he had yielded himself to Jehovah,
to announce, as His herald, the destruction of the Temple, and the
devastation of the Holy Land. He had submitted his shrinking flesh and
reluctant spirit to God's most unsparing demands, and had dared the
worst that man could inflict. Such surrender and such experiences
wrought in him a certain stern and terrible strength, and made his life
still more remote from the hopes and fears, the joys and sorrows of
common men. In his isolation and his inspired self-sufficiency he had
become an "iron pillar." Doubtless he seemed to many as hard and cold as
iron; but this pillar of the faith could still glow with white heat of
indignant passion, and within the shelter of the "brasen walls" there
still beat a human heart, touched with tender sympathy for those less
disciplined to endure.
We have thus tried to estimate the development of Jeremiah's character
during the second period of his ministry, which began with the death
of Josiah and terminated with the brief reign of Jehoiachin. Before
considering Jeremiah's judgment upon this prince we will review the
scanty data at our disposal to enable us to appreciate the prophet's
verdict.
Jehoiakim died while Nebuchadnezzar was on the march to punish his
rebellion. His son Jehoiachin, a youth of eighteen,[89] succeeded his
father and continued his policy. Thus the accession of the new king
was no new departure, but merely a continuance of the old order; the
government was still in the hands of the party attached to Egypt, and
opposed to Babylon and hostile to Jeremiah. Under these circumstances
we are bound to accept the statement of Kings that Jehoiakim "slept
with his fathers," _i.e._ was buried in the royal sepulchre.[90] There
was no literal fulfilment of the prediction that he should "be buried
with the burial of an ass." Jeremiah had also declared concerning
Jehoiakim: "He shall have none to sit upon the throne of David."[91]
According to popular superstition, the honourable burial of Jehoiakim
and the succession of his son to the throne further discredited
Jeremiah and his teaching. Men read happy omens in the mere observance
of ordinary constitutional routine. The curse upon Jehoiakim seemed so
much spent breath: why should not Jeremiah's other predictions of ruin
and exile also prove a mere _vox et præterea nihil_? In spite of a
thousand disappointments, men's hopes still turned to Egypt; and if
earthly resources failed they trusted to Jehovah Himself to intervene,
and deliver Jerusalem from the advancing hosts of Nebuchadnezzar, as
from the army of Sennacherib.
Ezekiel's elegy over Jehoiachin suggests that the young king displayed
energy and courage worthy of a better fortune:--
"He walked up and down among the lions,
He became a young lion;
He learned to catch the prey,
He devoured men.
He broke down[92] their palaces,
He wasted their cities;
The land, was desolate, and the fulness thereof,
At the noise of his roaring."[93]
However figurative these lines may be, the hyperbole must have had some
basis in fact. Probably before the regular Babylonian army entered
Judah, Jehoiachin distinguished himself by brilliant but useless
successes against the marauding bands of Chaldeans, Syrians, Moabites,
and Ammonites, who had been sent to prepare the way for the main body.
He may even have carried his victorious arms into the territory of Moab
or Ammon. But his career was speedily cut short: "The servants of
Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came up to Jerusalem and besieged the
city." Pharaoh Necho made no sign, and Jehoiachin was forced to retire
before the regular forces of Babylon, and soon found himself shut up in
Jerusalem. Still for a time he held out, but when it was known in the
beleaguered city that Nebuchadnezzar was present in person in the camp
of the besiegers, the Jewish captains lost heart. Perhaps too they hoped
for better treatment, if they appealed to the conqueror's vanity by
offering him an immediate submission which they had refused to his
lieutenants. The gates were thrown open; Jehoiachin and the Queen
Mother, Nehushta, with his ministers and princes and the officers of his
household, passed out in suppliant procession, and placed themselves and
their city at the disposal of the conqueror. In pursuance of the policy
which Nebuchadnezzar had inherited from the Assyrians, the king and his
court and eight thousand picked men were carried away captive to
Babylon.[94] For thirty-seven years Jehoiachin languished in a Chaldean
prison, till at last his sufferings were mitigated by an act of grace,
which signalised the accession of a new king of Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar's successor Evil Merodach, "in the year when he began to
reign, lifted up the head of Jehoiachin king of Judah out of prison, and
spake kindly to him, and set his throne above the throne of the kings
that were with him in Babylon. And Jehoiachin changed his prison
garments, and ate at the royal table continually all the days of his
life, and had a regular allowance given him by the king, a daily
portion, all the days of his life."[95] At the age of fifty-five, the
last survivor of the reigning princes of the house of David emerges from
his dungeon, broken in mind and body by his long captivity, to be a
grateful dependent upon the charity of Evil Merodach, just as the
survivor of the house of Saul had sat at David's table. The young lion
that devoured the prey and caught men and wasted cities was thankful to
be allowed to creep out of his cage and die in comfort--"a despised
broken vessel."
We feel a shock of surprise and repulsion as we turn from this
pathetic story to Jeremiah's fierce invectives against the unhappy
king. But we wrong the prophet and misunderstand his utterance if we
forget that it was delivered during that brief frenzy in which the
young king and his advisers threw away the last chance of safety for
Judah. Jehoiachin might have repudiated his father's rebellion against
Babylon; Jehoiakim s death had removed the chief offender, no personal
blame attached to his successor, and a prompt submission might have
appeased Nebuchadnezzar's wrath against Judah and obtained his favour
for the new king. If a hot-headed young rajah of some protected Indian
state revolted against the English suzerainty and exposed his country
to the misery of a hopeless war, we should sympathise with any of his
counsellors who condemned such wilful folly; we have no right to find
fault with Jeremiah for his severe censure of the reckless vanity
which precipitated his country's fate.
Jeremiah's deep and absorbing interest in Judah and Jerusalem is
indicated by the form of this utterance; it is addressed to the
"Daughter of Zion"[96]:--
"Go up to Lebanon, and lament,
And lift up thy voice in Bashan,
And lament from Abarim,[97]
For thy lovers are all destroyed!"
Her "lovers," her heathen allies, whether gods or men, are impotent,
and Judah is as forlorn and helpless as a lonely and unfriended woman;
let her bewail her fate upon the mountains of Israel, like Jephthah's
daughter in ancient days.
"I spake unto thee in thy prosperity;
Thou saidst, I will not hearken.
This hath been thy way from thy youth,
That thou hast not obeyed My voice.
The tempest shall be the shepherd to all thy shepherds."
Kings and nobles, priests and prophets, shall be carried off by the
Chaldean invaders, as trees and houses are swept away by a hurricane.
These shepherds who had spoiled and betrayed their flock would
themselves be as silly sheep in the hands of robbers.
"Thy lovers shall go into captivity.
Then, verily, shalt thou be ashamed and confounded
Because of all thy wickedness.
O thou that dwellest in Lebanon!
O thou that hast made thy nest in the cedar!"
The former mention of Lebanon reminded Jeremiah of Jehoiakim's halls
of cedar. With grim irony he links together the royal magnificence of
the palace and the wild abandonment of the people's lamentation.
"How wilt thou groan[98] when pangs come upon thee,
Anguish as of a woman in travail!"
The nation is involved in the punishment inflicted upon her rulers. In
such passages the prophets largely identify the nation with the
governing classes--not without justification. No government, whatever
the constitution may be, can ignore a strong popular demand for
righteous policy, at home and abroad. A special responsibility of
course rests on those who actually wield the authority of the state,
but the policy of rulers seldom succeeds in effecting much either for
good or evil without some sanction of public feeling. Our revolution
which replaced the Puritan Protectorate by the restored Monarchy was
rendered possible by the change of popular sentiment. Yet even under
the purest democracy men imagine that they divest themselves of civic
responsibility by neglecting their civic duties; they stand aloof, and
blame officials and professional politicians for the injustice and
crime wrought by the state. National guilt seems happily disposed of
when laid on the shoulders of that convenient abstraction "the
government"; but neither the prophets nor the Providence which they
interpret recognise this convenient theory of vicarious atonement: the
king sins, but the prophet's condemnation is uttered against and
executed upon the nation.
Nevertheless a special responsibility rests upon the ruler, and now
Jeremiah turns from the nation to its king.
"As I live--Jehovah hath spoken it--
Though Coniah ben Jehoiakim king of Judah were a signet ring
upon My right hand----"
By a forcible Hebrew idiom Jehovah, as it were, turns and confronts
the king and specially addresses him:--
"Yet would I pluck thee thence."
A signet ring was valuable in itself, and, as far as an inanimate object
could be, was an "_alter ego_" of the sovereign; it scarcely ever left
his finger, and when it did, it carried with it the authority of its
owner. A signet ring could not be lost or even cast away without some
reflection upon the majesty of the king. Jehoiachin's character was by
no means worthless; he had courage, energy, and patriotism. The heir of
David and Solomon, the patron and champion of the Temple, dwelt, as it
were, under the very shadow of the Almighty. Men generally believed that
Jehovah's honour was engaged to defend Jerusalem and the house of David.
He Himself would be discredited by the fall of the elect dynasty and the
captivity of the chosen people. Yet everything must be sacrificed--the
career of a gallant young prince, the ancient association of the sacred
Name with David and Zion, even the superstitious awe with which the
heathen regarded the God of the Exodus and of the deliverance from
Sennacherib. Nothing will be allowed to stand in the way of the Divine
judgment. And yet we still sometimes dream that the working out of the
Divine righteousness will be postponed in the interests of
ecclesiastical traditions and in deference to the criticisms of ungodly
men!
"And I will give thee into the hand of them that seek thy
life,
Into the hand of them of whom thou art afraid,
Into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and the
Chaldeans.
And I will hurl thee and the mother that bare thee into
another land, where ye were not born:
There shall ye die.
And unto the land whereunto their soul longeth to return,
Thither they shall not return."
Again the sudden change in the person addressed emphasises the scope
of the Divine proclamation; the doom of the royal house is not only
announced to them, but also to the world at large. The mention of the
Queen Mother, Nehushta, reveals what we should in any case have
conjectured, that the policy of the young prince was largely
determined by his mother. Her importance is also indicated by xiii.
18, usually supposed to be addressed to Jehoiachin and Nehushta:---
"Say unto the king and the queen mother,
Leave your thrones and sit in the dust,
For your glorious diadems are fallen."
The Queen Mother is a characteristic figure of polygamous Eastern
dynasties, but we may be helped to understand what Nehushta was to
Jehoiachin if we remember the influence of Eleanor of Poitou over
Richard I. and John, and the determined struggle which Margaret of
Anjou made on behalf of her ill-starred son.
The next verse of our prophecy seems to be a protest against the
severe sentence pronounced in the preceding clauses:--
"Is then this man Coniah a despised vessel, only fit to be
broken?
Is he a tool, that no one wants?"
Thus Jeremiah imagines the citizens and warriors of Jerusalem crying
out against him, for his sentence of doom against their darling prince
and captain. The prophetic utterance seemed to them monstrous and
incredible, only worthy to be met with impatient scorn. We may find a
mediæval analogy to the situation at Jerusalem in the relations of
Clement IV. to Conradin, the last heir of the house of Hohenstaufen.
When this youth of sixteen was in the full career of victory, the Pope
predicted that his army would be scattered like smoke, and pointed out
the prince and his allies as victims for the sacrifice. When Conradin
was executed after his defeat at Tagliacozzo, Christendom was filled
with abhorrence at the suspicion that Clement had countenanced the
doing to death of the hereditary enemy of the Papal See. Jehoiachin's
friends felt towards Jeremiah somewhat as these thirteenth-century
Ghibellines towards Clement.
Moreover the charge against Clement was probably unfounded; Milman[99]
says of him, "He was doubtless moved with inner remorse at the
cruelties of 'his champion' Charles of Anjou." Jeremiah too would
lament the doom he was constrained to utter. Nevertheless he could not
permit Judah to be deluded to its ruin by empty dreams of glory:--
"O land, land, land,
Hear the word of Jehovah."
Isaiah had called all Nature, heaven and earth to bear witness against
Israel, but now Jeremiah is appealing with urgent importunity to Judah.
"O Chosen Land of Jehovah, so richly blessed by His favour, so sternly
chastised by His discipline, Land of prophetic Revelation, now at last,
after so many warnings, believe the word of thy God and submit to His
judgment. Hasten not thy unhappy fate by shallow confidence in the
genius and daring of Jehoiachin: he is no true Messiah."
"For saith Jehovah,
Write this man childless,
A man whose life shall not know prosperity:
For none of his seed shall prosper;
None shall sit upon the throne of David,
Nor rule any more over Judah."
Thus, by Divine decree, the descendants of Jehoiakim were
disinherited; Jehoiachin was to be recorded in the genealogies of
Israel as having no heir. He might have offspring,[100] but the
Messiah, the Son of David, would not come of his line.
Two points suggest themselves in connection with this utterance of
Jeremiah; first as to the circumstances under which it was uttered,
then as to its application to Jehoiachin.
A moment's reflection will show that this prophecy implied great courage
and presence of mind on the part of Jeremiah--his enemies might even
have spoken of his barefaced audacity. He had predicted that Jehoiakim's
corpse should be cast forth without any rites of honourable sepulture;
and that no son of his should sit upon the throne. Jehoiakim had been
buried like other kings, he slept with his fathers, and Jehoiachin his
son reigned in his stead. The prophet should have felt himself utterly
discredited; and yet here was Jeremiah coming forward unabashed with new
prophecies against the king, whose very existence was a glaring disproof
of his prophetic inspiration. Thus the friends of Jehoiachin. They would
affect towards Jeremiah's message the same indifference which the
present generation feels for the expositors of Daniel and the
Apocalypse, who confidently announce the end of the world for 1866, and
in 1867 fix a new date with cheerful and undiminished assurance. But
these students of sacred records can always save the authority of
Scripture by acknowledging the fallibility of their calculations. When
their predictions fail, they confess that they have done their sum wrong
and start it afresh. But Jeremiah's utterances were not published as
human deductions from inspired data; he himself claimed to be inspired.
He did not ask his hearers to verify and acknowledge the accuracy of his
arithmetic or his logic, but to submit to the Divine message from his
lips. And yet it is clear that he did not stake the authority of Jehovah
or even his own prophetic status upon the accurate and detailed
fulfilment of his predictions. Nor does he suggest that, in announcing a
doom which was not literally accomplished, he had misunderstood or
misinterpreted his message. The details which both Jeremiah and those
who edited and transmitted his words knew to be unfulfilled were allowed
to remain in the record of Divine Revelation--not, surely, to illustrate
the fallibility of prophets, but to show that an accurate forecast of
details is not of the essence of prophecy; such details belong to its
form and not to its substance. Ancient Hebrew prophecy clothed its ideas
in concrete images; its messages of doom were made definite and
intelligible in a glowing series of definite pictures. The prophets were
realists and not impressionists. But they were also spiritual men,
concerned with the great issues of history and religion. Their message
had to do with _these_: they were little interested in minor matters;
and they used detailed imagery as a mere instrument of exposition.
Popular scepticism exulted when subsequent facts did not exactly
correspond to Jeremiah's images, but the prophet himself was
unconscious of either failure or mistake. Jehoiakim might be
magnificently buried, but his name was branded with eternal dishonour;
Jehoiachin might reign for a hundred days, but the doom of Judah was not
averted, and the house of David ceased for ever to rule in Jerusalem.
Our second point is the application of this prophecy to Jehoiachin.
How far did the king deserve his sentence? Jeremiah indeed does not
explicitly blame Jehoiachin, does not specify his sins as he did those
of his royal sire. The estimate recorded in the Book of Kings
doubtless expresses the judgment of Jeremiah, but it may be directed
not so much against the young king as against his ministers. Yet the
king cannot have been entirely innocent of the guilt of his policy and
government. In chapter xxiv., however, Jeremiah speaks of the captives
at Babylon, those carried away with Jehoiachin, as "good figs"; but we
scarcely suppose he meant to include the king himself in this
favourable estimate, otherwise we should discern some note of sympathy
in the personal sentence upon him. We are left, therefore, to conclude
that Jeremiah's judgment was unfavourable; although, in view of the
prince's youth and limited opportunities, his guilt must have been
slight compared to that of his father.
And, on the other hand, we have the manifest sympathy and even
admiration of Ezekiel. The two estimates stand side by side in the
sacred record to remind us that God neither tolerates man's sins
because there is a better side to his nature, nor yet ignores his
virtues on account of his vices. For ourselves we may be content to
leave the last word on this matter with Jeremiah. When he declares
God's sentence on Jehoiachin, he does not suggest that it was
undeserved, but he refrains from any explicit reproach. Probably if he
had known how entirely his prediction would be fulfilled, if he had
foreseen the seven-and-thirty weary years which the young lion was to
spend in his Babylonian cage, Jeremiah would have spoken more tenderly
and pitifully even of the son of Jehoiakim.
FOOTNOTES:
[86] Also called Coniah and Jeconiah.
[87] Considerable portions of chaps. i.-xx. are referred to the reigns
of Jehoiakim and Jehoiachin: see previous volume on Jeremiah.
[88] i. 18.
[89] The Chronicler's account of Jehoiakim's end (2 Chron. xxviii.
6-8) is due to a misunderstanding of the older records. According to
Chronicles Jehoiachin was only eight, but all our data indicate that
Kings is right.
[90] In LXX. of 2 Chron. xxxvi. 8, Jehoiakim, like Manasseh and Amon,
was "buried in the garden of Uzza": B, Ganozæ; A, Ganozan. Cheyne is
inclined to accept this statement, which he regards as derived from
tradition.
[91] xxxvi. 30.
[92] So A. B. Davidson in Cambridge Bible, etc., by a slight
conjectural emendation; there have been many other suggested
corrections of the text. The Hebrew text as it stands would mean
literally "he knew their widows" (R.V. margin); A.V., R.V., by a
slight change, "he knew their (A.V. desolate) palaces."
[93] Ezek. xix. 5-7.
[94] 2 Kings xxiv. 8-17.
[95] 2 Kings xxv. 27-30; Jer. lii. 31-34.
[96] The Hebrew verbs are in 2 s. fem.; the person addressed is not
named, but from analogy she can only be the "Daughter of Zion," _i.e._
Jerusalem personified.
[97] Identified with the mountains of Moab.
[98] R.V. margin, with LXX., Vulg., and Syr.
[99] Milman's _Latin Christianity_, vi. 392.
[100] 1 Chron. iii. 17 mentions the "sons" of Jeconiah, and in Matt.
i. 12 Shealtiel is called his "son," but in Luke iii. 27 Shealtiel is
called the son of Neri.
CHAPTER VIII
_BAD SHEPHERDS AND FALSE PROPHETS_
xxiii., xxiv.
"Woe unto the shepherds that destroy and scatter the sheep of My
pasture!"--JER. xxiii. 1.
"Of what avail is straw instead of grain?... Is not My word like
fire, ... like a hammer that shattereth the rocks?"--JER. xxiii.
28, 29.
The captivity of Jehoiachin and the deportation of the flower of the
people marked the opening of the last scene in the tragedy of Judah and
of a new period in the ministry of Jeremiah. These events, together with
the accession of Zedekiah as Nebuchadnezzar's nominee, very largely
altered the state of affairs in Jerusalem. And yet the two main features
of the situation were unchanged--the people and the government
persistently disregarded Jeremiah's exhortations. "Neither Zedekiah, nor
his servants, nor the people of the land, did hearken unto the words of
Jehovah which He spake by the prophet Jeremiah."[101] They would not
obey the will of Jehovah as to their life and worship, and they would
not submit to Nebuchadnezzar. "Zedekiah ... did evil in the sight of
Jehovah, according to all that Jehoiakim had done; ... and Zedekiah
rebelled against the king of Babylon."[102]
It is remarkable that though Jeremiah consistently urged submission to
Babylon, the various arrangements made by Nebuchadnezzar did very little
to improve the prophet's position or increase his influence. The
Chaldean king may have seemed ungrateful only because he was ignorant of
the services rendered to him--Jeremiah would not enter into direct and
personal co-operation with the enemy of his country, even with him whom
Jehovah had appointed to be the scourge of His disobedient people--but
the Chaldean policy served Nebuchadnezzar as little as it profited
Jeremiah. Jehoiakim, in spite of his forced submission, remained the
able and determined foe of his suzerain, and Zedekiah, to the best of
his very limited ability, followed his predecessor's example.
Zedekiah was uncle of Jehoiachin, half-brother of Jehoiakim, and own
brother to Jehoahaz.[103] Possibly the two brothers owed their bias
against Jeremiah and his teaching to their mother, Josiah's wife
Hamutal, the daughter of another Jeremiah, the Libnite. Ezekiel thus
describes the appointment of the new king: "The king of Babylon ...
took one of the seed royal, and made a covenant with him; he also put
him under an oath, and took away the mighty of the land: that the
kingdom might be base, that it might not lift itself up, but that by
keeping of his covenant it might stand."[104] Apparently
Nebuchadnezzar was careful to choose a feeble prince for his "base
kingdom"; all that we read of Zedekiah suggests that he was weak and
incapable. Henceforth the sovereign counted for little in the
internal struggles of the tottering state. Josiah had firmly
maintained the religious policy of Jeremiah, and Jehoiakim, as firmly,
the opposite policy; but Zedekiah had neither the strength nor the
firmness to enforce a consistent policy and to make one party
permanently dominant. Jeremiah and his enemies were left to fight it
out amongst themselves, so that now their antagonism grew more bitter
and pronounced than during any other reign.
But whatever advantage the prophet might derive from the weakness of
the sovereign was more than counterbalanced by the recent deportation.
In selecting the captives Nebuchadnezzar had sought merely to weaken
Judah by carrying away every one who would have been an element of
strength to the "base kingdom." Perhaps he rightly believed that
neither the prudence of the wise nor the honour of the virtuous would
overcome their patriotic hatred of subjection; weakness alone would
guarantee the obedience of Judah. He forgot that even weakness is apt
to be foolhardy--when there is no immediate prospect of penalty.
One result of his policy was that the enemies and friends of Jeremiah
were carried away indiscriminately; there was no attempt to leave
behind those who might have counselled submission to Babylon as the
acceptance of a Divine judgment, and thus have helped to keep Judah
loyal to its foreign master. On the contrary Jeremiah's disciples were
chiefly thoughtful and honourable men, and Nebuchadnezzar's policy in
taking away "the mighty of the land" bereft the prophet of many
friends and supporters, amongst them his disciple Ezekiel and
doubtless a large class of whom Daniel and his three friends might be
taken as types. When Jeremiah characterises the captives as "good
figs" and those left behind as "bad figs,"[105] and the judgment is
confirmed and amplified by Ezekiel,[106] we may be sure that most of
the prophet's adherents were in exile.
We have already had occasion to compare the changes in the religious
policy of the Jewish government to the alternations of Protestant and
Romanist sovereigns among the Tudors; but no Tudor was as feeble as
Zedekiah. He may rather be compared to Charles IX. of France, helpless
between the Huguenots and the League. Only the Jewish factions were
less numerous, less evenly balanced; and by the speedy advance of
Nebuchadnezzar civil dissensions were merged in national ruin.
The opening years of the new reign passed in nominal allegiance to
Babylon. Jeremiah's influence would be used to induce the vassal king to
observe the covenant he had entered into and to be faithful to his oath
to Nebuchadnezzar. On the other hand a crowd of "patriotic" prophets
urged Zedekiah to set up once more the standard of national
independence, to "come to the help of the Lord against the mighty." Let
us then briefly consider Jeremiah's polemic against the princes,
prophets, and priests of his people. While Ezekiel in a celebrated
chapter[107] denounces the idolatry of the princes, priests, and women
of Judah, their worship of creeping things and abominable beasts, their
weeping for Tammuz, their adoration of the sun, Jeremiah is chiefly
concerned with the perverse policy of the government and the support it
receives from priests and prophets, who profess to speak in the name of
Jehovah. Jeremiah does not utter against Zedekiah any formal judgment
like those on his three predecessors. Perhaps the prophet did not regard
this impotent sovereign as the responsible representative of the state,
and when the long-expected catastrophe at last befell the doomed people,
neither Zedekiah nor his doings distracted men's attention from their
own personal sufferings and patriotic regrets. At the point where a
paragraph on Zedekiah would naturally have followed that on Jehoiachin,
we have by way of summary and conclusion to the previous sections a
brief denunciation of the shepherds of Israel.
"Woe unto the shepherds that destroy and scatter the sheep of My
pasture!... Ye have scattered My flock, and driven them away, and have
not cared for them; behold, I will visit upon you the evil of your
doings."
These "shepherds" are primarily the kings, Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and
Jehoiachin, who have been condemned by name in the previous chapter,
together with the unhappy Zedekiah, who is too insignificant to be
mentioned. But the term shepherds will also include the ruling and
influential classes of which the king was the leading representative.
The image is a familiar one in the Old Testament and is found in the
oldest literature of Israel,[108] but the denunciation of the rulers of
Judah as unfaithful shepherds is characteristic of Jeremiah, Ezekiel,
and one of the prophecies appended to the Book of Zechariah.[109]
Ezekiel xxxiv. expands this figure and enforces its lessons:--
"Woe unto the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves!
Should not the shepherds feed the sheep? Ye eat the fat, and
ye clothe you with the wool.
Ye kill the fatlings; but ye feed not the sheep.
The diseased have ye not strengthened,
Neither have ye healed the sick,
Neither have ye bound up the bruised,
Neither have ye brought back again that which was driven
away,
Neither have ye sought for that which was lost,
But your rule over them has been harsh and violent.
And for want of a shepherd, they were scattered,
And became food for every beast of the field."[110]
So in Zechariah ix., etc., Jehovah's anger is kindled against the
shepherds, because they do not pity His flock.[111] Elsewhere[112]
Jeremiah speaks of the kings of all nations as shepherds, and pronounces
against them also a like doom. All these passages illustrate the concern
of the prophets for good government. They were neither Pharisees nor
formalists; their religious ideals were broad and wholesome. Doubtless
the elect remnant will endure through all conditions of society; but the
Kingdom of God was not meant to be a pure Church in a rotten state. This
present evil world is no manure heap to fatten the growth of holiness:
it is rather a mass for the saints to leaven.
Both Jeremiah and Ezekiel turn from the unfaithful shepherds whose
"hungry sheep look up and are not fed" to the true King of Israel, the
"Shepherd of Israel that led Joseph like a flock, and dwelt between
the Cherubim." In the days of the Restoration He will raise up
faithful shepherds, and over them a righteous Branch, the real Jehovah
Zidqenu, instead of the sapless twig who disgraced the name
"Zedekiah." Similarly Ezekiel promises that God will set up one
shepherd over His people, "even My servant David." The pastoral care
of Jehovah for His people is most tenderly and beautifully set forth
in the twenty-third Psalm. Our Lord, the root and the offspring of
David, claims to be the fulfilment of ancient prophecy when He calls
Himself "the Good Shepherd." The words of Christ and of the Psalmist
receive new force and fuller meaning when we contrast their pictures
of the true Shepherd with the portraits of the Jewish kings drawn by
the prophets. Moreover the history of this metaphor warns us against
ignoring the organic life of the Christian society, the Church, in our
concern for the spiritual life of the individual. As Sir Thomas More
said, in applying this figure to Henry VIII., "Of the multitude of
sheep cometh the name of a shepherd."[113] A shepherd implies not
merely a sheep, but a flock; His relation to each member is tender and
personal, but He bestows blessings and requires service in fellowship
with the Family of God.
By a natural sequence the denunciation of the unfaithful shepherds is
followed by a similar utterance "concerning the prophets." It is true
that the prophets are not spoken of as shepherds; and Milton's use of
the figure in _Lycidas_ suggests the New Testament rather than the
Old. Yet the prophets had a large share in guiding the destinies of
Israel in politics as well as in religion, and having passed sentence
on the shepherds--the kings and princes--Jeremiah turns to the
ecclesiastics, chiefly, as the heading implies, to the prophets. The
priests indeed do not escape, but Jeremiah seems to feel that they are
adequately dealt with in two or th
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