JEREMIAH ירמיהו

The Book of Jeremiah is also called The Prophecy Of Jeremias. The superscription in chapter Jeremiah 1:1–3 identifies the book as “the words of Jeremiah, son of Hilkiah.” Of all the prophets, Jeremiah comes through most clearly as a person, ruminating to his scribe Baruch about his role as a servant of God with little good news for his audience.

His book is intended as a message to the Jews in exile in Babylon, explaining the disaster of exile as God’s response to Israel’s pagan worship: the people say, Jeremiah, is like an unfaithful wife and rebellious children, their infidelity and rebelliousness made judgment inevitable, although restoration and a new covenant are foreshadowed. The authentic oracles of Jeremiah are probably to be found in the poetic sections of chapters 1–25.

The major parts of the book are usually delineated as follows: prophecies against Judah and Jerusalem (chapters 1–25), narratives about Jeremiah (chapters 26–45), prophecies against foreign nations (chapters 46–51), and a historical appendix (chapter 52).

An unusual feature of this book is the “confessions” of Jeremiah, a group of individual laments reflecting the personal struggles precipitated by the prophet’s role as the spokesman of a message so unpopular that it evoked imprisonments and threats to his life.

Covenant: Much of Jeremiah’s prophetic preaching are based on the theme of the covenant between God and Israel (God would protect the people in return for their exclusive worship of him): Jeremiah insists that the covenant is conditional, and can be broken by Israel’s apostasy (worship of gods other than Yahweh, the God of Israel).

The people, says Jeremiah, are like an unfaithful wife and rebellious children: their infidelity and rebelliousness make judgment inevitable. Interspersed with this are references to repentance and renewal, although it is unclear whether Jeremiah thought that repentance could ward off a judgment or whether it would have to follow judgment.

The theme of restoration is strongest in chapter 31:32, which looks to a future in which a new covenant is made with Israel and Judah, one which will not be broken. This is the theme of the “new covenant” passage in chapter 31:31–34, drawing on Israel’s past relationship with God through the covenant at Sinai to foresee a new future in which Israel will be obedient to God.

Prophetic gestures also known as sign acts or symbolic actions were a form of communication in which a message was delivered by performing symbolic actions. Not unique to the book of Jeremiah, these were often bizarre and violated the cultural norms of the time.

They served the purposes of both drawing an audience and causing that audience to ask questions, giving the prophet an opportunity to explain the meaning of the behavior.

According to its opening verses, the book records the prophetic utterances of the priest Jeremiah son of Hilkiah, “to whom the word of YHWH came in the days of king Josiah” and after. Jeremiah lived during a turbulent period, the final years of the kingdom of Judah, from the death of king Josiah and the loss of independence that followed, through the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and the exile of much of its population.

The book depicts a remarkably introspective prophet, impetuous and often angered by the role into which he has been thrust, alternating efforts to warn the people with pleas to God for mercy until he is ordered to “pray no more for this people.” He engages in extensive performance art, walking about in the streets with a yoke about his neck and engaging in other efforts to attract attention. He is taunted and retaliates, is thrown in jail as the result, and at one point is thrown into a pit to die.

Jeremiah and the Deuteronomists: From the Deuteronomistic perspective the prophetic role implied, more than anything else, concern with law and covenant after the manner of Moses. In this reading Jeremiah was the last of a long line of prophets sent to warn Israel of the consequences of infidelity to God; unlike the Deuteronomists, for whom the call for repentance was always central, Jeremiah seems at some point in his career to have decided that further intercession was pointless and that Israel’s fate was sealed.

The Book of Jeremiah goes into detail regarding the prophet’s private life, his experiences, and his imprisonment. The book also proclaims many prophecies of Yahweh, the God of Israel. Jeremiah, also called the “weeping prophet,” was closely involved in the political and religious events of a crucial era.

His spiritual leadership helped his fellow countrymen survive disasters that included the capture of Jerusalem by the Babylonians and the exile of many Judaeans to Babylonia.

Jeremiah was born and grew up in the village of Anathoth, a few miles northeast of Jerusalem, in a priestly family. In his childhood, he must have learned some of the traditions of his people, particularly the prophecies of Hosea, whose influence can be seen in his early messages.

The era in which Jeremiah lived was one of transition for the ancient Near East. The Assyrian empire, which had been dominant for two centuries, declined and fell. Its capital, Nineveh, was captured by the Babylonians and Medes. Egypt had a brief period of resurgence but did not prove strong enough to establish an empire.

The new world power was the Neo-Babylonian empire, ruled by a Chaldean dynasty whose best-known king was Nebuchadrezzar. The small and comparatively insignificant state of Judah had been a vassal of Assyria and, when Assyria declined, asserted its independence for a short time. Subsequently, Judah vacillated its allegiance between Babylonia and Egypt and ultimately became a province of the Neo-Babylonian empire.

Jeremiah began his prophetic career during King Josiah’s reign. It is told there that he responded to Yahweh’s (God’s) call to prophesy by protesting “I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth,” but he received Yahweh’s assurance that he would put his own words into Jeremiah’s mouth and make him a “prophet to the nations.”

Jeremiah’s early messages to the people were condemnations of them for their false worship and social injustice, with a summons to repentance. He proclaimed the coming of a foe from the north, symbolized by a boiling pot facing from the north in one of his visions, that would cause great destruction.

One year, King Josiah instituted far-reaching reforms based upon a book discovered in the Temple of Jerusalem in the course of building repairs, which was probably Deuteronomy or some part of it.

Josiah’s reforms included the purification of worship from pagan practices, the centralization of all sacrificial rites in the Temple of Jerusalem, and perhaps an effort to establish social justice following principles of earlier prophets (this program constituted what has been called “the Deuteronomic reforms”).

Jeremiah 1:5 – “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart; I appointed you as a prophet to the nations.”

Jeremiah 2:4 – “Hear the word of the Lord, O house of Jacob, and all the families of the house of Israel.”

Jeremiah 17:9 – “The heart is deceitful above all things and beyond cure. Who can understand it?”

Jeremiah 29:10-11 – “This is what the LORD says: ‘When seventy years are completed for Babylon, I will come to you and fulfill my gracious promise to bring you back to this place. For I know the plans I have for you,’ declares the LORD, ‘plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.’”

Jeremiah 31:31 – “‘Behold, days are coming,’ declares the Lord, ‘when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah,’”

Jeremiah 33:3 – “Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know.”

Jeremiah 52:12-13 – “On the tenth day of the fifth month, in the nineteenth year of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, Nebuzaradan commander of the imperial guard, who served the king of Babylon, came to Jerusalem. He set fire to the temple of the LORD, the royal palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem. Every important building he burned down.”