Text -- Jeremiah 28:9-17 (NET)

28:9 So if a prophet prophesied peace and prosperity, it was only known that the Lord truly sent him when what he prophesied came true.” 28:10 The prophet Hananiah then took the yoke off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck and broke it. 28:11 Then he spoke up in the presence of all the people. “The Lord says, ‘In the same way I will break the yoke of servitude of all the nations to King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon before two years are over.’” After he heard this, the prophet Jeremiah departed and went on his way. 28:12 But shortly after the prophet Hananiah had broken the yoke off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck, the Lord spoke to Jeremiah. 28:13 “Go and tell Hananiah that the Lord says, ‘You have indeed broken the wooden yoke. But you have only succeeded in replacing it with an iron one! 28:14 For the Lord God of Israel who rules over all says, “I have put an irresistible yoke of servitude on all these nations so they will serve King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. And they will indeed serve him. I have even given him control over the wild animals.”’” 28:15 Then the prophet Jeremiah told the prophet Hananiah, “Listen, Hananiah! The Lord did not send you! You are making these people trust in a lie! 28:16 So the Lord says, ‘I will most assuredly remove you from the face of the earth. You will die this very year because you have counseled rebellion against the Lord.’” 28:17 In the seventh month of that very same year the prophet Hananiah died.

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Jer 28:12

Some time after.

Wesley: Jer 28:13

Thou hast further incensed God against them, and provoked him to make their judgment heavier.

Wesley: Jer 28:17

Within two months after Jeremiah had thus prophesied; so dangerous a thing it is for ministers to teach people contrary to the revealed will of God.

JFB: Jer 28:9

Hananiah had given no warning as to the need of conversion, but had foretold prosperity unconditionally. Jeremiah does not say that all are true prophets who foretell truths in any instance (which Deu 13:1-2, disproves); but asserts only the converse, namely, that whoever, as Hananiah, predicts what the event does not confirm, is a false prophet. There are two tests of prophets: (1) The event, Deu 18:22. (2) The word of God, Isa 8:20.

JFB: Jer 28:10

(Jer 27:2). Impious audacity to break what God had appointed as a solemn pledge of the fulfilment of His word. Hence Jeremiah deigns no reply (Jer 28:11; Mat 7:6).

JFB: Jer 28:11

Opposed to Jer 27:7.

JFB: Jer 28:13

Not here, "Thou hast broken . . . wood," and "I will make . . . iron" (compare Jer 28:16). The same false prophets who, by urging the Jews to rebel, had caused them to throw off the then comparatively easy yoke of Babylon, thereby brought on them a more severe yoke imposed by that city. "Yokes of iron," alluding to Deu 28:48. It is better to take up a light cross in our way, than to pull a heavier on our own heads. We may escape destroying providences by submitting to humbling providences. So, spiritually, contrast the "easy yoke" of Christ with the "yoke of bondage" of the law (Act 15:10; Gal 5:1).

JFB: Jer 28:14

Though Hananiah and those like him were secondary instruments in bringing the iron yoke on Judea, God was the great First Cause (Jer 27:4-7).

JFB: Jer 28:15

(Jer 29:31; Eze 13:22).

JFB: Jer 28:16

The prediction was uttered in the fifth month (Jer 28:1); Hananiah's death took place in the seventh month, that is, within two months after the prediction, answering with awful significance to the two years in which Hananiah had foretold that the yoke imposed by Babylon would end.

JFB: Jer 28:16

Opposition to God's plain direction, that all should submit to Babylon (Jer 29:32).

Clarke: Jer 28:9

When the word of the prophet shall come to pass - Here is the criterion. He is a true prophet who specifies things that he says shall happen, and also fixes the time of the event; and the things do happen, and in that time

You say that Nebuchadnezzar shall not overthrow this city; and that in two years from this time, not only the sacred vessels already taken away shall be restored, but also that Jeconiah and all the Jewish captives shall be restored, and the Babylonish yoke broken, see Jer 28:2, Jer 28:3, Jer 28:4. Now I say that Nebuchadnezzar will come this year, and destroy this city, and lead away the rest of the people into captivity, and the rest of the sacred vessels; and that there will be no restoration of any kind till seventy years from this time.

Clarke: Jer 28:10

Then Hananiah - took the yoke - and brake it - He endeavored by this symbolical act to persuade them of the truth of his prediction.

Clarke: Jer 28:13

Yokes of iron - Instead of Nebuchadnezzar’ s yoke being broken, this captivity shall be more severe than the preceding. All these nations shall have a yoke of iron on their neck. He shall subdue them and take all their property, even the beasts of the field.

Clarke: Jer 28:15

Hear now, Hananiah; the Lord hath not sent thee - This was a bold speech in the presence of those priests and people who were prejudiced in favor of this false prophet, who prophesied to them smooth things. In such cases men wish to be deceived.

Clarke: Jer 28:16

This year thou shalt die - By this shall the people know who is the true prophet. Thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord, and God will cut thee off; and this shall take place, not within seventy years, or two years, but in this very year, and within two months from this time.

Clarke: Jer 28:17

So Hananiah - died the same year in the seventh month - The prophecy was delivered in the fifth month, (Jer 28:1), and Hananiah died in the seventh month. And thus God, in mercy, gave him about two months, in which he might prepare to meet his Judge. Here, then the true prophet was demonstrated, and the false prophet detected. The death of Hananiah thus predicted, was God’ s seal to the words of his prophet; and must have gained his other predictions great credit among the people.

Calvin: Jer 28:9

Jeremiah seems here to conclude that those alone are to be deemed true prophets who prove by the event that they have been sent from above; and it not only appears that this may be gathered from his words, but it may also be shewn to be the definition of a true prophet; for when the event corresponds with the prophecy, there is no doubt but that he who predicted what comes to pass must have been sent by God. But we must bear in mind what is said in Deu 13:1, where God reminds the people that even when the event answers to the prophecy, the prophets are not to be thoughtlessly and indiscriminately believed, as though they predicted what was true;

“for God,” he says, “tries thee,” that is, proves thy faith, whether thou wilt be easily carried away by every wind of doctrine.”

But there are two passages, spoken by Moses himself, which at the first sight seem to militate the one against the other. We have already quoted the first from Deu 13:0; we have the other in the Deu 18:18,

“The prophet who has predicted what is found to be true,
I have sent him.”

God seems there to acknowledge as his faithful servants those who foretell what is true. But Moses had before reminded the people that even impostors sometimes speak the truth, but that they ought not on this account to be believed. But we must remember what God often declares by Isaiah, when he claims to himself alone the foreknowledge of things,

“Go,” he says, “and inquire whether the gods of the Gentiles will answer as to future things.” (Isa 44:7)

We see that God ascribes to himself alone this peculiarity, that he foreknows future events and testifies respecting them. And surely nothing can be more clear than that God alone can speak of hidden things: men, indeed, can conjecture this or that, but they are often mistaken.

With regard to the devil, I pass by those refined disquisitions with which Augustine especially wearied himself; for above all other things he toiled on this point, how the devils reveal future and hidden things? He speculated, as I have said, in too refined a manner. But the solution of the difficulty, as to the subject now in hand, may be easily given. We first conclude, that future events cannot be known but by God alone, and that, therefore, prescience is his exclusive property, so that nothing that is future or hidden can be predicted but by him alone. But, then, it does not follow that God does not permit liberty to the devil and his ministers to foretell something that is true. How? As the case was with Balaam, who was an impostor, ready to let on hire or to sell his prophecies, as it is well known, and yet he was a prophet. But it was a peculiar gift to foretell things: whence had he this? Not from the devil any farther than it pleased God; and yet the truth had no other fountain than God himself and his Spirit. When, therefore, the devil declares what is true, it is as it were extraneous and adventitious.

Now, as we have said, that God is the source of truth, it follows that the prophets sent by him cannot be mistaken; for they exceed not the limits of their call, and so they do not speak falsely of hidden things; but when they declare this or that, they have him as their teacher. But these terms, as they say, are not convertible — to foretell what is true and to be a true prophet: for some, as I have said, predict what is found afterwards by trial and experience to be true, and yet they are impostors; nor did God, in the eighteenth chapter of Deuteronomy, intend to give a certain definition by which his own prophets are to be distinguished; but as he saw that the Israelites would be too credulous, so as greedily to lay hold on anything that might have been said, he intended to restrain that excess, and to correct that immoderate ardor. Hence he commanded them to expect the event, as though he had said, “If any arise among you who will promise this or that in my name, do not immediately receive what they may announce; but the event will shew whether I have sent them.” So also, in this place, Jeremiah says, that the true prophets of God had spoken efficiently, as they had predicted nothing but what God had ratified and really proved to have come from him.

Thus, then, we ought to think of most, that is, that those who predict what is true are for the most part the prophets of God: this is to be taken as the general rule. But we cannot hence conclude, that all those who apparently predict this or that, are sent by God, so that the whole of what they teach is true: for one particular prophecy would not be sufficient to prove the truth of all that is taught and preached. It is enough that God condemns their vanity who speak from their own hearts or from their own brains, when the event does not correspond. At the same time he points out his own prophets by this evidence, — that he really shews that he has sent them, when he fulfils what has been predicted by them. As to false prophets there is a special reason why God permits to them so much liberty, for the world is worthy of such reward, when it willingly offers itself to be deceived. Satan, the father of lies, lays everywhere his snares for men, and they who run into them, and wish to cast themselves on his tenterhooks, deserve to be given up to believe a lie, as they will not, as Paul says, believe the truth. (2Th 2:10.)

We now then see what was the object of Jeremiah: his design was not to prove that all were true prophets who predicted something that was true, for this was not, his subject; but he took up another point, — that all who predicted this or that, which was afterwards found to be vain, were thus convicted of falsehood. If then any one predicted what was to be, and the thing itself came not to pass, it was a sufficient proof of his presumption: it hence appeared, that he was not sent of God as he boasted. This was the object of Jeremiah, nor did he go beyond it; for he did not discuss the point, whether all who predicted true things were sent from above, and whether all their doctrines were to be credited and they believed indiscriminately; this was not the subject handled by Jeremiah; but he shewed that Hananiah was a false prophet, for it would appear evident after two years that he had vainly spoken of what he had not received from God’s Spirit. And the same thing Moses had in view, as I have already explained.

As to the prophets, who had been in all ages and prophesied respecting many lands and great kingdoms, they must be considered as exclusively the true prophets: for though there had been some prophets among heathen nations, yet Jeremiah would not have thought them worthy of so great an honor; and it would have been to blend together sacred and profane things, had he placed these vain foretellers and the true prophets in the same rank. But we know that all God’s servants had so directed their discourse to the elect people, as yet to speak of foreign kingdoms and of far countries; and this has not been without reason distinctly expressed; for when they spoke of any monarchy they could not of themselves conjecture what would be: it was therefore necessary for them thus to speak by the impulse of the Holy Spirit. Were I disposed to assume more than what is lawful, and to pretend that I possess some special gift of prophesying, I could more easily lie and deceive, were I to speak only of one city, and of the state of things open before my eyes, than if I extended my predictions to distant countries: when therefore Jeremiah says that the prophets had spoken of divers and large countries, and of most powerful kingdoms, he intimates that their predictions could not have been ascribed to human conjectures; for were any one possessed of the greatest acuteness, and were he to surpass angels in intelligence, he yet could not predict what is hereafter to take place in lands beyond the seas But whatever had been predicted by the prophets, God sanctioned it by the events of time. It then follows that their call was at the same time sanctioned; that is, when God as it were ratified from heaven what they had spoken on earth. Whether therefore the prophets spoke of peace, that is, of prosperity, or of war, famine, and pestilence, when experience proved that true which they had said, their own authority was at the same time confirmed, as though God had shewed that they had been sent by him.

We must also notice the word באמת , beamet, he says that God sent them in truth He condemns here the boldness which impostors ever assume; for they surpass God’s faithful servants in boasting that they have been sent. As then they were thus insolent, and by a fallacious pretense of having been called to their office, deceived unwary men, the Prophet adds here this clause, intimating that they were not all sent in truth. He thus conceded some sort of a call to these unprincipled men, but yet shewed how much they differed from God’s servants, whose call was sealed by God himself. It follows —

Calvin: Jer 28:10

It was not enough for the impostor to resist the holy servant of God to his face, without laying sacrilegious hands on that visible symbol, by which it had pleased God to testify that the Prophet’s message was true. For such was the tardiness of the people, nay, their insensibility, that they could not be much moved by words; therefore God added a symbol, for Jeremiah carried cords or bands around his neck: and it was a sign of reproach before men, yet, in order to touch the people, he refused not to undergo that reproach.

The band then on the neck of Jeremiah was like a sacrament; for it was a visible sign to establish the credit of his message. And what did Hananiah do? After having insolently inveighed against Jeremiah, and promised deliverance to the people after two years, he violently broke and took off the cord or the band which Jeremiah had around his neck.

We hence see how great and how impetuous is the fury of those whom the devil impels: for when once they arrive at that degree of temerity as to dare to resist the word of God, and, were it possible, to cast him from his own throne, they spare no symbols of his power and glory. We ought especially to notice this madness of Hananiah; for he not only resisted God’s servant, and endeavored to subvert his prophecy, but also snatched away the bands, that he might set up the falsehood of the devil in opposition to the true sacrament. This sign, as we have said, availed to confirm the prophecy of which we have heard; but what was done by Hananiah? he not only took away that sign, but by breaking the bands he attracted the attention of men, and by such a representation made them to believe that there would be in two years a deliverance. Then Hananiah displayed his furious zeal in two ways; for he profaned that symbol which Jeremiah had adopted according to God’s command, and he also took it away, as though he aimed to be above God, and to overthrow his truth, and would triumph over it.

The same thing we now see done under the Papacy: for we know that what Christ had commanded has been either corrupted, or obscured, or blotted out by them; and they have also devised fictitious sacraments and innumerable pompous rites, by which they fascinate foolish and credulous men. The same did Hananiah; and therefore his disciples and imitators are the Papists; who not only reject or extenuate the testimonies which have come from God, but plainly dishonor his sacraments by arrogantly bringing forward their own devices and inventions.

Calvin: Jer 28:11

We must also notice how craftily this impostor insinuated himself; for he seemed to imitate the true prophets of God, for he set a sign before the people, and then added a doctrine. The Papists have their empty signs, but they only delight the eyes, while yet they have no care nor concern for the ears. But Hananiah came still nearer to God’s servants, so that he might deceive even those who were not stupid. What, indeed, could we desire more in this man than that he should set forth a sign? He also added the name of God and declared what was his purpose, in this manner will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar: nor did he speak in his own name, but assumed the person of God, Thus saith Jehovah, I will break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar.

But as we have elsewhere said, this preposterous imitation of the devil ought not to disturb pious minds; for God ever supplies his own people with the spirit of discernment, provided they humbly pray to him. And therefore whenever Jeremiah repeated the word prophet, which he conceded to Hananiah, as he assumed it himself, for whenever he spoke of Hananiah, he honored him with this name, even that he was a prophet, — the holy man was not ignorant what an occasion of offense it was, when a prophet, who is so acknowledged in the Church of God, is yet the minister of Satan, a liar and an impostor. But his object was to warn us in due time, lest novelty should frighten us when any boasts of the title of a prophet. So the Papists brag that they are prelates and bishops, and boast that they are the successors of the Apostles: but the devil is their chief, who calls himself the Vicar of Christ on the earth. Then Jeremiah designedly called Hananiah so many times a prophet, so that our faith, when any such thing happens to us, may not fail, as though some new thing had taken place. I cannot to-day finish the last part of the verse.

Calvin: Jer 28:12

It hence appears that Jeremiah had regard only to the common benefit of the people, and that he wisely kept silence for a time, that he might not throw pearls before swine, and thus expose in a manner the holy name of God to the insolence of the ungodly. He therefore waited until he might again go forth with new messages, and thus secure more credit to himself. For had he contended longer with Hananiah, contentions would have been kindled on every side, there would have been no hearing in a tumult, and the Jews would have wholly disregarded anything he might have then spoken. But as he had withdrawn from the crowd, and was afterwards sent by God, the Jews could not have so presumptuously despised him or his doctrine. This, then, was the reason why he was for a short time silent.

If he feared and trembled in the midst of these commotions, God in due time confirmed him by giving him new commands: The word of Jehovah, he says, came to Jeremiah, after Hananiah broke the band from his neck. By these words he intimates, that the ungodly, however insolently they may rise up against God, ever depart with shame and reproach. For Hananiah had not only opposed Jeremiah by his words and tongue, but had also broken the cords or bands from his neck. This, then, the Prophet now repeats, in order that he might shew, as it were by his finger, that Hananiah by his audacity gained nothing, except that he rendered his vanity more notorious.

Calvin: Jer 28:13

Now it is an abrupt sentence when he says, Go and speak to Hananiah, saying, Thus saith Jehovah, Thou hast broken the wooden bands; but make to thee iron bands; Jeremiah does not keep to the same point; for in the first clause he relates what he had been commanded to say to Hananiah; and in the second he relates what God had commanded him to do, even iron bands. But there is no obscurity as to the meaning; for doubtless the Prophet might have arranged his words thus, “Thou hast broken the bands from my neck; but God has commanded me to make new ones from iron.” ¹⁹⁹ Though Jeremiah, then, only tells us here that God commanded him to make iron bands, it may yet be easily concluded that when he spoke of wooden bands he at the same time added what he relates of iron bands, but in a different connection., Now follows the explanation, —

Calvin: Jer 28:14

It would have been a vain spectacle, had Jeremiah brought only his iron band around his neck; but when he added an explanation of the symbol, he no doubt prevailed on many to believe his prophecy, and rendered those inexcusable who had hardened themselves in their wickedness. But it is worthy of being observed, that God replaced the wooden bands with iron bands; and he did this, because the whole people had through their foolish and wicked consent approved of the madness of that impostor, who had dared to profane that symbol, by which God had testified that he did not speak in vain, but seriously by the mouth of his servant.

A profitable doctrine may be hence elicited, — that the ungodly by barking against God gain nothing, except that they kindle more and more his wrath, and thus render double their own evils, like a dog, who being ensnared obstinately strives to extricate himself from the snare and to shake it off, and thus strangles himself. In like manner the ungodly, the more they resist God, the heavier judgment they procure for themselves. And, therefore, whenever God declares to us that he is offended with our sins, we ought to take heed, lest while we seek to break the wooden bands, he be preparing and forming for us iron bands. Our condition will ever become worse, unless we humbly deprecate God’s wrath as soon as it appears, and also patiently submit to his scourges when he chastises us for our offenses. We ought then to bear this in mind as to the wooden and iron bands.

He adds, Upon the neck of all these nations The Jews, as it has been stated, hoped that Nebuchadnezzar could be in a moment driven back beyond the Euphrates, and would be made to surrender other countries which he had occupied; and all the neighboring nations had conspired, and sent ambassadors here and there; and when the Amorites, the Moabites, and other nations gave encouragement to the Jews, they also in their turn animated others, so that they might all make an assault on the Babylonians. As, then, such a secret conspiracy gave courage to the Jews, this was the reason why the Prophet spoke of other nations. He says, And they shall serve him He had, indeed, already subdued all these countries; but the Prophet means, that the domination of the king of Babylon would continue, though Hananiah had said, that it would stand only for two years. Continuance, then, is set in opposition to a short time, as though the Prophet had said, “Let, indeed, the nations chafe and fret, but they shall abide under the yoke of King Nebuchadnezzar, and in vain shall they attempt to extricate themselves, for God has delivered them up to bondage.”

This servitude may at the same time be explained in another way; the condition of these nations was bearable, as long as Nebuchadnezzar ordered tribute to be paid; and when he sent his prefects, the object was no other than to retain possession; but when he found that they could not be otherwise subdued than by a harder servitude, he began to exercise great tyranny, though he had been before an endurable master. The same thing may be also said of the Jews; for we know that they had been tributaries to the king of Babylon; and as he had spared them, his humanity might have been deemed a sort of liberty; but when he found that a hard wood could not be split but by a hard wedge, he began more violently to oppress them. Then that servitude began which is now mentioned. The Jews, therefore, began then really to serve the king of Babylon, when he saw that they would not endure that bearable yoke which he had laid on them, but in their obstinacy and pride ever struggled against it.

The Prophet adds, The beast of the field have 1 also given him By these words he indirectly upbraids the Jews, as we have before reminded you, with their perverseness, because they perceived not that it was the righteous judgment of God, that Nebuchadnezzar imposed laws on them as a conqueror; for they would have been defended by a celestial aid, as it is said by Moses, had they not deprived themselves of it. (Deu 29:25.) As, then, they had long rejected the protection of God, hence it was that Nebuchadnezzar invaded their country and conquered them. As they now continued to bite and champ their bridle, the Prophet exposes their madness; for they did not humble themselves under the mighty hand of God, while wild beasts, void of reason and understanding, perceived that it happened through God’s secret and wonderful providence, that Nebuchadnezzar took possession of these lands. This, then, is the reason why the Prophet expressly mentioned wild beasts, as though he said, that the Jews were so refractory, that there was in them less reason, humility, and solicitude than in lions, bears, and animals of the like kind; for through the secret impulse of God the wild beasts submitted to the authority of King Nebuchadnezzar, while the Jews became more and more insolent. It was the highest madness not to acknowledge God’s judgment, while this was done by wild and savage animals. It follows, —

Calvin: Jer 28:15

There would not have been weight enough in the plain teaching of Jeremiah had he not confronted his adversary, as the case is at this day with us; when insolent and unprincipled men rise up and dare to vomit forth their blasphemies, by which they darken and degrade the doctrines of true religion, we are under the necessity to contend with them, otherwise what we teach would be ineffectual; for the minds of many, I mean the simple, are in suspense and fluctuate when they see a great conflict between two contrary parties. It was therefore necessary for the holy man to expose the lies of Hananiah, for he ever vaunted himself and boasted of his own predictions.

But what did Jeremiah say? Jehovah hath not sent thee This refutation ought to be noticed whenever we contend with Satan’s ministers and false teachers; for whatever they may pretend, and with whatever masks they may cover their lies, this one thing ought to be more than sufficient to put an end to their boastings, — that they have not been sent by the Lord. Jeremiah might have contended in a long speech with Hananiah, for he might have been made sufficiently eloquent through the Holy Spirit suggesting and dictating whatever was needful on the subject; but this concise brevity produced much greater effect than if he had made great display and used many words. Let this, then, be borne in mind, that wherever there is a controversy about religion, we ought ever to ask whether he who speaks has been sent by God; for whatever he may babble, though the most acute, and though he may talk things which may fill with wonder the minds of the simple, yet all this is nothing but smoke when his doctrine is not from God. So also we ought at this day to deal in a brief manner with those mercenary dogs of the Pope who bark against the pure truth of the Gospel; we ought to be satisfied with this compendious answer, — that God is not their master and teacher. But as our state now is different from that of the ancient people, we must observe that sent by the Lord is he only whose doctrine is according to the rule of the Law, and of the Prophets, and of the Gospel. If, then, we desire to know whom the Lord has sent, and whom he approves as his servants, let us come to the Scripture, and let there be a thorough examination; he who speaks according to the Law, the Prophets, and the Gospel, has a sure and an indubitable evidence of his divine call; but he who cannot prove that he draws what he advances from these fountains, whatever his pretences may be, ought to be repudiated as a false prophet. We hence see what an important instruction this passage contains.

He then adds, Thou hast made this people to rely on falsehood They pervert the meaning of the Prophet who thus render the words, “Thou hast falsely rendered this people secure,” at least they lessen by one half what the Prophet intended to express; for not only is Hananiah condemned because he vainly and falsely pretended God’s name, but the word שקר , shicor, is introduced, the very thing employed; as though he had said, “Thou feedest this people with a vain hope which thou hast formed in thine own brains; therefore thy fictions make this people to go astray.” Hence Jeremiah not only accused this impostor that he by his fictions deceived the people, but also that he brought forward his prophecies in God’s name; and these removed their fear and gave them some hope, so that the people became torpid in their security.

Let us learn from this passage that we ought especially to take heed when the ground of trust is the subject, lest we rely on any empty or perishable thing, like wretched hypocrites who devour shadows only, and afterwards find nothing solid in their own fictions. But when we refer to trust, let there be something solid on which we can safely rely; and we know that we cannot possibly be disappointed, if we look to God for all things, if we recumb on his mercy alone; for there is no rest nor peace for us anywhere else but in Christ. Let us then retain this object of trust, and let it be our only support. It follows, —

Calvin: Jer 28:16

Here is added the punishment which confirmed the prophecy of Jeremiah; for it was God’s purpose to have regard to the ignorance of many who would have otherwise stumbled, or made their ignorance a pretext, for they could not determine which of the two had been sent by God, Hananiah or Jeremiah. It was then God’s design, in his paternal indulgence, to stretch forth his hand to them, and also in an especial manner to render inexcusable the unbelieving who had already given themselves up, as it were, to the devil; for the greater part were not moved by an event, so memorable; ²⁰⁰ for it follows immediately, —

Calvin: Jer 28:17

All those who had disregarded Jeremiah saw, in a manner, before their eyes the judgment of God. No surer confirmation could have been expected by the Jews, had they a particle of understanding, than to see the impostor slain by the word of Jeremiah alone; for he never touched him with a finger, nor caused him to be led to punishment, though he deserved this; but he drove him out of the world by the mere sound of his tongue. As, then, the word of the holy Prophet had a celestial and divine power, as though God himself had fulminated from heaven, or with an armed hand had slain that ungodly man, how great was their blindness not to be moved! However, they were not moved; hence some of the Rabbins, wishing to conceal, as their manner is, the reproach of their own nation, imagine that the disciples of Hananiah secretly took away his body, and that then the people knew nothing of his death. But what need is there of such an evasion as this? for Jeremiah says no such thing, but speaks of the event as well known; it was indeed a sure testimony of his own call. It hence follows that it was not unknown to the Jews; and yet the devil had so blinded the greatest part of them, that they paid no more attention to the holy man than before; on the contrary, they wholly disregarded those threatenings of which he had been the witness and herald.

But how does this appear? the greatest part of the people often rose up against him as though he was the most wicked of men; he was accused as the betrayer of his country, and hardly escaped, through the clemency of. a cruel king, when he was cast into a dungeon as one half-dead. Since, then, the Jews thus pertinaciously raged, we hence understand what the Prophet so often threatened them with, even with the spirit of giddiness, and of fury, and of madness, and of stupor, and of drunkenness. Moreover, it was needful for that small portion which was not wholly irreclaimable to be restored to the right way; and this was done by this manifest proof of Jeremiah’s call. It was also necessary on the other hand that the unbelieving should be more restrained, so that they might be condemned by their own conscience, as Paul calls heretics self-condemned who were become fixed in their own perverseness, and had willingly and designedly sold themselves as slaves to the devil.

Defender: Jer 28:15

Hananiah was prominent among the many false prophets in Judah in the days of King Zedekiah, prophesying peace and freedom when God had decreed exile and slavery because of sin pervading the nation, especially by its leaders. The test of a true prophet or any other professed spokesman for God is not whether he says what people want to hear, but whether he speaks in accord with God's Word (Isa 8:20)."

TSK: Jer 28:9

which : Jer 4:10, Jer 6:14, Jer 8:11, Jer 14:13; Eze 13:10,Eze 13:16

then : Deu 18:22; Eze 13:10-16

TSK: Jer 28:10

took : Jer 28:2, Jer 28:4, Jer 27:2, Jer 36:23, Jer 36:24; 1Ki 22:11, 1Ki 22:24, 1Ki 22:25; Mal 3:13

TSK: Jer 28:11

Thus : Jer 23:17, Jer 29:9; 1Ki 13:18, 1Ki 22:6, 1Ki 22:11, 1Ki 22:12; 2Ch 18:10,2Ch 18:22, 2Ch 18:23; Pro 14:7; Eze 13:7

Even : Jer 28:2-4, Jer 27:2-12

TSK: Jer 28:12

Jer 1:2, Jer 29:30; 2Ki 20:4; 1Ch 17:3; Dan 9:2

TSK: Jer 28:13

Thou hast : Jer 27:15; Psa 149:8; Lam 2:14

thou shalt : By encouraging an unavailing resistance to Nebuchadnezzar.

TSK: Jer 28:14

I have put : Jer 27:4, Jer 27:7, Jer 40:4; Deu 4:20, Deu 28:48; Isa 14:4-6

that they : Jer. 25:9-26; Rev 17:12, Rev 17:13

and I : Jer 27:6, Jer 27:7; Dan 2:38

TSK: Jer 28:15

The Lord : This was a bold speech, in the presence of those priests and people who were prejudiced in favour of the false prophets, who prophesied to them smooth things. Jer 28:11, Jer 14:14, Jer 14:15, Jer 23:21, Jer 27:15, Jer 29:23, Jer 29:31, Jer 29:32; 1Ki 22:23; Eze 13:2, Eze 13:3, Eze 13:22; Eze 22:28; Lam 2:14; Zec 13:3

TSK: Jer 28:16

I will : Gen 7:4; Exo 32:12; Deu 6:15; 1Ki 13:34; Amo 9:8

this year : Jer 28:3, Jer 20:6; Num 14:37, Num 16:28-35, Num 29:32; Deu 13:5-11

because : Eze 13:11, Eze 13:12; Act 13:8-11

rebellion : Heb. revolt, Jer 29:32; Deu 13:5 *marg.

TSK: Jer 28:17

Hananiah : Isa 44:25, Isa 44:26; Zec 1:6

the seventh month : The prophecy was delivered in the fifth month (Jer 29:1), and Hananiah died in the seventh month; exactly two months after he had delivered his false prophecy, which he declared, in the name of God, would be fulfilled in two years. Here then the true prophet was demonstrated, and the false prophet detected. The death of Hananiah, thus predicted, was God’ s seal to the words of His prophet, and must have gained his other predictions great credit among the people; though it is evident that it did not induce them to forsake their sins and return to the God of Israel.

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Jer 28:6-9

Jeremiah’ s own wishes concurred with Hananiah’ s prediction, but asserts that that prediction was at variance with the language of the older prophets.

Jer 28:9

Then shall the prophet ... - Or, "shall be known as the prophet whom the Lord hath truly sent."

Barnes: Jer 28:10

The multitude would see in Hananiah’ s act a symbol of deliverance.

Barnes: Jer 28:16

I will cast thee - Rather, I send thee away. God had not sent Hananiah to prophesy, but He does now send him away to die.

Taught rebellion - As Nebuchadnezzar was Yahweh’ s servant, to teach rebellion against him was to teach rebellion against his Master.

Poole: Jer 28:9

By peace is here meant prosperity, all good being by the Hebrews usually understood under the notion of peace . The prophets either prophesied evil or good, according as God revealed his will unto them; what way was for them to discover whether the prophets were truly sent of God, yea or no? It was known by the event: this was the rule God set, Deu 18:22 ,

When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken But this was not true on the contrary part, for a prophet might speak a thing, which thing might come to pass, and yet be none of the Lord’ s prophets, nor be hearkened to, as appeareth from Deu 13:1-3 . Some have thought that prophecies concerning good things always were brought to pass if the prophet were a true prophet, but it appeareth otherwise from Jer 18:9,10 . Prophecies both concerning good and evil might not come to pass, and yet the prophet be a true prophet, in case the manners of the people altered; for in all promises or threatenings of temporal good or evil there is a condition to be understood; God neither by his promises bindeth himself to do good to wicked men, nor by his threatenings tieth up his own hands from showing mercy to such as turn good: but some observe yet this difference, that good things are in Scripture never absolutely promised, but they come certainly to pass, and are fulfilled; but God for terror often threateneth evil things, without expressing any condition, when notwithstanding a condition is understood, upon the fulfilling of which the threatening cometh not to pass, as it was in the case of Nineveh, upon the prophecy of Jonah. But the greater difficulty is to determine by what rule they could judge one a true or false prophet, if they might not always judge by the event, the coming or not coming to pass of what he prophesied. I answer, they were to judge from the word of God, as well as from the event, Isa 8:20 ; therefore, Deu 13:1-3 , the people were commanded not to hearken to that prophet which should confirm what he said by a sign or wonder, if his scope were by it to persuade people to idolatry. So that if a prophet prophesied good and prosperity to any people, the people were to consider what his scope was, and whether what he prophesied was according to the law of God, which speaketh no good to a wicked impenitent people; and though what he said came to pass, yet he was to be determined no true prophet, if what he said were contrary to God’ s revealed will, or his scope in speaking of it was to harden people in sinful courses, or to seduce them from the right ways of God. Jeremiah here, as to the trial of the truth of his and Hananiah’ s contrary prophecies, appealeth to the event, telling him that he as a man heartily wished that his words might prove true.

Poole: Jer 28:10

The prophet Jeremiah’ s coming into the temple with a yoke upon his neck, as a type of the yoke of the king of Babylon, under which the Jews were to come, gave occasion to the affront given him by the false prophet; in a further degree of impudence, being thus confronted by Jeremiah, he pulls the yoke off Jeremiah’ s neck, and breaketh it in a high and impudent contempt of God, and his will revealed by this prophet, and confirmed by this yoke as a sign, adding also the following words.

Poole: Jer 28:11

As God hath his sacraments to confirm the truth of his word, of which his ministers are the stewards and administrators; so the devil hath his sacraments, of which his prophets are the administrators. God by his prophet Jeremiah had revealed his will as to the king of Babylon’ s success against many nations, and bringing them into his servitude; as a sacrament or sign of this, he had commanded Jeremiah to put on a yoke with bonds. Hananiah, the false prophet, cometh in the name of God, and declares the contrary, that within two years God would break the yoke of the king of Babylon, and free the nations in subjection to him; and as a sacrament or sign to gain credit to this falsehood, he plucks off Jeremiah’ s yoke, and breaks it, and expounds himself that God should so break the king of Babylon’ s yoke from the neck of all nations, and pretends he had a commission from God to say this. Jeremiah, not able to endure to hear such lies, goeth away in testimony of his dissent from him, and adherence to what he had said.

Poole: Jer 28:12

Some time after this, God taking notice of the affront put upon his prophet Jeremiah, for faithfully discharging the message with which he had intrusted him, revealeth his mind unto Jeremiah, that he might declare it unto the people, and particularly to this false prophet.

Poole: Jer 28:13

Jeremiah seeing the impudence of Hananiah, and that his further discourse with him would do no good, but it may be have caused more danger to himself, prophesying what was more ungrateful to the people than what the false prophet prophesied, and possibly desirous further to know the will of God, withdrew himself. Soon after God sends him back to the people and to Hananiah with this message, That he by his false prophecy had done the people no good, but much hurt, further incensed God against them, and provoked him to make their judgment heavier, giving them iron yokes instead of those of wood.

Poole: Jer 28:14

For notwithstanding all he had said, God was resolved to justify his word, and to bring them under subjection to Nebuchadnezzar, and to give all they had also into his power.

Poole: Jer 28:15

Jeremiah being a second time confirmed in the truth of his revelation, and having likewise a special revelation relating to this false prophet, comes now and tells him his doom, viz. that he should die within a year, because he had taught people to believe, and to hope for, and trust to what was false, and they were never like to see.

Poole: Jer 28:16

And because by this his doctrine he had made God a liar, contradicting his will revealed by Jeremiah, and by it taught people to hold out against Nebuchadnezzar, and not quietly to yield to him.

Poole: Jer 28:17

That is, within the compass of a year after that Jeremiah had spoken these words, within two months after that Jeremiah had thus prophesied, as appeareth from Jer 28:1 ; so dangerous a thing it is for ministers to teach people contrary to the revealed will of God.

Haydock: Jer 28:9

Truth. This criterion was given by Moses; and another was assigned in case the prophet attempted to introduce idolatry, which was not here the case, Deuteronomy xiii., and xviii. 20. (Calmet)

Haydock: Jer 28:10

Chain, or wooden yoke, chap. xxvii. 2. (Haydock)

Haydock: Jer 28:12

Way, mildly. God inspired him what to say soon after.

Haydock: Jer 28:13

Iron. Deuteronomy xxviii. 48. The rashness of Hananias brought a heavier punishment on his admirers, which is the lot of all who follow heresiarchs. (Haydock)

Haydock: Jer 28:17

Seventh month. He had spoken in the 5th of the sacred year, ver. 1. (Calmet)

Gill: Jer 28:9

The prophet which prophesieth of peace,.... Of prosperity, of good things, as Hananiah did, and which are always acceptable to men; and such a prophet is agreeable to them:

when the word of the Lord shall come to pass; when the prophecy of good things, which he delivers in the name of the Lord, shall be filled:

then shall the prophet be known that the Lord hath truly sent him; and not till then; it is the event that must make it manifest: in the other case it may be in a good measure known before it comes to pass, and, whether it comes to pass or not, that a prophet is a true prophet; because his prophecies are agreeable to the word and the declared will of God; contain evils threatened on account of sin, and in order to bring men to repentance, which must needs be right; and besides, they have no interest of their own to serve, but run contrary to the stream of the people, and are exposed to their rage and censure: whereas, a man that prophesies of peace, he is more to be suspected of flattering the people, and of prophesying out of his own heart; and nothing but the event can show him a true prophet; which if he delivers with a proviso, that the people do not do that which is evil in the sight of God, to provoke him to deny them the promised good, is always certainly fulfilled; and if it is not, then he appears manifestly a false prophet.

Gill: Jer 28:10

Then Hananiah the prophet took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah's neck,.... Which he wore as a symbol of the subjection of Judea, and other nations, to the king of Babylon: an impudent and insolent action this was, to take the prophet's yoke from his neck; and the more so, as it was by the command of God that he made it, and wore it:

and brake it; being made of wood, as it afterwards appears, and so might easily be broken.

Gill: Jer 28:11

And Hananiah spoke in the presence of all the people,.... Explaining to them his meaning, in taking the yoke, and breaking it:

saying, thus saith the Lord; wickedly making use of the Lord's name, to give countenance to his words and actions:

even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from the neck of all nations, within the space of two full years; the time he had fixed for the bringing back of the vessels of the sanctuary, Jer 28:3;

and the prophet Jeremiah went his way; showing thereby his dissent from him, and his dislike and detestation of his lies and blasphemies; patiently bearing his affronts and insolence; and prudently withdrawing to prevent riots and tumults; returning no answer till he had received one from the Lord himself, which he quickly had.

Gill: Jer 28:12

Then the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah the prophet,.... When in his own house or apartment, to which he retired; and this came to him either in a vision or dream, or by some articulate voice, or by an impulse upon his spirit, directing him what to say to the false prophet:

after that Hananiah the prophet had broken the yoke from off the neck of the Prophet Jeremiah: how long afterwards is not known, perhaps the same day; or, however, it is certain it was in the same year, and less than two months after, Jer 28:17; and very probably in a few hours after:

saying; as follows:

Gill: Jer 28:13

Go and tell Hananiah, saying, thus saith the Lord,.... Whose name he had abused; whose prophet he had ill treated; and whose prophecies he had contradicted, and the symbols of them had contumeliously used:

thou hast broken the yokes of wood: or, "bonds", or "the thongs" ^q; with which the yokes of wood were bound and fastened, as Kimchi interprets it:

but thou shall make for them yokes of iron; not Hananiah, but Jeremiah; who should prophesy of a more severe bondage the nations should be brought into by Nebuchadnezzar, in direct contradiction to Hananiah's prophecy; instead of wooden yokes, they should have iron ones; which should lie heavier, and bear harder upon them, and which could not be broken nor taken off.

Gill: Jer 28:14

For thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel,.... Under which titles he is often spoken of; and which he uses, when he delivered anything to his prophets to declare in his name to others:

I have put a yoke of iron upon the neck of all these nations: mentioned in Jer 27:3;

that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and they shall serve him; directly contrary to what Hananiah had prophesied, Jer 28:11; that his yoke should be broke off from them; but instead of that, it should become heavier unto them, and they should be obliged to serve him, whether they would or not; and refusing to pay tribute to him, should be carried captive by him, as had been foretold:

and I have given him the beasts of the field also; as he had said he would, Jer 27:6; and which is repeated, to show that the whole would be punctually fulfilled; that not only those nations, the men, the inhabitants of them, would be delivered to him; but even the very cattle, and all that belonged to them.

Gill: Jer 28:15

Then said Jeremiah the prophet unto Hananiah the prophet,.... The false prophet, as he is again called by the Targum, and in the Syriac version; where he went to him, and met with him, whether in the temple or elsewhere, is not mentioned; very probably in some public place, that there might be witnesses of what was said; for it was for the conviction of others, as well as for his own confusion, the following things are observed:

hear now, Hananiah, the Lord hath not sent thee; though he spoke in his name, and pretended a mission from him, when he had none, which was abominable wickedness:

but thou makest this people to trust in a lie: that the Lord would break off the yoke of the king of Babylon, and free the nations from servitude to him, particularly Judea; and that the king, and his princes, and people, and the vessels of the temple, carried away with him, would be returned within two years; this the people depended on as coming from the Lord, when he was not sent by him.

Gill: Jer 28:16

Therefore thus saith the Lord,.... Because of this heinous offence, in lying in the name of the Lord, and deceiving the people:

behold, I will cast thee from off the face of the earth; with the utmost indignation and abhorrence, as not worthy to live upon it: it signifies that he should die, and that not a natural, but violent death, by the immediate hand of God, by some judgment upon him; and so be by force taken off the earth, and buried in it, and be no more seen on it:

this year thou shalt die; within the present year, reckoning from this time; so that, had he died any time within twelve months from hence, it would have been sufficient to have verified the prophecy:

because thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord; to despise his word by his prophet; to contradict his will; to refuse subjection to the king of Babylon; to neglect his instructions, directions, and exhortations; and to believe a lie.

Gill: Jer 28:17

So Hananiah the prophet died the same year,.... That he had delivered out his prophecy; in the same year in which Jeremiah said he should die; which proved him to be a false prophet, and Jeremiah to be a true one:

in the seventh month: it was two months after he had prophesied; for it was in the fifth month that he prophesied, and in the seventh he died; not after seven months, as Theodoret remarks, but in two months; so he that prophesied, that within two years what he foretold would come to pass, in two months time dies himself, according to the word of the Lord, and his prophecies die with him. The Jewish writers move a difficulty here, how he should be said to die the same year, when the seventh month was the beginning of another year; for the civil year of the Jews began from the seventh month, or the month Tisri; as their ecclesiastical year from the month Nisan or Abib. To solve this they observe a tradition, that he died the last day of the sixth month, or the eve of the new year; and ordered his sons and his servants, before his death, to hide it, and not bring him out to be buried till after the year was begun, to make Jeremiah a liar: to which agrees the Targum, both of the clause in Jer 28:16; and this; the former of which it paraphrases thus,

"this year shall thou die; and in the other year (or the year following) thou shalt be buried;''

and this verse thus,

"and Hananiah the false prophet died this year, and was buried in the seventh month:''

but there was no occasion to raise such a difficulty, since it would have been enough to have verified the prediction, that he died any time within the twelve months from the date of it; and, besides, the solution makes the difficulty greater, and contradicts the very text, which says, he died in the seventh month.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Jer 28:9

¹ tn The verbs in this verse are to be interpreted as iterative imperfects in past time rather than as futures because of the explicit contrast that is drawn in the two verses by the emphatic syntactical construction of the two verses. Both verses begin with a casus pendens construction to throw the two verses into contrast: Heb “The prophets who were before me and you from ancient times, they prophesied…The prophet who prophesied peace, when the word of that prophet came true, that prophet was known that the Lord truly sent him.”

NET Notes: Jer 28:11

¹ tn Heb “I will break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from upon the necks of all the nations.”

² tn Heb “Then the prophet Jeremiah went his way.”

NET Notes: Jer 28:13

¹ tn Heb “Hananiah, ‘Thus says the Lord….” The translation uses an indirect quotation here used to eliminate one level of embedded quotation.

² tn The Greek version reads “I have made/put” rather than “you have made/put.” This is the easier reading and is therefore rejected.

³ tn Heb “the yoke bars of wood you have broken, but you have made in its stead yoke bars of iron.”

sn This whole incident (and the preceding one in Jer 28) is symbolic. Jeremiah’s wearing of the yoke was symbolic of the Lord’s message to submit to Babylonian authority. Hananiah’s breaking of the yoke was a prediction that that authority would not last beyond two years. By breaking the yoke he was encouraging rebellion against Nebuchadnezzar’s (and hence the Lord’s) authority (cf. 27:9, 14). However, rebelling would only result in further, harsher, more irresistible measures by Nebuchadnezzar to control such rebellion.

NET Notes: Jer 28:14

¹ tn Heb “Yahweh of armies, the God of Israel.” See the study notes on 2:19 and 7:3 for this title.

² tn Heb “An iron yoke I have put on the necks of all these nations.”

³ sn The emphasis is on the absoluteness of Nebuchadnezzar’s control. The statement is once again rhetorical and not to be taken literally. See the study note on 27:6.

NET Notes: Jer 28:15

¹ tn Or “You are giving these people false assurances.”

NET Notes: Jer 28:16

¹ sn There is a play on words here in Hebrew between “did not send you” and “will…remove you.” The two verbs are from the same root word in Hebrew. The first is the simple active and the second is the intensive.

² sn In giving people false assurances of restoration when the Lord had already told them to submit to Babylon, Hananiah was really counseling rebellion against the Lord. What Hananiah had done was contrary to the law of Deut 13:6 and was punishable by death.

NET Notes: Jer 28:17

¹ sn Comparison with Jer 28:1 shows that this whole incident took place in the space of two months. Hananiah had prophesied that the captivity would be over before two years had past. However, before two months were past, Hananiah himself died in fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy of his death. His death was a validation of Jeremiah as a true prophet. The subsequent events of 588 b.c. would validate Jeremiah’s prophesies and invalidate those of Hananiah.

Geneva Bible: Jer 28:10

Then Hananiah the prophet took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah's neck, and ^{( g )} broke it.

^{( g )} This declares the impudency of the wicked hirelings who have no zeal to the truth but are led with ambition to get the favour of men and therefore cannot abide any that might discredit them but burst forth into rages and contrary to their own conscience, pass not what lies they report or how wickedly they do so that they may maintain their estimation.

Geneva Bible: Jer 28:14

For thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; I have put a ^{( h )} yoke of iron upon the neck of all these nations, that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; and they shall serve him: and I have given him the ^{( i )} beasts of the field also.

^{( h )} That is, a hard and cruel servitude.

^{( i )} Signifying that all would be his as in (Dan 2:38).

Geneva Bible: Jer 28:17

So Hananiah the prophet ^{( k )} died the same year in the seventh month.

^{( k )} Seeing this thing was evident in the eyes of the people and yet they returned not to the Lord, it is manifest that miracles cannot move us, neither the word itself, unless God touch the heart.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Jer 28:1-17

1 Hananiah prophesies falsely the return of the vessels, and of Jeconiah.

5 Jeremiah, wishing it to be true, shews that the event will declare the true prophets.

10 Hananiah breaks Jeremiah's yoke.

12 Jeremiah tells of an iron yoke;

15 and foretells Hananiah's death.

Maclaren: Jer 28:13

Yokes Of Wood And Of Iron

Go and tell Hananiah, saying, Thus saith the Lord; Thou hast broken the yokes of wood; but thou shalt make for them yokes of iron.'--Jer. 28:13.

I SUPPOSE that I had better begin by a word of explanation as to the occasion of this saying. One king of Judah had already been carried off to Babylon, and the throne refilled by his brother, a puppet of the conquerors. This shadow of a king, with the bulk of the nation, was eager for revolt. Jeremiah had almost single-handed to stem the tide of the popular wish. He steadfastly preached submission, not so much to Nebuchadnezzar as to God, who had sent the invaders as chastisement. The lesson was a difficult one to learn, and the people hated the teacher. In the Jerusalem of Jeremiah's day, as in other places and at other times, a love of country which is not blind to its faults and protests against a blatant militarism, was scoffed at as unpatriotic,' playing into the hands of the enemy,' seeking peace at any price,' whilst an insane eagerness to rush to arms without regard to resources or righteousness was called a spirited foreign policy.' So Jeremiah had plenty of enemies.

He had adopted a strange way of enforcing his counsel, which would be ridiculous to-day, but was natural and impressive then and there. He constantly for months went about with an ox-yoke on his neck, as a symbol of the submission which he advocated. One day, in the temple, before a public assembly, a certain Hananiah, a member of the opposite faction, made a fierce attack on the prophet and his teaching, and uttered a counter-prophecy to the effect that, in two years, the foreign invasion would be at an end, and all would be as it used to be. Our prophet answered very quietly, saying in effect,' I hope to God that it may be true; the event will show.' And then Hananiah, encouraged by his meekness, proceeded to violence, tore the yoke off his shoulders and snapped it in two, reiterating his prophecy. Then Jeremiah went away home.

Soon after, the voice which he knew to be God's, and not his own thoughts, spoke within him, and gave a much sharper answer. God declared, through Jeremiah, the plain truth that, for a tiny kingdom like Judah to perk itself up in the face of a world-conquering power like Babylon, could only bring down greater severity from the conqueror. And then he declared that Hananiah, for rebellion--not against Babylon, but against God, the true King of Israel--would be taken from the earth. He died in a couple of months.

My text forms the first word of this divine message. I have nothing more to do with its original application. It gives a picturesque setting to a very impressive and solemn truth; very familiar, no doubt, but none the less because of its familiarity needing to be dinned into people's ears. It is that to throw off legitimate authority is to bind on a worse tyranny. To some kind of yoke all of us must bend our necks, and if we slip them out we do not thereby become independent, but simply bring upon ourselves a heavier pressure of a harder bondage. The remainder of my remarks will simply go to illustrate that principle in two or three cases of ascending importance. I begin at the bottom.

I. We Have The Choice Between The Yoke Of Law And The Iron Yoke Of Lawlessness.

We all know that society could not be held together without some kind of restraints upon what is done, and some stimulus to do what is apt to be neglected. Even a band of brigands, or a crew of pirates, must have some code. I have read somewhere that the cells in a honeycomb are circles squeezed by the pressure of the adjacent cells into the hexagonal shape which admits of contiguity. If they continued circles there would be space and material lost, and no complete continuity. So, in like manner, you cannot keep five men together without some mutual limitations which are shaped into a law. Now, as long as a man keeps inside it, he does not feel its pressure. A great many of us, for instance, who are in the main law-abiding people, do not ever remember that there is such a thing as restrictions upon our licence, or as obligations to perform certain duties; for we never think either of taking the licence or of shirking the duties. The yoke that is accepted ceases to press. Once let a man step outside, and what then? Why, then, he is an outlaw; and the rough side of the law is turned to him, and all possible terrors, which people within the boundary have nothing to do with, gather themselves together and frown down upon him. The sheep that stops inside the pasture is never torn by the barbed wires of the fence. If you think of the life of a criminal, with all its tricks and evasions, taking every bush to be an officer, as Shakespeare says; or as the first of the brood who was the type of them all said, Every man that seeth me sham kill me': if you think of the sword that hangs over the head of every law-breaker, and which he knows is hanging by a hair; if you think of men in counting-houses who have manipulated the books of the firm, and who durst not be away from their desks for a day lest all should come to light; and if you think of the punishment that follows sooner or later, you will see that it is better to bear the light yoke of the law than the heavy yoke of crime. Some men buy their ruin very dearly.

So much for the individual. But there is another aspect of this same principle on which I venture to say a word, although it is only a word, in passing. I do not suppose that there are many of my hearers who are likely to commit overt breaches of the law. But there are a great many of us who are apt to neglect the obligations of citizenship. In a community like ours, laziness, fastidiousness, absorption in our own occupations, and a number of other more or less reputable reasons, tempt many to stand aloof from the plain imperative obligations of every citizen in a free country. Every man who thus neglects to do his part for the common weal does his part in handing over the rule of the community to the least worthy. You will find--as you see in some democratic countries to-day, where the cultivated classes, and the classes with the sternest morality, have withdrawn in disgust from the turmoil--the mob having the upper hand, the least worthy scrambling into high places, and the community suffering, and bearing a heavier yoke, by reason of the unwillingness of some to bear the yoke and do the duty of a citizen. Vice lifts up its head, morality is scouted, self-interest is pursued unblushingly, and the whole tone of public opinion is lowered. Christian men and women, remember that you are members of a community, and you bear the yoke of responsibility therefore; and if you do not discharge your obligation, then you will have a heavier burden still to bear.

I need not remind you, I suppose, of how this same thesis, that we have to choose between the yoke of law and the iron yoke of lawlessness--is illustrated in the story of almost all violent revolutions. They run the same course. First a nation rises up against intolerable oppression, then revolution devours its own children, and the scum rises to the top of the boiling pot. Then comes, in the language of the picturesque historian of the French Revolution, the type of them all--then comes at the end the whiff of grapeshot and the despot. First the government of a mob, and then the tyranny of an emperor, crush the people that shake off the yoke of reasonable law. That is my first point.

II. We Have To Choose Between The Yoke Of Virtue And The Iron Yoke Of Vice.

Let me take a higher illustration;--we have to choose between the yoke of virtue and the iron yoke of vice.

We are under a far more spiritual and searching law than that written in any statute-book, or administered by any court. Every man carries within his own heart the court, the tribunal; the culprit and the judge. And here too, if law is not obeyed, the result is not liberty, but the slavery of lawlessness.

No man can ponder his own nature and make without feeling that on every fibre of him is stamped a great law which he is bound to obey, and that on every fibre of him is impressed the necessity of part of his nature coercing, restraining, or spurring other parts of it. For, if we take stock of ourselves, what do we find? The broad basis of the pyramid, as it were, is laid in the faculties nearest the earth, the appetites which are inseparable from our corporeal being, and these know nothing about right or wrong, but are utterly blind to such distinctions. Put a loaf before a hungry man, and his mouth waters, whether the loaf belongs to himself or whether it is inside a baker's window.

Then above these, as the next course of the pyramid, there are other desires, sentiments, affections, and emotions, less grossly sensuous than those of which I have been speaking, but still equally certain to be excited by the presence of their appropriate object, without any consideration of whether law is broken or kept in securing of it. Above these, which are, so to speak, branded on their very foreheads with the iron of slavery, stand certain faculties which are as clearly anointed to rule as the others are intended to serve. There is reason or intelligence, which is evidently meant to be eyes to these blind instincts and emotions of desire, and there is what we call the power of will, that stands like an engine-driver with his hand upon the lever which will either stop the engine or accelerate its revolutions. It says to passions and desires Go! and they go; and, alas! it sometimes says Halt! and they will not halt. Then there is conscience, which brings to light for every man something higher than himself. A great philosopher once said that the two sublimest things in the universe were the moral law and the starry heavens; and that law I ought' bends over us like the starry heavens with which he associated it. No man can escape from the pressure of duty, and on every man is laid. by his very make, the twofold obligation, first to look upwards and catch the behests of that solemn law, and then to turn his eyes and his strength inwards and coerce or spur, as the case may be, the powers of his nature, and rule the kingdom within himself.

Now, as long as a man lets the ruling parts of his nature guide the lower faculties, he feels comparatively no pressure from the yoke. But, if he once allows beggars to ride on horseback whilst princes walk--sense and appetite and desire, and more or less refined forms of inclination, to take the place which belongs only to conscience interpreting duty--then he has exchanged the easy yoke for one that is heavy indeed.

What does a man do when, instead of loyally accepting the conditions of his nature, and bowing himself to serve the all-embracing and all-penetrating law of duty, he sets up inclination of any sort in its place? What does he do? I will tell you. He unships the helm; he flings compass and sextant overboard; he fires up the furnaces, and screws down the safety-valve, and says, Go ahead! And what will be the end of that, think you? Either an explosion or a crash upon a reef; and you may take your choice of which is the better kind of death--to be blown up or to go down. Keep within the law of conscience, and let it govern all inclinations, and most of all the animal part of your nature; and you will feel little pressure, and no pain, from the yoke. Shake it off, and there is fulfilled in the disobedient man the threatening of my text, which rightly translated ought to be, Thou hast broken the yokes of wood, and thou hast made instead of them yokes of iron.'

For do you think it will be easy to serve the base-born parts of your nature, when you set them on the throne and tell them to govern you? Did you never hear of such a thing as a man's vices getting such a hold on him that, when his weakened will tried to shake them off, they laughed in his face and said, Here we are still ? Did you never hear of that other solemn truth--and have you never experienced how true it is?--that no man can say, I will let my inclination have its fling this once ? There are never this onces.' or very, very seldom. When you are glissading down a snowy Alpine slope, you cannot stop when you like, though you strike your alpenstock ever so deep into the powdery snow. If you have started, away you must go. God be thanked! the illustration does not altogether apply, for a man can stop if he will repent, but he cannot stop unless he does. Did you never hear that a teaspoonful of narcotic to-day will have to be a tablespoonful in a week or two, to produce the same effect? Are there not plenty of men who have said with all the force that a weakened will has left in it, I will never touch a drop of drink again, as long as I live, God helping me'?--and they have gone down the street, and they have turned in, not at the first or the second public-house, but at the fourth or the fifth. The! brother, they promised them liberty, but they are the servants of corruption.' Fix this in your minds. He that committeth sin is the slave of sin,' of the sin that he commits. Do not put off the easy yoke of obedience to conscience and duty, or you will find that there is an iron one, with many a sharp point in its unpolished surface rubbing into your skin and wounding your shoulders. It's wiser to be good than bad. It's safer to be meek than fierce.' Thou hast broken the yokes of wood'; it is not difficult to do that; thou hast made instead of them yokes of iron.' That is my second point.

III. Lastly, We Have The Choice Between The Yoke Of Christ And The Iron Yoke Of Godlessness.

You may think that to be a very harsh saying, and much too vehement an antithesis. Let me vindicate it according to my own belief in a sentence or two. It seems to me that for civilised and cultivated Europe at this day, the choice lies between accepting Jesus Christ as the Revealer of God, or wandering away out into the wastes of uncertainty, or as they call it nowadays, agnosticism and doubt. I believe myself, and I venture to state it here, though there is not time to do more than state it--that no form of what is now called Theism, which does not accept the historic revelation of God in Jesus Christ as the master-light of all our seeing,' will ever be able to sustain itself permanently in the face of present currents of opinion. If you do not take Christ for your Teacher, you are handed over either to the uncertainty of your own doubts, or to pinning your faith to some man and enrolling yourself as a disciple who is prepared to swallow down whole whatsoever the rabbi may say, and so giving to him what you will not give to Jesus; or else you will sink back into utter indolence and carelessness about the whole matter; or else you will go and put your belief and your soul into the hands of a priest, and shut your eyes and open your mouth and take whatever tradition may choose to send you. The one refuge from all these, as I believe, is to go to Him and learn of Him, and so take His yoke upon your shoulders.

But, let me say further, it is better to obey Christ's commandments than to set ourselves against them. For if we will take His will for our law, and meekly assume the yoke of loyal and loving obedience to Him, the door into an earthly paradise is thrown open to us. His yoke is easy, not because its prescriptions and provisions lower the standard of righteousness and morality, but because love becomes the motive; and it is always blessed to do that which the Beloved desires. When I will' and I ought cover exactly the same ground, then there is no kind of pressure from the yoke. Christ's yoke is easy because, too, He gives the power to obey His commandments. His burden is such a burden (as I think one of the old fathers puts it) as sails are to a ship or wings to a bird. They add to the weight, but they carry that which carries them. So Christ's yoke bears the man that bears it. It is easy, too, because in,' and not only after or for, keeping of it there is great reward'; seeing that He commands nothing which is not Congruous with the highest good, and bringing along with it the purest blessing. Instead of that yoke, what has the world to offer, or what do we get to dominate us, if we cast off Christ? Self, the old anarch self, and that is misery. To be self-ruled is to be self-destroyed.

There is no need that I should remind you of how it is better to accept Christ's providences than to kick against them. Sorrow to which we submit loses all its bitterness and much of its sadness. Kicking against the affliction makes its sharp point penetrate our limbs. The bird that will dash itself against the wires of its cage beats itself all bloody and torn. Let us take the providence and it ceases to be hard.

One last word;--we all carry an iron yoke upon our shoulders. For, hard as it is for us preachers to get our friends that listen to us to believe and realise it, We all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.' That yoke is on us all. And I, for my part, believe that no man by his own efforts can cast it off, but that the attempt to do so often brings greater strength to the sins that we seek to cast out, just as the more you mow the grass, the thicker and the stronger it grows. So I come with the great message which Jesus Christ Himself struck as the keynote and prelude of His whole ministry, when in the synagogue He said, The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me, to preach deliverance to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.' He, and He only, will break every yoke and let the oppressed go free. And then He addresses us, after He has done that, with the immortal words, the sweetness of whose sound, sweet as it is, is less than the sweetness of their sense: Take My yoke upon you … and ye shall find rest to your souls.' Oh, brother! will you not answer, O Lord! truly I am Thy servant. Thou hast loosed my bonds, and thereby bound me for ever to wear Thy yoke'; as the slave clings to his ransomer, and delights to serve him all the days of his life?

MHCC: Jer 28:1-9

Hananiah spoke a false prophecy. Here is not a word of good counsel urging the Jews to repent and return to God. He promises temporal mercies, in God's name, but makes no mention of the spiritual mercies which God always promised with earthly blessings. This was not the first time Jeremiah had prayed for the people, though he prophesied against them. He appeals to the event, to prove Hananiah's falsehood. The prophet who spake only of peace and prosperity, without adding that they must not by wilful sin stop God's favours, will be proved a false prophet. Those who do not declare the alarming as well as the encouraging parts of God's word, and call men to repentance, and faith, and holiness, tread in the steps of the false prophets. The gospel of Christ encourages men to do works meet for repentance, but gives no encouragement to continue in sin.

MHCC: Jer 28:10-17

Hananiah is sentenced to die, and Jeremiah, when he has received direction from God, boldly tells him so; but not before he received that commission. Those have much to answer for, who tell sinners that they shall have peace, though they harden their hearts in contempt of God's word. The servant of God must be gentle to all men. He must give up even his right, and leave the Lord to plead his cause. Every attempt of ungodly men to make vain the purposes of God, will add to their miseries.

Matthew Henry: Jer 28:1-9

This struggle between a true prophet and a false one is said here to have happened in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah, and yet in the fourth year, for the first four years of his reign might well be called the beginning, or former part, of it, because during those years he reigned under the dominion of the king of Babylon and as a tributary to him; whereas the rest of his reign, which might well be called the latter part of it, in distinction from that former part, he reigned in rebellion against the king of Babylon. In this fourth year of his reign he went in person to Babylon (as we find, Jer 51:59), and it is probable that this gave the people some hope that his negotiation in person would put a good end to the war, in which hope the false prophets encouraged them, this Hananiah particularly, who was of Gibeon, a priests' city, and therefore probably himself a priest, as well as Jeremiah. Now here we have,

I. The prediction which Hananiah delivered publicly, solemnly, in the house of the Lord, and in the name of the Lord, in an august assembly, in the presence of the priests and of all the people, who probably were expecting to have some message from heaven. In delivering this prophecy, he faced Jeremiah, he spoke it to him (Jer 28:1), designing to confront and contradict him, as much as to say, "Jeremiah, thou liest."Now this prediction is that the king of Babylon's power, at least his power over Judah and Jerusalem, should be speedily broken, that within two full years the vessels of the temple should be brought back, and Jeremiah, and all the captives that were carried away with him, should return; whereas Jeremiah had foretold that the yoke of the king of Babylon should be bound on yet faster, and that the vessels and captives should not return for 70 years, Jer 28:2-4. Now, upon the reading of this sham prophecy, and comparing it with the messages that God sent by the true prophets, we may observe what a vast difference there is between them. Here is nothing of the spirit and life, the majesty of style and sublimity of expression, that appear in the discourses of God's prophets, nothing of that divine flame and flatus. But that which is especially wanting here is an air of piety; he speaks with a great deal of confidence of the return of their prosperity, but here is not a word of good counsel given them to repent, and reform, and return to God, to pray, and seek his face, that they may be prepared for the favours God had in reserve for them. He promises them temporal mercies, in God's name, but makes no mention of those spiritual mercies which God always promised should go along with them, as Jer 24:7, I will give them a heart to know me. By all this it appears that, whatever he pretended, he had only the spirit of the world, not the Spirit of God (1Co 2:12), that he aimed to please, not to profit.

II. Jeremiah's reply to this pretended prophecy. 1. He heartily wishes it might prove true. Such an affection has he for his country, and so truly desirous is he of the welfare of it, that he would be content to lie under the imputation of a false prophet, so that their ruin might be prevented. He said, Amen; the Lord do so; the Lord perform thy words, Jer 28:5, Jer 28:6. This was not the first time that Jeremiah had prayed for his people, though he had prophesied against them, and deprecated the judgments which yet he certainly knew would come; as Christ prayed, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, when yet he knew it must not pass from him. Though, as a faithful prophet, he foresaw and foretold the destruction of Jerusalem, yet, as a faithful Israelite, he prayed earnestly for the preservation of it, in obedience to that command, Pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Though the will of God's purpose is the rule of prophecy and patience, the will of his precept is the rule of prayer and practice. God himself, though he has determined, does not desire, the death of sinners, but would have all men to be saved. Jeremiah often interceded for his people, Jer 18:20. The false prophets thought to ingratiate themselves with the people by promising them peace; now the prophet shows that he bore them as great a good-will as their prophets did, whom they were so fond of; and, though he had no warrant from God to promise them peace, yet he earnestly desired it and prayed for it. How strangely were those besotted who caressed those who did them the greatest wrong imaginable by flattering them and persecuted him who did them the greatest service imaginable by interceding for them! See Jer 27:18. 2. He appeals to the event, to prove it false, Jer 28:7-9. The false prophets reflected upon Jeremiah, as Ahab upon Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerning them, but evil. Now he pleads that this had been the purport of the prophecies that other prophets had delivered, so that it ought not to be looked upon as a strange thing, or as rendering his mission doubtful; for prophets of old prophesied against many countries and great kingdoms, so bold were they in delivering the messages which God sent by them, and so far from fearing men, or seeking to please them, as Hananiah did. They made no difficulty, any more than Jeremiah did, of threatening war, famine, and pestilence, and what they said was regarded as coming from God; why then should Jeremiah be run down as a pestilent fellow, and a sower of sedition, when he preached no otherwise than God's prophets had always done before him? Other prophets had foretold destruction did not come, which yet did not disprove their divine mission, as in the case of Jonah; for God is gracious, and ready to turn away his wrath from those that turn away from their sins. But the prophet that prophesied of peace and prosperity, especially as Hananiah did, absolutely and unconditionally, without adding that necessary proviso, that they do not by wilful sin put a bar in their own door and stop the current of God's favours, will be proved a true prophet only by the accomplishment of his prediction; if it come to pass, then it shall be known that the Lord has sent him, but, if not, he will appear to be a cheat and an impostor.

Matthew Henry: Jer 28:10-17

We have here an instance,

I. Of the insolence of the false prophet. To complete the affront he designed Jeremiah, he took the yoke from off his neck which he carried as a memorial of what he had prophesied concerning the enslaving of the nations to Nebuchadnezzar, and he broke it, that he might give a sign of the accomplishment of this prophecy, as Jeremiah had given of his, and might seem to have conquered him, and to have defeated the intention of his prophecy. See how the lying spirit, in the mouth of this false prophet, mimics the language of the Spirit of truth: Thus saith the Lord, So will I break the yoke of the king of Babylon, not only from the neck of this nation, but from the neck of all nations, within two full years. Whether by the force of a heated imagination Hananiah had persuaded himself to believe this, or whether he knew it to be false, and only persuaded them to believe it, does not appear; but it is plain that he speaks with abundance of assurance. It is no new thing for lies to be fathered upon the God of truth.

II. Of the patience of the true prophet. Jeremiah quietly went his way, and when he was reviled he reviled not again, and would not contend with one that was in the height of his fury and in the midst of the priests and people that were violently set against him. The reason why he went his way was not because he had nothing to answer, but because he was willing to stay till God was pleased to furnish him with a direct and immediate answer, which as yet he had not received. He expected that God would send a special message to Hananiah, and he would say nothing till he had received that. I, as a deaf man, heard not, for thou wilt hear, and thou shalt answer, Lord, for me. It may sometimes be our wisdom rather to retreat than to contend. Currenti cede furori - Give place unto wrath.

III. Of the justice of God in giving judgment between Jeremiah and his adversary. Jeremiah went his way, as a man in whose mouth there was no rebuke, but God soon put a word into his mouth; for he will appear for those who silently commit their cause to him. 1. The word of God, in the mouth of Jeremiah, is ratified and confirmed. Let not Jeremiah himself distrust the truth of what he had delivered in God's name because it met with such a daring opposition and contradiction. If what we have spoken be the truth of God, we must not unsay it because men gainsay it; for great is the truth and will prevail. It will stand, therefore let us stand to it, and not fear that men's unbelief or blasphemy will make it of no effect. Hananiah has broken the yokes of wood, but Jeremiah must make for them yokes of iron, which cannot be broken (Jer 28:13), for (says God) " I have put a yoke of iron upon the neck of all these nations, which shall lie heavier, and bind harder, upon them (Jer 28:14), that they may serve the king of Babylon, and not be able to shake off the yoke however they may struggle, for they shall serve him whether they will or no;"and who is he that can contend with God's counsel? What was said before is repeated again: I have given him the beasts of the field also, as if there were something significant in that. Men had by their wickedness made themselves like the beasts that perish, and therefore deserved to be ruled by an arbitrary power, as beasts are ruled, and such a power Nebuchadnezzar ruled with; for whom he would he slew and whom he would he kept alive. 2. Hananiah is sentenced to die for contradicting it, and Jeremiah, when he has received commission from God, boldly tells him so to his face, though before he received that commission he went away and said nothing. (1.) The crimes of which Hananiah stands convicted are cheating the people and affronting God: Thou makest this people to trust in a lie, encouraging them to hope that they shall have peace, which will make their destruction the more terrible to them when it comes; yet this was not the worst: Thou hast taught rebellion against the Lord; thou hast taught them to despise all the good counsel given them in God's name by the true prophets, and hast rendered it ineffectual. Those have a great deal to answer for who, by telling sinners that they shall have peace though they go on, harden their hearts in a contempt of the reproofs and admonitions of the word, and the means and methods God takes to bring them to repentance. (2.) The judgment given against him is, " I will cast thee off from the face of the earth, as unworthy to live upon it; thou shalt be buried in it. This year thou shalt die, and die as a rebel against the Lord, to whom death will come with a sting and a curse."This sentence was executed, Jer 28:17. Hananiah died the same year, within two months; for his prophecy is dated the fifth month (Jer 28:1) and his death the seventh. Good men may perhaps be suddenly taken off by death in the midst of their days, and in mercy to them, as Josiah was; but this being foretold as the punishment of his sin, and coming to pass accordingly, it may safely be construed as a testimony from Heaven against him and a confirmation of Jeremiah's mission. And, if the people's hearts had not been wretchedly hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, it would have prevented their being further hardened by the deceitfulness of their prophets.

Keil-Delitzsch: Jer 28:5-9

Jeremiah's reply . - First Jeremiah admits that the fulfilment of this prediction would be desirable (Jer 28:6), but then reminds his opponent that all the prophets of the Lord up till this time have prophesied of war and calamity (Jer 28:7 and Jer 28:8). So that if a prophet, in opposition to these witnesses of God, predicts nothing but peace and safety, then nothing short of the fulfilment of his prediction can make good his claim to be a true prophet (Jer 28:9). - Jeremiah's answer is to this effect: Jer 28:6. " Amen (i.e., yea ), may Jahveh so do! may Jahveh perform thy words which thou hast prophesied, to bring again the vessels of Jahveh's house and all the captives from Babylon into this place. Jer 28:7. Only hear now this word that I speak in thine ears, and in the ears of all the people. Jer 28:8. The prophets that were before me and before thee from of old, they prophesied concerning many lands and great kingdoms, of war, and of trouble, and of pestilence. Jer 28:9. The prophet that prophesieth of peace, when the word of the prophet cometh to pass, shall be known as the prophet that Jahveh hath truly sent. - As to אמן , yea, see on Jer 11:5. The scope of this assent is straightway defined in "may Jahveh so do." But in order that the hearers may not misunderstand his assent, Jeremiah proceeds to show that hitherto only threatening predictions have carried with them the presumption of their being true prophecies, inasmuch as it is these alone that have been in harmony with the predictions of all previous prophets. ויּנּבאוּ (Jer 28:8) is explained by the fact that "the prophets" with the accompany relative clause is made to precede absolute-wise. In the same absolute manner the clause "the prophet...peace" is disposed so that after the verb יוּדע the word הנּביא is repeated. For לרעה many MSS have לרעב ; manifestly an adaptation to passages like Jer 14:12; Jer 21:9; Jer 24:10; Jer 27:8, Jer 27:13; Jer 29:17., where sword, famine, and pestilence are mentioned together as three modes of visitation by God; whereas only the general word רעה seems in place here, when mentioned alongside of "war." For this very reason Hitz. rejects רעב as being the least difficult reading, while Ew. takes it under his protection on account of the parallel passages, not considering that the train of thought is different there. - The truth expressed in Jer 28:9 is based on the Mosaic law concerning prophecy, Deu 18:21., where the fulfilment of the prediction is given as the test of true, God-inspired prophecy.

Keil-Delitzsch: Jer 28:10-11

Had Hananiah been sent by the Lord, he might have been satisfied with Jeremiah's opinion, and have contentedly awaited the issue. But instead of this, he seeks by means of violence to secure credence for his prophesying. He takes the yoke from off the neck of the prophet, and breaks it in pieces, as he repeats before the people his former prediction: "Thus hath Jahveh said: Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from the neck of all nations within two years." - Thereupon Jeremiah went his way without answering a word, calmly entrusting to the Lord the vindication of the truth of His own word.

Keil-Delitzsch: Jer 28:12-17

The Lord's testimony against Hananiah. - Apparently not long after Jeremiah had departed, he received from the Lord the commission to go to Hananiah and to say to him: Jer 28:13. "Thus saith Jahveh: Yokes of wood hast thou broken, but hast made in place of them yokes of iron. Jer 28:14. For thus saith Jahveh of hosts, the God of Israel: A yoke of iron I lay upon the neck of all these nations, that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and they shall serve him; and the beasts of the field also have I given him." - When the prophet says: Yokes of wood hast thou broken, etc., we are not to understand him as speaking of the breaking of the wooden yoke Jeremiah had been wearing; he gives the deeper meaning of that occurrence. By breaking Jeremiah's wooden yoke, Hananiah has only signified that the yoke Nebuchadnezzar lays on the nations will not be so easily broken as a wooden one, but is of iron, i.e., not to be broken. The plural "yokes" is to be explained by the emblematical import of the words, and is not here to be identified, as it sometimes may be, with the singular, Jer 28:10. Jer 28:14 shows in what sense Hananiah put an iron yoke in the place of the wooden one: Jahveh will lay iron yokes on all nations, that they may serve the king of Babel. Hananiah's breaking the wooden yoke does not alter the divine decree, but is made to contribute to its fuller revelation. With the last clause of Jer 28:14, cf. Jer 27:6. - Hereupon Jeremiah forewarns the false prophets what is to be God's punishment on them for their false and audacious declarations. Jer 28:15. "Hear now, Hananiah: Jahveh hath not sent thee, and thou hast made this people to believe a lie. Jer 28:16. Therefore thus saith Jahveh: Behold, I cast thee from off the face of the earth; this year shalt thou die, for thou hast spoken rebellion against Jahveh." "The year" = this year, as in Isa 37:30. The words "for thou hast spoken," etc., recall Deu 13:6. They involve an application to Hananiah's case of the command there given to put such a prophet to death, and show how it can with justice be said that the Lord will cast him from off the face of the earth. The verb משׁלּחך is chosen for the sake of the play on לא שׁלחך . God has not sent him as prophet to His people, but will send him away from off the earth, i.e., cause him to die. - In Jer 28:17 it is recorded that this saying was soon fulfilled. Hananiah died in the seventh month of that year, i.e., two months after his controversy with Jeremiah (cf. Jer 28:1).

Constable: Jer 2:1--45:5

II. Prophecies about Judah chs. 2--45

The first series of prophetic announcements, reflections, and incidents that comprise this part of the book deals with Jeremiah's ministry to his own people.⁶⁴ The second main division of the book contains oracles against foreign nations (chs. 46-51).

Constable: Jer 26:1--29:32

B. Controversies concerning false prophets chs. 26-29

These chapters contrast the true prophet of Yahweh with the false prophets. Distinguishing between them was difficult for Jeremiah's contemporaries, but their essential difference is clear. The true prophets proclaimed the Lord's words, and the false prophets announced their own messages. It is the response to Jeremiah's preaching that these chapters stress rather than the content of his preaching, which is the emphasis in chapters 1-25.

"The subject of the previous five chapters has been the certainty of judgment to come. In the next four chapters attention is directed to the man Jeremiah, who preached the message of judgment."³⁴⁷

Constable: Jer 27:1--28:17

2. Conflict with the false prophets in Jerusalem chs. 27-28

Chapters 27 and 28 record the controversies Jeremiah had with false prophets in Jerusalem before the Babylonian captivity. The events recorded may have happened sometime after a failed coup attempt against Nebuchadnezzar in Babylon in December, 595, and January, 594 B.C.³⁶⁰

Constable: Jer 28:1-17

Jeremiah's conflict with Hananiah ch. 28

Jeremiah's symbolic act of wearing a yoke led to another symbolic act, the breaking of that yoke. Jeremiah's act brought a false prophet into direct confrontation with the true prophet.

28:1 The following event took place in the same year as the preceding one, 594 or 593 B.C., in the fifth month. Another prophet, Hananiah ben Azzur from Gibeon in Benjamin (about 5 miles northwest of Jerusalem), spoke to Jeremiah in the temple courtyard before the priests and the people who had assembled there (cf. 27:16).³⁷⁰

28:2-3 Hananiah prophesied that Yahweh had broken Babylon's authority over Judah. Within two years the Lord would return to the temple the vessels that Nebuchadnezzar had already taken to Babylon. Hananiah, whose name means "Yahweh has been gracious," announced a message that Yahweh would be gracious.³⁷¹ Jeremiah predicted that the captivity would last 70 years (25:11-12; 29:10), but Hananiah predicted it would last only two years.

28:4 The Lord would also return Jeconiah (Jehoiachin) and the people who went with him to Babylon as captives, Hananiah predicted, because Yahweh would break Babylon's yoke. This flatly contradicted Jeremiah's prophecy that Jeconiah would die in Babylon (22:24-27; cf. 52:31-34).

28:5-6 Jeremiah responded to Hananiah sincerely but ironically. So be it, he said. Would that the Lord would do just as Hananiah had predicted. Jeremiah wished that Hananiah's prophecy would come true because he loved his people and his land and did not want them to experience the horrors of invasion and a long exile.

28:7 Yet Jeremiah urged the people to listen to what he was about to say to them. What Jeremiah wished would happen would not.

28:8-9 Time would tell, he said, whether Hananiah's prophecies of peace or Jeremiah's prophecies of war were truly from Yahweh. One of the tests of a true prophet in Israel was the fulfillment of his predictions (cf. 23:16-40; Deut. 18:21-22).

"Jeremiah's meaning was that the usual message of the earlier prophets was one of doom, and that when he spoke of judgment he was more in the line of the predecessors than Hananiah, who spoke only of peace and prosperity (Deut. 18:20-22)."³⁷²

28:10-11 Hananiah proceeded to deliver a symbolic act of his own by vandalizing Jeremiah's sign. He dramatically smashed the yoke that Jeremiah had been wearing on his neck (cf. 27:2). He claimed that similarly within two years Yahweh would break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar off the neck of all the nations that he was oppressing.

28:12-13 Shortly after these events, the Lord told Jeremiah to return to Hananiah with a message. He told the false prophet that by breaking the wooden yoke off Jeremiah's neck he had only made Nebuchadnezzar's oppression more certain. Failure to repent had resulted in more certain judgment.

". . . we only add to our chastening when we resist it--exchanging wood for iron."³⁷³

28:14 Jeremiah told Hananiah that Yahweh of Hosts, Israel's God, said that all the nations round about would serve Nebuchadnezzar. The Babylonian king would even control the beasts; his supremacy would be total. Nothing the people could do would divert this judgment (cf. Acts 20:26-27). His yoke over them was as unbreakable as iron (cf. 15:12).

28:15-16 Jeremiah also told Hananiah that the Lord had not sent the false prophet. Furthermore, the Lord had revealed that He would take Hananiah's life within a year because he had encouraged the people to rebel against the Lord's word. The penalty that false prophets were to suffer under the Mosaic Covenant was death (Deut. 18:20).

"It is a serious thing indeed to use the name of God to say that secondary solutions can cure our problems when the real problem is that people have turned away from God and the truth that He has revealed in verbalized, propositional form concerning Himself."³⁷⁴

28:17 Sure enough, about two months later Hananiah died (cf. v. 1; 2 Kings 1:17; 7:19-20; 8:10-15; Ezek. 11:13; Acts 5:1-11). The prophet who predicted deliverance in two years died in two months. God graciously gave him two months to repent before He put him to death. His death was another object lesson to the people on the importance of obeying God's word.

"In chapters 26-29 the deaths of four prophets are predicted and/or reported. Of the prophets named in these chapters, only Jeremiah survives to see the fulfillment of the prophecies given to him by the LORD."³⁷⁵

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

JEREMIAH, son of Hilkiah, one of the ordinary priests, dwelling in Anathoth of Benjamin (Jer 1:1), not the Hilkiah the high priest who discovered the book of the law (2Ki 22:8); had he been the same, the designation would have been "the priest", or "the high priest". Besides, his residence at Anathoth shows that he belonged to the line of Abiathar, who was deposed from the high priesthood by Solomon (1Ki 2:26-35), after which the office remained in Zadok's line. Mention occurs of Jeremiah in 2Ch 35:25; 2Ch 36:12, 2Ch 36:21. In 629 B.C. the thirteenth year of King Josiah, while still very young (Jer 1:5), he received his prophetical call in Anathoth (Jer 1:2); and along with Hilkiah the high priest, the prophetess Huldah, and the prophet Zephaniah, he helped forward Josiah's reformation of religion (2Ki. 23:1-25). Among the first charges to him was one that he should go and proclaim God's message in Jerusalem (Jer 2:2). He also took an official tour to announce to the cities of Judah the contents of the book of the law, found in the temple (Jer 11:6) five years after his call to prophesy. On his return to Anathoth, his countrymen, offended at his reproofs, conspired against his life. To escape their persecutions (Jer 11:21), as well as those of his own family (Jer 12:6), he left Anathoth and resided at Jerusalem. During the eighteen years of his ministry in Josiah's reign he was unmolested; also during the three months of Jehoahaz or Shallum's reign (Jer 22:10-12). On Jehoiakim's accession it became evident that Josiah's reformation effected nothing more than a forcible repression of idolatry and the establishment of the worship of God outwardly. The priests, prophets, and people then brought Jeremiah before the authorities, urging that he should be put to death for his denunciations of evil against the city (Jer 26:8-11). The princes, however, especially Ahikam, interposed in his behalf (Jer 26:16, Jer 26:24), but he was put under restraint, or at least deemed it prudent not to appear in public. In the fourth year of Jehoiakim (606 B.C.), he was commanded to write the predictions given orally through him, and to read them to the people. Being "shut up", he could not himself go into the house of the Lord (Jer 36:5); he therefore deputed Baruch, his amanuensis, to read them in public on the fast day. The princes thereupon advised Baruch and Jeremiah to hide themselves from the king's displeasure. Meanwhile they read the roll to the king, who was so enraged that he cut it with a knife and threw it into the fire; at the same time giving orders for the apprehension of the prophet and Baruch. They escaped Jehoiakim's violence, which had already killed the prophet Urijah (Jer 26:20-23). Baruch rewrote the words, with additional prophecies, on another roll (Jer 36:27-32). In the three months' reign of Jehoiachin or Jeconiah, he prophesied the carrying away of the king and the queen mother (Jer 13:18; Jer 22:24-30; compare 2Ki 24:12). In this reign he was imprisoned for a short time by Pashur (Jer. 20:1-18), the chief governor of the Lord's house; but at Zedekiah's accession he was free (Jer 37:4), for the king sent to him to "inquire of the Lord" when Nebuchadnezzar came up against Jerusalem (Jer 21:1-3, &c.; Jer 37:3). The Chaldeans drew off on hearing of the approach of Pharaoh's army (Jer 37:5); but Jeremiah warned the king that the Egyptians would forsake him, and the Chaldeans return and burn up the city (Jer 37:7-8). The princes, irritated at this, made the departure of Jeremiah from the city during the respite a pretext for imprisoning him, on the allegation of his deserting to the Chaldeans (Jer 38:1-5). He would have been left to perish in the dungeon of Malchiah, but for the intercession of Ebed-melech, the Ethiopian (Jer 38:6-13). Zedekiah, though he consulted Jeremiah in secret yet was induced by his princes to leave Jeremiah in prison (Jer 38:14-28) until Jerusalem was taken. Nebuchadnezzar directed his captain, Nebuzar-adan, to give him his freedom, so that he might either go to Babylon or stay with the remnant of his people as he chose. As a true patriot, notwithstanding the forty and a half years during which his country had repaid his services with neglect and persecution, he stayed with Gedaliah, the ruler appointed by Nebuchadnezzar over Judea (Jer 40:6). After the murder of Gedaliah by Ishmael, Johanan, the recognized ruler of the people, in fear of the Chaldeans avenging the murder of Gedaliah, fled with the people to Egypt, and forced Jeremiah and Baruch to accompany him, in spite of the prophet's warning that the people should perish if they went to Egypt, but be preserved by remaining in their land (Jer. 41:1-43:13). At Tahpanhes, a boundary city on the Tanitic or Pelustan branch of the Nile, he prophesied the overthrow of Egypt (Jer 43:8-13). Tradition says he died in Egypt. According to the PSEUDO-EPIPHANIUS, he was stoned at Taphnæ or Tahpanhes. The Jews so venerated him that they believed he would rise from the dead and be the forerunner of Messiah (Mat 16:14).

HAVERNICK observes that the combination of features in Jeremiah's character proves his divine mission; mild, timid, and susceptible of melancholy, yet intrepid in the discharge of his prophetic functions, not sparing the prince any more than the meanest of his subjects--the Spirit of prophecy controlling his natural temper and qualifying him for his hazardous undertaking, without doing violence to his individuality. Zephaniah, Habakkuk, Daniel, and Ezekiel were his contemporaries. The last forms a good contrast to Jeremiah, the Spirit in his case acting on a temperament as strongly marked by firmness as Jeremiah's was by shrinking and delicate sensitiveness. Ezekiel views the nation's sins as opposed to righteousness--Jeremiah, as productive of misery; the former takes the objective, the latter the subjective, view of the evils of the times. Jeremiah's style corresponds to his character: he is peculiarly marked by pathos, and sympathy with the wretched; his Lamentations illustrate this; the whole series of elegies has but one object--to express sorrow for his fallen country; yet the lights and images in which he presents this are so many, that the reader, so far from feeling it monotonous, is charmed with the variety of the plaintive strains throughout. The language is marked by Aramæisms, which probably was the ground of JEROME'S charge that the style is "rustic". LOWTH denies the charge and considers him in portions not inferior to Isaiah. His heaping of phrase on phrase, the repetition of stereotyped forms--and these often three times--are due to his affected feelings and to his desire to intensify the expression of them; he is at times more concise, energetic, and sublime, especially against foreign nations, and in the rhythmical parts.

The principle of the arrangement of his prophecies is hard to ascertain. The order of kings was--Josiah (under whom he prophesied eighteen years), Jehoahaz (three months), Jehoiakim (eleven years), Jeconiah (three months), Zedekiah (eleven years). But his prophecies under Josiah (the first through twentieth chapters) are immediately followed by a portion under Zedekiah (the twenty-first chapter). Again, Jer 24:8-10, as to Zedekiah, comes in the midst of the section as to Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Jeconiah (the twenty-second, twenty-third, twenty-fifth chapters, &c.) So the thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth chapters as to Jehoiakim, follow the twenty-seventh, twenty-eighth, twenty-ninth, thirty-third, thirty-fourth chapters, as to Zedekiah; and the forty-fifth chapter, dated the fourth year of Jehoiakim, comes after predictions as to the Jews who fled to Egypt after the overthrow of Jerusalem. EWALD thinks the present arrangement substantially Jeremiah's own; the various portions are prefaced by the same formula, "The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord" (Jer 7:1; Jer 11:1; Jer 18:1; Jer 21:1; Jer 25:1; Jer 30:1; Jer 32:1; Jer 34:1, Jer 34:8; Jer 35:1; Jer 40:1; Jer 44:1; compare Jer 14:1; Jer 46:1; Jer 47:1; Jer 49:34). Notes of time mark other divisions more or less historical (Jer 26:1; Jer 27:1; Jer 36:1; Jer 37:1). Two other portions are distinct of themselves (Jer 29:1; Jer 45:1). The second chapter has the shorter introduction which marks the beginning of a strophe; the third chapter seems imperfect, having as the introduction merely "saying" (Jer 3:1, Hebrew). Thus in the poetical parts, there are twenty-three sections divided into strophes of from seven to nine verses, marked some way thus, "The Lord said also unto me". They form five books: I. The Introduction, first chapter II. Reproofs of the Jews, the second through twenty-fourth chapters, made up of seven sections: (1) the second chapter (2) the third through sixth chapters; (3) the seventh through tenth chapters; (4) the eleventh through thirteenth chapters; (5) the fourteenth through seventeenth chapters; (6) the seventeenth through nineteenth and twentieth chapters; (7) the twenty-first through twenty-fourth chapters. III. Review of all nations in two sections: the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth through forty-ninth chapters, with a historical appendix of three sections, (1) the twenty-sixth chapter; (2) the twenty-seventh chapter; (3) the twenty-eighth and twenty-ninth chapters. IV. Two sections picturing the hopes of brighter times, (1) the thirtieth and thirty-first chapters; (2) the thirty-second and thirty-third chapters; and an historical appendix in three sections: (1) Jer 34:1-7; (2) Jer 34:8-22; (3) Jer. 35:1-19. V. The conclusion, in two sections: (1) Jer 36:2; (2) Jer 45:1-5. Subsequently, in Egypt, he added Jer 46:13-26 to the previous prophecy as to Egypt; also the three sections, the thirty-seventh through thirty-ninth chapters; fortieth through forty-third chapters; and forty-fourth chapter. The fifty-second chapter was probably (see Jer 51:64) an appendix from a later hand, taken from 2Ki 24:18, &c.; 2Ki 25:30. The prophecies against the several foreign nations stand in a different order in the Hebrew from that of the Septuagint; also the prophecies against them in the Hebrew (the forty-sixth through fifty-first chapters) are in the Septuagint placed after Jer 25:14, forming the twenty-sixth and thirty-first chapters; the remainder of the twenty-fifth chapter of the Hebrew is the thirty-second chapter of the Septuagint. Some passages in the Hebrew (Jer 27:19-22; Jer 33:14-26; Jer 39:4-14 Jer 48:45-47) are not found in the Septuagint; the Greek translators must have had a different recension before them; probably an earlier one. The Hebrew is probably the latest and fullest edition from Jeremiah's own hand. See on Jer 25:13. The canonicity of his prophecies is established by quotations of them in the New Testament (see Mat 2:17; Mat 16:14; Heb 8:8-12; on Mat 27:9, see on Introduction to Zechariah); also by the testimony of Ecclesiasticus 49:7, which quotes Jer 1:10; of PHILO, who quotes his word as an "oracle"; and of the list of canonical books in MELITO, ORIGEN, JEROME, and the Talmud.

JFB: Jeremiah (Outline)

• EXPOSTULATION WITH THE JEWS, REMINDING THEM OF THEIR FORMER DEVOTEDNESS, AND GOD'S CONSEQUENT FAVOR, AND A DENUNCIATION OF GOD'S COMING JUDGMENTS FOR THEIR IDOLATRY. (Jer. 2:1-37)
• GOD'S MERCY NOTWITHSTANDING JUDAH'S VILENESS. (Jer. 3:1-25)
• CONTINUATION OF ADDRESS TO THE TEN TRIBES OF ISRAEL. (Jer 4:1-2). THE PROPHET TURNS AGAIN TO JUDAH, TO WHOM HE HAD ORIGINALLY BEEN SENT (Jer. 4:3-31). (Jer. 4:1-31)
• THE CAUSE OF THE JUDGMENTS TO BE INFLICTED IS THE UNIVERSAL CORRUPTION OF THE PEOPLE. (Jer. 5:1-31)
• ZION'S FOES PREPARE WAR AGAINST HER: HER SINS ARE THE CAUSE. (Jer. 6:1-30)
• THE SEVENTH THROUGH NINTH CHAPTERS. DELIVERED IN THE BEGINNING OF JEHOIAKIM'S REIGN, ON THE OCCASION OF SOME PUBLIC FESTIVAL. (Jer. 7:1-34)
• THE JEW'S COMING PUNISHMENT; THEIR UNIVERSAL AND INCURABLE IMPENITENCE. (Jer. 8:1-22) The victorious Babylonians were about to violate the sanctuaries of the dead in search of plunder; for ornaments, treasures, and insignia of royalty were usually buried with kings. Or rather, their purpose was to do the greatest dishonor to the dead (Isa 14:19).
• JEREMIAH'S LAMENTATION FOR THE JEWS' SINS AND CONSEQUENT PUNISHMENT. (Jer. 9:1-26) This verse is more fitly joined to the last chapter, as Jer 9:23 in the Hebrew (compare Isa 22:4; Lam 2:11; Lam 3:48).
• CONTRAST BETWEEN THE IDOLS AND JEHOVAH. THE PROPHET'S LAMENTATION AND PRAYER. (Jer. 10:1-25)
• EPITOME OF THE COVENANT FOUND IN THE TEMPLE IN JOSIAH'S REIGN. JUDAH'S REVOLT FROM IT, AND GOD'S CONSEQUENT WRATH. (Jer. 11:1-23)
• CONTINUATION OF THE SUBJECT AT THE CLOSE OF THE ELEVENTH CHAPTER. (Jer. 12:1-17) (Psa 51:4).
• SYMBOLICAL PROPHECY. (Jer 13:1-7). (Jer. 13:1-27)
• PROPHECIES ON THE OCCASION OF A DROUGHT SENT IN JUDGMENT ON JUDEA. (Jer. 14:1-22) Literally, "That which was the word of Jehovah to Jeremiah concerning the dearth"
• GOD'S REPLY TO JEREMIAH'S INTERCESSORY PRAYER. (Jer. 15:1-21)
• CONTINUATION OF THE PREVIOUS PROPHECY. (Jer. 16:1-21)
• THE JEWS' INVETERATE LOVE OF IDOLATRY. (Jer. 17:1-27) The first of the four clauses relates to the third, the second to the fourth, by alternate parallelism. The sense is: They are as keen after idols as if their propensity was "graven with an iron pen (Job 19:24) on their hearts," or as if it were sanctioned by a law "inscribed with a diamond point" on their altars. The names of their gods used to be written on "the horns of the altars" (Act 17:23). As the clause "on their hearts" refers to their inward propensity, so "on . . . altars," the outward exhibition of it. Others refer "on the horns of . . . altars" to their staining them with the blood of victims, in imitation of the Levitical precept (Exo 29:12; Lev 4:7, Lev 4:18), but "written . . . graven," would thus be inappropriate.
• GOD, AS THE SOLE SOVEREIGN, HAS AN ABSOLUTE RIGHT TO DEAL WITH NATIONS ACCORDING TO THEIR CONDUCT TOWARDS HIM; ILLUSTRATED IN A TANGIBLE FORM BY THE POTTER'S MOULDING OF VESSELS FROM CLAY. (Jer. 18:1-23)
• THE DESOLATION OF THE JEWS FOR THEIR SINS FORETOLD IN THE VALLEY OF HINNOM; THE SYMBOL OF BREAKING A BOTTLE. (Jer 19:1-15)
• JEREMIAH'S INCARCERATION BY PASHUR, THE PRINCIPAL OFFICER OF THE TEMPLE, FOR PROPHESYING WITHIN ITS PRECINCTS; HIS RENEWED PREDICTIONS AGAINST THE CITY, &c., ON HIS LIBERATION. (Jer. 20:1-18)
• ZEDEKIAH CONSULTS JEREMIAH WHAT IS TO BE THE EVENT OF THE WAR: GOD'S ANSWER. (Jer 21:1-14)
• EXHORTATION TO REPENTANCE; JUDGMENT ON SHALLUM, JEHOIAKIM, AND CONIAH. (Jer. 22:1-30)
• THE WICKED RULERS TO BE SUPERSEDED BY THE KING, WHO SHOULD REIGN OVER THE AGAIN UNITED PEOPLES, ISRAEL AND JUDAH. (Jer. 23:1-40)
• THE RESTORATION OF THE CAPTIVES IN BABYLON AND THE DESTRUCTION OF THE REFRACTORY PARTY IN JUDEA AND IN EGYPT, REPRESENTED UNDER THE TYPE OF A BASKET OF GOOD, AND ONE OF BAD, FIGS. (Jer 24:1-10)
• PROPHECY OF THE SEVENTY YEARS CAPTIVITY; AND AFTER THAT THE DESTRUCTION OF BABYLON, AND OF ALL THE NATIONS THAT OPPRESSED THE JEWS. (Jer. 25:1-38)
• JEREMIAH DECLARED WORTHY OF DEATH, BUT BY THE INTERPOSITION OF AHIKAM SAVED; THE SIMILAR CASES OF MICAH AND URIJAH BEING ADDUCED IN THE PROPHET'S FAVOR. (Jer. 26:1-24)
• THE FUTILITY OF RESISTING NEBUCHADNEZZAR ILLUSTRATED TO THE AMBASSADORS OF THE KING, DESIRING TO HAVE THE KING OF JUDAH CONFEDERATE WITH THEM, UNDER THE TYPE OF YOKES. JEREMIAH EXHORTS THEM AND ZEDEKIAH TO YIELD. (Jer. 27:1-22)
• PROPHECIES IMMEDIATELY FOLLOWING THOSE IN THE TWENTY-SEVENTH CHAPTER. HANANIAH BREAKS THE YOKES TO SIGNIFY THAT NEBUCHADNEZZAR'S YOKE SHALL BE BROKEN. JEREMIAH FORETELLS THAT YOKES OF IRON ARE TO SUCCEED THOSE OF WOOD, AND THAT HANANIAH SHALL DIE. (Jer. 28:1-17)
• LETTER OF JEREMIAH TO THE CAPTIVES IN BABYLON, TO COUNTERACT THE ASSURANCES GIVEN BY THE FALSE PROPHETS OF A SPEEDY RESTORATION. (Jer. 29:1-32)
• RESTORATION OF THE JEWS FROM BABYLON AFTER ITS CAPTURE, AND RAISING UP OF MESSIAH. (Jer. 30:1-24)
• CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY IN THE THIRTIETH CHAPTER. (Jer. 31:1-40)
• JEREMIAH, IMPRISONED FOR HIS PROPHECY AGAINST JERUSALEM, BUYS A PATRIMONIAL PROPERTY (HIS RELATIVE HANAMEEL'S), IN ORDER TO CERTIFY TO THE JEWS THEIR FUTURE RETURN FROM BABYLON. (Jer 32:1-14)
• PROPHECY OF THE RESTORATION FROM BABYLON, AND OF MESSIAH AS KING AND PRIEST. (Jer. 33:1-26)
• CAPTIVITY OF ZEDEKIAH AND THE PEOPLE FORETOLD FOR THEIR DISOBEDIENCE AND PERFIDY. (Jer. 34:1-22)
• PROPHECY IN THE REIGN OF JEHOIAKIM, WHEN THE CHALDEANS, IN CONJUNCTION WITH THE SYRIANS AND MOABITES, INVADED JUDEA. (Jer. 35:1-19)
• BARUCH WRITES, AND READS PUBLICLY JEREMIAH'S PROPHECIES COLLECTED IN A VOLUME. THE ROLL IS BURNT BY JEHOIAKIM, AND WRITTEN AGAIN BY BARUCH AT JEREMIAH'S DICTATION. (Jer. 36:1-32)
• HISTORICAL SECTIONS, THIRTY-SEVENTH THROUGH FORTY-FOURTH CHAPTERS. THE CHALDEANS RAISE THE SIEGE TO GO AND MEET PHARAOH-HOPHRA. ZEDEKIAH SENDS TO JEREMIAH TO PRAY TO GOD IN BEHALF OF THE JEWS: IN VAIN, JEREMIAH TRIES TO ESCAPE TO HIS NATIVE PLACE, BUT IS ARRESTED. ZEDEKIAH ABATES THE RIGOR OF HIS IMPRISONMENT. (Jer. 37:1-21)
• JEREMIAH PREDICTS THE CAPTURE OF JERUSALEM, FOR WHICH HE IS CAST INTO A DUNGEON, BUT IS TRANSFERRED TO THE PRISON COURT ON THE INTERCESSION OF EBED-MELECH, AND HAS A SECRET INTERVIEW WITH ZEDEKIAH. (Jer. 38:1-28)
• JERUSALEM TAKEN. ZEDEKIAH'S FATE. JEREMIAH CARED FOR. EBED-MELECH ASSURED. (Jer. 39:1-18)
• JEREMIAH IS SET FREE AT RAMAH, AND GOES TO GEDALIAH, TO WHOM THE REMNANT OF JEWS REPAIR. JOHANAN WARNS GEDALIAH OF ISHMAEL'S CONSPIRACY IN VAIN. (Jer. 40:1-16)
• ISHMAEL MURDERS GEDALIAH AND OTHERS, THEN FLEES TO THE AMMONITES. JOHANAN PURSUES HIM, RECOVERS THE CAPTIVES, AND PURPOSES TO FLEE TO EGYPT FOR FEAR OF THE CHALDEANS. (Jer. 41:1-18)
• THE JEWS AND JOHANAN INQUIRE OF GOD, THROUGH JEREMIAH, AS TO GOING TO EGYPT, PROMISING OBEDIENCE TO HIS WILL. THEIR SAFETY ON CONDITION OF STAYING IN JUDEA, AND THEIR DESTRUCTION IN THE EVENT OF GOING TO EGYPT, ARE FORETOLD. THEM HYPOCRISY IN ASKING FOR COUNSEL WHICH THEY MEANT NOT TO FOLLOW, IF CONTRARY TO THEIR OWN DETERMINATION, IS REPROVED. (Jer. 42:1-22)
• THE JEWS CARRY JEREMIAH AND BARUCH INTO EGYPT. JEREMIAH FORETELLS BY A TYPE THE CONQUEST OF EGYPT BY NEBUCHADNEZZAR, AND THE FATE OF THE FUGITIVES. (Jer 43:1-13)
• JEREMIAH REPROVES THE JEWS FOR THEIR IDOLATRY IN EGYPT, AND DENOUNCES GOD'S JUDGMENTS ON THEM AND EGYPT ALIKE. (Jer. 44:1-30)
• JEREMIAH COMFORTS BARUCH. (Jer 45:1-5)
• THE PROPHECIES, FORTY-SIXTH THROUGH FIFTY-SECOND CHAPTERS, REFER TO FOREIGN PEOPLES. (Jer. 46:1-28) General heading of the next six chapters of prophecies concerning the Gentiles; the prophecies are arranged according to nations, not by the dates.
• PROPHECY AGAINST THE PHILISTINES. (Jer 47:1-7) Pharaoh-necho probably smote Gaza on his return after defeating Josiah at Megiddo (2Ch 35:20) [GROTIUS]. Or, Pharaoh-hophra (Jer 37:5, Jer 37:7) is intended: probably on his return from his fruitless attempt to save Jerusalem from the Chaldeans, he smote Gaza in order that his expedition might not be thought altogether in vain [CALVIN] (Amo 1:6-7).
• PROPHECY AGAINST MOAB. (Jer. 48:1-47)
• PREDICTIONS AS TO AMMON, IDUMEA, DAMASCUS, KEDAR, HAZOR, AND ELAM. (Jer. 49:1-39)
• BABYLON'S COMING DOWNFALL; ISRAEL'S REDEMPTION. (Jer. 50:1-46) Compare Isa. 45:1-47:15. But as the time of fulfilment drew nearer, the prophecies are now proportionally more distinct than then.
• CONTINUATION OF THE PROPHECY AGAINST BABYLON BEGUN IN THE FIFTIETH CHAPTER. (Jer. 51:1-64)
• WRITTEN BY SOME OTHER THAN JEREMIAH (PROBABLY EZRA) AS AN HISTORICAL SUPPLEMENT TO THE PREVIOUS PROPHECIES. (Jer. 52:1-34)

TSK: Jeremiah 28 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Jer 28:1, Hananiah prophesies falsely the return of the vessels, and of Jeconiah; Jer 28:5, Jeremiah, wishing it to be true, shews that the event will declare the true prophets; Jer 28:10, Hananiah breaks Jeremiah’s yoke; Jer 28:12, Jeremiah tells of an iron yoke; v.15, and foretells Hananiah’s death.

Poole: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

BOOK OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH

THE ARGUMENT

IT was the great unhappiness of this prophet to be a physician to, but that could not save, a dying state, their disease still prevailing against the remedy; and indeed no wonder that all things were so much out of order, when the book of the law had been wanting above sixty years. He was called to be a teacher in his youth, in the days of good Josiah, being sanctified and ordained by God to his prophetical office from his mother’ s womb, Jer 1:5 in a very evil time, though the people afterward proved much worse upon the death of that good king. He setting himself against the torrent of the corruptions of the times, was always opposed and unkindly treated by his ungrateful countrymen, as also by false prophets, and the priests, princes, and people, who encouraged all their impieties and unrighteousness. At length he threatened their destruction and captivity by the Chaldeans, which he lived to see, but foretells their return after seventy years; all which accordingly came to pass. He doth also, notwithstanding his dreadful threatenings, intermix divers comfortable promises of the Messiah, and the days of the gospel; he denounceth also heavy judgments against the heathens nations that had afflicted God’ s people, both such as were near, and also more remote, as Egypt, the Philistines, Moab, Edomites, Ammonites, Damascus, Kedar, Hazor, Elam, but especially Babylon herself, that is made so great a type of the antichristian Babylon in the New Testament. Upon the murder of Gedaliah, whom the Chaldeans had made governor of Judea, he was forcibly against his will carried into Egypt, where (after he had prophesied from first to last between forty and fifty years) probably he died; some say he was stoned.

Whatever else we hear mentioned of his writings, they are either counterfeit, as the Prophecies of Baruch, &c., or it is likely we have the sum of them in this book, though possibly some of his sermons might have had some enlargements in that roll which, by his appointment, was written by Baruch, Jer 36:2 , &c.

Poole: Jeremiah 28 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 28

Hananiah’ s false prophecy: Jeremiah’ s answer, Jer 28:1-9 . Hananiah breaketh Jeremiah’ s yoke: he foretelleth an iron yoke, and Hananiah’ s death, Jer 28:10-17 .

Here is a great appearing difficulty, viz. how the fourth year could be called

MHCC: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

Jeremiah was a priest, a native of Anathoth, in the tribe of Benjamin. He was called to the prophetic office when very young, about seventy years after the death of Isaiah, and exercised it for about forty years with great faithfulness, till the sins of the Jewish nation came to their full measure and destruction followed. The prophecies of Jeremiah do not stand as they were delivered. Blayney has endeavoured to arrange them in more regular order, namely, ch. 1-20; 22; 23; 25; 26; 35; 36; Jer 45:1-5; Jer 24:1-10; 29; 30; 31; 27; 28; Jer 21:1-14; 34; 37; 32; 33; 38; 39; (Jer 39:15-18, Jer 39:1-14.) 40-44; 46-52. The general subject of his prophecies is the idolatry and other sins of the Jews; the judgments by which they were threatened, with references to their future restoration and deliverance, and promises of the Messiah. They are remarkable for plain and faithful reproofs, affectionate expostulations, and awful warnings.

MHCC: Jeremiah 28 (Chapter Introduction)

(Jer 28:1-9) A false prophet opposes Jeremiah.

(Jer 28:10-17) The false prophet warned of his approaching death.

Matthew Henry: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah

The Prophecies of the Old Testament, as the Epistles of the New, are placed rather according to their bulk than their seniority - the longest first, not the oldest. There were several prophets, and writing ones, that were contemporaries with Isaiah, as Micah, or a little before him, as Hosea, and Joel, and Amos, or soon after him, as Habakkuk and Nahum are supposed to have been; and yet the prophecy of Jeremiah, who began many years after Isaiah finished, is placed next to his, because there is so much in it. Where we meet with most of God's word, there let the preference be given; and yet those of less gifts are not to be despised nor excluded. Nothing now occurs to be observed further concerning prophecy in general; but concerning this prophet Jeremiah we may observe, I. That he was betimes a prophet; he began young, and therefore could say, from his own experience, that it is good for a man to bear the yoke in his youth, the yoke both of service and of affliction, Lam 3:27. Jerome observes that Isaiah, who had more years over his head, had his tongue touched with a coal of fire, to purge away his iniquity (Isa 6:7), but that when God touched Jeremiah's mouth, who was yet but young, nothing was said of the purging of his iniquity (Jer 1:9), because, by reason of his tender years, he had not so much sin to answer for. II. That he continued long a prophet, some reckon fifty years, others above forty. He began in the thirteenth year of Josiah, when things went well under that good king, but he continued through all the wicked reigns that followed; for when we set out for the service of God, though the wind may then be fair and favourable, we know not how soon it may turn and be tempestuous. III. That he was a reproving prophet, was sent in God's name to tell Jacob of their sins and to warn them of the judgments of God that were coming upon them; and the critics observe that therefore his style or manner of speaking is more plain and rough, and less polite, than that of Isaiah and some others of the prophets. Those that are sent to discover sin ought to lay aside the enticing words of man's wisdom. Plain-dealing is best when we are dealing with sinners to bring them to repentance. IV. That he was a weeping prophet; so he is commonly called, not only because he penned the Lamentations, but because he was all along a mournful spectator of the sins of his people and of the desolating judgments that were coming upon them. And for this reason, perhaps, those who imagined our Saviour to be one of the prophets thought him of any of them to be most like to Jeremiah (Mat 16:14), because he was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. V. That he was a suffering prophet. He was persecuted by his own people more than any of them, as we shall find in the story of this book; for he lived and preached just before the Jews' destruction by the Chaldeans, when their character seems to have been the same as it was just before their destruction by the Romans, when they killed the Lord Jesus, and persecuted his disciples, pleased not God, and were contrary to all men, for wrath had come upon them to the uttermost, 1Th 2:15, 1Th 2:16. The last account we have of him in his history is that the remaining Jews forced him to go down with them into Egypt; whereas the current tradition is, among Jews and Christians, that he suffered martyrdom. Hottinger, out of Elmakin, an Arabic historian, relates that, continuing to prophesy in Egypt against the Egyptians and other nations, he was stoned to death; and that long after, when Alexander entered Egypt, he took up the bones of Jeremiah where they were buried in obscurity, and carried them to Alexandria, and buried them there. The prophecies of this book which we have in the first nineteen chapters seem to be the heads of the sermons he preached in a way of general reproof for sin and denunciation of judgment; afterwards they are more particular and occasional, and mixed with the history of his day, but not placed in due order of time. With the threatenings are intermixed many gracious promises of mercy to the penitent, of the deliverance of the Jews out of their captivity, and some that have a plain reference to the kingdom of the Messiah. Among the Apocryphal writings an epistle is extant said to be written by Jeremiah to the captives in Babylon, warning them against the worship of idols, by exposing the vanity of idols and the folly of idolaters. It is in Baruch, ch. 6. But it is supposed not to be authentic; nor has it, I think, any thing like the life and spirit of Jeremiah's writings. It is also related concerning Jeremiah (2 Macc. 2:4) that, when Jerusalem was destroyed by the Chaldeans, he, by direction from God, took the ark and the altar of incense, and, carrying them to Mount Nebo lodged them in a hollow cave there and stopped the door; but some that followed him, and thought that they had marked the place, could not find it. He blamed them for seeking it, telling them that the place should be unknown till the time that God should gather his people together again. But I know not what credit is to be given to that story, though it is there said to be found in the records. We cannot but be concerned, in the reading of Jeremiah's prophecies, to find that they were so little regarded by the men of that generation; but let us make use of that as a reason why we should regard them the more; for they are written for our learning too, and for warning to us and to our land.

Matthew Henry: Jeremiah 28 (Chapter Introduction)

In the foregoing chapter Jeremiah had charged those prophets with lies who foretold the speedy breaking of the yoke of the king of Babylon and the speedy return of the vessels of the sanctuary; how here we have his contest with a particular prophet upon those heads. I. Hananiah, a pretender to prophecy, in contradiction to Jeremiah, foretold the sinking of Nebuchadnezzar's power and the return both of the persons and of the vessels that were carried away (Jer 28:1-4), and, as a sing of this, he broke the yoke from the neck of Jeremiah (Jer 28:10, Jer 28:11). II. Jeremiah wished his words might prove true, but appealed to the event whether they were so or no, not doubting but that would disprove them (Jer 28:5-9). III. The doom both of the deceived and the deceiver is here read. The people that were deceived should have their yoke of wood turned into a yoke of iron (Jer 28:12-14), and the prophet that was the deceiver should be shortly cut off by death, and he was so, accordingly, within two months (Jer 28:15-17).

Constable: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title

The title of this book derives from its writer, the late seventh and early sixth-century Judean prophet Jeremiah. The book occupies the second position in the Latter Prophets section of the Hebrew Bible after Isaiah and before Ezekiel, which accounts for its position in the Septuagint and most modern translations.

The meaning of "Jeremiah" is not clear. It could mean "Yahweh founds or establishes," "Yahweh exalts," "Yahweh throws down," "Yahweh hurls," or "Yahweh loosens (the womb)."

Writer

The composition and structure of Jeremiah, discussed below, have led many scholars to conclude that an editor or editors (redactors) probably put the book in its final form. Many conservatives, however, believe that Jeremiah himself was responsible for the final form, though it is clear that the book went through several revisions before it reached its final canonical form. Jeremiah could even have written the last chapter, which describes events that took place about 25 years after the next latest events, since he would have been approximately 83 years old, assuming he was still alive. Clearly Jeremiah's secretary, Baruch, provided the prophet with much assistance in writing the material and possibly arranging it in its final form (36:17-18; 45:1). Baruch was to Jeremiah what Luke was to Paul: his companion, amanuensis, and biographer. The book bears marks of having been assembled by one person at one time.

"There is no satisfactory reason for doubting that Jeremiah himself was the author of the entire book."¹

The Book of Jeremiah tells us more about the prophet Jeremiah than any other prophetic book reveals about its writer. It is highly biographical and autobiographical.² We know more about his personality than that of any other prophet.

Jeremiah's hometown was Anathoth, a Levitical town in the territory of Benjamin three miles northeast of Jerusalem.³ Jeremiah's father, Hilkiah, was evidently a descendant of Abiathar, a descendant of Eli (1 Sam. 14:3). Thus Jeremiah had ancestral connections to Shiloh, where the tabernacle stood during the judges period of Israel's history (the amphictyony). Jeremiah referred to Shiloh in his Temple Sermon (7:12, 14; 26:6). Abiathar was the sole survivor of King Saul's massacre of the priests at Nob, also only a few miles northeast of Jerusalem (1 Sam. 22:20). Later Solomon exiled Abiathar to Anathoth, where Abiathar had property, because Abiathar had proved unfaithful to David (1 Kings 2:26). Jeremiah's father Hilkiah may have been the high priest who found the book of the Law in the temple during Josiah's reforms (1 Kings 2:26).⁴ Even though Jeremiah came from a priestly family (like Ezekiel and Zechariah), there is no indication that he ever underwent training for the priesthood or functioned as a priest.

Jeremiah's date of birth is a matter of dispute. Most scholars believe he was born about 643 B.C., one year before the end of King Manasseh's reign.⁵ He probably died in Egypt.

"A late, unattested tradition, mentioned by Tertullian, Jerome, and others, claims that the people of Tahpanhes [in Egypt] stoned Jeremiah to death."⁶

His call to the prophetic office came in 627 or 626 B.C. (1:2; 25:3) when he would have been about 20 years old.⁷ His ministry as a prophet may have extended over 40 years.⁸ He evidently exercised his ministry mainly during periods of crisis in Judah's history, though it is impossible to date some of his prophecies. His ministry involved prophesying about Judah and the other ancient Near Eastern nations of his time (1:10).

Judging by Jeremiah's autobiographical remarks and the narrative information about him in this book, his life was a sad one, one long martyrdom. He probably encountered more opposition from more enemies than any other prophet. Much of it stemmed from his message to his own people: unconditional surrender to Babylon.

"No braver or more tragic figure ever trod the stage of Israel's history than the prophet Jeremiah. . . .

"Jeremiah was hated, jeered at, ostracized (e.g., chs. 15:10f., 17; 18:18; 20:10), continually harassed, and more than once almost killed (e.g., chs. 11:18 to 12:6; 26; 36)."⁹

Jeremiah is the only prophet who recorded his own feelings as he ministered, which makes him both very interesting and very helpful to other ministers. Some authorities believe that his greatest contribution to posterity is his personality.

". . . by birth a priest; by grace a prophet; by the trials of life a bulwark for God's truth; by daily spiritual experience one of the greatest exponents of prophetic faith in his unique relation to God; by temperament gentle and timid, yet constantly contending against the forces of sin; and by natural desire a seeker after the love of a companion, his family, friends, and above all, his people--which were all denied him."¹⁰

"He was a weeping prophet to a wayward people."¹¹

There are many similarities between Jeremiah and Hosea. Hosea announced the fall of Samaria, and Jeremiah announced the fall of Jerusalem. Both prophets experienced much personal tragedy. In his ideas as well as in his vocabulary, Jeremiah demonstrates familiarity with Hosea's prophecies. There are also affinities with Job and the Psalter.

There are also remarkable parallels between Jeremiah and the Lord Jesus Christ. No other prophet bears as many striking similarities to the Savior, which makes him the most Christ-like of the prophets. The people of Jesus' day noted these similarities (Matt. 16:14). In both cases Jerusalem was about to fall, the temple would suffer destruction soon, the worship of Yahweh had become a formalistic husk, and there was need for emphasis on individual relationship with God. Both men had a message for Israel and the whole world. Both of them used nature quite extensively for illustrative purposes in their teaching. Both came from a high tradition: Jeremiah from a priestly prophetic heritage and Jesus from a divine royal position. Both were very conscious of their call from God. Both condemned the commercialism of temple worship in their day (7:11: Matt. 21:13). Their enemies charged both of them with political treason. Both experienced persecutions, trials, and imprisonments. Both foretold the destruction of the temple (7:14; Matt. 13:2). Both wept over Jerusalem (9:1; Luke 19:41). Both condemned the priests of their day. Both experienced rejection by members of their own families (12:6; John 1:11). Both were so tenderhearted that some Jewish leaders identified them with the Suffering Servant of Isaiah 53. Both loved Israel deeply. Both were lonely (15:10; Isa. 53:3). And both enjoyed unusually intimate fellowship with God (20:7; John 11:41-42).¹²

"It has often been remarked that Jeremiah's life was finally a failure. He was alone for most of his ministry. It seemed that no one gave any heed to his words. He was dragged off finally to live his last days in exile against his own will. He was a failure as the world judges human achievement. But a more balanced assessment of him would be that his very words of judgment saved Israel's faith from disintegration, and his words of hope finally helped his people to gain hope in God's future for them."¹³

"The character of Jeremiah is also reflected in his writings. His speech is clear and simple, incisive and pithy, and, though generally speaking somewhat diffuse, yet ever rich in thought. If it lacks the lofty strain, the soaring flight of an Isaiah, yet it has beauties of its own. It is distinguished by a wealth of new imagery which is wrought out with great delicacy and deep feeling, and by a versatility that easily adapts itself to the most various objects, and by artistic clearness' (Ewald)."¹⁴

Historical Background

The biblical records of the times in which Jeremiah ministered are 2 Kings 21-25 and 2 Chronicles 33-36. His contemporary prophets were Zephaniah and Habakkuk before the Exile, and Ezekiel and Daniel after it began.

King Manasseh had been Judah's most ungodly king, but toward the end of his life he repented (2 Chron. 33:15-19). He was responsible for many of the evil conditions that marked Judah in Jeremiah's earliest years (cf. 15:4; 2 Kings 23:26). His long life was not a blessing for faithfulness, as his father Hezekiah's had been, but an instrument of chastening for Judah.

King Amon succeeded Manasseh and reigned two years (642-640 B.C.). Rather than perpetuating the repentant attitude that his father had demonstrated, Amon reverted to the policies of Manasseh's earlier reign and rebelled against Yahweh completely. This provoked some of his officials to assassinate him (2 Kings 21:23).

Josiah was eight years old when his father Amon died. He began reigning then and continued on the throne for 31 years (640-609 B.C.). Josiah was one of Judah's best kings and one of the four reforming kings of the Southern Kingdom. He began to seek the Lord when he was 16 years old and began initiating religious reforms when he was 20 (2 Chron. 34:3-7). Jeremiah received his call to minister in the thirteenth year of Josiah when the king was 21, namely, 627 B.C. (1:6). Josiah's reforms were more extensive than those of any of his predecessors. He began the major projects when he was 26. During these years Assyria was declining as a world power and Neo-Babylonia was not yet the dominant empire it soon became. One of Josiah's projects was the repairing of Solomon's temple (v. 5; cf. 12:4-16). During its renovation Hilkiah, the high priest and possibly Jeremiah's father, discovered the Mosaic Law, which had been lost for a long time (cf. 2 Kings 22:8). This discovery spurred a return to the system of worship that the Book of Deuteronomy specified (2 Kings 23). Josiah also did much to clear the land of idolatry, sacred prostitution, child sacrifice, and pagan altars not only in Judah but also in some formerly Israelite territory. He also reinstituted the Passover. Unfortunately for Judah, Josiah felt compelled to travel to Megiddo to try and block Pharaoh Necho II from advancing north to assist the Assyrians in resisting the westward expanding Babylonians. Josiah died at Megiddo in 609 B.C. at the age of 39. His death was a tragic loss for Judah.

Some of Jeremiah's prophecies date from Josiah's reign.¹⁵ Zephaniah also ministered in Judah during the reign of Josiah as did the prophetess Huldah (2 Kings 22:14-20).

Three of Josiah's sons and one of his grandsons ruled Judah after his death. The first of these, though he was the second son, was Jehoahaz who ruled for only three months in 609 B.C. The Judean people favored Jehoahaz, but Pharaoh Necho, who by slaying Josiah gained control over Judah, found him uncooperative. Therefore, Pharaoh deported Jehoahaz to Egypt as a prisoner where he died (22:10-12). God gave Jeremiah a few prophecies during this king's brief reign.

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Jehoahaz's older brother Jehoiakim succeeded him on Judah's throne, thanks to Pharaoh Necho. He reigned for 11 years (609-598 B.C.). Jehoiakim was a weak king who changed allegiances between Egypt and Babylon whenever he thought a change might be to Judah's advantage. During his tenure Prince Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon defeated the allied Egyptian and Assyrian forces at Carchemish thus establishing Babylonian supremacy in the ancient Near East (605 B.C.). Shortly thereafter King Nebuchadnezzar, as he had become, invaded Palestine, conquered some cities, and took some of the nobles, including Daniel, as exiles to Babylon (Dan. 1:1-3). Jehoiakim refused to follow Jeremiah's counsel to submit to the Babylonians. Instead he showed his contempt for the prophet by burning his prophecies (ch. 36). Jeremiah despised this king for his wickedness (22:18-19; 26:20-23; 36). Jehoiakim rebelled against Babylon in 601 B.C., so the Babylonians deposed him and took him to Babylon (2 Chron. 36:6). Later they allowed him to return to Jerusalem where he died in 561 B.C. (cf. 22:19). Several of Jeremiah's prophecies apparently date from Jehoiakim's reign. Habakkuk probably also ministered at this time, as the content of his book suggests.

Jehoiakim's son Jehoiachin succeeded his father but only reigned for three months (598-597 B.C.). During that time Nebuchadnezzar attacked Jerusalem and carried off a large portion of the city's population (in 597 B.C.). The king was evil, and Jeremiah predicted that none of his sons would rule over the nation (22:30). He ended his days in Babylon enjoying the favor of the Babylonian king Evilmerodach (52:31-34).

Zedekiah was the third son of Josiah to rule Judah, and he too ruled under Nebuchadnezzar's sovereignty (597-586 B.C.). The Babylonian monarch summoned Zedekiah to Babylon in 593 B.C. (51:59), but he rebelled against Nebuchadnezzar by making a treaty with Pharaoh Hophra (589-570 B.C.) under pressure from Judean nationalists (chs. 37-38). This resulted in the final siege of Jerusalem in 588 and its fall two years later in 586 B.C. (ch. 39).¹⁶ The Babylonians took Zedekiah captive to Riblah in Syria where they slew his sons and put out his eyes. He died later in Babylon. Since Jeremiah advocated surrender to the Babylonians, Nebuchadnezzar allowed him to choose where he wanted to live when Jerusalem fell, and the prophet elected to stay where he was.

Shortly after he defeated Zedekiah, Nebuchadnezzar set up a pro-Babylonian Judean named Gedaliah as his governor (40:5-6). But a group of Jewish nationalists under Ishmael's leadership assassinated Gedaliah within the year (586 B.C.; 41:2). This ill-advised act resulted in the rebels having to flee to Egypt for safety from Nebuchadnezzar. They forced Jeremiah to accompany them against his will (chs. 42-43). There the prophet evidently spent the remaining years of his life and produced his final prophecies.¹⁷

Important Dates for Jeremiah
Years	Events	References
643	Probable date of Jeremiah's birth
640	Josiah becomes king of Judah at age 8	2 Chron. 34:1
628	Josiah begins his reforms	2 Chron. 34:3
627	Jeremiah begins his ministry	Jer. 1:2; 25:3
626	Nabopolassar founds the Neo-Babylonian Empire
622	The book of the Law discovered in the temple	2 Chron. 34:8, 14
612	The fall of Nineveh, Assyria's capitol
609	Josiah killed in battle by Egyptians at Megiddo	2 Chron. 35:20-25
	Jehoahaz reigns over Judah for 3 months	2 Chron. 36:1-3
	Jehoiakim made king of Judah by Pharaoh Necho	2 Chron. 36:4
605	Nebuchadnezzar defeats the Egyptians at Carchemish	Jer. 46:2
	The first deportation of exiles (including Daniel) to Babylon	Dan. 1:1-7
604	Jehoiakim burns Jeremiah's first scroll	Jer. 36
601	Jehoiakim rebels against Babylon	2 Kings 24:1
598	Jehoiakim is deposed and dies	2 Chron. 36:3
	Jehioachin reigns over Judah for 3 months	2 Kings 24:8
597	The second deportation of exiles (including Jehoiachin) to Babylon	2 Kings 24:12-16
	Zedekiah made king of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar	2 Kings 24:17
593	Zedekiah summoned to Babylon	Jer. 51:59
588	Zedekiah is besieged in Jerusalem for treachery	Jer. 52:3-4
586	Fall of Jerusalem	Jer. 39
	Gedaliah appointed governor of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar	Jer. 40:5-6
	Gedaliah assassinated by Ishmael	Jer. 41:2
	Judean refugees flee to Egypt taking Jeremiah with them	Jer. 42-43
581	The third deportation of exiles to Babylon	Jer. 52:30
568	Nebuchadnezzar invades Egypt	Jer. 43:8-13; 46:13-26
561	Jehoiachin released from prison in Babylon	Jer. 52:31-34
539	Fall of Babylon to Cyrus the Persian	Dan. 5:30
538	Cyrus issues his decree allowing the Jews to return to Palestine	Ezra 1:1-4

Date

As has already been pointed out, Jeremiah gave the prophecies and composed the narratives that constitute this book at various times during his long ministry. The date at which the book reached the state in which it is today is debatable. Most scholars believe that editors continued to add and rearrange the material long after Jeremiah's day. However, the tradition that Jeremiah was responsible for the book is old and has encouraged conservative scholars to view it as the product of the prophet himself or perhaps his scribe Baruch. If Jeremiah was the final editor of the work, as well as its writer, he completed this editorial task after his last historical reference and before his death. The last historical reference is Jehoiachin's release from captivity in Babylon (561 B.C.; 52:31-34). We do not know when Jeremiah died, but if he was born about 643 B.C., he probably did not live much beyond 560 B.C. Some scholars believe Jeremiah wrote this account himself and or that Baruch provided it. Others believe the writer of the Book of Kings added it to the collections of Jeremiah's writings.¹⁸ One writer speculated that the final canonical form of the book was in circulation not later than 520 B.C.¹⁹ Another believed it was available shortly after Jeremiah's death, which he guessed was about 586 B.C.²⁰

Audience

Jeremiah ministered to the people of Judah during the last days of the monarchy and the early part of the captivity. Almost all of his ministry took place in Jerusalem. He spoke to kings, priests, and prophets, as well as the ordinary citizens, and he delivered oracles against foreign nations.

"The book of Jeremiah and the book of Lamentations show how God looks at a culture which knew Him and deliberately turned away."²¹

Purpose

Jeremiah's purpose was to call his hearers to repentance in view of God's judgment on Judah, which would come soon from an army from the north (chs. 2-45). Judgment was coming because God's people had forsaken Yahweh and had given themselves to idolatry. Jeremiah spoke more about repentance than any other prophet. He also assured his audience that God had a future for Israel and Judah (chs. 30-33). Once it became clear that the people would not repent, he advocated submission to Babylon to minimize the destruction that was inevitable. As God's prophetic spokesman, he also uttered oracles against the nations that opposed God's chosen people (chs. 46-51).

"The theme of this prophet consists largely in a stern warning to Judah to turn from idolatry and sin to avoid the catastrophe of exile."²²

Theological Emphases

The Book of Jeremiah is not theologically organized in the sense that it develops a certain theological emphasis as it unfolds, as Isaiah does. Rather it presents certain theological truths in greater or lesser degree throughout its 52 chapters. The dominant theological emphases are as follows.

The prophet paid more attention to God and the Israelites than to any other subjects of revelation. His appreciation for God as the Lord of all creation is noteworthy. In contrast to Isaiah, Micah, Zechariah, and Daniel, Jeremiah did not reveal much about the coming Messiah, though he did record some significant messianic predictions. A coming revealer would outshine the ark of the covenant (3:14-17), and the fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant promises would come (33:14-26).

Regarding the Israelites, Jeremiah stressed the fact that immorality always accompanies idolatry. Israel's present problems were the result of her past and present apostasy. The priests, Jeremiah asserted, were primarily responsible for the degeneration of worship from spiritual to merely formal, though several false prophets also misled the people. The Judahites could not escape going into captivity because they refused to repent. Therefore, they needed to accept the inevitable and not resist the Babylonians. Jerusalem and Judah would suffer destruction, the Davidic kings would not rule (for some time), and the Israelites would lose their land (temporarily). But there would be a return from exile (25:11; 29:10). Israel had hope of a glorious future in view of God's faithfulness to His promises (32:1-15). In the distant future, Israel would return in penitence to the Lord (32:37-40). Messiah would rule over her (23:5-8).

". . . Jeremiah placed an enormous emphasis on the sins and misdeeds of Israel. . . .

"The evil deeds in which Israel was involved were of two broad classes--the worship of false gods, and the perpetration of personal and social sins of an ethical and moral kind."²³

"The theology of the book of Jeremiah may be summarized as follows: God's judgment would fall on Judah because she had broken His covenant."²⁴

The nations were God's agents in executing His will, particularly Nebuchadnezzar (27:6). But Babylon would fall (chs. 50-51). The nations, as well as Israel, needed to demonstrate righteousness (chs. 46-51). God had a concern for the nations as well as for His people (29:1-14). In the distant future, the remnant of the nations would enjoy blessing from the Lord (3:17; 16:19).

There is also a strong emphasis on the biblical covenants in Jeremiah, particularly the Mosaic and New Covenants. Jeremiah viewed Israel as the chosen people of God adopted by Him for a special relationship with Himself and for a special purpose in the world. The Mosaic Covenant was pure grace, and Yahweh had made it with a redeemed people. It involved promises from God and responsibilities for the Israelites that required trust, obedience, and holiness. Obedience would result in blessing from God, and disobedience would yield divine cursing. The prophet knew the Mosaic Law and compared the conduct of the people to what it required.²⁵ Jeremiah anticipated the appearing of the promised Davidic Messiah and the fulfillment of the kingdom promises that God had made to David. He also predicted that God would make a new covenant with the Israelites sometime in the future that would involve new provisions and conditions for living (31:31-34). It would replace the old Mosaic Covenant and would feature personal relationship with God to an extent never experienced before.

"Probably the outstanding emphasis in Jeremiah's ministry was the priority of the spiritual over everything else. He saw how secondary the temporal features of Judah's faith were. . . .

"The lasting value of Jeremiah's book lies not only in the allusions (between forty and fifty of them) in the NT (over half are in Revelation) but also in its being a wonderful handbook for learning the art of having fellowship with God."²⁶

Composition

The present canonical form of the book was probably the result of a long and complex process of collection. The Book of Psalms also underwent compilation in a similar fashion over many years. The compilation is not chronological, but it did occur in stages.

"Precisely how the final form of the prophecy arose is unknown."²⁷

In some cases key words link units of material together. There is also some grouping of subject matter according to genre within the larger sections of the book.²⁸

The attempt to identify the original sources of material in Bible books is a worthy subject of study, but the purpose of these notes is to expound the text.²⁹ The book itself indicates that King Jehoiakim destroyed some of Jeremiah's earlier written prophecies and that Baruch rewrote them and added more to form another collection (ch. 36). This information explains to some extent the anthological structure of the book and suggests that Jeremiah, Baruch, and perhaps others added even more prophecies as time passed and that the final product is what we have.

"It is clear that the book assumed its present form either very late in the prophet's lifetime, or more probably after his death."³⁰

Genre

About half of Jeremiah is poetry and half prose. But poetry and prose appear side by side in many sections of the book; several literary units contain both forms of composition.

Scholars have identified three types of literature (genre) in Jeremiah: poetic sayings or oracles (so-called Type A material), prose narratives that are largely biographical and historical (so-called Type B material), and prose speeches or discourses (so-called Type C material).³¹

Several generations of scholars have held that the poetic oracles toward the first part of the book represent Jeremiah's original sayings, and the historical and biographical narratives that follow were the product of Baruch, Jeremiah's scribe. This view, while a common one, contains serious problems, and many competent authorities have pointed out the inconsistencies of this position. I mention it here because it is a common view, not because I accept it. I do not.

Structure

Like most other prophetic books of the Old Testament, Jeremiah is a collection of oracles and other materials. It is an anthology of Jeremiah's speeches and writings, really an anthology of anthologies. It is not like a novel that one may read from start to finish discovering that it unfolds in a logical fashion as it goes.

"No commentator, ancient or modern, has seriously posited a chronological arrangement of its prophecies."³²

This book, even more than most of the other prophetic books, strikes the western mind initially as not following any consistently logical order, especially within the body of the book. The difficulty that students of Jeremiah have had in discovering its underlying plan is clear from the fact that commentators have offered so many different outlines of it.³³

"When we come to inquire whether any principles of arrangement can be observed in the book of Jeremiah, we have to admit that any consistent principles escape us."³⁴

". . . it is often difficult to see why certain passages occur at precisely the point where they do occur."³⁵

Distinctive Features

In addition to the lack of a clear organizing plan, Jeremiah is quite repetitive. The repetition is for emphasis, no doubt, and many very similar passages occur two and even three times.

The last chapter is unique because someone must have written it long after the rest of the book. The options are that Jeremiah or Baruch wrote it or that some other writer added it later. There is no way to tell for sure who wrote it or when, but it's purpose seems clear enough. It provides hope at the end of a record of discouraging circumstances.

The biographical and autobiographical sections of the book are also distinctive. No other prophet wrote as much about himself and his experiences as Jeremiah did, and no other prophet let us into his head and his heart as much as he did by sharing how he thought and felt.

Jeremiah used object lessons to communicate spiritual truth more than the other prophets. He made his prophecies concrete and vivid by this means. He did not delight to paint word pictures as much as Isaiah did, but he did acts and spoke of real situations far more than that earlier prophet did.

Text

The history of the textual transmission of Jeremiah is unusual. The Septuagint (Greek) translation, made in the third and second centuries B.C. in Alexandria, Egypt, is about one-eighth shorter than the Masoretic Text (the Hebrew text formalized in the fifth century A.D. that is the basis for the modern Hebrew Bible and our English translations). In addition to its being shorter, the arrangement of material in the book is in a different order in several places. The Septuagint version of Jeremiah differs from the Hebrew more widely than is true of any other Old Testament book. There are omissions, additions, transpositions, alterations, and substitutions.³⁶

Probably the Septuagint translators worked from a different version of Jeremiah than the one that was the basis for the Masoretic Text.³⁷ The Septuagint was the Bible of most of the early Christians, especially those who lived outside Palestine. Which version is more reliable, the shorter one that they used (and quoted in the New Testament) or the longer one that we have? Most conservative scholars believe that the Masoretic Text has a solid history and is more reliable than the Septuagint. The differences between these two versions are not significant in terms of theology. We do not have contradictions between what the New Testament writers quoted as being from Jeremiah and what we read in our English translations of Jeremiah.³⁸

Message³⁹

The reader of Jeremiah must have a knowledge of the times in which this prophet lived and ministered to appreciate the message of this book. This is more important for understanding Jeremiah than it is for understanding any other prophetic book.

Jeremiah lived in days of darkness and disaster. He ministered about a century after Isaiah had finished prophesying. The Northern Kingdom was no more; it had ceased to exist with the Assyrian invasion of 722 B.C. Only the Southern Kingdom of Judah remained.

Two strong nations greatly affected life in Judah when Jeremiah began his ministry: Egypt on the southwest, and Assyria on the northeast. Judah was the jelly in this sandwich and found herself pressed on both sides. Instead of looking to God for their security, the people looked either to Egypt or to Assyria. There were two parties in Jeremiah's day: the pro-Egyptian party and the pro-Assyrian party. Each vied with the other trying to gain supporters for alliances with their particular favorite superpower, trying to outwit their opponents and trick their enemy.

The internal condition of Judah was the result of 52 years of rule by the apostate King Manasseh who reacted to godly King Hezekiah's trust in Yahweh.

Manasseh, and King Amon who ruled after him for two years, set up pagan altars all over Judah. These kings encouraged idolatry of every sort, even in the Jerusalem temple. The people departed farther and farther from the Lord. It was a condition very much like the one in North America today.

The next king was Josiah. Josiah tried to turn the people back to the Lord, but his reforms were more external than internal. The people just did not want to submit to Yahweh. They had gone their own way for so long that they viewed following the Mosaic Law as a step backward rather than forward. Jeremiah began to minister during Josiah's reign. Unfortunately Josiah died prematurely, so his reforms did not last very long or have much effect.

The four kings who followed Josiah, the last four in Judah's history, were all weak men who lacked spiritual conviction. They just played politics and tried to win Judah's security through political intrigue and alliances. Three of these sad rulers were sons of Josiah: Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Zedekiah. The fourth was Josiah's grandson, Jehoiachin, the son of Jehoiakim. The last of these kings was Zedekiah, the most spineless of them all. He was a chameleon, a double-minded man who was unstable in all his ways. Jeremiah ministered during the reigns of these four kings until Jerusalem fell to the Babylonians in 586 B.C., and he ministered beyond that from Egypt.

Throughout Jeremiah's entire ministry he was never blessed to see the people of Judah turn back to God. Repentance was one of his greatest pleas, but the kings, priests, false prophets, and ordinary citizens did not return to the Lord. He did not check the deterioration of his nation. He was very unpopular in his day because he was always preaching to the people to do the opposite of what they wanted to do. Even after the fall of the nation the Judahites proved unresponsive to his preaching. There was no encouraging revival in his day, as there was in Isaiah's day with the appearance of King Hezekiah. Things just kept going from bad to worse.

The meaning of "Jeremiah" is not clear. It could mean "Yahweh founds or establishes," "Yahweh exalts," "Yahweh throws down," "Yahweh hurls," or "Yahweh loosens." All of these meanings reflect aspects of Jeremiah's ministry as a prophet. He announced that Yahweh founds or establishes those who trust in Him rather than trusting in other people or nations. He announced that Yahweh eventually exalts those whom He has chosen and that He throws down and humbles those who disregard Him. He also announced that Yahweh hurls into captivity people who depart from Him and loosens from their captivity those whom He has disciplined.

Just as God had foreordained Jeremiah to his ministry (1:5), so He had foreordained Israel to a royal priestly ministry on the earth (Exod. 19:5-6). Just as Jeremiah felt inadequate for his ministry (1:6), so Israel was inadequate to fulfill her calling without divine enablement. And just as Jeremiah received divine enablement for his ministry (1:7-8), so Israel received divine enablement for hers.

What was true for Jeremiah on the personal level and for Israel on the national level is also true for Christians on the personal level and for the church on the corporate level.

The Book of Jeremiah also reveals more about the person of the prophet than any other prophetic book. Jeremiah shared his life with His Lord, and the Lord shared the record of Jeremiah's life with the reader. Four things characterized Jeremiah: his simplicity, his sensitivity, his strength, and his spirituality.

We see the first indication of Jeremiah's simplicity in his response to the Lord's call when he was a teenager. He realized that he was an inadequate child (1:7). He never lost that sense of inadequacy. He was poor in spirit in that he sensed his own personal lack of resources to carry out the task God had given him (cf. Matt. 5:3).

We see his sensitivity in the way he shrunk from his work. He confessed to his Lord how much he disliked having to proclaim messages of judgment to the people he loved. He felt the pain of the prophecies he delivered. He mourned over the fate of his hardhearted and stubborn fellow Judahites (cf. Matt. 5:4).

We see Jeremiah's strength in his willingness to stand alone against the popular opinions and opinion makers of his day. He always delivered the whole message that God had given him to proclaim, and he never stopped speaking what God told him to say. He was persecuted for the sake of righteousness (cf. Matt. 5:10). His contemporaries reviled him, persecuted him, and said all kinds of evil things against him falsely (Matt. 5:11). Nevertheless through it all Jeremiah followed God faithfully, and undoubtedly his reward in heaven will be great (Matt. 5:12).

No prophet in the Old Testament was more like our Lord Jesus Christ than Jeremiah. He faithfully represented the true King of Israel, Yahweh, when the Judahites rejected His authority and neglected His grace. He was God's representative on the earth when people were acting like there was no Sovereign in heaven. God knew him and chose him before his birth, equipped him by giving him His word, led him to practice a simple and solitary lifestyle, strengthened him to love his people, enabled him to oppose the apostasy of his day, and preserved his life until his work was done.

One of the great values of the Book of Jeremiah is that it reveals how God behaves when His people fail Him and depart from Him.

When His people fail Him and depart from Him, God judges their sin. As Isaiah emphasizes the salvation of God, Jeremiah stresses the judgment of God. God enabled Jeremiah to see what the Judahites did not see, namely that all the bad things that were happening to them were divine discipline on them for their apostasy. The people interpreted these calamities as the result of their failure to continue worshipping the Queen of Heaven and their other pagan idols (44:18). Jeremiah saw that sin leads to death. He came to appreciate the devastating effects of sin. Ever since the Fall Satan has been convincing people that they can sin with impunity. Jeremiah shows that the sin of God's people will find us out, and when it does there is a terrible price to pay.

Jeremiah also reveals how human sin causes great suffering for God. It breaks His heart when His people sin. Not only did God explain to Jeremiah how sin hurt Him, but Jeremiah reflected God's pain over sin with his own tears and terror at the prospect of the fall of Jerusalem and its attending horrors. We see God's attitude toward the people in the prophet's attitude.

Jeremiah also reveals that there is life beyond sin, there is victory over sin. In the prophet's life we see how God blessed him and preserved His faithful servant in the midst of what we might compare to the bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City. In Jeremiah's messages to Judah, Israel, and the nations we see how bright the distant future is beyond the present judgment for sin. God's plans for humankind are plans for blessing ultimately. Judgment is His immediate response to sin, but blessing is His ultimate purpose. The politicians in Jeremiah's day blamed the nation's troubles on the nations around them. Jeremiah blamed them on the internal condition of Judah herself.

We need voices and lives like Jeremiah's today calling people to recognize the fact that all ruin and loss and national decay are due to forgetting God who lifts up or breaks down according to how we relate to Him. Though Jeremiah lived 2, 600 years ago, his voice continues to challenge us today. We appear to be ministering in a context very similar to Jeremiah's. The study of his life and ministry encourages and motivates us to remain faithful. He enables us to understand what Christ-like ministry in such a context looks like.

What is the message of Jeremiah? Jeremiah teaches us that God's judgment falls when people break His covenant. There are constant references to Judah's covenant unfaithfulness to her sovereign suzerain. Judgment is inevitable unless there is repentance. But when there is repentance, God is rich in mercy. One of Jeremiah's favorite words was shub, meaning "return." God and he held out the possibility of return and release from judgment as long as possible. However, as with Pharaoh, repentance is not always possible when one resists Yahweh continually (cf. Heb. 6:4-6). It was not possible eventually for Judah.

There are at least three abiding lessons of this book.

Sin brings destruction. No policy can outmaneuver God. National rebellion is national ruin. Sin brings with it its own destruction and retribution.

Sin wounds the heart of God. He weeps over the doom of a city and its people. He does not delight in bringing devastation and ruin, and neither should His servants.

The ultimate victory is with God. He made again the vessel that He destroyed because of its flaws. The stump of David will sprout. Though the last Davidic king died in exile, God promised that another Davidic King would emerge (23:5; 30:9). There is hope of a new covenant and enabling grace that will replace the old covenant that no one could keep (31:31-34).

Constable: Jeremiah (Outline)

Outline

I. Introduction ch. 1

A. The introduction of Jeremiah 1:1-3

B. The call of Jeremiah 1:4-19

1. The promise of divine enablement 1:4-10

2. Two confirming visions 1:11-19

II. Prophecies about Judah chs. 2-45

A. Warnings of judgment on Judah and Jerusalem chs. 2-25

1. Warnings of coming punishment because of Judah's guilt chs. 2-6

2. Warnings about apostasy and its consequences chs. 7-10

3. Warnings in view of present conditions 11:1-15:9

4. Warnings in view of Judah's hardheartedness 15:10-25:38

B. Controversies concerning false prophets chs. 26-29

1. Conflict with the people ch. 26

2. Conflict with the false prophets in Jerusalem chs. 27-28

3. Conflict with the false prophets in exile ch. 29

C. The Book of Consolation chs. 30-33

1. The restoration of all Israel chs. 30-31

2. The restoration of Judah and Jerusalem chs. 32-33

D. Incidents surrounding the fall of Jerusalem chs. 34-45

1. Incidents before the fall of Jerusalem chs. 34-36

2. Incidents during the fall of Jerusalem chs. 37-39

3. Incidents after the fall of Jerusalem chs. 40-45

III. Prophecies about the nations chs. 46-51

A. The oracle against Egypt ch. 46

B. The oracle against the Philistines ch. 47

C. The oracle against Moab ch. 48

D. The oracle against Ammon 49:1-6

E. The oracle against Edom 49:7-22

F. The oracle against Damascus 49:23-27

G. The oracle against the Arab tribes 49:28-33

H. The oracle against Elam 49:34-39

I. The oracle against Babylon chs. 50-51

IV. Conclusion ch. 52.

A. The fall of Jerusalem and the capture of Zedekiah 52:1-16

B. The sacking of the temple 52:17-23

C. The numbers deported to Babylon 52:24-30

D. The release of Jehoiachin from prison 52:31-34

Constable: Jeremiah

Jeremiah

Bibliography

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Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

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Haydock: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

THE PROPHECY OF JEREMIAS.

INTRODUCTION.

Jeremias was a priest, a native of Anathoth, a priestly city, in the tribe of Benjamin, and was sanctified from his mother's womb to be a prophet of God; which office he began to execute when he was yet a child in age. He was in his whole life, according to the signification of his name, great before the Lord, and a special figure of Jesus Christ, in the persecutions he underwent for discharging his duty, in his charity for his persecutors, and in the violent death he suffered at their hands; it being an ancient tradition of the Hebrews, that he was stoned to death by the remnant of the Jews who had retired into Egypt, (Challoner) at Taphnes. His style is plaintive, (Worthington) like that of Simonides, (Calmet) and not so noble as that of Isaias and Osee. (St. Jerome) --- He was the prophet of the Gentiles, as well as of the Jews, predicting many things which befell both, and particularly the liberation of the latter, the year of the world 3485, after the seventy years' captivity, dating from the year of the world 3415, (Calmet) or 3398, the 4th of Joakim. (Usher) (Chap. xxv.) (Haydock) --- He began to prophesy when he was very young, the year of the world 3375, in the 13th year of Josias, (Calmet) before that prince had brought his reformation to any great perfection. (Haydock)

Gill: Jeremiah (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH

The title of the book in the Vulgate Latin version is, "the Prophecy of Jeremiah"; in the Syriac and Arabic versions, "the Prophecy of the Prophet Jeremiah". According to a tradition of the Jews ^a, this book stands the first of the Prophets, the order of which is, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Isaiah, and the twelve. Kimchi makes mention of it in a preface to his comment on this book; and Dr. Lightfoot from hence concludes, that this is the reason why a passage in Zechariah is cited under the name of Jeremy, Mat 27:9, because he standing first in the volume of the Prophets gave name to the whole; just as the book of Psalms, being the first of the Hagiographa, they are called the Psalms from it, Luk 24:44. The name of the writer of this book, Jeremiah, signifies, "the Lord shall exalt", or "be exalted"; or, "exalting the Lord"; being composed of ירם, "he shall exalt", and יה, "Jehovah", according to Hillerus ^b. Though others ^c take it to be a composition of יה, and ירמה, "the Lord shall cast down"; as he did his enemies, and also himself, he being greatly afflicted; and which suits with the argument of his book, foretelling the casting away of the people of the Jews. His style of writing, according to the opinion of Jerom ^d, is more rustic than that of Isaiah and some other prophets, and which he attributes to his being born and brought up in a country village; and Abarbinel to his age, being a child when he began to prophesy. The duration of his prophesying was forty years and upwards. He began to prophesy in the thirteenth year of Josiah's reign; in 3375 A.M. or before the era of Christ 629, according both to Bishop Usher ^e and Mr. Whiston ^f, and the Universal History ^g; and according to Mr. Bedford ^h 627. If any credit can be given to Epiphanius ⁱ, or to the writer that bears his name, he was stoned to death by the people at Taphnas in Egypt, and was buried where Pharaoh dwelt. Abulpharagius, an Arabic writer ^k, says, that he went to Egypt, where some of the Jews took him and put him into a well, and afterwards took him out and stoned him, so that he died, and he was buried in Egypt; and was from thence removed by Alexander, in his time, to Alexandria, and buried there. And both Tertullian ^l and Jerom ^m affirm that he was stoned by the people. This prophecy contains several discourses delivered to the people of the Jews; charging them with many sins they were guilty of; exhorting them to repentance; threatening them with the destruction of their city and temple, and with captivity in Babylon; and comforting the saints, not only with a promise of deliverance from thence, but of spiritual redemption by the Messiah. And it also has in it several predictions of judgments upon other nations; and gives a particular account of the destruction of Jerusalem, and of the carrying of the Jews captive into Babylon; which he lived to see, as the fulfilment of his prophecies.

Gill: Jeremiah 28 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH 28

Thus chapter relates a false prophecy of Hananiah, who broke off the yoke from Jeremiah; but in return the people are threatened with an iron yoke, and he with death; which came to pass. The time, place, and substance of his prophecy, are in Jer 28:1; Jeremiah's answer to it, Jer 28:5; Hananiah breaks Jeremiah's yoke, and explains the meaning of it to the people, Jer 28:10; Jeremiah prophesies that iron yokes should be given instead of wooden ones, Jer 28:12; and foretells the death of the false prophet, Jer 28:15.