By Michael S. Sherwin, o.p.

Introduction

A reader approaching the book of the prophet Jeremiah for the first time is likely to have two reactions. First, he or she will undoubtedly be struck by the power and beauty of Jeremiah’s words. Jeremiah speaks with love and devotion, with conviction and pain. His are the words of a lover pleading for his beloved to return. They are the words of God spoken to his people. The reader, however, is also likely to feel lost. Prophecies of doom and of consolation, prayers of abandonment as well as of confidence and joy, follow one after another with little or no apparent order. There are indeed narrative sections—sections that allow us to know more about the life and work of Jeremiah than about any other Old Testament prophet. Yet, these sections provide the contexts of only some of Jeremiah’s prophecies, without supplying the Book with a discernible beginning, middle and end. In short, the book of the prophet Jeremiah does not present the prophecies of Jeremiah from within the historical narrative of his life.

Happily, however, scholars are able to reconstruct important elements of this narrative. As a consequence, we can now present Jeremiah’s prophecies within the context of the historical events in which Jeremiah proclaimed them. By doing so, the tragedy of the kingdom of Judah comes into focus. The people’s love for their God grew cold, and they lost confidence in him. Their God, however, remained faithful. Through the pained voice of Jeremiah, God calls to them, but they do not listen. The inevitable result is destruction. Jeremiah’s story is a tragedy. Yet, the tragedy ends in hope : the hope of resurrection and new life. Jerusalem is destroyed, but God is still God and has a plan of new life for his people. Throughout this drama, the voice of God speaks through the voice of Jeremiah. God reveals his love through Jeremiah’s agonized love for Jerusalem.

Each of Jeremiah’s prophecies is like a piece of colored glass. In their current locations within the Book of Jeremiah, they form an impressionistic and multicolored collage Yet, when we arrange these colored pieces according to the narrative of Jeremiah’s life, they become something akin to a portrait of the prophet in stained glass, a portrait that lets the light of God’s love shine through the continence of this sorrow-filled son of Judah.

The narrative offered below unfolds in three voices. There is the voice of Jeremiah and of the narrator, Baruch. These two voices speak verbatim from the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah according to the English of the New American Bible. The third voice is the voice of a commentator. The content of this voice has been gleaned from several commentaries, but principally from John Bright’s commentary in the Anchor Bible Series.

This narrative in three voices is designed for public presentation. Ideally, these voices will not merely expose an audience to the life of Jeremiah, but will draw the audience into communal prayer around the Word of God. Hence, opportunities for song and the communal recitation of one of Jeremiah’s canticles are included in the text. Although a community can proclaim this narrative any time of year, it is especially appropriate for the season of Lent, as a prayerful part of a community’s preparations for Easter. Of course, the text is not reserved solely for public recitation. Individual readers can also profitably read the work on their own. For further reading about the life and work of the prophet, or the historical context of his ministry, a selected bibliography has been appended to the end of the text.

After the experience of sin—after the sorrow of destruction and death—the words of Jeremiah brought conversion and hope. They helped the people of Judah find their way back to God. In these troubled times, may Jeremiah’s words bring conversion, hope and new life to the people of God today.

MSS

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Jeremiah
The People of God’s Prophet of Conversion
A Reader’s Theater Presentation

• Narrator :
  • The words of Jeremiah, son of Hilkiah, of a priestly family in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin. The word of the Lord first came to him in the days of Josiah, son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign, and continued through the reign of Jehoiakim, son of Josiah, king of Judah, and until the downfall and exile of Jerusalem. (1:1-3)

• Commentator :
  • With these words, probably written by Baruch, Jeremiah’s faithful scribe, the book of the Prophet Jeremiah begins. This brief paragraph places Jeremiah firmly in the history and traditions of his people. They reveal that Jeremiah was a priest, a Levite from a distinguished family that had supplied Israel a long line of High Priests, including Eli, the mentor of the Prophet Samuel at the sanctuary at Shiloh.

• Baruch also informs us that Jeremiah began his ministry at a pivotal time in his peoples history. Since the death of King Solomon many hundreds of years before, the people Israel had ceased to be governed by one kingdom. There were two kingdoms. The larger and more powerful Northern kingdom, which encompassed ten of Israel’s twelve tribes and which enjoyed the privilege of bearing the name "Israel," and the Southern kingdom of Judah, which was weaker and more isolated, but which enjoyed the privilege of having Jerusalem, the city of David and the temple, as its capital. One hundred years before Jeremiah’s birth (721 B.C.), the Northern Kingdom of Israel was savagely and quite thoroughly destroyed by the Assyrians. This event was seen by the prophets as a punishment—and indeed was foretold to be such—for the sins of the North. This event and its theological significance made a lasting impression on Jeremiah and would shape his future. From the dates provided, Baruch also informs us that Jeremiah started his public ministry the very year that the hated Assyrian empire collapsed and the tiny Kingdom of Judah was passing through a dynamic period of reform and renewal under the righteous King Josiah. It was during this period of ferment that the young Jeremiah received his call :

• Jeremiah :
  • The word of the Lord came to me thus :
    Before I formed you in the womb I knew you,
    before you were born I dedicated you,
    a prophet to the nations I appointed you.
    "Ah, Lord God !" I said, "I know not how to speak ;
    I am too young."
    But the lord answered me,
    Say not, "I am too young."
    To whomever I send you, you shall go ;
    whatever I command you, you shall speak.
    Have no fear before them,
    because I am with you to deliver you, says the Lord.
    Then the Lord extended his hand
    and touched my mouth, saying,
    See, I place my words in your mouth !
    This day I set you over nations and over kingdoms,
    To root up and to tear down,
    to destroy and demolish,
    to build and to plant. (1:4-10)

• Commentator :
  • Years before, when the Northern Kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians, the Lord sent the prophet Isaiah to Ahaz, king of Judah, to assure him that Judah and Jerusalem would be spared ; shortly afterward the Assyrian army, plagued by disease, withdrew. Since that date, and especially after the fall of Assyria, the belief grew among the people of Judah that God’s promise of protection and his fidelity to the house of David were unconditional, even though the people were simultaneously engaging in many of the sinful pagan practices of their neighbors. God sent Jeremiah to disabuse the people of this notion :

• Jeremiah :
  • The Lord said to me :
    Go, cry out this message for Jerusalem to hear !
    I remember the devotion of your youth,
    how you loved me as a bride,
    Following me in the desert, in a land unsown. [. . .]
    [Yet] two evils have my people done :
    they have forsaken me, the source of living waters ;
    They have dug themselves cisterns,
    broken cisterns, that hold no water. (2:2,13)

• I had thought :
  How I should like to treat you as sons,
  and give you a pleasant land,
  a heritage most beautiful among the nations !
  You would call me, "My Father," I thought,
  and never cease following me.
  But like a woman faithless to her lover,
  even so have you been faithless to me,
  O house of Israel, says the Lord. [. . .]
  Return, rebellious children,
  and I will cure you of your rebelling. (3:19-20,22)

• Commentator :
  • In these early years of hope during the just reign of the good King Josiah, Jeremiah’s message was one of conversion ; destruction was nowhere proclaimed as immanent or unavoidable. This soon changed, however. In 609 B.C. Josiah was killed in battle against the Egyptians. Jeremiah saw this as a punishment for Judah’s continued infidelity and its refusal to follow Josiah’s call to reform. Many, however, saw it as proof that pagan ways were better. The Lord had not saved Josiah his champion, better then to follow other lords, such as the gods of the Cannanites. To make matters worse, the Egyptians deposed Jehoahaz, Josiah’s oldest son and rightful heir, and installed another of Josiah’s sons, Jehoiakim, who was a disaster of a man and totally unfit to rule. In the midst of a humiliating defeat by the Egyptians, the first thing this hapless ruler set out to do was build a more elegant palace, providing for it through oppressive taxes and unjust wages.

• Jeremiah :
  • Woe to him who builds his house on wrong,
    his terraces on injustice ;
    Who works his neighbor without pay,
    and gives him no wages.
    Who says, "I will build myself a spacious house,
    with airy rooms," [. . .]
    Must you prove your rank among kings
    by competing with them in cedar ?
    Did not your father [Josiah] eat and drink ?
    He did what was right and just and it went well with him.
    Because he dispensed justice to the weak and the poor,
    it went well with him.
    Is this not true knowledge of me ? says the Lord.
    But your eyes and heart are set on nothing
    except on your own gain,
    On shedding innocent blood,
    on practicing oppression and extortion. (22:13-14,15-17)

• Commentator :
  • Such talk did not endear Jeremiah to the King, and his warning went unheeded. Pagan practices returned with a vengeance among the people, practices such as temple prostitution and even human sacrifice :

• Jeremiah :
  • They have built high places for Baal to immolate their sons and daughters in fire as holocausts to Baal : such a thing as I neither commanded nor spoke of, nor did it ever enter my mind. (19:5)

• Commentator :
  • This immorality was coupled with the false hope in Judah’s unconditional protection by a God they no longer really knew or understood. In utter frustration during the first year of Jehoiakim’s rein, Jeremiah went to the temple and raised his voice :

• Jeremiah :
  • Hear the word of the Lord, all you of Judah who enter these gates to worship the Lord ! Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel : Reform your ways and your deeds, so that I may remain with you in this place. Put not your trust in the deceitful words : "This is the temple of the Lord ! The temple of the Lord ! The temple of the Lord !" Only if you thoroughly reform your ways and your deeds ; if each of you deals justly with his neighbor ; if you no longer oppress the resident alien, the orphan, and the widow ; if you no longer shed innocent blood in this place, or follow strange gods to your own harm, will I remain with you in this place, in the land which I gave your fathers long ago and forever.

• But here you are, putting your trust in deceitful words to your own loss ! Are you to steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, burn incense to Baal, go after strange gods that you know not, and yet come to stand before me in this house which bears my name, and say : "we are safe ; we can commit all these abominations again" ? Has this house which bears my name become in your eyes a den of thieves ? I too see what is being done, says the Lord. You may go to Shiloh, which I made the dwelling place of my name in the beginning. See what I did to it because of the wickedness of my people Israel. And now, because you have committed all these misdeeds, says the Lord, because you did not listen, though I spoke to you untiringly ; because you did not answer, though I called you, I will do to this house named after me, in which you trust, and to this place which I gave to you and your fathers, just as I did to Shiloh. I will cast you away from me, as I cast away all your brethren, all the offspring of Ephraim. (7:2-15)

• Commentator :
  • These words were latter quoted by Christ, who himself made a similar prophecy concerning the fate of the temple of his day. As with Christ, whose life Jeremiah’s own frequently foreshadows, these words evoked a similar response from the elders :

• Narrator :
  • Now the priests, the prophets, and all the people heard Jeremiah speak these words in the house of the Lord. When Jeremiah finished speaking all that the Lord bade him speak to all the people, the priests and prophets laid hold of him, crying, "You must be put to death ! Why do you prophesy in the name of the Lord : ’This house shall be like Shiloh,’ and ’This city shall be desolate and deserted’ ?" And all the people gathered about Jeremiah in the house of the Lord.

• When the princes of Judah were informed of these things, they came up from the king’s palace to the house of the Lord and held court at the New Gate of the house of the Lord. The priests and prophets said to the princes and to all the people, "This man deserves death ; he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your own ears." Jeremiah gave this answer to the princes and all the people : (26:7-12)

• Jeremiah :
  • It was the Lord who sent me to prophesy against this house and city all that you have heard. Now, therefore, reform your ways and your deeds ; listen to the voice of the Lord your God, so that the Lord will repent of the evil with which he threatens you. As for me, I am in your hands ; do with me what you think good and right. But mark well : if you put me to death, it is innocent blood you bring on yourselves, on this city and its citizens. For in truth it was the Lord who sent me to you, to speak all these things for you to hear. (26:12-16)

• SONG :

• Commentator :
  • Even though the priests and the prophets and many of the people wanted to put Jeremiah to the death, Judah still had enough good princes loyal to Josiah’s reform that Jeremiah was spared. Jeremiah, for his part, quickly perceived the tragic consequences of this rejection of the Lord. The Lord revealed to Jeremiah that Judah and Jerusalem were under judgment, a judgment from which they could not escape. The die was cast, the stage was set. Repentance could lead to the salvation of a remnant, but the kingdom of Judah would be destroyed. After the fall of Assyria, the people believed themselves secure, but another empire was on the rise, a great nation from the North, Babylon :

• Jeremiah :
  • All Judah I will deliver to the king of Babylon, who shall take them captive to Babylon or slay them with the sword. All the wealth of this city, all it has toiled for and holds dear, all the treasures of the kings of Judah, I will give as plunder into the hands of their foes, who shall seize it and carry it away to Babylon. (20:4b-5)

• Commentator :
  • In assuming such a stance, Jeremiah seemed to set himself against the very hopes and aspirations of his people. Jeremiah was quickly left to stand alone against the world. He loved Judah and prayed for her daily, yet he had to preach her destruction. Because of this, he was hated by the very people he loved so dearly. He was compelled by God to preach a word he did not relish, and was despised because of it. The tension drove him to the edge of despair :

• Jeremiah :
  • Woe to me, mother, that you gave me birth !
    a man of strife and contention to all the land !
    I neither borrow nor lend, yet all curse me.
    Tell me Lord, have I not served you for their good ?
    Have I not interceded with you
    in time of misfortune and anguish ?
    You know I have. [. . .]
    When I found your words, I devoured them ;
    they became my joy and the happiness of my heart,
    Because I bore your name, O Lord, God of hosts. [. . .]
    Why is my pain continuous,
    my wound incurable, refusing to be healed ?
    You have indeed become for me a treacherous brook,
    whose waters do not abide. (15:10-11, 15a, 16, 18)

• You duped me, O Lord, and I let myself be duped ;
  you were too strong for me, and you triumphed.
  All the day I am an object of laughter ;
  everyone mocks me.
  Whenever I speak, I must cry out,
  violence and outrage is my message ;
  The word of the Lord has brought me
  derision and reproach all the day.
  I say to myself, I will not mention him,
  I will speak in his name no more.
  But then it becomes like fire burning in my heart,
  imprisoned in my bones ;
  I grew weary holding it in,
  I cannot endure it. (20:7-9)

• Commentator :
  • Yet, Jeremiah continued to intercede for the people in prayer. In 605 B.C., after the Babylonians had crushed Judah’s Egyptian neighbors, Jeremiah was called by the Lord to make one last effort at leading Judah to repentance :

• Narrator :
  • [T]his word came to Jeremiah from the Lord : Take a scroll and write on it all the words I have spoken to you against Israel, Judah, and all the nations, from the day I first spoke to you, in the days of Josiah, until today. Perhaps, when the house of Judah hears all the evil I have in mind to do to them, they will turn back each from his evil way, so that I may forgive their wickedness and their sin. So Jeremiah called Baruch, [. . .] who wrote down on a scroll, as Jeremiah dictated, all the words which the Lord had spoken to him. (36:1-4)

• Commentator :
  • Since Jeremiah was forbidden under pain of death to return to the temple, he sent Baruch to read the scroll in the temple to the people. This he did. Jeremiah’s words caused great consternation, and those princes loyal to the reform called Baruch aside :

• Narrator :
  • "Come, and bring with you the scroll you read publicly to the people." Scroll in hand, Baruch [. . .] went to them. "Sit down," they said to him, "and read it to us." Baruch read it to them, and when they heard all its words, they were frightened and said to one another, "We must certainly tell the king all these things." Then they asked Baruch : "Tell us, please, how you came to write down all these words." "Jeremiah dictated all these words to me," Baruch answered them, "and I wrote them down in ink in the book." At this the princes said to Baruch, "Go into hiding, you and Jeremiah ; let no one know where you are." (36:14b-19)

• Commentator :
  • These princes then brought the scroll to the king’s presence to be read before him.

• Narrator :
  • Now the king was sitting in his winter house, since it was [December] and fire was burning in a brazier before him. Each time Jehudi [the scribe] finished reading three or four columns, the king would cut off the piece with a scribe’s knife and cast it into the fire in the brazier, until the entire roll was consumed in the fire. Hearing all these words did not frighten the king and his ministers or cause them to rend their garments. And though [the princes who had brought the scroll to his presence] urged the king not to burn the scroll, he would not listen to them, but commanded [his servants] to arrest Baruch, the secretary, and the prophet Jeremiah. But the Lord kept them concealed. (36:22-26)

• Commentator :
  • Baruch now found himself in tight straits. He had not sought it, but he was now a fugitive. He cried out :

• Narrator :
  • Alas ! the Lord adds grief to my pain ; I am weary from groaning, and can find no rest. (45:3)

• Commentator :
  • At a time of national crisis, when his community needed subjects dedicated to the common good, Baruch was seeking his personal safety. Yet, no community can long endure when the common good is held at a discount and one’s private good is sought above all else. How clear this was to the Lord, and yet he took pity upon Baruch :

• Jeremiah :
  • Say this to [Baruch], says the Lord : "What I have built, I am tearing down ; what I have planted, I am uprooting : even the whole land. And do you seek great things for yourself ? Seek them not ! I am bringing evil on all mankind, says the Lord, but your life I will leave you as booty, wherever you may go. (45:4-5)

• Commentator :
  • Fortunately for future generations, God commanded Jeremiah once more to write down everything that had been in the scroll—which scholars now think comprises the bulk of chapters 1-24 of Jeremiah’s work as it now stands. But the Lord also made it clear that he had lost patience. His judgment was at hand. The blow was struck in 597 B.C. After laying waste the countryside and its villages, and only shortly after the death by natural causes of the pathetic Jehoiakim, Jerusalem fell to the conquering Babylonians. The king’s son, Jehoiachin, a large portion of the royal family and many court officials, as well as artisans and skilled laborers useful to the Babylonians, were taken away to captivity. Jeremiah had preached destruction for many years, but when the blow came he lamented :

• Jeremiah : (for communal recitation 14:17-21)

• Let my eyes stream with tears
  day and night, without rest,

• Over the great destruction which overwhelms the virgin daughter of my people,
  over her incurable wound.

• If I walk out into the field,
  look ! those slain by the sword ;

• If I enter the city,
  look ! those consumed by hunger.

• Even the prophet and the priest
  forage in a land they know not.

• Have you cast Judah off completely ?
  Is Zion loathsome to you ?

• Why have you struck us a blow
  that cannot be healed ?

• We wait for peace, to no avail ;
  for a time of healing, but terror comes instead.

• We recognize, O Lord, our wickedness, /
  the guilt of our fathers ;
  that we have sinned against you.

• For your name’s sake spurn us not,
  disgrace not the throne of your glory ;

• remember your covenant with us,
  and break it not.

• Glory to the Father and to the Son
  and to the Holy Spirit

• As it was in the beginning is now
  and will be forever. Amen.

• Commentator :
  • But Judah’s destruction was not total. The Babylonians did not destroy the city. Instead, they placed on the thrown yet another son of Josiah, Zedekiah, and made Jerusalem and the remnants of Judah a vassal of Babylon. Jeremiah had these words for the new king :

• Jeremiah :
  • Submit your necks to the yoke of the king of Babylon ; serve him and his people, so that you may live. Why should you and your people die by the sword, famine, and pestilence, with which the Lord has threatened the nation that will not serve the king of Babylon ? (27:12-13)

• Commentator :
  • Zedekiah was moved by Jeremiah’s words and wanted to do the Lord’s will, but he was a weak and vacillating king, easily swayed by his princes. Many of these nobles were determined to rebel against the yoke of Babylon. Bowing to their pressure, the king and his ministers planned rebellion for the next four years. The rebellion occurred in 587 ; Babylon’s response was swift and decisive. By autumn of that year, Jerusalem was under siege. One by one the fortified cities of Judah were destroyed, and the siege works were closing in on Jerusalem’s walls. In fear, Zedekiah sought Jeremiah’s counsel.

• Narrator :
  • The message which came to Jeremiah from the Lord when King Zedekiah sent [messengers] with this request : Inquire for us of the Lord, because Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, is attacking us. Perhaps the Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful works, so that [Nebuchadnezzar] will withdraw from us. But Jeremiah answered them : (21:1-3)

• Jeremiah :
  • This is what you shall report to Zedekiah : [. . .] Thus says the Lord : See, I am giving you a choice between life and death. Whoever remains in this city shall die by the sword or famine or pestilence. But whoever leaves and surrenders to the besieging Chaldeans shall live and have his life as booty. For I have turned against this city, for its woe and not for its good, says the Lord. It shall be given into the power of the king of Babylon who shall burn it with fire. (21:3b, 8b-10)

• Commentator :
  • The king was not pleased with this response, and his nobles more than ever sought to do away with Jeremiah.

• Jeremiah :
  • Yet, I like a trusting lamb led to slaughter, had not realized that they were hatching plots against me : "Let us destroy the tree in its vigor ; let us cut him off from the land of the living, so that his name will be spoken no more." (11:19)

• Commentator :
  • Jeremiah’s foes found the pretext they were seeking when the Babylonians briefly lifted the siege of Jerusalem to suppress a rebellion in Egypt.

• Narrator :
  • When the Chaldean army lifted the siege of Jerusalem at the threat of the army of Pharaoh, Jeremiah set out from Jerusalem for the district of Benjamin, to take part with his family in the division of an inheritance. But when he reached the Gate of Benjamin, he met the captain of the guard, a man named Irijah [. . .] ; he seized the prophet Jeremiah, saying, "You are deserting to the Chaldeans !" (37:11-13)

• Jeremiah :
  • That is a lie ! I am not deserting to the Chaldeans ! (37:14a)

• Narrator :
  • Without listening, Irijah kept Jeremiah in custody and brought him to the princes. The princes were enraged, and had Jeremiah beaten and thrown into prison. (37:14b-15a)

• Commentator :
  • The charge of desertion was a pretext, as the words of the princes themselves testify :

• Narrator :
  • "This man ought to be put to death," the princes said to the king ; "he demoralizes the soldiers who are left in this city, and all the people, by speaking such things to them [by telling them that ’he who remains in this city shall die by sword, or famine or pestilence ; but he who goes out to the Chaldeans shall live’] ; he is not interested in the welfare of our people, but in their ruin." King Zedekiah answered : "He is in your power" ; for the king could do nothing with them. And so they took Jeremiah and threw him into the cistern of Prince Malchiah, which was in the quarters of the guard, letting him down with ropes. There was no water in the cistern, only mud, and Jeremiah sank into the mud. (38:4-6)

• Commentator :
  • Jeremiah was left to die in the mud. What must have stung him more than the prospect of dying in the mire, however, was the accusation that he was not interested in the welfare of the people. The Prophet loved the Holy City and its people, but the Lord had given him the painful vocation to teach the people that not even God could protect them from the consequences of their own sins. He had shown them patiently the path of life, yet they continually chose the path of death. They loved the practices of their pagan neighbors and now those same neighbors were leading them to destruction. The Lord had given Jeremiah the vocation to teach his people the painful lesson that sin itself is what brings death.

• Jeremiah :
  • Your own wickedness chastises you,
    your own infidelities punish you.
    Know then, and see, how evil and bitter
    is your forsaking the Lord, your God. (2:19)

• Commentator :
  • God’s plans were for life. He had shown them the path of life, but they had chosen the path of death, continual immorality and injustice. God’s promises to David, the temple and its many sacrifices : none of these could save them from destruction if they chose in their own lives the hard road of sin.

• Jeremiah :
  • Small and great alike, all are greedy for gain ;
    prophet and priest, all practice fraud.
    They would repair, as though it were naught,
    the injury to my people :
    "Peace, peace !" they say, though there is no peace. (6:13-14)

• Commentator :
  • Jeremiah would have died in the mire with these bitter reflections on his mind except for the courage of an Ethiopian eunuch who told the king that Jeremiah—now a man in his late fifties—was soon to die of exposure if not helped. The king ordered Jeremiah removed from the cistern and kept in the quarters of the guard. The king, still troubled, once more called for Jeremiah :

• Narrator :
  • "I have a question to ask you," the king said to Jeremiah ; "hide noting from me." Jeremiah answered Zedekiah : (38:14)

• Jeremiah :
  • If I tell you anything, you will have me killed, will you not ? If I counsel you, you will not listen to me ! (38:15)

• Narrator :
  • But king Zedekiah swore to Jeremiah secretly : "As the Lord lives who gave us the breath of life, I will not kill you ; nor will I hand you over to these men who seek your life." Thereupon Jeremiah said to Zedekiah : (38:16)

• Jeremiah :
  • Thus says the Lord God of hosts, the God of Israel : If you surrender to the princes of Babylon’s king, you shall save your life ; this city shall not be destroyed with fire, and you and your family shall live. But if you do not surrender to the princes of Babylon’s king, this city shall fall into the hands of the Chaldeans, who shall destroy it with fire, and you shall not escape their hands. (38:17-18)

• Narrator :
  • King Zedekiah, however, said to Jeremiah, "I am afraid of the men of Judah who have deserted to the Chaldeans ; I may be handed over to them, and they will mistreat me." (38:19)

• Jeremiah :
  • You will not be handed over. [. . .] Please obey the voice of the Lord and do as I tell you ; then it shall go well with you, and your life will be spared. But if you refuse to surrender, this is what the Lord shows me : [. . .] All your wives and sons shall be led forth to the Chaldeans, and you shall not escape their hands ; you shall be handed over to the king of Babylon, and this city shall be destroyed with fire. (38:20-21,23)

• Commentator :
  • Another page of this epic tragedy was about to be turned. Zedekiah ordered Jeremiah to tell no one about their meeting. Greatly troubled though he was, Zedekiah still refused to surrender. The inevitable blow struck shortly after. Baruch supplies the details :

• Narrator :
  • A breach was made in the city’s defenses. All the princes of the king of Babylon came and occupied the middle gate. [. . .] When Zedekiah, king of Judah, saw them, he and all his warriors fled by night, leaving the city on the Royal Garden Road through the gate between the two walls. He went in the direction of Arabah, but the Chaldean army pursued them, and overtook and captured Zedekiah in the desert near Jericho. [. . .] As Zedekiah looked on, his sons were slain at Riblah by order of the king of Babylon who slew also all the nobles of Judah. He then blinded Zedekiah and bound him in chains to bring him to Babylon.

• The Chaldeans set fire to the king’s palace and the houses of the people, and demolished the walls of Jerusalem. Nebuzaradan, chief of the bodyguard, deported to Babylon the rest of the people left in the city, those who had deserted to him, and the rest of the workmen. But some poor who had no property were left in the land of Judah by [him] and were given at the same time vineyards and farms. (39:2b-10)

• SONG :

• Commentator :
  • The year was 587 B.C. The city and the temple were destroyed. The people of Jerusalem were sent into exile to Babylon, to join king Jehoiachin and the others sent there in the first exile of ten years before. And what of Jeremiah ? He was bound in chains and ready for deportation to Babylon when Nebuzaradan, the Babylonian commander, recognized him and said :

• Narrator :
  • The Lord, your God, foretold the ruin of this place. Now he has brought about in deed what he threatened ; because you sinned against the Lord and did not obey his voice, this fate has befallen you. And now, I am freeing you today from the fetters that bind your hands ; if it seems good to you to come with me to Babylon, you may come : I will look after you well. But if it does not please you to come to Babylon, you need not come. See, the whole land is before you ; go wherever you think good and proper, [. . .] or go to Gedaliah [. . .] whom the king of Babylon has appointed ruler over the cities of Judah ; stay with him among the people, or go wherever you please. (40:2b-5)

• Commentator :
  • This Gedaliah was a life-long supporter and possibly a friend of Jeremiah. He was one of the few remaining princes of Judah loyal to the reform and had been so since his days of service under the good king Josiah. Jeremiah stayed with Gedaliah, who set up his government in Mizpah, some five miles from the ruins of Jerusalem. The Lord had assured the survivors that if they lived peacefully on the land and obeyed the Babylonians, things would go well with them. They would stay on the land. But the tragedy had yet one more chapter to complete. Gedaliah was assassinated by a usurper, who brutally slew Gedaliah and his court, but himself barely fled with his life to the territory of the Ammonites. The survivors were distraught. They feared that the Babylonians would indiscriminately blame them for Gedaliah’s death. Many wanted to flea to Egypt. In fear they consulted the bereaved Jeremiah.

• Narrator :
  • Let the Lord, your God, show us what way we should take and what we should do." (42:3)

• Jeremiah :
  • Very well ! [. . .] I will pray to the Lord, your God, as you desire ; whatever the Lord answers you, I will tell you ; I will withhold nothing from you. (42:4)

• Narrator :
  • "May the Lord be our witness : we will truly and faithfully follow all the instructions the Lord, your God, will send us. Whether it is pleasant or difficult, we will obey the command of the Lord, our God, to whom we are sending you, so that it will go well with us for obeying the command of the Lord, our God." (42:5) [The Lord responded thus :]

• Jeremiah :
  • If you remain quietly in this land I will build you up, and not tear you down ; I will plant you, not uproot you. [. . .] But if you disobey the voice of the Lord, your God, and decide not to remain in this land [and go instead to Egypt, then] when you arrive to stay, the sword you fear shall reach you in the land of Egypt, the hunger you fear will cling to you no less in Egypt, and their you will die. (42:10, 13a, 15b-16)

• Commentator :
  • The people, however, would not listen. Breaking their vow, they fled to Egypt, taking with them against his will the aged prophet. It was there that Jeremiah breathed his last, murdered, the traditions tell us, at the hands of his own people whom he loved.

• Jeremiah seems to have been a failure. The people did not listen to him and were destroyed. Yet, his mission was not to end merely in destruction. As the Lord had said, his vocation was not simply to uproot and to tear down, but also to build and to plant. First, there was the letter he had written during the final days of the siege of Jerusalem and had sent to the exiles in Babylon :

• Jeremiah :
  • Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, to all the exiles whom I exiled from Jerusalem to Babylon ; Build houses to dwell in ; plant gardens, and eat their fruits. Take wives and beget sons and daughters ; find wives for your sons and give your daughters husbands, so that they may bear sons and daughters. There you must increase in number, not decrease. Promote the welfare of the city to which I have exiled you ; pray for it to the Lord, for upon its welfare depends your own. [. . .] Only after seventy years have elapsed for Babylon will I visit you and fulfill for you my promise to bring you back to this place. For I know well the plans I have in mind for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare not for woe ! plans to give you a future full of hope. [. . .] I will gather you together from all the nations and all the places to which I have banished you, says the Lord, and bring you back to the place from which I have exiled you. (29:4-7, 10b-11, 14b)

• Commentator :
  • The Lord would protect his people. Through this tragedy he would also reveal a new way of being in relationship with him, a way of walking with him that was less tied to the temple. The temple was destroyed, but God’s covenant remained.

• Jeremiah :
  • When you call me, when you go to pray to me, I will listen to you. When you look for me with all your heart, you will find me with you, says the Lord, and I will change your lot. (29:12-13)

• Commentator :
  • Even after the exiles were brought home and the temple and Jerusalem were rebuilt, this new intimacy with the Lord would remain. Indeed, it would be deepened.

• Jeremiah :
  • The days are coming, says the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. [. . .] I will place my law within them, and write it upon their hearts ; I will be their God, and they shall by my people. (31:31, 33b)

• Commentator :
  • From the midst of destruction, not only had Jeremiah helped the exiles to understand what had happened (God was still God and he had not abandoned them, but only chastised them for their sins), Jeremiah had also revealed a deeper blessing. God was calling his people to a new, more personal and radically intimate relationship with himself. Judah would be rebuilt, but it would be a new Israel preparing to meet its Lord, the Lord coming in human vesture, whom Jeremiah in his sufferings had so often foreshadowed :

• Jeremiah :
  • I myself will gather the remnant of my flock from all the lands to which I have driven them and bring them back to their meadow ; there they shall increase and multiply. [. . .]

• Behold, the days are coming, says the Lord,
  when I will raise up a righteous shoot to David ;
  As king he shall reign and govern wisely,
  he shall do what is just and right in the land.
  In his days Judah shall be saved,
  Israel shall dwell in security.
  This is the name they give him :
  "The Lord our justice." (23:3, 5-6)

• SONG :

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