Jeremiah 26 recounts a dangerous moment for the prophet Jeremiah early in the reign of King Jehoiakim, where he was threatened with death for his prophecies warning of impending destruction if the people did not repent. The chapter highlights the opposition he faced from priests and prophets, as well as his steadfast commitment to deliver God's message without alteration. Despite the hostility, he was ultimately saved from execution by the intervention of Ahikam, showcasing the tension between divine authority and human opposition.

1. JEREMIAH 26 COMMENTARY
EDITED BY GLENN PEASE
Jeremiah Threatened With Death
1 Early in the reign of Jehoiakim son of Josiah
king of Judah, this word came from the Lord:
BARNES, "Jer. 26 is a narrative of the danger to which Jeremiah was exposed by
reason of the prophecy contained in Jer. 7 and should be read in connection with it. Jer_
26:4-6 contain a summary of the prediction contained in Jer. 7, and that again is but an
outline of what was a long address.
CLARKE, "In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim - As this prophecy must
have been delivered in the first or second year of the reign of Jehoiakim, it is totally out
of its place here. Dr. Blayney puts it before chap. 36.; and Dr. Dahler immediately after
chap. ix., and before chap. 46.
GILL, "In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of
Judah,.... So that the prophecy of this chapter, and the facts and events connected with
it, were before the prophecy of the preceding chapter, though here related; that being in
the fourth year, this in the beginning of Jehoiakim's reign. Josiah was lately dead;
Jehoahaz his son reigned but three months, and then was deposed by Pharaohnecho
king of Egypt; and this Jehoiakim, another son of Josiah, who before was called Eliakim,
was set on the throne; and quickly after his coming to it
came this word from the Lord, saying; as follows, to the prophet. This was in the
year of the world 3394, and before Christ 610, according to Bishop Usher (a); with
whom agree Mr, Whiston (b), and the authors of the Universal History (c).
HENRY, "We have here the sermon that Jeremiah preached, which gave such offence
that he was in danger of losing his life for it. It is here left upon record, as it were, by way
of appeal to the judgment of impartial men in all ages, whether Jeremiah was worthy to
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2. die for delivering such a message as this from God, and whether his persecutors were not
very wicked and unreasonable men.
I. God directed him where to preach this sermon, and when, and to what auditory, v.
2. Let not any censure Jeremiah as indiscreet in the choice of place and time, nor say
that he might have delivered his message more privately, in a corner, among his friends
that he could confide in, and that he deserved to smart for not acting more cautiously;
for God gave him orders to preach in the court of the Lord's house, which was within the
peculiar jurisdiction of his sworn enemies the priests, and who would therefore take
themselves to be in a particular manner affronted. He must preach this, as it should
seem, at the time of one of the most solemn festivals, when persons had come from all
the cities of Judah to worship in the Lord's house. These worshippers, we may suppose,
had a great veneration for their priests, would credit the character they gave of men, and
be exasperated against those whom they defamed, and would, consequently, side with
them and strengthen their hands against Jeremiah. But none of these things must move
him or daunt him; in the face of all this danger he must preach this sermon, which, if it
were not convincing, would be very provoking. And because the prophet might be in
some temptation to palliate the matter, and make it better to his hearers than God had
made it to him, to exchange an offensive expression for one more plausible, therefore
God charges him particularly not to diminish a word, but to speak all the things, nay, all
the words, that he had commanded him. Note, God's ambassadors must keep closely to
their instructions, and not in the least vary from them, either to please men or to save
themselves from harm. They must neither add nor diminish, Deu_4:2.
JAMISON, "Jer_26:1-24. 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.
The prophecies which gave the offense were those given in detail in the seventh,
eighth, and ninth chapters (compare Jer_26:6 here with Jer_7:12, Jer_7:14); and
summarily referred to here [Maurer], probably pronounced at one of the great feasts
(that of tabernacles, according to Ussher; for the inhabitants of “all the cities of Judah”
are represented as present, Jer_26:2). See on Jer_7:2.
K&D 1-7, "
Accusation and Acquittal of Jeremiah. - Jer_26:1-7. His prophecy that temple and city
would be destroyed gave occasion to the accusation of the prophet. - Jer_26:1. "In the
beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim, the son of Josiah king of Judah, came this word
from Jahveh, saying: Jer_26:2. Thus said Jahveh: Stand in the court of the house of
Jahveh, and speak to all the cities of Judah which come to worship in Jahveh's house,
all the words that I have commanded thee to speak to them; take not a word therefrom.
Jer_26:3. Perchance they will hearken and turn each from his evil way, that I may
repent me of the evil which I purpose to do unto them for the evil of their doings. Jer_
26:4. And say unto them: Thus saith Jahveh: If ye hearken not to me, to walk in my
law which I have set before you, Jer_26:5. To hearken to the words of my servants the
prophets whom I sent unto you, from early morning on sending, but ye have not
hearkened. Jer_26:6. Then I make this house like Shiloh, and this city a curse to all the
peoples of the earth. Jer_26:7. And the priests and the prophets and all the people
heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of Jahveh."
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3. In the discourse of Jer 7, where he was combating the people's false reliance upon the
temple, Jeremiah had already threatened that the temple should share the fate of Shiloh,
unless the people turned from its evil ways. Now, since that discourse was also delivered
in the temple, and since Jer_26:2-6 of the present chapter manifestly communicate only
the substance of what the prophet said, several comm. have held these discourses to be
identical, and have taken it for granted that the discourse here referred to, belonging to
the beginning of Jehoiakim's reign, was given in full in Jer 7, while the history of it has
been given in the present chapter by way of supplement (cf. the introductory remarks to
Jer 7). But considering that it is a peculiarity of Jeremiah frequently to repeat certain of
the main thoughts of his message, the saying of God, that He will do to the temple as He
has done to Shiloh, is not sufficient to warrant this assumption. Jeremiah frequently
held discourses in the temple, and more than once foretold the destruction of Jerusalem;
so that it need not be surprising if on more than one occasion he threatened the temple
with the fate of Shiloh. Between the two discourses there is further this distinction:
Whereas in Jer 7 the prophet speaks chiefly of the spoliation or destruction of the temple
and the expulsion of the people into exile, here in brief incisive words he intimates the
destruction of the city of Jerusalem as well; and the present chapter throughout gives
the impression that by this, so to speak, peremptory declaration, the prophet sought to
move the people finally to decide for Jahveh its God, and that he thus so exasperated the
priests and prophets present, that they seized him and pronounced him worthy of
death. - According to the heading, this took place in the beginning of the reign of
Jehoiakim. The like specification in the heading of Jer 27 does not warrant us to refer
the date to the fourth year of this king. "The beginning" intimates simply that the
discourse belongs to the earlier period of Jehoiakim's reign, without minuter
information as to year and day. "To Jeremiah" seems to have been dropped out after
"came this word," Jer_26:1. The court of the house of God is not necessarily the inner or
priests' court of the temple; it may have been the outer one where the people assembled;
cf. Jer_19:14. All the "cities of Judah" for their inhabitants, as in Jer_11:12. The
addition: "take not a word therefrom," cf. Deu_4:2; Deu_13:1, indicates the peremptory
character of the discourse. In full, without softening the threat by the omission of
anything the Lord commanded him, i.e., he is to proclaim the word of the Lord in its full
unconditional severity, to move the people, if possible, to repentance, acc. to Jer_26:3.
With Jer_26:3, cf. Jer_18:8, etc. - In Jer_26:4-6 we have the contents of the discourse.
If they hearken not to the words of the prophet, as has hitherto been the case, the Lord
will make the temple as Shiloh, and this city, i.e., Jerusalem, a curse, i.e., an object of
curses (cf. Jer_24:9), for all peoples. On this cf. Jer_7:12. But ye have not hearkened.
The Chet. ‫זּאתה‬ ַֹ‫ה‬ Hitz. holds to be an error of transcription; Ew. §173, g, and Olsh.
Gramm. §101, c, and 133, a paragogically lengthened form; Böttcher, Lehrb. §665. iii.
and 897, 3, a toneless appended suffix, strengthening the demonstrative force: this (city)
here.
CALVIN, "This chapter contains a remarkable history, to which a very useful
doctrine is annexed, for Jeremiah speaks of repentance, which forms one of the
main points of true religion, and he shews at the same time that the people were
rejected by God, because they perversely despised all warnings, and could by no
means be brought to a right mind. We shall find these two things in this chapter.
He says that this word came to him at the beginning of the reign, of Jehoiakim, of
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4. which king we have spoken in other places, where Jeremiah related other discourses
delivered in his reign. We hence conclude that this book was not put together in a
regular order, but that the chapters were collected, and from them the volume was
formed.
The time, however, is not here repeated in vain, for we know that the miserable
derive some hope from new events. When men have been long afflicted and well-
nigh have rotted in their evils, they yet think, when a change takes place, that they
shall be happy, and they promise themselves vain hopes. Such was probably the
confidence of the people when Jehoiakim began to reign; for they might have
thought that things would be restored by him to a better state. There is also another
circumstance to be noticed; though their condition was nigh past hope, they yet
hardened themselves against God, so that they obstinately resisted the prophets. It
hence appears that the reprobate were become more and more exasperated by the
scourges of God, and had never been truly and really humbled. This was the reason
why Jeremiah, according to God’s command, spoke so sharply.
I pass by other things and come to the words, that the word of Jehovah came to him.
He thus arrogated nothing to himself; but he testifies how necessary it was,
especially among a people so refractory, that he should bring nothing of his own,
but announce a truth that came from heaven. A general subject might be here
handled, which is, that God alone is to be heard in the Church, and also that no one
ought to assume to himself the name of a prophet or teacher, except he whom the
Lord has formed and appointed, and to whom he has committed his message; but
these things have been treated elsewhere and often and much at large; and I do not
willingly dwell long on general subjects. It is then enough to bear in mind the
purpose for which Jeremiah says that the word of Jehovah came to him, even that
he might secure authority to himself; he does not boast of his own wisdom nor of
anything human or earthly, but says only that he spoke what the Lord had
commanded him.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:1 In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah
king of Judah came this word from the LORD, saying,
Ver. 1. In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim.] What a sudden change was here,
soon after the death of good Josiah! And was there not the like in England after the
death of that English Josiah, Edward VI? Within a very few days of Queen Mary’s
reign were various learned and godly men in various parts committed to prison for
religion, and Mr Rogers, the proto-martyr, put to death, as was that holy prophet of
God, Uriah the son of Shemaiah of Kirjathjearim, not many weeks before Jeremiah
was apprehended and questioned for his life, as is here related, his adversaries being
pricked on by pride and malice.
COFFMAN, "Verse 1
JEREMIAH 26
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5. JEREMIAH WAS TRIED ON CAPITAL CHARGES
This chapter is dated "early in the reign of Jehoiachim," which is supposed to be a
technical term indicating the time between his accession to the throne and the New
Year following that event. Some dispute this; and there are several opinions held by
various scholars regarding the date, which seems certainly to have been at some
point in the reign of Jehoiachim. "Most of the present-day expositors date the
chapter in 609-608 B.C."[1]
Another disputed interpretation relates this chapter to chapter 7, in which is
recorded the prophecy of God's forthcoming destruction of Jerusalem; of course,
the same prophecy, or another one much like it, is in Jeremiah 25 (immediately
preceding). Some have supposed that the specific prophecy of the seventy years
captivity in Jeremiah 25 was what actually precipitated the death-threatening
procedure against Jeremiah. Of course, Keil and others do not agree with the
alleged connection between Jeremiah 7 and Jeremiah 25; but as Feinberg noted,
"The affinities between the chapters are too many and too minute for them not to
relate to the same address."[2]
Barnes understood that, "This chapter is a narrative of the danger to which
Jeremiah was exposed by reason of his prophecy in Jeremiah 7. Jeremiah 26:6-7
here contain a summary of that prophecy; and that, again, is only an outline of what
was a long address."[3]
The violation of all conceptions of chronological order is a phenomenon of Biblical
literature; and, as Cheyne declared, "It is only natural to expect it in Jeremiah."[4]
Cawley and Millard began their final division of the Book of Jeremiah with this
chapter, lumping the rest of the book (Jeremiah 26-52) into a single division entitled
"Historical Narratives."[5] This treatment of the Book of Jeremiah appeals to this
writer. However, those who prefer further divisions may find Ash's system
satisfactory. He divided the rest of the book as follows:
V. Jeremiah and the False Prophets (Jeremiah 26-29).
VI. The book of Consolation (Jeremiah 30-33).
VII. In the Days of Jehoiachim, Zedekiah (Jeremiah 35-39).
VIII. After the Fall of Jerusalem (Jeremiah 40-45).
IX. Oracles Concerning the Nations (Jeremiah 46-51).
X. An Historical Appendix (Jeremiah 52).[6]
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6. The divisions of this chapter suggested by Henderson are: Jeremiah announces the
doom of Jerusalem as God commanded him (Jeremiah 26:1-6); the false prophets
and the priests at once accuse him of blasphemy and declare him to be worthy of
death (Jeremiah 26:7-11); Jeremiah pleads his innocence (Jeremiah 26:12-15); the
elders and princes decide in favor of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 26:16-19); the execution of
Uriah (Jeremiah 26:20-23); and Ahikam rescues and protects Jeremiah (Jeremiah
26:24).
The uncertainty which exists regarding the connection between the various chapters
in this part of Jeremiah was noted by Smith who pointed out that, "Ewald
considered these next three chapters as a historical supplement regarding the
distinction between true and false prophecy; Havernick thought that the purpose of
Jeremiah 26 was to prove that the Jews had rejected the prophets; Keil related it to
the vindication of the truth of the prophecy that the captivity would last seventy
years. All this is unsatisfactory; it is better to treat the chapter as a unit, complete in
itself, and as connected with Jeremiah 7."[7]
Jeremiah 26:1-7
"In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiachim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, came
this word from Jehovah, saying. Thus saith Jehovah: Stand in the court of
Jehovah's house, and speak unto all the cities of Judah, which come to worship in
Jehovah's house, all the words that I command thee to speak unto them; diminish
not a word. It may be they will hearken, and turn every man from his evil way; that
I may repent me of the evil which I purposed to do unto them because of the evil of
their doings. And thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith Jehovah: If ye will not
hearken to me, to walk in my law, which I have set before you, to hearken to the
words of my servants the prophets, whom I send unto you, even rising up early and
sending them, but ye have not hearkened; then will I make this house like Shiloh,
and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth. And the priests and the
prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of
Jehovah."
"Stand in the court of Jehovah's house ..." (Jeremiah 26:4). This location enabled
Jeremiah to preach to the greatest number of the throngs of people from all the
cities of Judah, who were gathering upon some national feast-day.
"And turn every man from his evil way ..." (Jeremiah 26:3). Feinberg stressed two
things of singular importance in this passage: "(1) The kind of repentance which
God demands is always an individual matter; and (2) promises of divine judgment
are always conditional."[8]
"Walk in my law ... hearken to the words of my servants the prophets ..." (Jeremiah
26:4-5). God's condemnation did not result from their refusal to hearken to
Jeremiah, merely; but it was the consequence of their rejection of all of God's
prophets, reaching all the way back to Moses and the sacred terms of the Old
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7. Sinaitic Covenant itself, all of this instruction being evident right here in this
passage.
The great things that stand out in this paragraph are: (1) the necessity of obeying
God's law, if the forthcoming destruction is to be averted; (2) the terrible nature of
the doom awaiting them if they did not repent; (3) Shiloh was cited as an example of
the destruction that awaited Jerusalem and the temple.
The significance of the citation of Shiloh derived from the fact of its having been the
very first place where the ark of the Lord rested after Israel's entry into the
promised land.
The Bible makes no specific reference to the occasion of Shiloh's destruction, and
critics once disputed it; but "The Danish expedition uncovered pottery and other
evidence demonstrating that the destruction of Shiloh occurred, by the hands of the
Philistines about 1050 B.C."[9] The mention of this fact here was intended to refute
the arrogant confidence of those Israelites who supposed that the existence of a mere
building was their guarantee of safety no matter what they did, a guarantee which
they erroneously ascribed to the existence of the temple.
As this narrative proceeds, it will be evident that "all the people" were a very fickle
and undependable element discernible in this shameful trial of Jeremiah.
"The priests, and the prophets, and all the people ..." (Jeremiah 26:7). These were
the enemies of Jeremiah. It should not be thought that the "prophets" were in any
sense true prophets. These characters are mentioned in Jeremiah 26:7,8,11,16; and
the LXX designates them as "pseudo-prophets."[10] That irresponsible and fickle
Jerusalem mob, designated here as "all the people," that is, the majority, started
yelling for the death of the holy Prophet. They were fit ancestors indeed of the mob
in that same city centuries afterward who would cry, Crucify Him! Crucify Him!
EXPOSITORS BIBLE COMMENTARY, "A TRIAL FOR HERESY
Jeremiah 26:1-24; cf. Jeremiah 7:1-34; Jeremiah 8:1-22; Jeremiah 9:1-26; Jeremiah
10:1-25
"When Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that Jehovah had commanded
him to speak unto all the people,
the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold on him, saying,
Thou shalt surely die."- Jeremiah 26:8
THE date of this incident is given, somewhat vaguely, as the beginning of the reign
of Jehoiakim. It was, therefore, earlier than B.C. 605, the point reached in the
previous chapter. Jeremiah could offer no political resistance to Jehoiakim and his
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8. Egyptian suzerain; yet it was impossible for him to allow Josiah’s policy to be
reversed without a protest. Moreover, something, perhaps much, might yet he saved
for Jehovah. The king, with his court and prophets and priests, was not everything.
Jeremiah was only concerned with sanctuaries, ritual, and priesthoods as means to
an end. For him the most important result of the work he had shared with Josiah
was a pure and holy life for the nation and individuals. Renan-in some passages, for
he is not always consistent-is inclined to minimise the significance of the change
from Josiah to Jehoiakim; in fact, he writes very much as a cavalier might have
done of the change from Cromwell to Charles II. Both the Jewish kings worshipped
Jehovah, each in his own fashion: Josiah was inclined to a narrow puritan severity
of life; Jehoiakim was a liberal, practical man of the world. Probably this is a fair
modern equivalent of the current estimate of the kings and their policy, especially
on the part of Jehoiakim’s friends; but then, as unhappily still in some quarters,
"narrow puritan severity" was a convenient designation for a decent and
honourable life, for a scrupulous and self-denying care for the welfare of others.
Jeremiah dreaded a relapse into the old half-heathen ideas that Jehovah would be
pleased with homage and service that satisfied Baal, Moloch, and Chemosh. Such a
relapse would lower the ethical standard, and corrupt or even destroy any
beginnings of spiritual life. Our English Restoration is an object lesson as to the
immoral effects of political and ecclesiastical reaction; if such things were done in
sober England, what must have been possible to hot Eastern blood! In protesting
against the attitude of Jehoiakim, Jeremiah would also seek to save the people from
the evil effects of the king’s policy. He knew from his own experience that a subject
might trust and serve God with his whole heart, even when the king was false to
Jehovah. What was possible for him was possible for others. He understood his
countrymen too well to expect that the nation would continue to advance in paths of
righteousness which its leaders and teachers had forsaken; but, scattered here and
there through the mass of the people, was Isaiah’s remnant, the seed of the New
Israel, men and women to whom the Revelation of Jehovah had been the beginning
of a higher life. He would not leave them without a word of counsel and
encouragement.
At the command of Jehovah, Jeremiah appeared before the concourse of Jews,
assembled at the Temple for some great fast or festival. No feast is expressly
mentioned, but he is charged to address "all the cities of Judah"; all the outlying
population would only meet at the Temple on some specially holy day. Such an
occasion would naturally be chosen by Jeremiah for his deliverance, just as Christ
availed Himself of the opportunities offered by the Passover and the Feast of
Tabernacles, just as modern philanthropists seek to find a place for their favourite
topics on the platform of May Meetings.
The prophet was to stand in the court of the Temple and repeat once more to the
Jews his message of warning and judgment, "all that I have charged thee to speak
unto them, thou shalt not keep back a single word." The substance of this address is
found in the various prophecies which expose the sin and predict the ruin of Judah.
They have been dealt with in the Prophecies of Jeremiah, and are also referred to in
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9. Book III under our present head.
According to the universal principle of Hebrew prophecy, the predictions of ruin
were conditional; they were still coupled with the offer of pardon to repentance, and
Jehovah did not forbid his prophet to cherish a lingering hope that "perchance they
may hearken and turn every one from his evil way, so that I may repent Me of the
evil I purpose to inflict upon them because of the evil of their doings." Probably the
phrase every one from his evil way is primarily collective rather than individual,
and is intended to describe a national reformation, which would embrace all the
individual citizens; but the actual words suggest another truth, which must also
have been in Jeremiah’s mind. The nation is, after all, an aggregate of men and
women; there can be no national reformation except through the repentance and
amendment of individuals.
Jeremiah’s audience, it must be observed, consisted of worshippers on the way to
the Temple, and would correspond to an ordinary congregation of churchgoers,
rather than to the casual crowd gathered round a street preacher, or to the throngs
of miners and labourers who listened to Whitefield and Wesley. As an
acknowledged prophet, he was well within his rights in expecting a hearer from the
attendants at the feast, and men would be curious to see and hear one who had been
the dominant influence in Judah during the reign of Josiah. Moreover, in the
absence of evening newspapers and shop windows, a prophet was too exciting a
distraction to be lightly neglected. From Jehovah’s charge to speak all that He had
commanded him to speak and not to keep back a word, we may assume that
Jeremiah’s discourse was long: it was also avowedly an old sermon; most of his
audience had heard it before, all of them were quite familiar with its main topics.
They listened in the various moods of a modern congregation "sitting under" a
distinguished preacher. Jeremiah’s friends and disciples welcomed the ideas and
phrases that had become part of their spiritual life. Many enjoyed the speaker’s
earnestness and eloquence, without troubling themselves about the ideas at all.
There was nothing specially startling about the well known threats and warnings;
they had become
"A tale of little meaning tho’ the words were strong."
Men hardened their hearts against inspired prophets as easily as they do against the
most pathetic appeals of modern evangelists. Mingled with the crowd were
Jeremiah’s professional rivals, who detested both him and his teaching-priests who
regarded him as a traitor to his own caste, prophets who envied his superior gifts
and his force of passionate feeling. To these almost every word he uttered was
offensive, but for a while there was nothing that roused them to very vehement
anger. He was allowed to finish what he had to say, "to make an end of speaking all
that Jehovah had commanded him." But in this peroration he had insisted on a
subject that stung the indifferent into resentment and roused the priests and
prophets to fury.
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10. "Go ye now unto My place which was in Shiloh, where I caused My name to dwell
at the first, and see what I did to it for the wickedness of My people Israel. And now,
because ye have done all these works, saith Jehovah, and I spake unto you, rising up
early and speaking, but ye heard not; and I called you, but ye answered not:
therefore will I do unto the house, that is called by My name, wherein ye trust, and
unto the place which I gave to you and to your fathers, as I have done to Shiloh."
The Ephraimite sanctuary of Shiloh, long the home of the Ark and its priesthood,
had been overthrown in some national catastrophe. Apparently when it was
destroyed it was no mere tent, but a substantial building of stone, and its ruins
remained as a permanent monument of the fugitive glory of even the most sacred
shrine.
The very presence of his audience in the place where they were met showed their
reverence for the Temple: the priests were naturally devotees of their own shrine; of
the prophets Jeremiah himself had said, "The prophets prophesy falsely, and the
priests rule in accordance with their teaching." [Jeremiah 5:31] Can we wonder that
"the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold on him, saying, Thou shalt
surely die"? For the moment there was an appearance of religious unity in
Jerusalem; the priests, the prophets, and the pious laity on one side, and only the
solitary heretic on the other. It was, though on a small scale, as if the obnoxious
teaching of some nineteenth century prophet of God had given an unexpected
stimulus to the movement for Christian reunion; as if cardinals and bishops,
chairmen of unions, presidents of conferences, moderators of assemblies, with great
preachers and distinguished laymen, united to hold monster meetings and denounce
the Divine message as heresy and blasphemy. In like manner Pharisees, Sadducees,
and Herodians found a basis of common action in their hatred of Christ, and Pilate
and Herod were reconciled by His cross.
Meanwhile the crowd was increasing; new worshippers were arriving, and others as
they left the Temple were attracted to the scene of the disturbance. Doubtless too the
mob, always at the service of persecutors, hurried up in hope of finding
opportunities for mischief and violence. Some six and a half centuries later, history
repeated itself on the same spot, when the Asiatic Jews saw Paul in the Temple and
laid hands on him, crying out, Men of Israel, help: This is the man, that teacheth all
men everywhere against the people and the law and this place and all the city was
moved, and the people ran together and laid hold on Paul. [Acts 21:27-30]
Our narrative, as it stands, is apparently incomplete: we find Jeremiah before the
tribunal of the princes, but we are not told how he came there; whether the civil
authorities intervened to protect him, as Claudius Lysias came down with his
soldiers and centurions and rescued Paul, or whether Jeremiah’s enemies observed
legal forms, as Annas and Caiaphas did when they arrested Christ. But, in any case,
"the princes of Judah, when they heard these things, came up from the palace into
the Temple, and took their seats as judges at the entry of the new gate of the
Temple." The "princes of Judah" play a conspicuous part in the last period of the
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11. Jewish monarchy: we have little definite information about them, and are left to
conjecture that they were an aristocratic oligarchy or an official clique, or both; but
it is clear that they were a dominant force in the state, with recognised constitutional
status, and that they often controlled the king himself. We are also ignorant as to the
"new gate"; it may possibly be the upper gate built by Jotham [2 Kings 15:35] about
a hundred and fifty years earlier.
Before these judges, Jeremiah’s ecclesiastical accusers brought a formal charge;
they said, almost in the very words which the high priest and the Sanhedrin used of
Christ, "This man is worthy of death, for he hath prophesied against this city, as ye
have heard with your ears"-i.e., when he said, "This house shall be like Shiloh, and
this city shall be desolate without inhabitant." Such accusations have been always
on the lips of those who have denounced Christ and His disciples as heretics. One
charge against Himself was that He said, "I will destroy this Temple that is made
with hands, and in three days I will build another that is made without hands."
[Mark 14:58] Stephen was accused of speaking incessantly against the Temple and
the Law, and teaching that Jesus of Nazareth would destroy the Temple and change
the customs handed down from Moses. When he asserted that "the Most High
dwelleth not in temples made with hands," the impatience of his audience compelled
him to bring his defence to an abrupt conclusion. [Acts 6:13-14; Acts 7:48] Of Paul
we have already spoken.
How was it that these priests and prophets thought that their princes might be
induced to condemn Jeremiah to death for predicting the destruction of the
Temple? A prophet would not run much risk nowadays by announcing that St.
Paul’s should be made like Stonehenge, or St. Peter’s like the Parthenon. Expositors
of Daniel and the Apocalypse habitually fix the end of the world a few years in
advance of the date at which they write, and yet they do not incur any appreciable
unpopularity. It is true that Jeremiah’s accusers were a little afraid that his
predictions might be fulfilled, and the most bitter persecutors are those who have a
lurking dread that their victims are right, while they themselves are wrong. But
such fears could not very well be evidence or argument against Jeremiah before any
court of law.
In order to realise the situation we must consider the place which the Temple held in
the hopes and affections of the Jews. They had always been proud of their royal
sanctuary at Jerusalem, but within the last hundred and fifty years it had acquired
a unique importance for the religion of Israel. First Hezekiah, and then Josiah, had
taken away the other high places and altars at which Jehovah was worshipped, and
had said to Judah and Jerusalem, "Ye shall worship before this altar." [2 Kings
18:4, 2 Kings 23:1-37; Isaiah 36:7] Doubtless the kings were following the advice of
Isaiah and Jeremiah. These prophets were anxious to abolish the abuses of the local
sanctuaries, which were a continual incentive to an extravagant and corrupt ritual.
Yet they did not intend to assign any supreme importance to a priestly caste or a
consecrated building. Certainly for them the hope of Israel and the assurance of its
salvation did not consist in cedar and hewn stones, in silver and gold. And yet the
11

12. unique position given to the Temple inevitably became the starting point for fresh
superstition. Once Jehovah, could be worshipped not only at Jerusalem, but at
Beersheba and Bethel and many other places where He had chosen to set His name.
Even then, it was felt that the Divine Presence must afford some protection for His
dwelling places. But now that Jehovah dwelt nowhere else but at Jerusalem, and
only accepted the worship of His people at this single shrine, how could any one
doubt that He would protect His Temple and His Holy City against all enemies, even
the most formidable? Had He not done so already?
When Hezekiah abolished the high places, did not Jehovah set the seal of approval
upon his policy by destroying the army of Sennacherib? Was not this great
deliverance wrought to guard the Temple against desecration and destruction, and
would not Jehovah work out a like salvation in any future time of danger? The
destruction of Sennacherib was essential to the religious future of Israel and of
mankind; but it had a very mingled influence upon the generations immediately
following. They were like a man who has won a great prize in a lottery, or who has,
quite unexpectedly, come into an immense inheritance. They ignored the unwelcome
thought that the Divine protection depended on spiritual and moral conditions, and
they clung to the superstitious faith that at any moment, even in the last extremity of
danger and at the eleventh hour, Jehovah might, nay, even must, intervene. The
priests and the inhabitants of Jerusalem could look on with comparative composure
while the country was ravaged, and the outlying towns were taken and pillaged;
Jerusalem itself might seem on the verge of falling into the hands of the enemy, but
they still trusted in their Palladium. Jerusalem could not perish, because it
contained the one sanctuary of Jehovah; they sought to silence their own fears and
to drown the warning voice of the prophet by vociferating their watchword: "The
Temple of Jehovah! the Temple of Jehovah! The Temple of Jehovah is in our
midst!" [Jeremiah 7:4]
In prosperous times a nation may forget its Palladium, and may tolerate doubts as
to its efficacy; but the strength of the Jews was broken, their resources were
exhausted, and they were clinging in an agony of conflicting hopes and fears to their
faith in the inviolability of the Temple. To destroy their confidence was like
snatching away a plank from a drowning man. When Jeremiah made the attempt,
they struck back with the fierce energy of despair. It does not seem that at this time
the city was in any immediate danger; the incident rather falls in the period of quiet
submission to Pharaoh Necho that preceded the battle of Carchemish. But the
disaster of Megiddo was fresh in men’s memories, and in the unsettled state of
Eastern Asia no one knew how soon some other invader might advance against the
city. On the other hand, in the quiet interval, hopes began to revive, and men were
incensed when the prophet made haste to nip these hopes in the bud, all the more so
because their excited anticipations of future glory had so little solid basis.
Jeremiah’s appeal to the ill-omened precedent of Shiloh naturally roused the
sanguine and despondent alike into frenzy.
Jeremiah’s defence was simple and direct: "Jehovah sent me to prophesy all that ye
12

13. have heard against this house and against this city. Now therefore amend your ways
and your doings, and hearken unto the voice of Jehovah your God, that He may
repent Him of the evil that He hath spoken against you. As for me, behold, I am in
your hands: do unto me as it seems good and right unto you. Only know assuredly
that, if ye put me to death, ye will bring the guilt of innocent blood upon yourselves,
and upon this city and its inhabitants: for of a truth Jehovah sent me unto you to
speak all these words in your ears." There is one curious feature in this defence.
Jeremiah contemplates the possibility of two distinct acts of wickedness on the part
of his persecutors: they may turn a deaf ear to his appeal that they should repent
and reform, and their obstinacy will incur all the chastisements which Jeremiah had
threatened; they may also put him to death and incur additional guilt. Scoffers
might reply that his previous threats were so awful and comprehensive that they left
no room for any addition to the punishment of the impenitent. Sinners sometimes
find a grim comfort in the depth of their wickedness; their case is so bad that it
cannot be made worse, they may now indulge their evil propensities with a kind of
impunity. But Jeremiah’s prophetic insight made him anxious to save his
countrymen from further sin, even in their impenitence; the Divine discrimination is
not taxed beyond its capabilities even by the extremity of human wickedness.
But to return to the main feature in Jeremiah’s defence. His accusers’ contention
was that his teaching was so utterly blasphemous, so entirely opposed to every
tradition and principle of true religion-or, as we should say, so much at variance
with all orthodoxy-that it could not be a word of Jehovah. Jeremiah does not
attempt to discuss the relation of his teaching to the possible limits of Jewish
orthodoxy. He bases his defence on the bare assertion of his prophetic mission-
Jehovah had sent him. He assumes that there is no room for evidence or discussion;
it is a question of the relative authority of Jeremiah and his accusers, whether he or
they had the better right to speak for God. The immediate result seemed to justify
him in this attitude. He was no obscure novice, seeking for the first time to establish
his right to speak in the Divine name. The princes and people had been accustomed
for twenty years to listen to him, as to the most fully acknowledged mouthpiece of
Heaven; they could not shake off their accustomed feeling of deference, and once
more succumbed to the spell of his fervid and commanding personality. "Then said
the princes and all the people unto the priests and the prophets, This man is not
worthy of death; for he hath spoken to us in the name of Jehovah our God." For the
moment the people were won over and the princes convinced; but priests and
prophets were not so easily influenced by inspired utterances: some of these
probably thought that they had an inspiration of their own, and their professional
experience made them callous.
At this point again the sequence of events is not clear; possibly the account was
compiled from the imperfect recollections of more than one of the spectators. The
pronouncement of the princes and the people seems, at first sight, a formal acquittal
that should have ended the trial, and left no room for the subsequent intervention of
"certain of the elders," otherwise the trial seems to have come to no definite
conclusion and the incident simply terminated in the personal protection given to
13

14. Jeremiah by Ahikam ben Shaphan. Possibly, however, the tribunal of the princes
was not governed by any strict rules of procedure; and the force of the argument
used by the elders does not depend on the exact stage of the trial at which it was
introduced.
Either Jeremiah was not entirely successful in his attempt to get the matter disposed
of on the sole ground of his own prophetic authority, or else the elders were anxious
to secure weight and finality for the acquittal, by bringing forward arguments in its
support. The elders were an ancient Israelite institution, and probably still
represented the patriarchal side of the national life; nothing is said as to their
relation to the princes, and this might not be very clearly defined. The elders
appealed, by way of precedent, to an otherwise unrecorded incident of the reign of
Hezekiah. Micah the Morasthite had uttered similar threats against Jerusalem and
the Temple: "Zion shall be ploughed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps,
and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest." But Hezekiah and
his people, instead of slaying Micah, had repented, and the city had been spared.
They evidently wished that the precedent could be wholly followed in the present
instance; but, at any rate, it was clear that one of the most honoured and successful
of the kings of Judah had accepted a threat against the Temple as a message from
Jehovah. Therefore the mere fact that Jeremiah had uttered such a threat was
certainly not prima facie evidence that he was a false prophet. We are not told how
this argument was received, but the writer of the chapter, possibly Baruch, does not
attribute Jeremiah’s escape either to his acquittal by the princes or to the reasoning
of the elders. The people apparently changed sides once more, like the common
people in the New Testament, who heard Christ gladly and with equal enthusiasm
clamoured for His crucifixion. At the end of the chapter we find them eager to have
the prophet delivered into their hands that they may put him to death. Apparently
the prophets and priests, having brought matters into this satisfactory position, had
retired from the scene of action; the heretic was to be delivered over to the secular
arm. The princes, like Pilate, seemed inclined to yield to popular pressure; but
Ahikam, a son of the Shaphan who had to do with the finding of Deuteronomy,
stood by Jeremiah, as John of Gaunt stood by Wyclif, and the Protestant Princes by
Luther, and the magistrates of Geneva by Calvin; and Jeremiah could say with the
Psalmist:-
I have heard the defaming of many,
Terror on every side:
While they took counsel together against me,
They devised to take away my life.
But I trusted in Thee, O Jehovah:
I said, Thou art my God.
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15. My times are in Thy hand:
Deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me.
Let the lying lips be dumb,
Which speak against the righteous insolently.
With pride and contempt.
Oh, how great is Thy goodness, which Thou hast laid up for them that fear Thee,
Which Thou hast wrought for them that put their trust in Thee, before the sons of
men.
We have here an early and rudimentary example of religious toleration, of the
willingness, however reluctant, to hear as a possible Divine message unpalatable
teaching, at variance with current theology; we see too the fountainhead of that
freedom which since has "broadened down from precedent to precedent."
But unfortunately no precedent can bind succeeding generations, and both Judaism
and Christianity have sinned grievously against the lesson of this chapter.
Jehoiakim himself soon broke through the feeble restraint of this newborn
tolerance. The writer adds an incident that must have happened somewhat later, to
show how real was Jeremiah’s danger, and how transient was the liberal mood of
the authorities. A certain Uriah ben Shemaiah of Kirjath Jearim had the courage to
follow in Jeremiah’s footsteps and speak against the city "according to all that
Jeremiah had said." With the usual meanness of persecutors, Jehoiakim and his
captains and princes vented upon this obscure prophet the ill will which they had
not dared to indulge in the case of Jeremiah, with his commanding personality and
influential friends. Uriah fled into Egypt, but was brought back and slain, and his
body cast out unburied into the common cemetery. We can understand Jeremiah’s
fierce and bitter indignation against the city where such things were possible.
This chapter is so full of suggestive teaching that we can only touch upon two or
three of its more obvious lessons. The dogma which shaped the charge against
Jeremiah and caused the martyrdom of Uriah was the inviolability of the Temple
and the Holy City. This dogma was a perversion of the teaching of Isaiah, and
especially of Jeremiah himself, which assigned a unique position to the Temple in
the religion of Israel. The carnal man shows a fatal ingenuity in sucking poison out
of the most wholesome truth. He is always eager to discover that something external,
material, physical, concrete-some building, organisation, ceremony, or form of
words-is a fundamental basis of the faith and essential to salvation. If Jeremiah had
died with Josiah, the "priests and prophets" would doubtless have quoted his
authority against Uriah. The teaching of Christ and His apostles, of Luther and
15

16. Calvin and their fellow reformers, has often been twisted and forged into weapons
to be used against their true followers. We are often tempted in the interest of our
favourite views to lay undue stress on secondary and accidental statements of great
teachers. We fail to keep the due proportion of truth which they themselves
observed, and in applying their precepts to new problems we sacrifice the kernel
and save the husk. The warning of Jeremiah’s persecutors might often "give us
pause." We need not be surprised at finding priests and prophets eager and
interested champions of a perversion of revealed truth. Ecclesiastical office does not
necessarily confer any inspiration from above. The hereditary priest follows the
traditions of his caste, and even the prophet may become the mouthpiece of the
passions and prejudices of those who accept and applaud him. When men will not
endure sound doctrine, they heap to themselves teachers after their own lusts;
having itching ears, they turn away their ears from the truth and turn unto fables.
[2 Timothy 4:3] Jeremiah’s experience shows that even an apparent consensus of
clerical opinion is not always to be trusted. The history of councils and synods is
stained by many foul and shameful blots; it was the Ecumenical Council at
Constance that burnt Huss, and most Churches have found themselves, at some time
or other, engaged in building the tombs of the prophets whom their own officials
had stoned in days gone by. We forget that "Athanasius contra mundum" implies
also "Athanasius contra ecclesiam."
PETT, "Verses 1-5
SECTION 2 (Jeremiah 26:1 to Jeremiah 45:5).
Whilst the first twenty five chapters of Jeremiah have mainly been a record of his
general prophecies, mostly given during the reigns of Josiah and Jehoiakim, and
have been in the first person, this second section of Jeremiah (Jeremiah 26:1 to
Jeremiah 45:5) is in the third person, includes a great deal of material about the
problems that Jeremiah faced during his ministry and provides information about
the opposition that he continually encountered. This use of the third person was a
device regularly used by prophets so that it does not necessarily indicate that it was
not directly the work of Jeremiah, although in his case we actually have good reason
to think that much of it was recorded under his guidance by his amanuensis and
friend, Baruch (Jeremiah 36:4).
It can be divided up as follows:
1. Commencing With A Speech In The Temple Jeremiah Warns Of What Is Coming
And Repudiates The Promises Of The False Prophets (Jeremiah 26:1 to Jeremiah
29:32).
2. Promises Are Given Of Eventual Restoration And Of A New Covenant Written In
The Heart (Jeremiah 30:1 to Jeremiah 33:26).
3. YHWH’s Continuing Word of Judgment Is Given Through Jeremiah And Its
16

17. Repercussions Leading Up To The Fall Of Jerusalem Are Revealed (Jeremiah 34:1
to Jeremiah 39:18).
4. Events Subsequent To The Fall Of Jerusalem (Jeremiah 40:1 to Jeremiah 45:5).
Verses 1-24
A). Jeremiah Declares In The Temple That If Judah Will Not Repent Their
Sanctuary Will End Up like That at Shiloh, Which Was Destroyed By The
Philistines, And Their City Will Be Subject To YHWH’s Curse. This Results In His
Being Brought Before The Authorities For What Were Seen As Treasonable
Utterances (Jeremiah 26:1-24).
The chapter commences with a statement of his source of authority, ‘the word of
YHWH’. ‘In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim -- came this word from YHWH
saying --’ (Jeremiah 26:1), and goes on to describe a speech made in the Temple
which includes a call to repentance, followed by a warning that if they did not take
heed their city would become a curse and their Temple would be made ‘like Shiloh’,
which was where the original Temple/Tabernacle had been destroyed, presumably
by the Philistines, in the days of Samuel. Subsequent attacks on Jeremiah by the
priests and prophets are then described, although ameliorated by a counter-
argument put forward by ‘the elders of the people of the land’ who cite the
prophecies of Micah in Jeremiah’s defence. A reminder of what happened to
another loyal prophet of YHWH named Uriah is then given.
Jeremiah 26:1
‘In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, came
this word from YHWH, saying,’
The prophecy is dated as ‘in the beginning’ of the reign of Jehoiakim. This may be a
technical description indicating the initial period after Jehoiakim came to the throne
prior to his ‘first (full) year’ which would commence at the new year. Alternately it
may just be a general indicator. But we know that it must have been fairly early on
in his reign because it is later made clear that relationships with Egypt were still
prominent. Babylon had not yet come on the scene. The mention of Jehoiakim’s
descent from Josiah is, in context, a reminder of the reforms of that good king, and
brings out that what follows was a new state of affairs which Josiah would not have
countenanced. It was already therefore an indicator that Judah’s downward slide
had openly recommenced.
PETT, "Verses 1-32
Section 2 Subsection 1 Commencing With A Speech In The Temple Jeremiah Warns
Of What Is Coming And Repudiates The Promises Of The False Prophets, And
While Opposed By The Hierarchy, Has His Own Status As A Prophet Recognised
17

18. by Many Of The People (Jeremiah 26:1 to Jeremiah 29:32).
The danger of dividing the prophecy up into sections and subsections, as we have
done, is that we can lose something of the continuity of the prophecy. Thus while the
divisions in this case are seemingly clear, the continuity must not be overlooked.
What follows in Jeremiah 26:1 to Jeremiah 29:32 must be seen in fact as a
subsequent explanation expanding on what Jeremiah has already said in chapter 25
concerning both the evil coming on Jerusalem and the seventy year period of
Babylonian domination. And we now discover that this was in direct contrast with
what was being currently declared by the cult prophets mentioned so prominently in
chapter 23.
The whole subsection thus brings out the threat under which Judah was standing,
and the direct rivalry existing between Jeremiah and his supporters, and the cult
prophets, a rivalry which was caused by their deeply contrasting views about the
future. It commences with the fact that the cult prophets combined with the priests
in arraigning Jeremiah and seeking his death in chapter 26, something which is
followed by examples of their activities and their continued opposition to Jeremiah,
thus illustrating what was described in Jeremiah 23:9-40. This section too could
have been headed ‘concerning the prophets’, were it not that its tentacles reached
out further.
The subsection is a unity. It commences at the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim
bringing out the new situation that had arisen with the death of Josiah and the
advent of a new king who ‘did what was evil in the eyes of YHWH’ (2 Kings 23:37),
continues by showing that from that time on Jeremiah wore a yoke about his neck
as an indication that Judah was no longer an independent nation, something which
goes on until things are brought to a head during the reign of Zedekiah when the
yoke is broken from his neck by a prophet who prophesies falsely and dies as a
result. Meanwhile Jeremiah has sent duplicates of his yoke to the kings of
surrounding nations who are contemplating rebellion against Babylon, to warn
them against such rebellion. And the subsection closes with a letter from him to the
exiles in Babylonia warning them against expecting a swift return, resulting in a
return letter from a prominent prophet calling for the arraignment of Jeremiah.
The subsection itself divides up as follows:
A) ‘In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim -- came this word from YHWH
saying --’ (Jeremiah 26:1). The chapter commences in the Temple with a call to
repentance, which is followed by a warning that their Temple would otherwise be
made like Shiloh, (which was where the original Temple/Tabernacle was destroyed
by the Philistines in the days of Samuel), and their city would become a curse among
the nations (compare Jeremiah 25:29; Jeremiah 25:37). The resulting persecution of
Jeremiah, especially by the priests and the cult prophets, is then described, although
ameliorated by a counter-argument put forward by ‘the elders of the people of the
land’ who clearly accepted Jeremiah as a genuine prophet and cited the prophecies
18

19. of Micah in his support.
B) ‘In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim -- came this word to Jeremiah from
YHWH saying --’ (Jeremiah 27:1). This chapter commences with Jeremiah, at the
command of YHWH, starting to wear symbolic instruments of restraint on his neck
as an illustration of the bondage that has come on them from Egypt and is coming at
the hands of Babylon. Then during the reign of Zedekiah he is commanded to send
these same instruments of bondage among the surrounding nations because of a
planned rebellion against Babylon, conveying a similar message to them, that they
must accept being subject nations, and warning them against listening to those who
say otherwise. Meanwhile Zedekiah and Judah are given the same message together
with the assurance, contrary to the teaching of the cult prophets, that rather than
experiencing deliverance, what remains of the vessels of YHWH in the Temple will
also be carried off to Babylon.
C) ‘And it came about in the same year at the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah --’
(Jeremiah 28:1). In this chapter the false prophets, and especially Hananiah,
prophesy that within a short time subservience to Babylon will be over and
Jehoiachin and his fellow exiles will return in triumph from Babylon together with
all the vessels of the Temple. Jeremiah replies that it will not be so. Rather ‘all these
nations’ will have to serve Babylon into the known future. He then prophesies the
death of Hananiah because of his rebellion against the truth of YHWH, something
which occurs within the year.
D) ‘Now these are the words of the letter that Jeremiah the Prophet sent from
Jerusalem to the residue of the elders of the captivity, -- etc. (Jeremiah 29:1). In a
letter sent to the exiles in Babylonia Jeremiah advises the exiles not to listen to false
prophets but to settle down in Babylonia and make the best of a bad situation,
because their exile is destined by YHWH to last for ‘seventy years’. Furthermore he
emphasises the dark shadows of the future for those who are left behind, although
promising that once His exiled people have been dealt with in judgment, YHWH
will bring them back again to the land and cause them to acknowledge Him once
again. He then prophesies against the false prophets, especially the prominent one
who had put pressure on for him to be arrested.
BI 1-24, "In the beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah.
Afflictions, distresses, tumults
Jehoiakim was, perhaps, the most despicable of the kings of Judah. Josephus says that
he was unjust in disposition, an evil-doer; neither pious towards God nor just towards
men. Something of this may have been due to the influence of his wife, Nehushta, whose
father, Elnathan, was an accomplice in the royal murder of Urijah. Jeremiah appears to
have been constantly in conflict with this king; and probably the earliest manifestation of
the antagonism that could not but subsist between two such men occurred in connection
with the building of Jehoiakim’s palace. Though his kingdom was greatly impoverished
with the heavy fine of between forty and fifty thousand pounds, imposed by Pharaoh-
19

20. Necho afar the defeat and death of Josiah, and though the times were dark with portents
of approaching disaster, yet he began to rear a splendid palace for himself, with spacious
chambers and large windows, floors of cedar, and decorations of vermilion. Clearly, such
a monarch must have entertained a mortal hatred towards the man who dared to raise
his voice in denunciation of his crimes; and, like Herod with John the Baptist, he would
not have scrupled to quench in blood the light that cast such strong condemnation upon
his oppressive and cruel actions. An example of this had been recently afforded in the
death of Urijah, who had uttered solemn words against Jerusalem and its inhabitants in
the same way that Jeremiah had done. But it would appear that this time, at least, his
safety was secured by the interposition of influential friends amongst the aristocracy,
one of whom was Ahikam, the son of Shaphan (Jer_26:20-24).
I. The divine commission. Beneath the Divine impulse, Jeremiah went up to the court of
the Lord’s house, and took his place on some great occasion when all the cities of Judah
had poured their populations to worship there. Not one word was to be kept back. We
are all more or less conscious of these inward impulses; and it often becomes a matter of
considerable difficulty to distinguish whether they originate in the energy of our own
nature or are the genuine outcome of the Spirit of Christ. It is only in the latter ease that
such service can be fruitful. There is no greater enemy of the highest usefulness than the
presence of the flesh in our activities. There is no department of life or service into which
its subtle, deadly influence does not penetrate. We meet it after we have entered upon
the new life, striving against the Spirit, and restraining His gracious energy. We are most
baffled when we find it prompting to holy resolutions and efforts after a consecrated life.
And lastly, it confronts us in Christian work, because there is so much of it that in our
quiet moments we are bound to trace to a desire for notoriety, to a passion to excel, and
to the restlessness of a nature which evades questions in the deeper life, by flinging itself
into every avenue through which it may exert its activities. There is only one solution to
these difficulties. By the way of the cross and the grave we can alone become
disentangled and discharged from the insidious domination of this evil principle, which
is accursed by God, and hurtful to holy living, as blight to the tender fruit.
II. The message and its reception. On the one side, by his lips, God entreated His people
to repent and turn from their evil ways; on the other, He bade them know that their
obduracy would compel Him to make their great national shrine as complete a
desolation as the site of Shiloh, which for five hundred years had been in ruins. It is
impossible to realise the intensity of passion which such words evoked. They seemed to
insinuate that Jehovah could not defend His own, or that their religion had become so
heartless that He would not. “So it came to pass, when Jeremiah had made, an end of
speaking all that the Lord commanded him to speak unto all the people,” that he found
himself suddenly in the vortex of a whirlpool of popular excitement. There is little doubt
that Jeremiah would have met his death had it not been for the prompt interposition of
the princes. Such is always the reception given on the part of man to the words of God.
We may gravely question how far our words are God’s, when people accept them quietly
and as a matter of course. That which men approve and applaud may lack the King’s
seal, and be the substitution on the part of the messenger of tidings which he deems
more palatable, and therefore more likely to secure for himself a larger welcome.
III. Welcome interposition. The princes were seated in the palace, and instantly on
receiving tidings of the outbreak came up to the temple. Their presence stilled the
excitement, and prevented the infuriated people from carrying out their designs upon
the life of the defenceless prophet. They hastily constituted themselves into a court of
20

21. appeal, before which prophet and people were summoned. Then Jeremiah stood on his
defence. His plea was that he could not but utter the words with which the Lord had sent
him, and that he was only re-affirming the predictions of Micah in the darts of Hezekiah.
He acknowledged that he was in their hands, but he warned them that innocent blood
would bring its own Nemesis upon them all; and at the close of his address he re-
affirmed his certain embassage from Jehovah. This bold and ingenuous defence seems to
have turned the scale in hie favour. The princes gave their verdict: “This man is not
worthy of death, for he hath spoken to us in the name of the Lord our God.” And the
fickle populace, swept hither and thither by the wind, appear to have passed over en
masse to the same conclusion; so that princes and people stood confederate against the
false prophets and priests. Thus does God hide His faithful servants in the hollow of His
hand. No weapon that is formed against them prospers. They are hidden in the secret of
His pavilion from the strife of tongues. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)
2 “This is what the Lord says: Stand in the
courtyard of the Lord’s house and speak to all the
people of the towns of Judah who come to worship
in the house of the Lord. Tell them everything I
command you; do not omit a word.
GILL, "Thus saith the Lord, stand in the court of the Lord's house,.... It, the
great court of Israel, where the people used to meet together for worship:
and speak unto all the cities of Judah; the inhabitants of them; not only to those
that dwelt at Jerusalem but in the rest of the cities of Judah; for what he was to say
concerned them all, they having all sinned, and needed repentance and reformation;
without which they would be involved in the general calamity of the nation:
which come to worship in the Lord's house; as they did three times in the year, at
the feasts of passover, pentecost, and tabernacles; and it was now the last of these, as
Bishop Usher thinks, when this prophecy was to be delivered to them:
21

22. all the words that I command thee to speak to them: nothing must be kept back,
the whole counsel of God must be declared; not a word suppressed through affection to
them, or fear of them; God commanded, and must be obeyed, let the consequence be
what it will:
diminish not a word; soften not any expression or alter any word, by putting one
more smooth for one rough; or change the accent, or abate of the vehemency of
delivering it; but both for matter manner, and form let it be as directed, without any
subtraction and diminution, change or alteration: a rule which every minister of the
word ought to attend to; seeking not to please men, but God that sends him and Christ
whose minister he is.
JAMISON, "in the court — the largest court, from which he could be heard by the
whole people.
come to worship — Worship is vain without obedience (1Sa_15:21, 1Sa_15:22).
all the words — (Eze_3:10).
diminish not a word — (Deu_4:2; Deu_12:32; Pro_30:6; Act_20:27; 2Co_2:17;
2Co_4:2; Rev_22:19). Not suppressing or softening aught for fear of giving offense; nor
setting forth coldly and indirectly what can only by forcible statement do good.
CALVIN, "He adds, Thus saith Jehovah, Stand in the court of the house (literally,
but house means the Temple) of Jehovah It was not allowed the people to enter into
the Temple; hence the Prophet was bidden to abide in the court where he might be
heard by all. He was, as we have seen, of the priestly order; but it would have been
but of little avail to address the Levites. (159) It was therefore necessary for him to
go forth and to announce to the whole people the commands of God which are here
recited; and he was to do this not only to the citizens of Jerusalem, but also to all the
Jews; and this is expressly required, speak to all the cities of Judah; and then it is
added, who come to worship in the Temple of Jehovah God seems to have
designedly anticipated the presumption of those who thought that wrong was done
to them, when they were so severely reproved; “What! we have left our wives and
children, and have come here to worship God; we have laid aside every attention to
our private advantage, and have come here, though inconveniently; we might have
lived quietly at home and enjoyed our blessings; we have incurred great expenses,
undertaken a tedious journey, brought sacrifices, and denied ourselves as to our
daily food, that God might be worshipped; and yet thou inveighest severely against
us, and we hear nothing from thy mouth but terrors; is this right? Does God render
such a reward to his servants?”
Thus then they might have contended with the Prophet; but he anticipates these
objections, and allows what they might have pleaded, that they came to the Temple
to offer sacrifices; but he intimates that another thing was required by God, and
that they did not discharge their duties in coming to the Temple, except they
faithfully obeyed God and his Law. We now see why the Prophet said, that he was
sent to those who came up to Jerusalem to worship God. The deed itself could not
indeed have been blamed; nay, it was highly worthy of praise, that they thus
22

23. frequented the worship of God; but as the Jews regarded not the end for which God
had commanded sacrifices to be offered to him, and also the end for which he had
instituted all these external rites, it was necessary to remove this error in which they
were involved.
Speak, he says, all the words which I have commanded thee to speak to them The
Prophet again confirms, that he was not the author of what he taught, but only a
minister, who faithfully announced what God had committed to him; and so the
people could not have objected to him by saying, that he brought forward his own
devices, for he repelled such a calumny. The false prophets might have also alleged
similar things; but Jeremiah had certain evidences as to his calling, that the Jews, by
rejecting him, condemned themselves, for their own consciences fully convicted
them. But from this passage, and from many like passages, we may draw this
conclusion, — that no one, however he may excel in powers of mind, or knowledge,
or wisdom, or station, ought to be attended to, except he proves that he is God’s
minister.
He afterwards adds, Thou shalt not diminish a word Some read, “Thou shall not
restrain,” which is harsh. The verb, ‫,גרע‬ garo, properly means to be lessened and to
be consumed. And Moses makes use of the same word in Deuteronomy 12:32, when
he says,
“Thou shalt not add, nor diminish,”
in reference to the Law, in which the people were to acquiesce, without corrupting it
with any human devices. To diminish then was to take away something from the
word. (160) But we ought to consider the reason why this was said to Jeremiah; it
never entered the mind of the holy man to adulterate God’s word; but God here
encourages him to confidence, so that he might boldly execute his commands. To
diminish then something from the word, was to soften what appeared sharp, or to
suppress what might have offended, or to express indirectly or coldly what could not
produce effect without being forcibly expressed. There is then no doubt but that
God anticipates here this evil, under which even faithful teachers in a great measure
labor; for when they find the ears of men tender and delicate, they dare not
vehemently to reprove, threaten, and condemn their vices. This is the reason why
God added this, Diminish not a word; as though he had said, “Declare thou with
closed eyes and with boldness whatever thou hast heard from my mouth, and
disregard whatever may tend to lessen thy courage.”
We may now easily learn the use of this doctrine; the Prophet was not sent to
profane men, who openly avowed their impiety, or lived in gross sins; but he was
sent to the very worshippers of God, who highly regarded his external worship, and
for this reason had left wives and children, came to the Temple and spared neither
labor nor expense. As, then, he was sent to them, we must beware, lest we sleep in
our vices and think that we have done our duty to God, when we have apparently
given some evidences of piety; for except we really and sincerely obey God, all other
23

24. things are esteemed of no value by him. It then follows —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:2 Thus saith the LORD Stand in the court of the LORD’S
house, and speak unto all the cities of Judah, which come to worship in the LORD’S
house, all the words that I command thee to speak unto them; diminish not a word:
Ver. 2. Diminish not a word.] Or, Detract not aught, viz., for fear or favour, lest I
confound thee before them. {Jeremiah 1:17; see there} Haec, instar speculi omnium
temporum, pastoribus inspicienda sunt. Here is a mirror for ministers.
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:2. Stand in the court, &c.— The great court, where both men
and women worshipped when they brought no sacrifice; for when they did so, they
were to carry it into the inner-court, called The court of Israel. Jeremiah frequently
spoke in the temple, because of the great concourse of people in that place. It is also
very probable, that he chose the days of the great festivals. See Lightfoot.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:2
“Thus says YHWH, Stand in the court of YHWH’s house, and speak to all the cities
of Judah, which come to worship in YHWH’s house, all the words that I command
you to speak to them. Diminish not a word.”
The command came from YHWH that Jeremiah was to stand and proclaim His
word in the outer court of YHWH’s house where a large number ‘from all the cities
of Judah’ who had come up to the feast would be present. It is apparent that amidst
all their idolatry, the regular worship of YHWH still continued, but the problem
was that their hearts were not in it, with their loyalties being more directed towards
the Baals on the high places.
Jeremiah was to speak what YHWH commanded, and not to hold back from
declaring the whole truth, or to relax from declaring all His commandments. He
must ‘diminish not a word’ (compare Deuteronomy 4:2; Deuteronomy 12:32). It is
the sign of a true man of God that, while not being unwise (courting persecution is
never godly), he holds nothing back of what God wants him to say.
Many see this Temple speech as paralleling the one in Jeremiah 7:1 ff. with this
being simply a summary of that speech. Certainly they contain a similar emphasis,
and it is therefore something which can neither be proved nor disproved, in which
case we may see the speech in Jeremiah 7:1 ff. as filling in the details here. But as
there is little doubt that it contained a message whose content would have been
reproduced on a number of occasions (Jeremiah often repeats himself), this may
well be a similar message proclaimed at a different time rather than the same one.
This could be seen as supported by the fact that here it is the city’s fate which is the
prime emphasis whereas in chapter 7 the concentration was on the Temple.
Furthermore it will be noted that in Jeremiah 7:1 ff. there is no indication of a
violent reaction to his message.
24

25. ‘Diminish not a word.’ Such a command was very necessary and a reminder of the
difficulty and danger surrounding Jeremiah’s ministry. It would have been very
tempting for him to take the sting out of some of what he was saying so as to make it
more acceptable. But he must not do so. Jeremiah was well aware of the feelings and
excitable nature of the people and he knew that he was demolishing what they saw
as guaranteed truths, namely that:
1. They believed that the land was their inheritance given to them by YHWH for
ever (whilst they had seen it taken away from northern Israel, their view was
probably that that was precisely because, unlike Judah, they had not remained
faithful to the Temple and to the son of David).
2. They believed that the Temple was the dwelling place of YHWH and therefore
inviolate as long as they maintained the proper rituals (as in their view was proved
by what had happened when Jerusalem was miraculously delivered under
Hezekiah). They were probably even more confident in this fact because they were
now tributaries of Egypt who ruled as far north as Carchemish, so that any other
enemies would have appeared far away. After all what could the others do against
mighty Egypt? (They were not to know at this point in time that within five years
Egypt would have been defeated by Babylon, and that its power would then be
limited to within its own borders)
3. They believed that the rule of the house of David over Judah was guaranteed for
ever unconditionally.
These things being granted, they would have argued, why should they believe that
the Temple would be destroyed or that they would be removed from the land? To
declare such things was to go against their cherished beliefs, and to attack what they
saw as their national and ‘rightful’ heritage.
3 Perhaps they will listen and each will turn from
their evil ways. Then I will relent and not inflict
on them the disaster I was planning because of the
evil they have done.
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26. GILL, "If so be they will hearken,.... And obey; which is expressive not of ignorance
and conjecture in God, but of his patience and long suffering, granting space and time
for repentance, and the means of it; which disregarded, leave without excuse:
and turn every man from his evil way; his series and course of life, which was evil,
and was the case of everyone; so that as their sin was general, the reformation ought to
be so too:
that I may repent me of the evil which I purpose to do unto them; or "am
thinking", or "devising (d) to do unto them"; which repentance must be understood not
of a change of mind, but of the course of his providence towards them, which, by his
threatenings, and some steps taken, portended ruin and destruction; yet, in case of
repentance and reformation, he would change his method of action agreeably to his will:
because of the evil of their doings; this was the reason why he had threatened them
with the evil of punishment, because of the evil of their actions; which were breaches of
his law, and such as provoked the eyes of his glory.
HENRY 3-6, "God directed him what to preach, and it is that which could not give
offence to any but such as were resolved to go on still in their trespasses. 1. He must
assure them that if they would repent of their sins, and turn from them, though they
were in imminent danger of ruin and desolating judgments were just at the door, yet a
stop should be put to them, and God would proceed no further in his controversy with
them, Jer_26:3. This was the main thing God intended in sending him to them, to try if
they would return from their sins, that so God might turn from his anger and turn away
the judgments that threatened them, which he was not only willing, but very desirous to
do, as soon as he could do it without prejudice to the honour of his justice and holiness.
See how God waits to be gracious, waits till we are duly qualified, till we are fit for him
to be gracious to, and in the mean time tries a variety of methods to bring us to be so. 2.
He must, on the other hand, assure them that if they continued obstinate to all the calls
God gave them, and would persist in their disobedience, it would certainly end in the
ruin of their city and temple, Jer_26:4-6. (1.) That which God required of them was that
they should be observant of what he had said to them, both by the written word and by
his ministers, that they should walk in all his law which he set before them, the law of
Moses and the ordinances and commandments of it, and that they should hearken to the
words of his servants the prophets, who pressed nothing upon them but what was
agreeable to the law of Moses, which was set before them as a touchstone to try the
spirits by; and by this they were distinguished from the false prophets, who drew them
from the law, instead of drawing them to it. The law was what God himself set before
them. The prophets were his own servants, and were immediately sent by him to them,
and sent with a great deal of care and concern, rising early to send them, lest they
should come too late, when their prejudices had got possession and become invincible.
They had hitherto been deaf both to the law and to the prophets: You have not
26

27. hearkened. All he expects now is that at length they should heed what he said, and make
his word their rule - a reasonable demand. (2.) That which is threatened in case of
refusal is that this city, and the temple in it, shall fare as their predecessors did, Shiloh
and the tabernacle there, for a like refusal to walk in God's law and hearken to his
prophets, then when the present dispensation of prophecy just began in Samuel. Now
could a sentence be expressed more unexceptionably? Is it not a rule of justice ut parium
par sit ratio - that those whose cases are the same be dealt with alike? If Jerusalem be
like Shiloh in respect of sin, why should it not be like Shiloh in respect of punishment?
Can any other be expected? This was not the first time he had given them warning to this
effect; see Jer_7:12-14. When the temple, which was the glory of Jerusalem, was
destroyed, the city was thereby made a curse; for the temple was that which made it a
blessing. If the salt lose that savour, it is thenceforth good for nothing. It shall be a
curse, that is, it shall be the pattern of a curse; if a man would curse any city, he would
say, God make it like Jerusalem! Note, Those that will not be subject to the commands
of God make themselves subject to the curse of God.
JAMISON, "if so be — expressed according to human conceptions; not as if God did
not foreknow all contingencies, but to mark the obstinacy of the people and the difficulty
of healing them; and to show His own goodness in making the offer which left them
without excuse [Calvin].
CALVIN, "In this verse God briefly shows for what end he sent his Prophet. For it
would not have been sufficient for him to announce what he taught, except it was
known to have been the will of God. Here then God asserts that he would not be
propitious to the people, except they complied with what he required, that is, to
repent. Thus he testifies that what was taught would be useful to them, because it
had reference to their safety; and a truth cannot be rendered more entitled to our
love than when we know that it tends to promote our wellbeing. Therefore God,
when he saw the people rushing headlong through blind despair into all kinds of
impiety, designed to make the trial whether or not some of them were healable; as
though he had said, “What are ye doing, ye miserable beings? It is not yet wholly
over with you; only obey me, and the remedy for all your evils is ready at hand.” We
now see what God’s design was, even that he wished to give those Jews the hope of
mercy who were altogether irreclaimable, so that they might not reject what he
taught on hearing that it would be for their good.
But we may hence gather a general doctrine; that when God is especially displeased
with us, it is yet an evidence of his paternal kindness when he favors us with the
prophetic teaching, for that will not be without its fruit, except it be through our
own fault. But at the same time we are rendered more and more inexcusable, if we
reject that medicine which would certainly give us life. Let us then understand that
the Prophet says here, that he was sent that he might try whether the Jews would
repent; for God was ready to receive them into favor.
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28. By saying ‫,אולי‬auli, “if peradventure,” he made use of a common mode of speaking.
God indeed has perfect knowledge of all events, nor had he any doubt respecting
what would take place, when the prophets had discharged their duties; but what is
pointed out here, and also condemned, is the obstinacy of the people; as though he
had said, that it was indeed difficult to heal those who had grown putrid in their
evils, yet he would try to do so. And thus God manifests his unspeakable goodness,
that he does not wholly cast away men who are almost past remedy, and whose
diseases seem to be unhealable. He also strengthens his Prophet; for he might from
long experience have been led to think that all his labor would be in vain; therefore
God adds this, that he might not cease to proceed in the course of his calling; for
what seemed incredible might yet take place beyond his expectation. We now see
why it was said, If so be that they will hear
It is then added, and turn, etc. From the context we learn, that repentance as well as
faith proceeds from the truth taught: for how is it that those alienated from God
return, confess their sins, and change their character, minds, and purposes? It is the
fruit of truth; not that truth in all cases is effectual, but he treats here of the elect: or
were they all healable, yet God shews that the use and fruit of his truth is to turn
men, as it is said also by the Prophet, (Malachi 4:6,) and repeated in the first chapter
of Luke,
“He will turn many of the children of Israel.” (Luke 1:6.)
What follows is not without its weight, every one from his evil way; for God
intimates that it was not enough that the whole people should ostensibly confess
their sins, but that every one was required to examine himself: for when we seek
God in a troop, and one follows another, it is often done with no right feeling.
Repentance therefore is only true and genuine, when every one comes to search his
own case; for its interior and hidden seat is in the heart. This is the reason why he
says, If a man, that is, if every one turns from his evil way
As to God’srepentance, of which mention is made, there is no need of long
explanation. No change belongs to God; but when God is said to turn away his
wrath, it is to be understood in a sense suitable to the comprehension of men: in the
same way also we are to understand the words, that he repents. (Psalms 85:5.) It is
at the same time sufficiently evident what God means here, even that he is
reconcilable, as soon as men truly turn to him: and thus we see that men cannot be
called to repent, until God’s mercy is presented to them. Hence also it follows, that
these two things, repentance and faith, are connected together, and that it is absurd
and an impious sacrilege to separate them; for God cannot be feared except the
sinner perceives that he will be propitious to him: for as long as we are apprehensive
of God’s wrath, we dread his judgment; and thus we storm against him, and must
necessarily be driven headlong into the lowest abyss, hence under the Papacy they
speak not only foolishly, but also coldly of repentance; for they leave souls doubtful
and perplexed, nay, they take away every kind of certainty. Let us then understand
the reason why the Holy Spirit teaches us, that repentance cannot be rightly and
28

29. profitably taught, unless it be added, that God will be propitious to miserable men
whenever they turn to him.
With regard to the wordI think, I have already said, that God forms no contrary
purposes; but this refers to those men who deserved his dreadful vengeance; it is the
same as though he had said, — “Their iniquity has already ripened; I am therefore
now ready to take vengeance on them: nevertheless let them return to me, and they
shall find me to be a Father. There is, then, no reason for them to despair, though I
have already manifested tokens of my vengeance.” This is the meaning; but he
repeats the reason of his wrath, On account of the wickedness of their doings; for we
know that they were proud and obstinate; it was therefore necessary to close their
mouths, otherwise they would have raised a clamor, and said, that God was unjustly
angry, or that he exceeded all bounds. Whatever evils then were at hand, God
briefly shews that they came from themselves, that the cause was their own
wickedness, (161) It follows, —
3.It may be they will hear and turn every one from his way that is evil; then I will
repent as to the evil which I purpose to bring on them for the evil of their doings.
Here is “evil for evil,” the evil of punishment for the evil of sin. The word is often
used in these two senses. It is changed in the Sept., κάκων and πονήρων; and in the
Vulg., “malum “ and “malitia.” “Thus evil,” says Gataker, “begetteth evil, a just
retaliation of evil for evil. The evil of iniquity and the evil of penalty are as the
needle and the thread; the one goeth before and maketh way for the other; and
when one hath found a passage it draweth on the other.” — Ed
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:3
“It may be they will listen, and turn every man from his evil way, that I may repent
me of the evil which I purpose to do to them because of the evil of their doings.”
YHWH declares here what His real desire is. It is that they would listen and turn
from their evil ways so that He Himself would not have to bring His severe
judgment on them. We are reminded of Peter’s words, ‘The Lord -- is not willing
that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance’ (2 Peter 3:9). It is a
reminder that in His love and compassion God desires to give every man a fair
opportunity, and that in His heart He longed for Judah’s repentance. This
emphasises the fact that while it was true that Manasseh’s behaviour had sealed
Judah’s doom (Jeremiah 15:4), it was only so because it was his influence that had
stirred up their latent sinfulness and had largely made them unwilling to repent.
Had they genuinely repented and maintained that repentance, Manasseh’s sin
would have counted for nothing.
We have here a reminder that man was created as a free will being who chooses his
own way. It is only the fact that he always chooses the way of sin that makes the
sovereign work of God in salvation necessary. For the truth is that while men and
29

30. women may of themselves repent of particular sins, full repentance is something
that is beyond them without God’s gracious working. That is why, at its foundation,
‘salvation is of the Lord’, and why all attempts to be saved apart from Him will fail.
4 Say to them, ‘This is what the Lord says: If you
do not listen to me and follow my law, which I
have set before you,
CLARKE, "If ye will not hearken - This and several of the following verses are
nearly the same with those in Jer_7:13, etc., where see the notes.
GILL, "And thou shalt say unto them,.... What follows is the substance of the
prophecy, and the sum of the sermon or discourse he was sent to deliver, without
diminishing a word of it:
thus saith the Lord, if ye will not hearken to me, to walk in my law which I
have set before you; first by Moses, by whose hands it was given to their fathers; and
by the prophets, the interpreters of it to them; before whom it was set as a way for them
to walk in, and a rule to walk by; a directory for them in their lives and conversations;
and which continues to be so, as it is set before us Christians by our King and Lawgiver
Jesus Christ; though not to obtain righteousness and life by the works of it; which
should not be sought for, nor are attainable thereby.
CALVIN, "The Prophet now briefly includes what he had been teaching, what he
had been commanded to declare to the people. No doubt he spoke to them more at
large; but he deemed it enough to shew in a few words what had been committed to
him. And the sum of it was, that except the Jews so hearkend as to walk in God’s
Law, and were submissive to the prophets, final ruin was nigh the Temple and the
city. This is the meaning: but it may be useful to consider every particular.
By these words, Except ye hearken to me, to walk in my law, God intimates, that he
mainly requires obedience, and esteems nothing as much, according to what he says,
that it is better than all sacrifices. (1 Samuel 15:22.) This subject was largely treated
in the seventh chapter, where he said,
30

31. “Did I command your fathers when they came out of Egypt to offer sacrifices to me?
this only I required, even to hear my voice.” (Jeremiah 7:22)
We hence see, that the only way of living piously, justly, holily, and uprightly, is to
allow ourselves to be ruled by the Lord. This is one thing. Then what follows is
worthy of being noticed, To walk in my law God here testifies that his will is not
ambiguous or doubtful, for he has prescribed what is right in his law. Were God
then to descend a hundred times from heaven, he would bring nothing but this
message, that he has spoken what is necessary to be known, and that his Law is the
most perfect wisdom. Had he said only, “Hear me,” men might have still evaded and
avowed themselves ready to learn. God therefore does here silence hypocrites, and
says that he required nothing else but to follow his Law. And for the same purpose
he adds what follows, which I have set before you: for this kind of speaking
intimates that the doctrine of the Law was by no means obscure or doubtful, as
Moses said,
“I this day call heaven and earth to witness, that I have set life and death before
your eyes.” (Deuteronomy 30:19)
And in another place he said,
“Say not, Who shall ascend above the clouds? or, Who shall descend into the abyss?
or, Who shall pass beyond the sea? The word is in thy heart and in thy mouth,”
(Deuteronomy 30:12; Romans 10:6)
as though he had said, “God has deprived you of every excuse, for there is no reason
for doubting, since he has spoken so familiarly to you, and has explained everything
necessary to be known.”
And hereby is confuted the impious blasphemy of the Papists, who impudently
assert that not only the Law is obscure, but also the Gospel. And Paul also loudly
declares, that the Gospel is not obscure except to those who perish, and who have a
veil over their hearts, being visited with judicial blindness. But as to the Law, in
which there is no such plainness as in the Gospel, we see what Jeremiah affirms
here, that it was set before the eyes of all, that they might learn from it what pleased
God, and what was just and right.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:4-6
“And you shall say to them,
Thus says YHWH,
If you will not listen to me,
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32. To walk in my law, which I have set before you,
To listen to the words of my servants the prophets,
Whom I send to you,
Even rising up early and sending them,
But you have not listened,
Then will I make this house like Shiloh,
And will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth.”
This abbreviated content of what must have been a larger speech sums up his
message, which was that if they failed to walk in accordance with the covenant, and
refused to listen to the genuine prophets, then in the end their Temple would be
made like Shiloh (destroyed and non-existent) and their holy city would become a
curse (subjected to the curses of Deuteronomy 28). In other words he was
contradicting all that they firmly believed, and suggesting that they were not as
secure as they had thought. Their city becoming a curse continued the thought in
Jeremiah 25:29; Jeremiah 25:37.
‘If you will not listen to me, to walk in my law, which I have set before you.’ YHWH
stresses that He had personally spoken to them from Mount Sinai and had made
clear to them His requirements. Thus to fall short of obedience to His Instruction
(Torah, Law) was to directly disobey Him.
‘To listen to the words of my servants the prophets, whom I send to you, even rising
up early and sending them -.’ compare Jeremiah 25:4. They had also refused to
listen to Him subsequently when He had sent His servants, the prophets. We know
of many of these prophets and ‘men of God’ from the early records (Joshua-
Chronicles), and they would have been known to them from their tradition. And He
stresses that He had not been backward in sending them. He had, as it were, risen
up early in order to send them, demonstrating real effort and determination (a
typical Jeremaic phrase).
‘But you have not listened.’ But they had not listened to them either. Their hearts
had been set obstinately against obeying YHWH’s covenant requirements. This
indeed was why they now came under the curses contained within that covenant
(Leviticus 26; Deuteronomy 27-28).
‘Then will I make this house like Shiloh, and will make this city a curse to all the
nations of the earth.’ And because of their failure to listen to Him and respond to
His covenant He would ‘make their house like Shiloh’ and ‘make their city a curse’.
What had happened at Shiloh was proof positive, for those who would listen, that
32

33. God’s Sanctuary was never seen by Him as inviolable. So let them remember Shiloh
where the Tabernacle had been erected after the Conquest, and which, as a result of
additional outbuildings, had itself become a kind of Temple. But when His people
had been disobedient in the time of Samuel that had been destroyed, and
furthermore this fact that YHWH had forsaken His Sanctuary in this way was
ironically something that they often sang about (Psalms 78:60). It was precisely
because YHWH had forsaken it that it was no more. And the same could therefore
happen to their present Temple.
On top of this the covenant had been backed up by curses (Leviticus 26;
Deuteronomy 27-28). Thus if they were disobedient to that covenant they should
expect their holy city to be cursed in the eyes of all nations, and to suffer the doom
described in the curses. That would in itself vindicate the covenant. It is a salutary
reminder that in the end God’s truth is in the final analysis demonstrated by
judgment.
But we can clearly see why, spoken to an excitable people, made more excitable by
the festival atmosphere, these words could cause more than a stir. They had come to
the feasts with such confidence that ‘they were doing right by YHWH’, and so full
of self-satisfaction at being uniquely ‘the people of God’, that to be informed that
that was not sufficient would have appeared to be almost blasphemy. They forgot
the words of Samuel, Isaiah, Hosea, Amos and Micah that obedience counted for
more than offerings, and to do YHWH’s will was more important than the fat of
rams (e.g. 1 Samuel 15:22; Isaiah 1:11-18; Hosea 6:6; Amos 5:21-24; Micah 6:7-8).
Like we so often are, they were limited in their spiritual vision. They had eyes but
they saw not.
5 and if you do not listen to the words of my
servants the prophets, whom I have sent to you
again and again (though you have not listened),
GILL, "To hearken to the words of my servants the prophets,.... The
interpretations they give of the law; the doctrines they deliver; the exhortations,
cautions, and reproofs given by them in the name of the Lord, whose servants they were;
and therefore should be hearkened to; since hearkening to them is hearkening to the
Lord himself, in whose name they speak, and whose message they deliver:
33

34. whom I sent unto you, both rising up early and sending them; they had their
mission and commission from the Lord; and who was careful to send them early, if they
might be instruments to do them good and prevent their ruin; they had the best of
means, and these seasonable, and so were left without excuse:
(but ye have not hearkened); neither to the Lord, nor to his prophets; but went on
in their own ways, neglecting the law of the Lord and the instructions of his servants.
JAMISON, "prophets — the inspired interpreters of the law (Jer_26:4), who
adapted it to the use of the people.
CALVIN, "But what follows in the next verse ought to be especially observed; for
these two things are necessarily connected, — that God required nothing but
obedience to his Law, — and that his will was that his prophets should be heard, —
To hearken, he says, to the words of my servants, the prophets, whom I send to you,
(it is in the second person.) Here there seems to be some inconsistency; for if God’s
Law was sufficient, why were the prophets to be heard? But these two things well
agree together: the Law alone was to be attended to, and also the prophets, for they
were its interpreters. For God sent not his prophets to correct the Law, to change
anything in it, to add or to take away; as it was an unalterable decree, not to add to
it nor to diminish from it. What then was the benefit of sending the prophets? even
to make more manifest the Law, and to apply it to the circumstances of the people.
As then the prophets devised no new doctrine, but were faithful interpreters of the
Law, God joined, not without reason, these two things together, — that his Law was
to be heard and also his prophets; for the majesty of the Law derogated nothing
from the authority of the prophets; and as the prophets confirmed the Law, it could
not have been that they took away anything from the Law.
Nay, this passage teaches us, that all those who repudiate the daily duty of learning,
are profane men, and extinguish as far as they can the grace of the Spirit; many
such fanatics among the Anabaptists have been in our time, who despised learning
of every kind. They boasted that the doctrine of the Law was the Alphabet; and they
also indulged in this dream, that wrong is done to the Holy Spirit when men attend
to learning. And some dare, in a grosser manner, to vomit forth their blasphemies;
they say that Scripture is enough for us, yea, even these two things, “Fear God and
love thy neighbor.” But as I have already said, we must consider how God has
spoken by his Law; whether he has closed up the way, so as not to explain his will
more clearly by the prophets, nor to apply to present use what would have otherwise
been less effectual? or that he purposed to draw continually by various channels the
doctrine which flows from that fountain? But now, since God had given his own
Law, and had added to the Law his prophets, every one who rejected the prophets
must surely ascribe no authority to the Law. Even so now, they who think it not
their duty at this day to seek knowledge in the school of Christ, and to avail
themselves of the hearing of his word, no doubt despise God in their hearts, and set
34

35. no value either on the Law, or on the prophets, or on the Gospel. Remarkable then
is this passage; it shews that the Lord would have his Law to be our leader and
teacher, and yet he adds his own prophets.
He says further, Whom I have sent to you, rising early and sending Here he
upbraids the Jews with their slowness and insensibility; for he roused them early,
and that not once but often, and yet he spent his labor in vain. Rising early, when
applied to God, means that he called these men in due time, as though he had said,
that it was not his fault that the Jews had departed from the right way of safety, for
he had been sedulously careful of their well-being, and had in due time warned
them. We hence see how the Prophet condemned their tardiness and indifference,
and then their hardness, by saying, and sending; for this intimates a repetition or
assiduity. He had said before, “whom I sent to you, rising early;” now, when he says
and sending, he means that he had not sent one prophet, or many at one time, but
one after another continually, and that yet it had been without any benefit. The end
of the verse I read in a parenthesis, (but ye have not hearkened.) Indeed what
follows stands connected with the previous verses. (162)
4.And say to them, Thus saith Jehovah, If ye will not hear me, so as to
5.walk in my law, which I have set before you, by hearkening to the words of my
servants the prophets, (whom I have been sending to you, even rising up early and
sending; but ye did not hearken;)
6.then will I make this house like Shiloh, and this city will I make a urse to all the
nations of the earth.
The Vulg. and the Syr. are in effect the same as above. — Ed.
6 then I will make this house like Shiloh and this
city a curse[a] among all the nations of the
earth.’”
GILL, "Then will I make this house like Shiloh,.... Where the ark was until it was
taken by the Philistines; and then the Lord forsook his tabernacle there, Psa_78:60; and
so he threatens to do the like to the temple at Jerusalem, should they continue in their
disobedience to him; See Gill on Jer_7:12 and See Gill on Jer_7:14;
and will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth; that is, the city of
35

36. Jerusalem, which should be taken up, and used proverbially in all countries; who, when
they would curse anyone, should say, the Lord make thee as Jerusalem, or do unto thee
as he has done to Jerusalem.
JAMISON, "like Shiloh — (see on Jer_7:12, Jer_7:14; 1Sa_4:10-12; Psa_78:60).
curse — (Jer_24:9; Isa_65:15).
CALVIN, "Then will I make, etc. : the copulative is to be rendered here as an
adverb of time. What had been just said, “but ye have not hearkened,” was by way
of anticipation; for the Jews, swelling with great arrogance, might have immediately
said, “Oh! what new thing dost thou bring? Except ye hearken to my voice, saith
Jehovah, to walk in my Law, which I have set before you, as though all this were not
well known even to children among us; and yet thou pretendest to be the herald of
some extraordinary prophecy; certainly such boasting will be deemed puerile by all
wise men.” Thus then they might have spoken, but the Prophet here briefly checks
the insolence of such a foolish censure, but ye have not hearkened; as though he had
said, that he had not been sent in vain to speak of a thing as it were new and
unusual, because the Jews had corrupted the whole Law, had become disobedient,
unteachable, and unbelieving, and had despised both the Law of God and his
Prophets.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:6 Then will I make this house like Shiloh, and will make this
city a curse to all the nations of the earth.
Ver. 6. Then will I make this house like Shiloh.] This same threat Jeremiah had
uttered in good Josiah’s days, [Jeremiah 7:12-14] and no harm ensued. Now,
tempora mutantur, truth breedeth hatred; and the prophet is in danger, for
discharging his conscience, to be murdered; as were Rogers, Bradford, Taylor, and
other famous preachers in those dog days of Queen Mary.
7 The priests, the prophets and all the people
heard Jeremiah speak these words in the house of
the Lord.
GILL, "So the priests, and the prophets, and all the people,.... As it was in the
temple, in one of the courts of it, that Jeremiah was, and said the above things, it is no
36

37. wonder to hear of the "priests", since they were there about their work and service; the
"prophets" were the false prophets, as the Septuagint and Arabic versions expressly call
them; and "all the people" were all the males out of the several cities of Judah, who were
come up to the temple on the account of the feast; see Jer_26:2; now these
heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of the Lord; in the temple;
in the court of Israel; they heard him out, and did not interrupt him while he was
speaking; and having heard him, they were angry with him, and were witnesses against
him; they did not hear him so as to obey his words, receive his instructions, and follow,
his directions; but they heard him with indignation, and were determined to prosecute
him unto death.
HENRY 7-9, "One would have hoped that such a sermon as that in the foregoing
verses, so plain and practical, so rational and pathetic, and delivered in God's name,
would work upon even this people, especially meeting them now at their devotions, and
would prevail with them to repent and reform; but, instead of awakening their
convictions, it did but exasperate their corruptions, as appears by this account of the
effect of it.
I. Jeremiah is charged with it as a crime that he had preached such a sermon, and is
apprehended for it as a criminal. The priests, and false prophets, and people, heard him
speak these words, Jer_26:7. They had patience, it seems, to hear him out, did not
disturb him when he was preaching, nor give him any interruption till he had made an
end of speaking all that the Lord commanded him to speak, Jer_26:8. So far they dealt
more fairly with him than some of the persecutors of God's ministers have done; they let
him say all he had to say, and yet perhaps with a bad design, in hopes to have something
worse yet to lay to his charge; but, having no worse, this shall suffice to ground an
indictment upon: He hath said, This house shall be like Shiloh, Jer_26:9. See how unfair
they are in representing his words. He had said, in God's name, If you will not hearken
to me, then will I make this house like Shiloh; but they leave out God's hand in the
desolation (I will make it so) and their own hand in it in not hearkening to the voice of
God, and charge it upon him that he blasphemed this holy place, the crime charged both
on our Lord Jesus and on Stephen: He said, This house shall be like Shiloh. Well might
he complain, as David does (Psa_56:5), Every day they wrest my words; and we must
not think it strange if we, and what we say and do, be thus misrepresented. When the
accusation was so weakly grounded, no marvel that the sentence passed upon it was
unjust: Thou shalt surely die. What he had said agreed with what God had said when he
took possession of the temple (1Ki_9:6-8), If you shall at all turn from following after
me, then this house shall be abandoned; and yet he is condemned to die for saying it. It
is not out of any concern for the honour of the temple that they appear thus warm, but
because they are resolved not to part with their sins, in which they flatter themselves
with a conceit that the temple of the Lord will protect them; therefore, right or wrong,
Thou shalt surely die. This outcry of the priests and prophets raised the mob, and all the
people were gathered together against Jeremiah in a popular tumult, ready to pull him
to pieces, were gathered about him (so some read it); they flocked together, some crying
one thing and some another. The people that were at first present were hot against him
(v. 8), but their clamours drew more together, only to see what the matter was
CALVIN, "Here the Prophet recites what happened to him, after he had declared
37

38. God’s message, and faithfully warned the people by adding threatenings, as God
had commanded him. He says first that he was heard; which is not to be deemed as
commendatory, as though the priests and prophets patiently heard what he taught;
for there was no teachable spirit in them, nor did they come prepared to learn, but
they had long indulged themselves in perverseness, so that Jeremiah was become to
them an avowed enemy; and they also audaciously opposed all his threatenings. But
though they were not ashamed to reject what the Prophet said, they yet observed a
certain form, as it is usual with hypocrites, for they are more exact than necessary,
as they say, in what is formal, but what is really important they neglect. We may
hence observe, that the priests and prophets deserved no praise, because they
restrained themselves, as though they deferred their judgment until the cause was
known, but as the whole people were present, they for a time shewed themselves
moderate; it was yet a reigned moderation, for their hearts were full of impiety and
contempt of God, as it became really manifest.
But it must be observed that he says that the priests and prophets hearkened As to
the priests, it is no wonder that he calls them so, though they were in every way
wicked, for it was an hereditary honor. But it is strange that he mentions the
prophets. At the same time we must know, that Jeremiah thus calls those who
boasted that they were sent from above. In the twenty-third chapter he at large
reproves them; and in many other places he condemns their impudence in falsely
assuming the authority of God. He then allowed them an honorable title, but
esteemed it as nothing; as we may do at this day, who without harm may call by way
of ridicule those prelates, bishops, or pastors, who under the Papacy seek to be
deemed so, provided we at the same time strip them of their masks. But these lay
hold on the title, and thus seek to suppress the truth of God, as though to be called a
bishop were of more weight than if an angel was to come down from heaven. And
yet were an angel to descend from heaven, he ought to be counted by us as a devil, if
he brought forward such filthy and execrable blasphemies, as we see the world is at
this day polluted with by these unprincipled men. This passage then, and the like,
ought to be borne in mind, for they shew that titles are not sufficient, except those
who bear them really shew that they are such as their calling imports. Thus, then,
Jeremiah was called a Prophet, and also those impostors were called prophets whose
only religion it was to corrupt and pervert the doctrine of the Law, but they were so
called with regard to the people. It is in the meantime necessary, wisely to
distinguish between prophets or teachers, as also the Apostle reminds us, we ought
to inquire whether their spirit is from God or not. (1 John 4:1.)
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:7. The prophets, &c.— The prophets, as is manifest from
many passages in Scripture, were an order of men among the Jews devoted to
sacred literature, and qualified by their attainments in religious knowledge to advise
and instruct the people, who came to consult them in cases of doubt and difficulty.
They appear to have been trained in seminaries and schools under the direction of
some prophet eminent for wisdom and piety, as those mentioned 1 Samuel 19:20
were under Samuel, and those 2 Kings 2:3; 2 Kings 6:1 under Elijah and Elisha.
That they were numerous, appears from this circumstance, that when Jezebel slew
38

39. all the prophets of JEHOVAH whom she could meet with, Obadiah hid a hundred
of them, and saved their lives; 1 Kings 18:4.: and afterwards there appeared no less
than four hundred of them prophesying in that character before Ahab and
Jehoshaphat, 1 Kings 22:6. It is not to be supposed that these were all of them, or at
all times, divinely inspired, but ordinarily gave their advice as men versed in the law
and in the other Scriptures. Sometimes, however, they were enabled to answer those
that consulted them by immediate revelation from God. And out of this body God
generally perhaps chose those whom he sent as his ambassadors, and messengers
extraordinary, to notify the designs of his providence, and to warn his people to
repent and turn from the ways which displeased him. I say, generally, but not
always; for Amos expressly says of himself, that he was "neither a prophet,"
meaning by profession, "nor a prophet's son," one bred up in the schools of the
prophets; but an illiterate herdsman, when JEHOVAH sent him to prophesy unto
Israel; Amos 7:14. But neither did the sacredness of their character secure them
from bearing a part in the general corruption of the times; on the contrary,
Jeremiah in particular complains bitterly of them for having prostituted themselves
to the worst of purposes, deceiving the people by false pretences, and being greatly
instrumental in promoting the cause of impiety and wickedness. See chap. Jeremiah
5:31, Jeremiah 14:13-14, Jeremiah 23:14, &c. Jeremiah 28:15, Jeremiah 29:8-9, &c.
See also Ezekiel 13:2; Ezekiel 13:23. Micah 3:5; Micah 3:11. Zephaniah 3:4. After a
total cessation of prophesy, the Scribes, who are often mentioned in the Gospels,
seem to have stepped into the place of the prophets, and by their acquired skill in
the sacred writings, without any claim to supernatural gifts, to have taught the
people, and instructed them in all matters of religious concernment. See Matthew
23:2-3.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:7
‘And the priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these
words in the house of YHWH.’
It is emphasised that Jeremiah’s words were heard by ‘the priest and the prophets
and all the people’. Such was his impact that even the priest and the cult prophets
had come to listen to his words, spoken in the outer court of the Temple to the
festival crowds. It is a reminder that the same thing happened to our Lord, Jesus
Christ, Who was also called to account for what He proclaimed and did in the
Temple.
8 But as soon as Jeremiah finished telling all the
people everything the Lord had commanded him
39

40. to say, the priests, the prophets and all the people
seized him and said, “You must die!
CLARKE, "And all the people - That were in company with the priests and the
prophets.
GILL, "Now it came to pass, when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking,....
For they let him alone till he had done, either out of reverence of him as a priest and
prophet; or they were awed by a secret influence on their minds that they might not
disturb him:
all that the Lord had commanded him to speak unto all the people; he did as
he was ordered, kept back nothing, not fearing the resentment of the people, but fearing
God:
that the priests, and the prophets, and all the people, took him; the priests and
the prophets were the leading men in this action; they stirred up the people against him,
and through their instigation he was seized and laid hold on:
saying, thou shall surely die; signifying that they would bring a charge against him,
which they were able to support, and which by the law would be death; unless they
meant in the manner of zealots to put him to death themselves, without judge or jury;
and which they would have put in execution, had not the princes of the land, or the great
sanhedrim, heard of it; and therefore to prevent it came to the temple, as is afterwards
related.
JAMISON, "priests — The captain (or prefect) of the temple had the power of
apprehending offenders in the temple with the sanction of the priests.
prophets — the false prophets. The charge against Jeremiah was that of uttering
falsehood in Jehovah’s name, an act punishable with death (Deu_18:20). His prophecy
against the temple and city (Jer_26:11) might speciously be represented as contradicting
God’s own words (Psa_132:14). Compare the similar charge against Stephen (Act_6:13,
Act_6:14).
K&D 8-9, "Jer_26:8-9
The behaviour of the priests, prophets, and princes of the people towards Jeremiah
on account of this discourse. - Jer_26:7-9. When the priests and prophets and all the
people present in the temple had heard this discourse, they laid hold of Jeremiah,
40

41. saying, "Thou must die. Wherefore prophesiest thou in the name of Jahveh, saying,
Like Shiloh shall this house become, and this city shall be desolate, without inhabitant?
And all the people gathered to Jeremiah in the house of Jahveh." This last remark is not
so to be understood, when compared with Jer_26:7 and Jer_26:8, as that all the people
who, according to Jer_26:7, had been hearing the discourse, and, according to Jer_26:8,
had with the priests and prophets laid hold on Jeremiah, gathered themselves to him
now. It means, that after one part of the people present had, along with the priests and
prophets, laid hold on him, the whole people gathered around him. "All the people,"
Jer_26:9, is accordingly to be distinguished from "all the people," Jer_26:8; and the
word ‫ֹל‬‫כּ‬, all, must not be pressed, in both cases meaning simply a great many. When it
is thus taken, there is no reason for following Hitz., and deleting "all the people" in Jer_
26:8 as a gloss. Jeremiah's special opponents were the priests and prophets after their
own hearts. But to them there adhered many from among the people; and these it is that
are meant by "all the people," Jer_26:8. But since these partisans of the priests and
pseudo-prophets had no independent power of their own to pass judgment, and since,
after Jeremiah was laid hold of, all the rest of the people then in the temple gathered
around him, it happens that in Jer_26:11 the priests and prophets are opposed to "all the
people," and are mentioned as being alone the accusers of Jeremiah. - When the princes
of Judah heard what had occurred, they repaired from the king's house (the palace) to
the temple, and seated themselves in the entry of the new gate of Jahve, sc. to investigate
and decide the case. The new gate was, according to Jer_36:10, by the upper, i.e., inner
court, and is doubtless the same that Jotham caused to be built (2Ki_15:35); but
whether it was identical with the upper gate of Benjamin, Jer_20:2, cannot be decided.
The princes of Judah, since they came up into the temple from the palace, are the
judicial officers who were at that time about the palace. the judges were chosen from
among the heads of the people; cf. my Bibl. Archäol. ii. §149.
CALVIN, "He says at last, that he was condemned by the priests, and the prophets,
and the whole people; he at the same time introduced these words, that he had
spoken all that the Lord had commanded him. Thus he briefly exposed the injustice
of those by whom he was condemned; for they had no regard to what was right, as
we shall presently see. But as they had brought with them a preconceived hatred, so
they vomited out what they could no longer contain. It afterwards follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:8 Now it came to pass, when Jeremiah had made an end of
speaking all that the LORD had commanded [him] to speak unto all the people, that
the priests and the prophets and all the people took him, saying, Thou shalt surely
die.
Ver. 8. That the priests and the prophets, &c.] So they dealt by Stephen, [Acts
7:57-58] by Arnulph, an excellent preacher of the truth according to godliness at
Rome, A.D. 1125, in the time of Pope Honorius II. Hic clericorum insidiis necatur.
(a) This good man was put to death by the instigation of the clergy, against whose
avarice, pride, and luxury he bitterly inveighed, and was therefore much favoured
by the Roman nobility; as was likewise Wycliffe by the English, and Huss by the
Bohemian; but the envious priests wrought their ruin.
41

42. COFFMAN, ""And it came to pass that when Jeremiah had made an end of
speaking all that Jehovah had commanded him to speak unto all the people, that the
priests, and the prophets, and all the people laid hold on him saying, Thou shalt
surely die. Why hast thou prophesied in the name of Jehovah, saying, This house
shall be like Shiloh, and this city shall be desolate, without inhabitant? And all the
people were gathered unto Jeremiah in the house of Jehovah."
The scene here is one of darkness and evil. The crooked prophets and false priests
were in control of the sadistic, thoughtless mob called "all the people." It is exactly
what took place again when the Jerusalem mob cried, "Crucify Him"!
The cunning crooked priests and prophets placed in the mouth of the mob the
essentials of two capital charges; (1) that Jeremiah had spoken "in the name of
Jehovah" without authority, and (2) that he had prophesied the destruction of
Jerusalem and of the temple, both of which events they falsely claimed had been
promised absolute and complete immunity from destruction by God Himself. The
Law of Moses gave the death penalty as punishment for blasphemy (Leviticus
24:16); and the same Law gave the death penalty for the speaking of a false
prophecy (Deuteronomy 18:20). We should not overlook the proof that these
charges by the crooked priests and prophets were based upon the provisions of the
Sinaitic covenant as revealed in the Pentateuch; and that the Jews of Jeremiah's day
were thoroughly familiar with every word of it! We believe that the crooked King
Jehoiachim was a party to this attack on Jeremiah, a fact clearly indicated by the
kings subsequent conduct.
"All the people were gathered together unto Jeremiah ..." (Jeremiah 26:9).
According to Barnes, this meant that the people had come together for the purpose
of constituting themselves as an impromptu court to try Jeremiah. If it had been
allowed to proceed as the crooked prosecutors of these charges had planned, it
would probably have resulted in the same kind of trial and stoning to death that
later marked the trial and death of Stephen in Acts 7th chapter. Fortunately,
someone evidently summoned the elders and princes of the nation to come and take
part in the trial, which they at once did.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:8
‘And it came about, when Jeremiah had made an end of speaking all that YHWH
had commanded him to speak to all the people, that the priests and the prophets and
all the people laid hold on him, saying, “You shall surely die.”
The whole of the populace who were present were at first aroused against him, ‘the
priests, the prophets and all the people’, although excluding the civil authorities. It
was a ‘popular’ movement. And when he had finished speaking he was by popular
consent, and by the authority of the priests and prophets, arrested, it being declared
that he was worthy of death. They were enflamed at the thought of what he had
said, and no doubt considered his prophecy to be patently false, making him worthy
42

43. of death (Deuteronomy 18:20).
PULPIT, "Had made an end of speaking. They allowed Jeremiah to finish his
discourse (of which we have here only the briefest summary), either from a lingering
reverence for his person and office, or to obtain fuller materials for an accusation
(comp. the trial of Stephen, Acts 6:12-14). All the people. The "people" appear to
have been always under some constraint. As long as the priests and prophets were
alone, they dominated the unofficial classes, but when the princes appeared (verse
11), the new influence proved superior. In verse 16 princes and people together go
over to the side of Jeremiah. Thou shalt surely die. Death was the legal penalty both
for blasphemy (Le 24:16) and for presuming to prophesy without having received a
prophetic revelation (Deuteronomy 18:20). Jeremiah's declaration ran so entirely
counter to the prejudices of his hearers that he may well have been accused of both
these sins, or crimes. True, Isaiah and Amos had already predicted the destruction
of Jerusalem (Isaiah 5:5, Isaiah 5:6; Isaiah 6:11; Amos 2:4, Amos 2:5; Amos 6:1,
Amos 6:2); but it may have been contended that the timely repentance of Judah
under Hezekiah and Josiah had effectually cancelled the threatened doom, and
though Isaiah 64:10, Isaiah 64:11 evidently refers to a time later than Josiah, and
represents the ruin of Jerusalem as practically certain, it would seem that the
prophetic book (Isaiah 40-66.) to which this belongs (to say the least) was not
generally known.
9 Why do you prophesy in the Lord’s name that
this house will be like Shiloh and this city will be
desolate and deserted?” And all the people
crowded around Jeremiah in the house of the
Lord.
BARNES, "The charge against Jeremiah was that of prophesying falsely, for which
the penalty was death Deu_18:20. They assumed that it was absolutely impossible that
Jerusalem ever could become like Shiloh.
Against Jeremiah - unto Jeremiah. They regularly constituted themselves a
congregation to take part in his trial.
43

44. GILL, "Why hast thou prophesied in the name of the Lord,.... Made use of his
name in declaring a falsehood, as they would have it; this was the crime: had he said
what he thought fit to say in his own name, they suggest it would not have been so bad;
but to vent his own imaginations in the name of the Lord, this they judged wicked and
blasphemous, and deserving of death; especially since what he said was against their city
and temple:
saying, this house shall be like Shiloh; forsaken and destroyed; that is, the temple:
and this city shall be desolate without an inhabitant? so they wrested his words;
for this he did not say, only that it should be a curse to all the nations of the earth:
and all the people were gathered against Jeremiah in the house of the Lord;
besides those that were in the temple that heard him, others, upon a rumour that he was
apprehended by the priests, and prophets, and people in the temple, got together in a
mob about him: or, they were "gathered to" (e) him; to hear what he had to say in his
own defence; and it appears afterwards that they were on his side, Jer_26:16.
CALVIN, "Here is added the cause of Jeremiah’s condemnation, that he had dared
to threaten with so much severity the holy city and the Temple. They did not inquire
whether God had commanded this to be done, whether he had any just cause for
doing so; but they took this principle as granted, that wrong was done to God when
anything was alleged against the dignity of the Temple, and also that the city was
sacred, and therefore nothing could be said against it without derogating from many
and peculiar promises of God, since he had testified that it would be ever safe,
because he dwelt in the midst of it. We hence see by what right, and under what
pretense the priests and the prophets condemned Jeremiah.
And by saying, in the name of Jehovah, they no doubt accused him as a cheat, or a
false pretender, because he had said that this had been commanded by God, for they
considered such a thing impossible and preposterous. God had promised that
Jerusalem would be his perpetual habitation; the words of Jeremiah were, “I will
make this city like Shiloh.” God seemed in appearance to be inconsistent with
himself, “This is my rest for ever,” “this shall be a desert.” We hence see that the
priests and the prophets were not without some specious pretext for condemning
Jeremiah. There is therefore some weight in what they said, “Dost thou not make
God contrary to himself? for what thou denouncest in his name openly and directly
conflicts with his promises; but God is ever consistent with himself; thou art
therefore a cheat and a liar, and thus one of the false prophets, whom God suffers
not in his Church.” And yet what they boasted was wholly frivolous; for God had
not promised that the Temple should be perpetual in order to give license to the
people to indulge in all manner of wickedness. It was not then God’s purpose to
bind himself to ungodly men, that they might expose his name to open reproach. It
is hence evident that the prophets and priests only dissembled, when they took as
granted what ought to have been understood conditionally, that is, if they
44

45. worshipped him in sincerity as he had commanded. For it was not right to separate
two things which God had connected; he required piety and obedience from the
people, and he also promised that he would be the guardian of the city, and that the
Temple would be safe under his protection. But the Jews, having neither faith nor
repentance, boasted of what had been said of the Temple, nay, they bragged, as we
have seen elsewhere, and spoke false things; and hence the Prophet derided them by
repeating three times,
“The Temple of Jehovah, the Temple of Jehovah, the Temple of Jehovah,”
(Jeremiah 7:4)
as though he had said, — “This is your silly talk, you ever cry boastingly, ‘The
Temple of God;’ but all this will avail you nothing.”
It then follows, that the people were assembled Here Jeremiah passes to another
part of the narrative, for he reminded the princes and the king’s councillors that
they were not without reason roused to go up to the Temple. (163)
If the dispute had been between few, either Jeremiah would have been slain, or in
some way intercepted, or it might have been that the princes would have
circumvented the king and his councillors, and thus the holy man would have been
privately crushed. But here he introduced these words, that the whole people were
assembled against him. Hence it was that the report, reached the king’s court; and
so the princes and councillors were commanded to come. In short, Jeremiah shews
the reason why the princes came unto the Temple; it was because the city was
everywhere in a commotion, when the report spread that something new and
intolerable had been announced. The king therefore could not neglect this
commotion; for it is a dangerous thing to allow a popular tumult to prevail. And
therefore Jeremiah thus adds, —
10.While the whole people were assembled against Jeremiah in the house of
Jehovah, then the princes of Judah heard these things, and went up from the king’s
house into the house of Jehovah, etc.
This seems to be the beginning of another section. The ‫ו‬ repeated ought often to be
thus rendered, while or when, and then; and indeed in our language, then may be
sometimes omitted. Were it here rendered and in both instances, the meaning would
be the same, only the connection appears more evident when rendered as above; the
report of the people congregated against Jeremiah reached the princes — Ed
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:9 Why hast thou prophesied in the name of the LORD,
saying, This house shall be like Shiloh, and this city shall be desolate without an
inhabitant? And all the people were gathered against Jeremiah in the house of the
LORD.
Ver. 9. Why hast thou prophesied in the name of the Lord?] Who doubtless hath not
45

46. sent thee on this errand; but thou speakest it of thine own head, and shalt dearly
answer it.
And all the people were gathered.] That many headed multitude, that neutrum
modo, mas modo vulgus. See Jeremiah 26:16.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:9
“Why have you prophesied in the name of YHWH, saying, ‘This house will be like
Shiloh, and this city will be desolate, without inhabitant?’
They demanded to know why he had dared to prophesy in the Name of YHWH that
the Temple would be destroyed in the same way as Shiloh had been, and that the
city would become a deserted city, a ghost town, a place where no one lived. It was
the very opposite of what the priests and prophets were telling them They probably
did not even think of what Micah had previously said (Jeremiah 26:18), as they may
well not have known about it. The ‘princes and elders’ would prove to be better
informed.
Jeremiah 26:9
‘And all the people were gathered to Jeremiah in the house of YHWH.’
Thus Jeremiah found himself surrounded by an enflamed people, encouraged on by
the priests and the prophets, those who should have been most concerned for the
truth of YHWH. What probably saved him from instant death was the sanctity of
the Temple. They would not want to shed his blood in the Temple and thus defile it
during the feast.
10 When the officials of Judah heard about these
things, they went up from the royal palace to the
house of the Lord and took their places at the
entrance of the New Gate of the Lord’s house.
BARNES, "The princes of Judah - The priests could scourge a man etc., but could
not then try him for his life, as the Sanhedrim subsequently did until the Romans
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47. deprived them of the power.
The new gate - That built by Jotham 2Ki_15:35, and probably a usual place for
trials.
CLARKE, "The princes of Judah - The king’s court; his cabinet counsellors.
GILL, "When the princes of Judah heard these things,.... The tumult there was
in the temple; these were the princes of the blood, or the nobles of the realm, particularly
the courtiers, and who were of the king's privy council; or else the great sanhedrim,
consisting of seventy persons, and were the chief court of judicature:
then they came up from the king's house to the house of the Lord; from the
royal palace where they resided; by which it should seem that they were the king's
courtiers, and counsellors, and officers of state; unless in those times the sanhedrim sat
there; from hence they came up to the temple, where Jeremiah and the priests, &c. were,
which, being built on a hill, was higher than the king's palace; and therefore are said to
"come up" to it:
and sat down in the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house; as a court of
judicature, to hear and try the cause between the prophet and his accusers. This gate of
the temple is thought to be the higher gate, which Jotham built, 2Ki_15:35. The Targum
calls it the eastern gate; and so Kimchi says it was; and that it was called the new gate,
according to the Rabbins, because there they renewed the constitutions and traditions;
though he thinks the better reason is, because newly repaired, or some new building was
added to it. Jarchi also says it was the eastern gate; and gives this reason for its being
called new; that when Jehoiakim was carried captive, and some of the vessels of the
temple, Nebuchadnezzar's army broke the eastern gate, which Zedekiah afterwards
repaired, and made new; but if so, it is here called new by a prolepsis; or this account
was written after that time.
JAMISON, "princes — members of the Council of State or Great Council, which
took cognizance of such offenses.
heard — the clamor of the popular tumult.
came up — from the king’s house to the temple, which stood higher than the palace.
sat — as judges, in the gate, the usual place of trying such cases.
new gate — originally built by Jotham (“the higher gate,” 2Ki_15:35) and now
recently restored.
K&D, "Jer_26:10-16
Before these princes, about whom all the people gathered, Jeremiah is accused by the
priests and prophets: "This man is worthy of death;" literally: a sentence of death (cf.
Deu_19:6), condemnation to death, is due to this man; "for he hath prophesied against
this city, as ye have heard with your ears." With these last words they appeal to the
47

48. people standing round who had heard the prophecy, for the princes had not reached the
temple till after Jeremiah had been apprehended. Jer_26:12. To this Jeremiah answered
in his own defence before the princes and all the people: "Jahveh hath sent me to
prophesy against (‫ל‬ ֶ‫א‬ for ‫ל‬ַ‫)ע‬ this house and against this city all the words which ye
have heard. Jer_26:13. And now make your ways good and your doings, and hearken
to the voice of Jahveh your God, and Jahveh will repent Him of the evil that He hath
spoken against you. Jer_26:14. But I, behold, I am in your hand; do with me as
seemeth to you good and right. Jer_26:15. Only ye must know, that if ye put me to
death, ye bring innocent blood upon you, and upon this city, and upon her inhabitants;
for of a truth Jahveh hath sent me to you to speak in your ears all these words." - As to
"make your ways good," cf. Jer_7:3. This defence made an impression on the princes
and on all the people. From the intimation that by reform it was possible to avert the
threatened calamity, and from the appeal to the fact that in truth Jahveh had sent him
and commanded him so to speak, they see that he is a true prophet, whose violent death
would bring blood-guiltiness upon the city and its inhabitants. They therefore declare to
the accusers, Jer_26:16 : "This man is not worthy of death, for in the name of Jahveh
our God hath he spoken unto us."
CALVIN, "We have said that the princes were roused by a popular clamor; nor is
there a doubt but; that the king had sent them to quell the commotion. It must be
especially noticed, that they were engaged in other matters, as it was seldom the case
that courtiers spent their time in hearing the prophets. It is indeed true, that the
occupations of those are sacred, who have the care of the commonwealth, who
dispense justice, and who have to provide for the public safety; but it behoves them
so to divide their time, that they may be able to consecrate some portion of it to God.
But courtiers think themselves exempted by a sort of privilege, when yet the truth is
more necessary for them than even for the common people; for not only the duty of
the head of a family lies on each of them, but the Lord has also set them over a
whole people. If, then, private men have need of being daily taught, that they may
faithfully rule and guide themselves and their families, what ought to be done by
those rulers who are as it were the fathers of the commonwealth? But as I have
already said, such men usually exempt themselves from the yoke of the faithful.
Hence then it was, that none of the princes were present, when Jeremiah had been
commanded to proclaim his message, not only on the day when few came to the
Temple, but when they came from all the cities of Judah to sacrifice at Jerusalem. It
was, indeed, a very shameful sign of gross contempt, that no one of the king’s
counsellors appeared in the Temple, when there were present, from remote places,
those whom religion and the desire to sacrifice had brought there. But he says that
they came to know the cause of the commotion; for it is said, that they sat at the new
gate, which some say was eastward; and they conjecture that it was called new,
because it had been renewed; the king’s palace was also towards the east, and the
eastern gate was his tribunal. I am disposed to embrace this opinion, that they sat at
the eastern gate. (164) It now follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:10 When the princes of Judah heard these things, then they
48

49. came up from the king’s house unto the house of the LORD, and sat down in the
entry of the new gate of the LORD’S [house].
Ver. 10. When the princes of Judah heard those things.] Pii viri sunt quibus doluit
populi impietas; good men they were, saith Oecolampadius. They might be so, some
of them at least; and it was well done of them here to pass an impartial sentence for
the innocent prophet against the priests and people. But Pilate did so for a while for
our Saviour; and these princes soon after turned Jeremiah’s cruel enemies
[Jeremiah 37:15] for his plain dealing. [Jeremiah 34:1-7]
And sat down in the entry of the new gate.] The east gate, saith the Chaldee
paraphrast; called the new gate because repaired by Jotham, [2 Kings 15:35] saith
Lyra.
COFFMAN, ""And when the princes of Judah heard these things, they came up
from the king's house unto the house of Jehovah; and they sat in the entry of the
new gate of Jehovah's house. Then spake the priests and prophets unto the princes
and unto all the people, saying, This man is worthy of death; for he hath prophesied
against this city, as ye have heard with your ears."
"When the princes of Judah heard these things ..." (Jeremiah 26:10). This refers to
their hearing of the commotion raised in the temple, which precipitated their
prompt investigation.
"As ye have heard with your ears ..." (Jeremiah 26:11). It was not true that the
princes and elders had indeed heard the alleged blasphemy of Jeremiah; and these
words were directed to the bloodthirsty mob as their cue to join in the demand for
Jeremiah's death. There was nothing fair about the charges of the priests and the
prophets; they announced the verdict of death before they even mentioned the
charges.
"The princes of Judah ..." (Jeremiah 26:10). "These, along with the elders, included
all the branches of the royal family who acted as judges, and the heads of
substantial families of Israel. Without these men, Jeremiah would have had only a
mock-trial."[11] In our opinion, the arrival of the princes and elders was totally
providential and unexpected by Jeremiah's enemies.
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:10. When the princes of Judah— That is, the king's
counsellors or chief officers of the state, who were also members of the Sanhedrin.
By the prophets, mentioned in these verses, are meant the false prophets, who were
extremely irritated against Jeremiah. The intelligent reader will observe a great
similarity between the conduct of these priests and prophets towards Jeremiah, and
in that of the priests, the Scribes and Pharisees, towards Jesus Christ, of whom
Jeremiah was a type. See particularly Mark 14:58. Matthew 26:61.
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50. PETT, "Jeremiah 26:10
‘And when the princes of Judah heard these things, they came up from the king’s
house to the house of YHWH, and they sat in the entry of the new gate of YHWH’s
house.’
Meanwhile news of the disturbance had reached ‘the princes of Judah’, the tribal
leaders and the royal court gathered at the king’s palace, and they came down to the
house of YHWH to quell the disturbance and try the case. They consequently sat in
session in the entry of ‘the new gate of YHWH’s house’. We do not know which gate
this was. Possibly it was the high gate built by Jotham (2 Chronicles 27:3). ‘The
gate’ in each city was the place where the elders of the city would meet in order to
hold trials. Jerusalem, of course, had a number of gates, but this was the one
seemingly seen as the correct site in which to hold a trial
11 Then the priests and the prophets said to the
officials and all the people, “This man should be
sentenced to death because he has prophesied
against this city. You have heard it with your own
ears!”
BARNES, "This man is worthy to die - literally, A sentence of death is to this
man, i. e., is his desert.
GILL, "Then spake the priests and the prophets unto the princes, and to all
the people,.... The priests and the prophets they were the accusers; the princes were
the court before whom the cause was brought; and the people were the hearers of it;
though it does not seem as if they were a sort of jury, or had any vote in determining;
though they sometimes had in instigating a court, and the judges of it, to take on the side
of the question they were for:
saying, this man is worthy to die; or, "the judgment of death is to this man" (f); he
is guilty of a capital crime, and judgment ought to be given against him, and he
condemned to die:
for he hath prophesied against this city; the city of Jerusalem; saying that it
50

51. should be a curse to other nations; or, as they interpreted it, that it should be utterly
destroyed, and become desolate, and none should inhabit it:
as ye have heard with your ears; this must be directed to the people only; for the
princes did not hear Jeremiah's prophecy.
CALVIN, "We hence conclude, that the people in assenting to the sentence of the
priests and prophets, had done nothing according to their own judgment, but that
all of every rank through a violent feeling condemned Jeremiah. And as the priests
and prophets directed also their discourse to the people, it appears clear, that they
were guided by them, so that they thoughtlessly and inconsiderately gave their
consent; for it often happens in a mob that the people exclaim, “Be it so, be it so;
amen, amen.” Jeremiah has indeed said, that he was condemned by the whole
people; but it must be observed, that the people are like the sea, which of itself is
calm and tranquil; but as soon as any wind arises, there is a great commotion, and
waves dash one against another; so also it is with the people, who without being
excited are quiet and peaceable; but a sedition is easily raised, when any one stirs up
men who are thoughtless and changeable, and who, to retain the same simile, are
fluid like water. This, then, is what Jeremiah now intimates.
But there is another thing to be noticed, — that the common people suffer
themselves to be drawn in all directions; but they may also be easily restored, as it
has been said, to a right mind. “When they see,” says Virgil, “a man remarkable for
piety and good works, they become silent and attend with listening ears.” He there
describes (Aeneid, 1) a popular commotion, which he compares to a tempest; and he
rightly speaks of a tempest; but he added this simile according to common usage.
The same thing is now set before us by the Prophet; the priests and prophets, who
thought that they alone could boast of their power and speak with authority, in a
manner constrained the people apparently to consent. The king’s counsellors being
now present, the people became as it were mute; the priests perceived this, and we
shall see by the issue that what the same poet mentions took place, “By his words he
rules their hearts and softens their breasts.” For it became easy for the king’s
counsellors even by a word to calm this foolish violence of the people. We shall
indeed soon see, that they unhesitantly said, “There is no judgment of death against
this man.” It is hence evident how easily ignorant men may be made inconsistent
with themselves; but this is to be ascribed to their inconstancy; and noticed also
ought to be what I have said, that there was no real consent, because there was no
judgment exercised. The authority of the priests overpowered them; and then they
servilely confessed what they saw pleased their princes, like an ass, who nods with
his ears.
Now, when the subject is duly considered, it appears, that the priests and the
prophets alone spoke both to the princes and to the whole people, that Jeremiah was
guilty of death, (165) because he had prophesied against the city. We have said that
they relied on those promises, which they absurdly applied for the purpose of
confirming their own impiety, even that God had chosen that city that he might be
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52. there worshipped. It was a false principle, and whence proceeded their error? not
from mere ignorance, but rather from presumption, for hypocrites are never
deceived, except when they determine not to obey God, and as far as they can to
reject his judgments. When, therefore, they are carried away by a perverse and
wicked impulse, they ever find out some plausible pretext; but it is nothing but a
disguise, as we clearly see from this narrative. It follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:11 Then spake the priests and the prophets unto the princes
and to all the people, saying, This man [is] worthy to die; for he hath prophesied
against this city, as ye have heard with your ears.
Ver. 11. Then spake the priests and the prophets.] Against a priest and a prophet;
but he had earnestly inveighed against them, [Jeremiah 23:1-2; Jeremiah 23:14-15;
Jeremiah 23:33-34] and hence the hatred. As Erasmus told the Duke of Saxony that
Luther had been too busy with the Pope’s triple crown and with the priests’ fat
paunches, and was therefore so generally set against.
Saying, This man is worthy to die.] Sic Papicolae nostri saeculi. These are the very
words of Popish persecutors.
For he hath prophesied against this city.] This holy, and therefore, it must be
believed, inviolable city. Novum crimen, C. Caesar, &c. These sinners against their
own souls, traitors also to the state, will neither see their evil condition, nor hear of
it from others, as having gall in their ears, as they say of some kinds of creatures.
NISBET, "‘IN PERILS BY MY COUNTRYMEN’
‘This man is worthy to die.… This man is not worthy to die.’
Jeremiah 26:11; Jeremiah 26:16
I. Jeremiah was never so near martyrdom as at the time described in this chapter.—
The old hatred of the priest and the false prophet arose against him, and
communicated itself to the people. In miniature it was a similar incident to the
closing scene of our Saviour’s life. The accusation against our Lord, as against
Jeremiah, was that He had anticipated the destruction of the Temple. If any man
dare to speak his mind to-day, if it conflicts with the prevailing sentiment, how
certainly will he have to pay the price of hatred! Is it for this reason that the
Christian Church refrains at the present juncture from insisting on our Lord’s
command to love our enemies, and do good to those who are in arms against us?
II. The princes interfered, and their appeal to the people seems to have turned the
fickle populace to be as antagonistic to the false priests as they had previously been
to the prophet.—Notice specially Jeremiah 26:16. How fickle is the voice of the
people. ‘Hosanna,’ to-day; to-morrow, ‘Crucify.’ Let us dare to do right in the sight
of God, following out the impulse of His Spirit, and ceasing from man whose breath
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53. is in his nostrils.
Illustration
‘The Jews saw no discord between the true God and idols, but worshipped both
together. And so people see no discord or contrariety between the Christian belief
and a worldly practice, simply because they are accustomed to both. A worldly life
justifies itself in their eyes because it is common; they take it and the Gospel
together and interpret the Gospel accordingly. The old prophets were witnesses
against this slavery of men to what is common and customary; they recalled them to
the purity of truth, they reminded them of the holiness of God’s law, and they put
before them Almighty God as a jealous God, who disdained to be half-obeyed, and
abhorred to be served in common with idols.’
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:11
‘Then the priests and the prophets spoke to the princes and to all the people, saying,
“This man is worthy of death, for he has prophesied against this city, as you have
heard with your ears.”
It was the priests and prophets, who recognised that Jeremiah had spoken against
them in what he had said, who put forward the case for the prosecution. (It was
Jeremiah against those who professed to speak in YHWH’s name). They declared in
open court that Jeremiah was worthy of death because he had prophesied the
destruction of the city (including the Temple). Note the emphasis on the whole city
(unlike in chapter 7). The safety of the city would be of more immediate concern to
the secular authorities.
12 Then Jeremiah said to all the officials and all
the people: “The Lord sent me to prophesy
against this house and this city all the things you
have heard.
BARNES 12-15, "The answer of Jeremiah is simple and straightforward. Yahweh, he
affirmed, had truly sent him, but the sole object of his prophesying had been to avert the
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54. evil by leading them to repentance. If they would amend their ways God would deliver
them from the threatened doom. As for himself he was in their hands, but if they put
him to death they would bring the guilt of shedding innocent blood upon themselves and
upon the city.
CLARKE, "The Lord sent me to prophesy - My commission is from him, and my
words are his own. I sought not this painful office. I did not run before I was sent.
GILL, "Then spake Jeremiah unto all the princes, and to all the people,
saying,.... In his own defence; which, as Jerom observes, was with prudence, humility,
and constancy:
the Lord sent me to prophesy against this house, and against this city, all the
words that ye have heard; he does not deny but that he had prophesied against the
city of Jerusalem and against the temple, and that they should both come to ruin, unless
the people repented and reformed; but then he urges, that he was sent by the Lord on
this errand, and that every word that he had said, and they had heard, he was ordered to
say by the Lord; and therefore what was he, that he should withstand God? he surely was
not to be blamed for doing what the Lord commanded him to do; besides, all this was
threatened only in case they continued obstinate and impenitent; wherefore he renews
his exhortations to them in Jer_26:13.
HENRY 12-15, "Jeremiah makes his defence before the princes and the people. He
does not go about to deny the words, nor to diminish aught from them; what he has said
he will stand to, though it cost him his life; he owns that he had prophesied against this
house and this city, but, 1. He asserts that he did this by good authority, not maliciously
nor seditiously, not out of any ill-will to his country nor any disaffection to the
government in church or state, but, The Lord sent me to prophesy thus: so he begins his
apology (Jer_26:12), and so he concludes it, for this is that which he resolves to abide by
as sufficient to bear him out (Jer_26:15): Of a truth the Lord hath sent me unto you, to
speak all these words. As long as ministers keep closely to the instructions they have
from heaven they need not fear the opposition they may meet with from hell or earth. He
pleads that he is but a messenger, and, if he faithfully deliver his message, he must bear
no blame; but he is a messenger from the Lord, to whom they were accountable as well
as he, and therefore might demand regard. If he speak but what God appointed him to
speak, he is under the divine protection, and whatever affront they offer to the
ambassador will be resented by the Prince that sent him. 2. He shows them that he did it
with a good design, and that it was their fault if they did not make a good use of it. It was
said, not by way of fatal sentence, but of fair warning; if they would take the warning,
they might prevent the execution of the sentence, Jer_26:13. Shall I take it ill of a man
that tells me of my danger, while I have an opportunity of avoiding it, and not rather
return him thanks for it, as the greatest kindness he could do me? “I have indeed (says
Jeremiah) prophesied against this city; but, if you will now amend your ways and your
doings, the threatened ruin shall be prevented, which was the thing I aimed at in giving
you the warning.” Those are very unjust who complain of ministers for preaching hell
and damnation, when it is only to keep them from that place of torment and to bring
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55. them to heaven and salvation. 3. He therefore warns them of their danger if they proceed
against him (Jer_26:14): “As for me, the matter is not great what become of me; behold,
I am in your hand; you know I am; I neither have any power, nor can make any interest,
to oppose you, nor is it so much my concern to save my own life: do with me as seems
meet unto you; if I be led to the slaughter, it shall be as a lamb.” Note, It becomes God's
ministers, that are warm in preaching, to be calm in suffering and to behave
submissively to the powers that are over them, though they be persecuting powers. But,
for themselves, he tells them that it is at their peril if they put him to death: You shall
surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves, Jer_26:15. They might think that killing
the prophet would help to defeat the prophecy, but they would prove wretchedly
deceived; it would but add to their guilt and aggravate their ruin. Their own consciences
could not but tell them that, if Jeremiah was (as certainly he was) sent of God to bring
them this message, it was at their utmost peril if they treated him for it as a malefactor.
Those that persecute God's ministers hurt not them so much as themselves.
JAMISON, "Lord sent me — a valid justification against any laws alleged against
him.
against ... against — rather, “concerning.” Jeremiah purposely avoids saying,
“against,” which would needlessly irritate. They had used the same Hebrew word (Jer_
26:11), which ought to be translated “concerning,” though they meant it in the
unfavorable sense. Jeremiah takes up their word in a better sense, implying that there is
still room for repentance: that his prophecies aim at the real good of the city; for or
concerning this house ... city [Grotius].
CALVIN, "Jeremiah pleads only his own calling and the command of God; and
thus he confutes the preposterous charge which they most impudently brought
against him. There is no doubt but that he might have spoken at large, but he
deemed it enough to include the substance of his defense. Had he made a long
discourse, the main point might have been more obscure. He now clearly makes
known the state of the question on both sides. The priests by their own authority
condemned Jeremiah, because he reduced to nothing [as they thought] God’s
promises, for he had threatened destruction to the city and to the temple; but
Jeremiah on the other side answers, that he had declared nothing but what God had
enjoined. There was need of proof, when the priests held that God was inconsistent
with himself in denouncing destruction on that city, which he had undertaken to
defend and protect. But the confutation of this was ready at hand, — that God had
never bound himself to hypocrites and ungodly men; nay, the whole glory of the city
and the majesty of the Temple were dependent on his worship; nor is there any
doubt but that Jeremiah had alleged these things. But as it was the main thing, he
was satisfied with stating that he had been sent by God.
Thus he indirectly condemned their vain boastings, — that God was on their side;
but he says, “I come not except by God’s command.” Now, though he declares
briefly and distinctly that he had been sent by God, he yet presents himself as ready
to prove everything; and as I have already said, there is no doubt but that he
55

56. answered and discussed that frivolous question on which the priests so much
insisted.
It is further worthy of being noticed, that he addressed both the princes and the
people; and thus he intimated that the priests and the prophets were deaf, and not
worthy of being spoken to; for it was their determination proudly to despise God,
and to carry on war, as it were avowedly, with his servants; for he would have
otherwise no doubt gladly endeavored to restore them to the way of safety. But as he
saw that they had closed the door against themselves, he passed them by. This is the
reason why he says, that he spoke to the princes and to the people, having passed by
those, on whom he must have spent labor in vain. And surely when they said that he
was worthy of death, they proved by such a presumption that they would not be
taught by him; and also their cruelty prevented them from being teachable. But the
Prophet had regard to the very source of evil, because their object was obstinately to
resist God and all his prophets.
By saying, that he was sent to prophesy all that they had heard, he made them
judges, though he did not address them together with the princes; for we have seen
that the latter were in the king’s palace, and had been sent for when there was a
fear of some commotion. But there is no doubt but that the address was repeated
again. Jeremiah then made them judges and arbitrators, when he said that he
retracted nothing, but that what they had heard, he had faithfully declared
according to the command of God. It follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:12 Then spake Jeremiah unto all the princes and to all the
people, saying, The LORD sent me to prophesy against this house and against this
city all the words that ye have heard.
Ver. 12. The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house.] In this apology of the
prophet thus answering for himself with a heroic spirit, five noble virtues, fit for a
martyr, are by an expositor well observed: (1.) His prudence in alleging his divine
mission; (2.) His charity in exhorting his enemies to repent; (3.) His humility in
saying, "Behold, I am in your hand," &c.; (4.) His magnanimity and freedom of
speech, in telling them that God would revenge his death; (5.) His spiritual security
and fearlessness of death in so good a cause, and with so good a conscience.
COFFMAN, "JEREMIAH'S COURAGEOUS DEFENSE
"Then spake Jeremiah unto all the princes and to all the people, saying, Jehovah
sent me to prophesy against this house and against this city all the words that ye
have heard. Now therefore amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of
your God; and Jehovah will repent him of the evil that he hath pronounced against
you. But as for me, behold, I am in your hands: do with me as is good and right in
your eyes. Only know ye for certain that, if ye put me to death, ye will bring
innocent blood upon yourselves, and upon this city, and upon the inhabitants
thereof; for of a truth Jehovah hath sent me unto you to speak all these words in
56

57. your ears."
Like the Blessed Saviour himself, Jeremiah submitted to the powers of the
government, but warned them of the consequences. The words of the prophet were
fully truthful and convincing. No person unmotivated with a hatred of God's Word
could deny the righteous defense of this godly prophet; and the princes and elders
promptly defiled that any death penalty was deserved.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:12
‘Then Jeremiah spoke to all the princes and to all the people, saying, “YHWH sent
me to prophesy against this house and against this city all the words which you have
heard.”
Jeremiah then provided his defence which was that it was YHWH Himself Who had
sent him to prophesy against both the Temple and the city with the very words that
they had heard. He as thus claiming that it was he who was YHWH’s messenger.
Note the exclusion of the mention of the priest and the prophets. They were the main
accusers, baying for his blood. There was little point in appealing to them. The very
people who should have been supporting his words were the ones most bitterly
opposed to him.
13 Now reform your ways and your actions and
obey the Lord your God. Then the Lord will
relent and not bring the disaster he has
pronounced against you.
CLARKE, "Therefore now amend your ways - If ye wish to escape the judgment
which I have predicted, turn to God, and iniquity shall not be your ruin.
GILL, "Therefore now amend your ways and your doings,.... Make them good;
leave your evil ways, and walk in good ways; forsake your evil works, and do good works:
and obey the voice of the Lord your God; and that because he is your God, as well
as what his word directs to is good, and for your good:
57

58. and the Lord will repent him of the evil that he hath pronounced against
you; will do as men do when they repent, change their method of acting, and manner of
behaviour; so the Lord is said to repent or turn, when he changes the method and
conduct of his providence towards men, though he never changes his mind or counsel.
JAMISON, "(Jer_26:3, Jer_26:19).
CALVIN, "He not only confirms here what he had taught, but also reproves the
hardness and obstinate wickedness of the priests and prophets; for though he
addressed the princes and the people, he yet no doubt designed to touch more
sharply those ungodly men who set themselves up against God; and at the same time
his discourse referred to them all, when he said, “How have I sinned? I have
endeavored to promote your safety, must I therefore die?” We hence see that the
Prophet not only confirmed what he had said, but also accused his adversaries of
ingratitude; for nothing could have been more kind, and ought to have been more
acceptable, than to be called to repent, that they might receive mercy from God:
“What was the object of my doctrine? even that ye might repent; and what does
repentance bring? even salvation; for God is ready to forgive you. Now ye cannot
bear to hear, that God would be merciful to you. What madness is this?” We now
then see the design of the Prophet.
And this passage deserves to be noticed; for God will render to all the ungodly their
own reward; not only because they harden themselves against every instruction, but
also because they are manifest and, as it were, sworn enemies to their own salvation,
inasmuch as they refuse the necessary remedy, and do not allow themselves to be
restored to the right way, that they may be forgiven. Very weighty, then, is what he
now says, that no fault could be found in his doctrine, except that it proved galling
to the wicked, but that they could yet obtain peace, provided they sought
reconciliation with God. (166)
He adds, Hear ye the voice of Jehovah, in order to shew that he required nothing
new from the people, that he imposed on them no hard yoke, but only called them to
the duty of obeying the Law; and he adds to this, your God, in order to take away
from them every excuse, lest they should object and say that what Jeremiah alleged
was unknown to them. Here, then, he triumphantly declares that he had taught
them nothing that was alien to the Law, and that the Jews were inexcusable who
professed Jehovah to be their God, and yet hearkened not to his voice, which ought
to have been familiar to them.
13.And now make good your ways and your doings, etc.;
or, But now, etc. It reads better than “therefore,” as in our version, borrowed from
the Vulg. The Sept. is “and,” and the Targ. also. “Amend” of our version, is the
Syr.; “make good” is the rendering of the other early versions. He mentions what is
posterior first; to hear God’s voice is in order previous to the making good our
58

59. ways; but this is according to the practice often adopted by the prophets. — Ed.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:13 Therefore now amend your ways and your doings, and
obey the voice of the LORD your God; and the LORD will repent him of the evil
that he hath pronounced against you.
Ver. 13. Amend your ways.] Fall out with your faults, and not with your friends. See
Jeremiah 7:3.
And the Lord will repent him of the evil.] This he often inculcateth. Ideo minatur
Deus ut non puniat. Therefore God will threaten so as not to punish. See Jeremiah
18:8.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:13
‘Now therefore amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of YHWH
your God, and YHWH will repent him of the evil that he has pronounced against
you.”
He then boldly called on them to amend their ways and their doings, their attitudes
and their actions, and to start obeying the voice of YHWH. Then they could be
assured that He would alter His purpose with regard to them and change His mind
about the evil that He had pronounced against them. It will be noted that this
change of mind by YHWH is not to be seen as describing an arbitrary ‘change of
mind’, as though He had previously got it wrong, It was a change of mind based on
the fact that they had first changed in their attitude towards Him and His covenant.
It was an indication that God would respond to man’s change of heart.
14 As for me, I am in your hands; do with me
whatever you think is good and right.
CLARKE, "As for me, behold, I am in your hand - I am the messenger of God;
you may do with me what you please; but if you slay me, you will bring innocent blood
upon yourselves.
GILL, "As for me, behold, I am in your hand,.... In their power, as they were the
chief court of judicature; and to whom it belonged to judge of prophets, and to acquit or
condemn them, as they saw fit; wherefore he submits to their authority:
59

60. do with me as seemeth good and meet unto you; he was not careful about it; he
readily submitted to their pleasure, and should patiently endure what they thought fit to
inflict upon him; it gave him no great concern whether his life was taken from him or
not; he was satisfied he had done what he ought to do, and should do the same, was it to
do again; and therefore they might proceed just as they pleased against him.
JAMISON, "Jeremiah’s humility is herein shown, and submission to the powers that
be (Rom_13:1).
CALVIN, "Jeremiah, after having exhorted the princes, the priests, and the whole
people to repent, and having shewn to them that there was a remedy for their evil,
except by their obstinacy they provoked more and more the wrath of God, now
speaks of himself, and warns them not to indulge their cruelty by following their
determination to kill him; for they had brought in a sentence that he deserved to die.
He then saw that their rage was so violent, that he almost despaired of his life; but
he declares here that God would be an avenger if they unjustly vented their rage
against him. He yet shews that he was not so solicitous about his life as to neglect his
duty, for he surrendered himself to their will; “Do what ye please,” he says, “with
me; yet see what ye do; for the Lord will not suffer innocent blood to be shed with
impunity.”
By saying that he was in their hand, he does not mean that he was not under the
care of God. Christ also spoke thus when he exhorted his disciples not to fear those
who could kill the body. (Matthew 10:28.) There is no doubt but that the hairs of
our head are numbered before God; thus it cannot be that tyrants, however they
may rage, can touch us, no, not with their little finger, except a permission be given
them. It is, then, certain that our life can never be in the hand of men, for God is its
faithful keeper; but Jeremiah said, after a human manner, that his life was in their
hand; for God’s providence is hidden from us, nor can we discover it but by the eyes
of faith. When, therefore, enemies seem to rule so that there is no escape, the
Scripture says, by way of concession, that we are in their hands, that is, as far as we
perceive. We ought yet to understand that we are by no means so exposed to the will
of the wicked that they can do what they please with us; for God restrains them by a
hidden bridle, and rules their hands and their hearts. This truth ought ever to
remain unalterable, that our life is under the custody and protection of God.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:14 As for me, behold, I [am] in your hand: do with me as
seemeth good and meet unto you.
Ver. 14. As for me, behold, I am in your hand.] See here how God gave his holy
prophet a mouth and wisdom, such as his adversaries were not able to resist. The
like he did to other of his martyrs and confessors, as were easy to instance. If the
queen will give me life, I will thank her; if she will banish me, I will thank her; if she
will burn me, I will thank her, said Bradford to Cresswell, offering to intercede for
him. (a)
60

61. To do with me as seemeth good and meet unto you.] But this I can safely say, Non
omnis moriar. All that ye can do is, to "kill the body." Kill me you may, but hurt me
you cannot. Life in God’s displeasure is worse than death. I am not of their mind
who say,
“ κακως ζην κρειον η θανειν καλως.”
- Euripid. in Aulide.
Better live basely than die bravely. Faxit Deus ut quilibet nostrum epilogum habeat
galeatum. God grant that, whether our death be a burnt-offering of martyrdom, or
a peace offering of a natural death, it may be a free will offering, a sweet sacrifice to
the Lord.
NISBET, "‘READY TO BE OFFERED’
‘As for me, behold, I am in your hand: do with me as seemeth good.’
Jeremiah 26:14
After Jeremiah had finished speaking all that the Lord had commanded, he
suddenly found himself in a whirlpool of popular excitement, and there is little
doubt that he would have met his death had it not been for the prompt interposition
of the princes.
I. Such is always the reception which the natural man will give to the words of
God.—We may, indeed, gravely question how far we are His ambassadors, if people
accept them quietly and as a matter of course. The Word of God to those that hug
their sin can only be as a fire, a hammer, and a sharp, two-edged sword. That which
men approve and applaud may lack the King’s seal, and be the substitution on the
part of the man of tidings which he deems more palatable, and therefore more likely
to secure for himself a larger welcome.
II. God, however, vindicated his faithful servant.—The weapons that were formed
against him did not prosper, and the tongues that rose against him in judgment
were condemned. The princes reversed the passionate judgments passed by the
priests and the populace. ‘This man,’ said they, ‘is not worthy of death, for he had
spoken to us in the name of the Lord our God.’ And their decision was confirmed by
elders who had come from all the cities of Judah. Thus the hearts of men are in the
hands of God, and He can turn them as the rivers of water. When a man’s ways
please Him, He makes his enemies be at peace with him. The main thing in life is to
go straight onward, following the inner voice, and doing God’s work with a single
eye to His ‘Well done,’ and He will care for you.
Illustration
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62. ‘Here is this timid man standing alone for God against this surging multitude, in
which priest and people are merged. Though his life is in the balance, and it might
seem necessary to purchase it by absolute silence, he refuses to hold his peace; he
insists that God has sent him, and calls on the maddened crowd to amend their ways
and return unto Jehovah. Had John the Baptist spoken thus, or John Knox, we had
not been surprised. But for this sensitive, retiring man to speak thus is due to the
transforming power of the grace of God. There is hope here for those who are
naturally reticent and backward, reserved and timid. Take your nature to God, and
ask Him to encrust it with iron and brass. Above all, seek a vivid realisation that
God is with you. Then open your mouth and speak. Greater is He that is in and with
you than he that is the world.’
EXPOSITOR'S BIBLR COMMENTARY, "RUIN
Jeremiah 22:1-9;, Jeremiah 26:14
"The sword, the pestilence, and the famine,"- Jeremiah 21:9 and passim.
"Terror on every side."- Jeremiah 6:25; Jeremiah 20:10;, Jeremiah 46:5; Jeremiah
49:29; also as proper name, MAGOR-MISSABIB, Jeremiah 20:3.
WE have seen, in the two previous chapters, that the moral and religious state of
Judah not only excluded any hope of further progress towards the realisation of the
Kingdom of God, but also threatened to involve Revelation itself in the corruption of
His people. The Spirit that opened Jeremiah’s eyes to the fatal degradation of his
country showed him that ruin must follow as its swift result. He was elect from the
first to be a herald of doom, to be set "over the nations and over the kingdoms, to
pluck up and to break down, and to destroy and to overthrow." [Jeremiah 1:10] In
his earliest vision he saw the thrones of the northern conquerors set over against the
walls of Jerusalem and the cities of Judah. [Jeremiah 1:15]
But Jeremiah was called in the full vigor of early manhood; he combined with the
uncompromising severity of youth its ardent affection and irrepressible hope. The
most unqualified threats of Divine wrath always carried the implied condition that
repentance might avert the coming judgment; and Jeremiah recurred again and
again to the possibility that, even in these last days, amendment might win pardon.
Like Moses at Sinai and Samuel at Ebenezer, he poured out his whole soul in
intercession for Judah, only to receive the answer, "Though Moses and Samuel
stood before Me, yet My mind could not be toward this people: cast them out of My
sight and let them go forth." [Jeremiah 15:1] The record of these early hopes and
prayers is chiefly found in chapters 1-20, and is dealt with in "The Prophecies of
Jeremiah," preceding. The prophecies in Jeremiah 14:1 - Jeremiah 17:18 seem to
recognise the destiny of Judah as finally decided, and to belong to the latter part of
the reign of Jehoiakim, and there is little in the later chapters of an earlier date. In
Jeremiah 22:1-5 the king of Judah is promised that if he and his ministers and
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63. officers will refrain from oppression, faithfully administer justice, and protect the
helpless, kings of the elect dynasty shall still pass with magnificent retinues in
chariots and on horses through the palace gates to sit upon the throne of David.
Possibly this section belongs to the earlier part of Jeremiah’s career. But there were
pauses and recoils in the advancing tide of ruin, alternations of hope and despair;
and these varying experiences were reflected in the changing moods of the court, the
people, and the prophet himself. We may well believe that Jeremiah hastened to
greet any apparent zeal for reformation with a renewed declaration that sincere and
radical amendment would be accepted by Jehovah. The proffer of mercy did not
avert the ruin of the state, but it compelled the people to recognise that Jehovah was
neither harsh nor vindictive. His sentence was only irrevocable because the
obduracy of Israel left no other way open for the progress of Revelation, except that
which led through fire and blood. The Holy Spirit has taught mankind in many
ways that when any government or church, any school of thought or doctrine,
ossifies so as to limit the expansion of the soul, that society or system must be
shattered by the forces it seeks to restrain. The decadence of Spain and the
distractions of France sufficiently illustrate the fruits of persistent refusal to abide
in the liberty of the Spirit.
But until the catastrophe is clearly inevitable, the Christian, both as patriot and as
churchman, will be quick to cherish all those symptoms of higher life which indicate
that society is still a living organism. He will zealously believe and teach that even a
small leaven may leaven the whole mass. He will remember that ten righteous men
might have saved Sodom; that, so long as it is possible, God will work by
encouraging and rewarding willing obedience rather than by chastising and
coercing sin.
Thus Jeremiah, even when he teaches that the day of grace is over, recurs wistfully
to the possibilities of salvation once offered to repentance. [Jeremiah 27:18] Was not
this the message of all the prophets: "Return ye now every one from his evil way,
and from the evil of your doings, and dwell in the land that Jehovah hath given unto
your fathers"? [Jeremiah 25:5; Jeremiah 25:15] Even at the beginning of
Jehoiakim’s reign Jehovah entrusted Jeremiah with a message of mercy, saying: "It
may be they will hearken, and turn every man from his evil way; that I may repent
Me of the evil, which I purpose to do unto them because of the evil of their doings."
[Jeremiah 26:3; Jeremiah 36:2] When the prophet multiplied the dark and lurid
features of his picture, he was not gloating with morbid enjoyment over the national
misery, but rather hoped that the awful vision of judgment might lead them to
pause, and reflect, and repent. In his age history had not accumulated her now
abundant proofs that the guilty conscience is panoplied in triple brass against most
visions of judgment. The sequel of Jeremiah’s own mission was added evidence for
this truth.
Yet it dawned but slowly on the prophet’s mind. The covenant of emancipation
(Chapter 11) in the last days of Zedekiah was doubtless proposed by Jeremiah as a
possible beginning of better things, an omen of salvation, even at the eleventh hour.
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64. To the very last the prophet offered the king his life and promised that Jerusalem
should not be burnt, if only he would submit to the Chaldeans, and thus accept the
Divine judgment and acknowledge its justice.
Faithful friends have sometimes stood by the drunkard or the gambler, and striven
for his deliverance through all the vicissitudes of his downward career; to the very
last they have hoped against hope, have welcomed and encouraged every feeble
stand against evil habit, every transient flash of high resolve. But, long before the
end, they have owned, with sinking heart, that the only way to salvation lay. through
the ruin of health, fortune, and reputation. So, when the edge of youthful
hopefulness had quickly worn itself away, Jeremiah knew in his inmost heart that,
in spite of prayers and promises and exhortations, the fate of Judah was sealed. Let
us therefore try to reproduce the picture of coming ruin which Jeremiah kept
persistently before the eyes of his fellow country men. The pith and power of his
prophecies lay in the prospect of their speedy fulfilment. With him, as with
Savonarola, a cardinal doctrine was that "before the regeneration must come the
scourge," and that "these things wilt come quickly." Here, again, Jeremiah took up
the burden of Hosea’s utterances. The elder prophet said of Israel, "The days of
visitation are come"; [Hosea 9:7] and his successor announced to Judah the coming
of "the year of visitation." [Jeremiah 23:12] The long deferred assize was at hand,
when the Judge would reckon with Judah for her manifold infidelities, would
pronounce sentence and execute judgment.
If the hour of doom had struck, it was not difficult to surmise whence destruction
would come or the man who would prove its instrument. The North (named in
Hebrew the hidden quarter) was to the Jews the mother of things unforeseen and
terrible. Isaiah menaced the Philistines with "a smoke out of the north," [Isaiah
14:30] i.e., the Assyrians. Jeremiah and Ezekiel both speak very frequently of the
destroyers of Judah as coming from the north. Probably the early references in our
book to northern enemies denote the Scythians, who invaded Syria towards the
beginning of Josiah’s reign; but later on the danger from the north is the restored
Chaldean Empire under its king Nebuchadnezzar. "North" is even less accurate
geographically for Chaldea than for Assyria. Probably it was accepted in a
somewhat symbolic sense for Assyria, and then transferred to Chaldea as her
successor in the hegemony of Western Asia.
Nebuchadnezzar is first introduced in the fourth year of Jehoiakim; after the
decisive defeat of Pharaoh Necho by Nebuchadnezzar at Carchemish, Jeremiah
prophesied the devastation of Judah by the victor; it is also prophesied that he is to
carry Jehoiachin away captive, and similar prophecies were repeated during the
reign of Zedekiah. [Jeremiah 16:7; Jeremiah 28:14] Nebuchadnezzar and his
Chaldeans very closely resembled the Assyrians, with whose invasions the Jews had
long been only too familiar; indeed, as Chaldea had long been tributary to Assyria,
it is morally certain that Chaldean princes must have been present with auxiliary
forces at more than one of the many Assyrian invasions of Palestine. Under
Hezekiah, on the other hand, Judah had been allied with Merodach-baladan of
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65. Babylon against his Assyrian suzerain. So that the circumstances of Chaldean
invasions and conquests were familiar to the Jews before the forces of the restored
empire first attacked them; their imagination could readily picture the horrors of
such experiences.
But Jeremiah does not leave them to their unaided imagination, which they might
preferably have employed upon more agreeable subjects. He makes them see the
future reign of terror, as Jehovah had revealed it to his shuddering and reluctant
vision. With his usual frequency of iteration, he keeps the phrase "the sword, the
famine, and the pestilence" ringing in their ears. The sword was the symbol of the
invading hosts, "the splendid and awful military parade" of the "bitter and hasty
nation" that was "dreadful and terrible." [Habakkuk 1:6-7] "The famine"
inevitably followed from the ravages of the invaders, and the impossibility of
ploughing, sowing, and reaping. It became most gruesome in the last desperate
agonies of besieged garrisons, when, as in Elisha’s time and the last siege of
Jerusalem, "men ate the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and ate
every one the flesh of his friend." [Jeremiah 19:9] Among such miseries and
horrors, the stench of unburied corpses naturally bred a pestilence, which raged
amongst the multitudes of refugees huddled together in Jerusalem and the fortified
towns. We are reminded how the great plague of Athens struck down its victims
from among the crowds driven within its walls during the long siege of the
Peloponnesian war.
An ordinary Englishman can scarcely do justice to such prophecies; his
comprehension is limited by a happy inexperience. The constant repetition of
general phrases seems meagre and cold, because they carry few associations and
awaken no memories. Those who have studied French and Russian realistic art, and
have read Erckmann-Chatrain, Zola, and Tolstoi, may be stirred somewhat more by
Jeremiah’s grim rhetoric. It will not be wanting in suggestiveness to those who have
known battles and sieges. For students of missionary literature we may roughly
compare the Jews, when exposed to the full fury of a Chaldean attack, to the
inhabitants of African villages raided by slave hunters.
The Jews, therefore, with their extensive, firsthand knowledge of the miseries
denounced against them, could not help filling in for themselves the rough outline
drawn by Jeremiah. Very probably, too, his speeches were more detailed and
realistic than the written reports. As time went on, the inroads of the Chaldeans and
their allies provided graphic and ghastly illustrations of the prophecies that
Jeremiah still reiterated. In a prophecy, possibly originally referring to the Scythian
inroads and afterwards adapted to the Chaldean invasions, Jeremiah speaks of
himself: "I am pained at my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I cannot hold
my peace; for my soul heareth the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. How long
shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet?" [Jeremiah 4:21] Here,
for once, Jeremiah expressed emotions that throbbed in every heart. There was
"terror on every hand"; men seemed to be walking "through slippery places in
darkness," [Jeremiah 23:12] or to stumble along rough paths in a dreary twilight.
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66. Wormwood was their daily food, and their drink maddening draughts of poison.
[Jeremiah 23:15]
Jeremiah and his prophecies were no mean part of the terror. To the devotees of
Baal and Moloch Jeremiah must have appeared in much the same light as the
fanatic whose ravings added to the horrors of the Plague of London, while the very
sanity and sobriety of his utterances carried a conviction of their fatal truth. When
the people and their leaders succeeded in collecting any force of soldiers or store of
military equipment, and ventured on a sally, Jeremiah was at once at hand to
quench any reviving hope of effective resistance. How could soldiers and weapons
preserve the city which Jehovah had abandoned to its fate? "Thus saith Jehovah,
the God of Israel: Behold I will turn back the weapons in your hands, with which ye
fight without the walls against your besiegers, the king of Babylon and the
Chaldeans, and will gather them into the midst of this city. I Myself will fight
against you in furious anger and in great wrath, with outstretched hand and strong
arm. I will smite the inhabitants of this city, both man and beast: they shall die of a
great pestilence." (Jeremiah 21:3-6.) When Jerusalem was relieved for a time by the
advance of an Egyptian army, and the people allowed themselves to dream of
another deliverance like that from Sennacherib, the relentless prophet only turned
upon them with renewed scorn: "Though ye had smitten the whole hostile army of
the Chaldeans, and all that were left of them were desperately wounded, yet should
they rise up every man in his tent and burn this city." [Jeremiah 37:10] Not even the
most complete victory could avail to save the city.
The final result of invasions and sieges was to be the overthrow of the Jewish state,
the capture and destruction of Jerusalem, and the captivity of the people. This
unhappy generation were to reap the harvest of centuries of sin and failure. As in
the last siege of Jerusalem there came upon the Jews "all the righteous blood shed
on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zachariah son of
Baraehiah," [Matthew 23:35] so now Jehovah was about to bring upon His Chosen
people all the evil that He had spoken against them (Jeremiah 35:17; Jeremiah
19:15; Jeremiah 36:31)-all that had been threatened by Isaiah and his brother
prophets, all the curses written in Deuteronomy. But these threats were to be fully
carried out, not because predictions must be fulfilled, nor even merely because
Jehovah had spoken and His word must not return to Him void, but because the
people had not hearkened and obeyed. His threats were never meant to exclude the
penitent from the possibility of pardon. As Jeremiah had insisted upon the guilt of
every class of the community, so he is also careful to enumerate all the classes as
about to suffer from the coming judgment: "Zedekiah king of Judah and his
princes"; [Jeremiah 34:21] "the people, the prophet, and the priest." [Jeremiah
23:33-34] This last judgment of Judah, as it took the form of the complete overthrow
of the State, necessarily included all under its sentence of doom. One of the
mysteries of Providence is that those who are most responsible for national sins
seem to suffer least by public misfortunes. Ambitious statesmen and bellicose
journalists do not generally fall in battle and leave destitute widows and children.
When the captains of commerce and manufacture err in their industrial policy, one
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67. great result is the pauperism of hundreds of families who had no voice in the matter.
A spendthrift landlord may cripple the agriculture of half a county. And yet, when
factories are closed and farmers ruined, the manufacturer and the landlord are the
last to see want. In former invasions of Judah, the princes and priests had some
share of suffering; but wealthy nobles might incur losses and yet weather the storm
by which poorer men were overwhelmed. Fines and tribute levied by the invaders
would, after the manner of the East, be wrung from the weak and helpless. But now
ruin was to fall on all alike. The nobles had been flagrant in sin, they were now to be
marked out for most condign punishment-"To whomsoever much is given, of him
shall much be required."
Part of the burden of Jeremiah’s prophecy, one of the sayings constantly on his lips,
was that the city would be taken and destroyed by fire. [Jeremiah 34:2; Jeremiah
34:22; Jeremiah 37:8] The Temple would be laid in ruins like the ancient sanctuary
of Israel at Shiloh. (chapters 7 and 26.) The palaces [Jeremiah 6:5] of the king and
princes would be special marks for the destructive fury of the enemy, and their
treasures and all the wealth of the city would be for a spoil; those who survived the
sack of the city would be carried captive to Babylon. [Jeremiah 20:5]
In this general ruin the miseries of the people would not end with death. All nations
have attached much importance to the burial of the dead and the due performance
of funeral rites. In the touching Greek story Antigone sacrificed her life in order to
bury the remains of her brother. Later Judaism attached exceptional importance to
the burial of the dead, and the Book of Tobit lays great stress on this sacred duty.
The angel Raphael declares that one special reason why the Lord had been merciful
to Tobias was that he had buried dead bodies, and had not delayed to rise up and
leave his meal to go and bury the corpse of a murdered Jew, at the risk of his own
life.
Jeremiah prophesied of the slain in this last overthrow: "They shall not be
lamented, neither shall they be buried; they shall be as dung on the face of the
ground; their carcases shall be meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts
of the earth."
When these last had done their ghastly work, the site of the Temple, the city, the
whole land would be left silent and desolate. The stranger, wandering amidst the
ruins, would hear no cheerful domestic sounds; when night fell, no light gleaming
through chink or lattice would give the sense of human neighbourhood. Jehovah
"would take away the sound of the millstones and the light of the candle."
[Jeremiah 25:10] The only sign of life amidst the desolate ruins of Jerusalem and the
cities of Judah would be the melancholy cry of the jackals round the traveller’s tent.
[Jeremiah 9:11; Jeremiah 10:22]
The Hebrew prophets and our Lord Himself often borrowed their symbols from the
scenes of common life, as they passed before their eyes. As in the days of Noah, as in
the days of Lot, as in the days of the Son of Man, so in the last agony of Judah there
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68. was marrying and giving in marriage. Some such festive occasion suggested to
Jeremiah one of his favourite formulae; it occurs four times in the Book of
Jeremiah, and was probably uttered much oftener. Again and again it may have
happened that, as a marriage procession passed through the streets, the gay
company were startled by the grim presence of the prophet, and shrank back in
dismay as they found themselves made the text for a stern homily of ruin: "Thus
saith Jehovah Sabaoth, I will take away from them the voice of mirth and the voice
of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride." At any rate,
however, and whenever used, the figure could not fail to arrest attention, and to
serve as an emphatic declaration that the ordinary social routine would be broken
up and lost in the coming calamity.
Henceforth the land would be as some guilty habitation of sinners, devoted to
eternal destruction, an astonishment and a hissing and a perpetual desolation.
[Jeremiah 25:9-10] When the heathen sought some curse to express the extreme of
malignant hatred, they would use the formula, "God make thee like Jerusalem."
[Jeremiah 26:6] Jehovah’s Chosen People would become an everlasting reproach, a
perpetual shame, which should not be forgotten. [Jeremiah 23:40] The wrath of
Jehovah pursued even captives and fugitives. In chapter 29 Jeremiah predicts the
punishment of the Jewish prophets at Babylon. When we last hear of him, in Egypt,
he is denouncing ruin against "the remnant of Judah that have set their faces to go
into the land of Egypt to sojourn there." He still reiterates the same familiar
phrases: "Ye shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence"; they
shall be "an execration, an astonishment, and a curse, and a reproach."
We have now traced the details of the prophet’s message of doom. Fulfilment
followed fast upon the heels of prediction, till Jeremiah rather interpreted than
foretold the thick coming disasters. When his book was compiled, the prophecies
were already, as they are now, part of the history of the last days of Judah. The
book became the record of this great tragedy, in which these prophecies take the
place of the choric odes in a Greek drama.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:14-15
“But as for me, see, I am in your hand. Do with me as is good and right in your eyes.
Only know you for certain that, if you put me to death, you will bring innocent
blood on yourselves, and on this city, and on its inhabitants, for of a truth YHWH
has sent me to you to speak all these words in your ears.”
He then declares that as far as he was concerned, they could do what they liked with
him. He was not important. What mattered was the truth of YHWH. But let them
only remember that they would be judged for the choice that they made, so that if
they shed his innocent blood, they would bring that blood on themselves, the blood
of YHWH’s messenger, both on themselves, and on their city and on its inhabitants.
And this was because it was YHWH Who had sent him to speak these words to
them.
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69. 15 Be assured, however, that if you put me to
death, you will bring the guilt of innocent blood
on yourselves and on this city and on those who
live in it, for in truth the Lord has sent me to you
to speak all these words in your hearing.”
GILL, "But know ye for certain, that if ye put me to death,.... Take this along
with you, and then do as you will; that if ye take away my life on this account, you may
depend upon it; nothing is more certain than this:
ye shall surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves, and upon this city,
and upon the inhabitants thereof; that is, the guilt of innocent blood, which would
cry for vengeance upon them that brought the accusation, and insisted upon his being
brought in guilty; and upon those that sat in judgment, and condemned him; and upon
all the inhabitants of the city of Jerusalem, who should agree to the putting him to
death:
for of a truth the Lord hath sent me unto you to speak all these words in
your ears; and therefore I am no false prophet, and am clear of the charge brought
against me; and have said nothing but what I had a mission and an order from the Lord
for, of which you may assure yourselves; and therefore he will avenge my blood, should
it be shed on that account; so that you will only increase your guilt, and add to that great
load that lies upon you, and will be your ruin, unless you repent and reform.
JAMISON, "bring ... upon yourselves — So far will you be from escaping the
predicted evils by shedding my blood, that you will, by that very act, only incur heavier
penalties (Mat_23:35).
CALVIN, "We now, then, see in what sense Jeremiah regarded his life as in the
hand of his enemies, not that he thought himself cast away by God, but that he
acknowledged that loosened reins were given to the wicked to rage against him. But
we must at the same time bear in mind why he said this; after having conceded that
his life was in their hand, he adds, yet knowing know ye, that if ye kill me, ye will
bring innocent blood upon yourselves. (167) But he had said before that they might
do what seemed them good and right (168) Good and right here is not to be taken
for a judgment formed according to the rule of justice, but for a sentence formed
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70. iniquitously according to their own will. This is a common mode of speaking in
Hebrew. Jeremiah then testifies that he was not solicitous about his life, for he was
prepared to offer himself, as it were, as a sacrifice, if the rage of his enemies should
go so far. But in warning them to beware of God’s vengeance, his object was not his
own safety, but it was to stimulate them to repentance. He then plainly says that he
did not fear death, for the Lord would presently shew himself to be his avenger, and
that his blood also would be so precious in the sight of God, that the whole city,
together with the people, would be punished, were they to deal unjustly with him.
But let us attend to what follows, even that God had sent him. He now takes this
principle as granted, that it could not be that God would forsake his servants, to
whom he has promised aid when oppressed by the ungodly. God, indeed, ever
exhorts his ministers to patience, and he would have them to be prepared for death
whenever there is need; yet he promises to bring them help in distress. Jeremiah
then relied on this promise, and was thus persuaded that it could not be that God
would forsake him; for he cannot disappoint his people, nor forfeit his faith pledged
to them. As, then, he was fully persuaded of his own calling, and knew that God was
the author of all his preaching, he boldly concluded that his blood could not be shed
with impunity. All faithful teachers ought to encourage themselves, for the purpose
of discharging strenuously the duties of their office, with this confidence, — that
God who has committed to them their office can never forsake them, but will ever
bring them help as far as it may be necessary. It now follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:15 But know ye for certain, that if ye put me to death, ye
shall surely bring innocent blood upon yourselves, and upon this city, and upon the
inhabitants thereof: for of a truth the LORD hath sent me unto you to speak all
these words in your ears.
Ver. 15. Ye shall surely bring innocent blood, &c.] So Mr Rogers, our proto-martyr
in Queen Mary’s days: If God, said he, look not mercifully upon England, the seeds
of utter destruction are sown in it already by these hypocritical tyrants, and
Antichristian prelates, double traitors to their native country. (a)
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:15. But know ye for certain— This is Jeremiah's justification
of himself. He reduces all to the proof that God had sent him; and his adversaries
were able to make no reply. "If God hath sent me, you can have nothing to say
against me." It is upon this that he is declared innocent, Jeremiah 26:16. This man is
not worthy to die. See Calmet.
16 Then the officials and all the people said to the
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71. priests and the prophets, “This man should not be
sentenced to death! He has spoken to us in the
name of the Lord our God.”
BARNES, "This man ... - literally, There is not to this man a sentence of death, i. e.,
he is acquitted by the princes and the congregation.
CLARKE, "This man is not worthy to die - The whole court acquitted him.
GILL, "Then said the princes and all the people unto the priests and to the
prophets,.... Hearing Jeremiah's apology for himself, by which it appeared that he was
to be justified in what he had done, took his part, and acquitted him; and the people,
who before were on the side of the priests and false prophets; yet hearing what Jeremiah
had to say for himself, and also the judgment of the princes, took his part also, and
joined with the court in an address to the priests and prophets, who were the chief
accusers, and who would fain have had him brought in guilty of death:
this man is not worthy to die; or, "the judgment of death is not for this man"; we
cannot give judgment against him; he is not guilty of any crime deserving death; See Gill
on Jer_26:11;
for he hath spoken to us in the name of the Lord our God; not in his own name,
and of his own head; but in the name of the Lord, and by his order; and therefore was
not a false, but a true prophet: what methods they took to know this, and to make it
appear to the people, is not said; very probably the settled character of the prophet; their
long acquaintance with him, and knowledge of him; his integrity and firmness of mind;
the plain marks of seriousness and humility, and a disinterested view, made them
conclude in his favour.
HENRY, "Here is, I. The acquitting of Jeremiah from the charge exhibited against him.
He had indeed spoken the words as they were laid in the indictment, but they are not
looked upon to be seditious or treasonable, ill-intended or of any bad tendency, and
therefore the court and country agree to find him not guilty. The priests and prophets,
notwithstanding his rational plea for himself, continued to demand judgment against
him; but the princes, and all the people, are clear in it that this man is not worthy to die
(Jer_26:16); for (say they) he hath spoken to us, not of himself, but in the name of the
Lord our God. And are they willing to own that he did indeed speak to them in the name
of the Lord and that that Lord is their God? Why then did they not amend their ways and
doings, and take the method he prescribed to prevent the ruin of their country? If they
say, His prophecy is from heaven, it may justly be asked, Why did you not then believe
71

72. him? Mat_21:25. Note, It is a pity that those who are so far convinced of the divine
original of gospel preaching as to protect it from the malice of others do not submit to
the power and influence of it themselves.
JAMISON, "princes ... all the people — The fickle people, as they were previously
influenced by the priests to clamor for his death (Jer_26:8), so now under the princes’
influence require that he shall not be put to death. Compare as to Jesus, Jeremiah’s
antitype, the hosannas of the multitude a few days before the same people, persuaded by
the priests as in this case, cried, Away with Him, crucify Him (Mat_21:1-11; Mat_
27:20-25). The priests, through envy of his holy zeal, were more his enemies than the
princes, whose office was more secular than religious. A prophet could not legally be put
to death unless he prophesied in the name of other gods (therefore, they say, “in the
name of the Lord”), or after his prophecy had failed in its accomplishment. Meanwhile,
if he foretold calamity, he might be imprisoned. Compare Micaiah’s case (1Ki_22:1-28).
CALVIN, "Jeremiah shews here that the sentence pronounced on him by the priests
and false prophets was soon changed. They had indeed heard him, and had given
some appearance of docility, as it is the case with hypocrites who for a time attend;
but they exasperated themselves against God, and as their minds were previously
malignant, they were rendered much worse by hearing. So it happened to the priests
and false prophets, and in their blind rage they doomed the holy Prophet to death.
He now says that he was acquitted by the princes and the king’s counsellors, and
also by the votes of the people. The people had, indeed, lately condemned him, but
they had been carried away by the vain pomp and splendor of the priests and
prophets; when they saw these so incensed against Jeremiah, they could not bring
themselves to inquire into the cause. Thus the common people are always blinded by
prejudices, so that they will not examine the matter itself. So it was when Jeremiah
was condemned. We have said that the people were of themselves quiet and
peaceable; but the prophets and priests were the farmers, and hence it was that the
people immediately gave their consent. But in the presence of the princes they went
in a contrary direction.
This passage, in short, teaches us how mischievous are rulers when there is no
regard had for equity or justice; and it also teaches us how desirable it is to have
honest and temperate rulers, who defend what is good and just, and aid the
miserable and the oppressed. But we see that there is nothing steady or fixed in the
common people; for they are carried here and there like the wind, which blows now
from this quarter and then from that.
But we must notice this clause, that Jeremiah was not worthy of death, (169)
because he had spoken in the name of Jehovah They thus confessed, that whatever
came from God ought to have been received, and that men were mad who opposed
the servants of God, for they hurried themselves headlong into their own
destruction.
We may hence deduce a useful truth, that whatever God has commanded ought,
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73. without exception, to be reverently received, and that his name is worthy of such a
regard, that we ought to attempt nothing against his servants and prophets. Now, to
speak in the name of Jehovah is no other thing than faithfully to declare what God
has commanded. The false prophets, indeed, assumed the name of God, but they did
so falsely; but the people acknowledge here that Jeremiah was a true prophet, who
did not presumptuously thrust in himself, nor falsely pretended God’s name, but
who in sincerity performed the duties of his office. It follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:16 Then said the princes and all the people unto the priests
and to the prophets; This man [is] not worthy to die: for he hath spoken to us in the
name of the LORD our God.
Ver. 16. Then said the princes and all the people.] The mobile vulgus. changeable
mob, on Jeremiah 26:9. The good prophet is acquitted, as Athanasius afterwards
was often; for if to be accused were enough to make a man guilty, none should be
innocent.
COFFMAN, ""Then said the princes and all the people unto the priests and the
prophets: This man is not worthy of death; for he hath spoken unto us in the name
of Jehovah our God!"
"Then said the princes and all the people ..." (Jeremiah 26:16). Notice that "all the
people" have dramatically switched sides. They here stand with the princes and
elders against the crooked priests and prophets. What a fickle and changeful thing
is a mob of people! (I commented at length on this phenomenon in Vol. I of my New
Testament Series, p. 470.)
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:16
‘Then the princes and all the people said to the priests and to the prophets, “This
man is not worthy of death, for he has spoken to us in the name of YHWH our
God.”
How quickly the mood of a crowd can change. Shortly before ‘all the people’ had
been clamouring for his blood. Now they were siding with the judges in recognising
his innocence. His defence had impressed the hearers, and so much so that they
turned on his accusers and declared that Jeremiah was not worthy of death because
he had spoken to them ‘in the Name of YHWH our God’. In their view he was a true
prophet. And Israel/Judah had a history of accepting such prophets (although
usually too late for their own good).
17 Some of the elders of the land stepped forward
73

74. and said to the entire assembly of people,
BARNES, "The elders of the land - The heads and spokesmen of the
congregation, who added their approval after the princes who represented the king had
given their decision.
CLARKE, "Certain of the elders - This is really a fine defense, and the argument
was perfectly conclusive. Some think that it was Ahikam who undertook the prophet’s
defense.
GILL, "Then rose up certain of the elders of the land,.... The same with the
princes; some of the court, who rose up as advocates for the prophet:
and spake to all the assembly of the people: to justify the vote of the court, and to
confirm the people in a good opinion of it, by giving them examples and instances of the
like kind:
saying; as follows:
JAMISON, "Compare Gamaliel’s interposition (Act_5:34, etc.).
elders — some of the “princes” mentioned (Jer_26:16) those whose age, as well as
dignity, would give weight to the precedents of past times which they adduce.
K&D 17-19, "Jer_26:17-19
To justify and confirm this sentence, certain of the elders of the land rise and point to
the like sentence passed on the prophet Micah of Moresheth-Gath, who had foretold the
destruction of the city and temple under King Hezekiah, but had not been put to death
by the king; Hezekiah, on the contrary, turning to prayer to the Lord, and thus
succeeding in averting the catastrophe. The "men of the elders of the land" are different
from "all the princes," and are not to be taken, as by Graf, for representatives of the
people in the capacity of assessors at judicial decisions, who had to give their voice as to
guilt or innocence; nor are they necessarily to be regarded as local authorities of the
land. They come before us here solely in their character as elders of the people, who
possessed a high authority in the eyes of the people. The saying of the Morasthite Micah
which they cite in Jer_26:18 is found in Mic_3:12, verbally agreeing with Jer_26:18; see
the exposition of that passage. The stress of what they say lies in the conclusion drawn
by them from Micah's prophesy, taken in connection with Hezekiah's attitude towards
the Lord, Jer_26:19 : "Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him to death? Did
he not fear Jahveh and entreat Jahveh, and did not Jahveh repent Him of the evil
which He had spoken concerning them? and we would commit a great evil against our
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75. souls?" Neither in the book of Micah, nor in the accounts of the books of Kings, nor in
the chronicle of Hezekiah's reign are we told that, in consequence of that prophecy of
Micah, Hezekiah entreated the Lord and so averted judgment from Jerusalem. There we
find only that during the siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians, Hezekiah besought the
help of the Lord and protection from that mighty enemy. The elders have combined this
fact with Micah's prophecy, and thence drawn the conclusion that the godly king
succeeded by his prayer in averting the mischief. Cf. the remarks on this passage at Mic_
4:10. '‫ה‬ָ‫לּ‬ ִ‫ח‬ , lit., stroke the face of Jahveh, i.e., entreat Him, cf. Exo_32:11. "And we
would commit," are thinking of doing, are on the point of doing a great evil against our
souls; inasmuch as by putting the prophet to death they would bring blood-guiltiness
upon themselves and hasten the judgment of God. - The acquittal of Jeremiah is not
directly related; but it may be gathered from the decision of the princes: This man is not
worthy of death.
CALVIN, "It is uncertain whether what is here recited was spoken before the
acquittal of Jeremiah or not; for the Scripture does not always exactly preserve
order in narrating things. It is yet probable, that while they were still deliberating
and the minds of the people were not sufficiently pacified, the elders interposed, in
order to calm the multitude and to soften their irritated minds, and to reconcile
those to Jeremiah who had previously become foolishly incensed against him; for no
doubt the priests and the false prophets had endeavored by every artifice to irritate
the silly people against the Prophet; and hence more than one kind of remedy was
necessary. When therefore the elders saw that wrath was still burning in the people,
and that their minds were not disposed to shew kindness, they made use of this
discourse. They took their argument from example, — that Jeremiah was not the
first witness and herald of dreadful vengeance, for God had before that time, and in
time past, been wont to speak by his other prophets against the city and the temple.
The priests and the prophets had indeed charged Jeremiah with novelty, and
further pretended that they thus fiercely opposed him on the ground of common
justice. Jeremiah had said, that God would spare neither the holy city nor the
Temple. This was intolerable, for it had been said of the Temple,
“This is my rest for ever; here will I dwell.”
(Psalms 132:14.)
We hence see that Jeremiah was overwhelmed as it were by this one expression,
while the priests and the false prophets objected and said,
“Thou then makest void God’s promises; thou regardest as nothing the sanctity of
the Temple.”
And they further pretended that not one of the prophets had ever thus spoken. But
what do the elders now answer? even that there had been other prophets who had
denounced ruin on the city and the Temple, and that, was falsely charged with this
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76. disgrace, that he was the first to announce God’s judgment. We now understand the
state of the case: Jeremiah is defended, because he had not alone threatened the city
and the first, but he had others as the originators, from whose mouths he had
spoken, who were also the acknowledged servants of God, from whom credit could
not be withholden, such as Micah.
Now, what is here related is found in Micah 3:12. The Prophet Micah had the same
contest with the priests and prophets as Jeremiah had; for they said that it was
impossible that God should pour his vengeance on the holy city and the Temple.
They said,
“Is not Jehovah in the midst of us?”
and they said also, “No evil shall come on us.” They were inebriated with such a
security, that they thought themselves beyond the reach of danger; and they
disregarded all the threatenings of the prophets, because they imagined that God
was bound to them. We indeed know that hypocrites ever relied on that promise,
“Here will I dwell;” and they also took and borrowed words from God’s mouth and
perverted them like cheats: “God resides in the midst of us; therefore nothing
adverse can happen to us.” But the Prophet said, (the same are the words which we
have just repeated,)
“For you Sion shall be plowed as a field, (170) and Jerusalem shall become heaps,
and the mountain of this house as the heights of a forest.”
But let us now consider each clause. It is first said, that the elders from the people of
the land rose up (171) It is probable that they were called elders, not as in other
places on account of their office, but of their age. It is indeed certain that they were
men of authority; but yet I doubt not but that they were far advanced in years, as
they were able to relate to the people what had happened many years before. As it is
added, that they spoke to the whole assembly of the people, we may hence deduce
what I have already stated, — that the people were so violent, that there was need of
a calm discourse to mitigate their ardor; and certainly when once a commotion is
raised and rages, it is not an easy matter immediately to allay it. When, therefore,
the kind elders saw that the minds of the people were still exasperated, they
employed a moderating language, and said, Micah (172) the Morasthite (they named
his country) prophesied in the days of Hezekiah, king of Judah, etc
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:17 Then rose up certain of the elders of the land, and spake
to all the assembly of the people, saying,
Ver. 17. Then rose up certain of the elders.] Viri illi admodum venerabiles erant,
saith Oecolampadius. These were very worthy men, whether princes or pleaders,
well read in the annals of the times, as great men ought to be.
COFFMAN, "ARGUMENT OF SOME OF THE ELDERS
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77. "Then rose up certain of the elders of the land, and spake to all the assembly of the
people, saying, Micah the Morashtite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of
Judah; and he spake to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus saith Jehovah of hosts:
Zion shall be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the
mountain of the house as the high places of a forest. Did Hezekiah king of Judah
and all Judah put him to death? did he not fear Jehovah, and entreat the favor of
Jehovah, and Jehovah repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against
them? Thus should we commit great evil against our own souls."
"Zion shall be plowed as a field ..." (Jeremiah 26:18). This whole quotation is a
verbatim account of what is written in Micah 3:12. There is hardly another instance
of this same kind of an appeal anywhere else in the Old Testament. Again, we have
convincing evidence of the existence of the whole corpus of Hebrew scriptures and
of the knowledge of the Hebrew people of exactly what those scriptures taught; and
all of this on the very eve of the captivity.
The elders who made this appeal were evidently familiar with God's Word and were
of a noble and pious character.
"Thus should we commit great evil against our own souls ..." (Jeremiah 26:19). This
means that by putting Jeremiah to death great guilt would accrue to their souls.
Their counsel won the day for Jeremiah.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:17
‘Then certain of the elders of the land rose up, and spoke to all the assembly of the
people, saying,’
The ‘elders of the land’ were probably the leaders of the people from around the
country, in contrast with those who dwelt in Jerusalem. We can compare the phrase,
‘the people of the land’ which often meant the landed gentry who were not so caught
up in high level politics. And it was some of them, visitors to Jerusalem for the
festival, who now spoke up on Jeremiah’s behalf. We have here the memory of an
eye-witness who remembered who said what. There is also here an indication that,
unlike in Jerusalem (Jeremiah 5:1), among the wider people were those who still
feared YHWH, at least to a certain extent.
PULPIT, "The elders of the land add their voice in favor of Jeremiah, not, however,
without first of all consulting the people whose representatives they are. The whole verse
is thoroughly technical in its phraseology. The word (qahal) rendered "assembly" is the
traditional legal term for the "congregation of Israel" (Deuteronomy 31:30); comp. verse
9, where the verb is the corresponding one to qahal. Thus, with all the faults of the
government of Judah, which Jeremiah himself reveals to us, it was very far removed from
the Oriental despotisms of our day. The "elders" are still an important element in the
social system, and form a link with that earlier period in which the family was the leading
77

78. power in the social organization. Originally the term denoted, strictly and in the full
sense, heads of families; they have their analogue in the councils of the Aryan village
communities. "References to their parliamentary status occur in Exodus 3:16; 2 Samuel
19:11; 1 Kings 8:1; 1 Kings 20:7. The institution lingered on during and after the
Babylonian Exile." We find another reference to their quasi-judicial authority in
Deuteronomy 21:2.
18 “Micah of Moresheth prophesied in the days of
Hezekiah king of Judah. He told all the people of
Judah, ‘This is what the Lord Almighty says:
“‘Zion will be plowed like a field,
Jerusalem will become a heap of rubble,
the temple hill a mound overgrown with
thickets.’[b]
CLARKE, "Micah the Morasthite - The same as stands among the prophets. Now
all these prophesied as hard things against the land as Jeremiah has done; yet they were
not put to death, for the people saw that they were sent of God.
GILL, "Micah the Morasthite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of
Judah,.... Or, Micah of Maresha, as the Targum. Mareshah was a city of the tribe of
Judah, Jos_15:44; the native place, of this prophet; who appears, by the following
quotation, to be the same Micah that stands among the minor prophets; and who is also
so called, and lived in the times of Hezekiah, Mic_1:1;
and spake to all the people of Judah; very openly and publicly, and just as
Jeremiah had done, Jer_26:2;
saying, thus saith the Lord of hosts, Zion shall be ploughed like a field, and
Jerusalem shall become heaps; Mount Zion, on part of which the temple was built,
and on the other the city of David, together with the city of Jerusalem, should be so
demolished, as that they might be ploughed, and become a tillage; as the Jews say they
78

79. were by Terentius, or Turnus Rufus, as they call him, after their last destruction by the
Romans:
and the mountain of the house as the high places of the forest; covered with
grass and shrubs, and thorns and briers; even Mount Moriah, on which the temple
stood, which is designed by the house; and so the Targum calls it the house of the
sanctuary. Now this was saying as much against the city and temple as Jeremiah did;
and was said in the days of a good king too, who encouraged a reformation, and carried
it to a great pitch. See Mic_3:12.
HENRY 18-19, "A precedent quoted to justify them in acquitting Jeremiah. Some of
the elders of the land, either the princes before mentioned or the more intelligent men of
the people, stood up, and put the assembly in mind of a former case, as is usual with us
in giving judgment; for the wisdom of our predecessors is a direction to us. The case
referred to is that of Micah. We have extant the book of his prophecy among the minor
prophets. 1. Was it thought strange that Jeremiah prophesied against this city and the
temple? Micah did so before him, even in the reign of Hezekiah, that reign of
reformation, Jer_26:18. Micah said it as publicly as Jeremiah had now spoken to the
same purport, Zion shall be ploughed like a field, the building shall be all destroyed, so
that nothing shall hinder but it may be ploughed; Jerusalem shall become heaps of
ruins, and the mountain of the house on which the temple is built shall be as the high
places of the forest, overrun with briers and thorns. That prophet not only spoke this,
but wrote it, and left it on record; we find it, Mic_3:12. By this it appears that a man may
be, as Micah was, a true prophet of the Lord, and yet may prophesy the destruction of
Zion and Jerusalem. When we threaten secure sinners with the taking away of the Spirit
of God and the kingdom of God from them, and declining churches with the removal of
the candlestick, we say no more than what has been said many a time, and what we have
warrant from the word of God to say. 2. Was it thought fit by the princes to justify
Jeremiah in what he had done? It was what Hezekiah did before them in a like case. Did
Hezekiah, and the people of Judah (that is, the representatives of the people, the
commons in parliament), did they complain of Micah the prophet? Did they impeach
him, or make an act to silence him and put him to death? No; on the contrary, they took
the warning he gave them. Hezekiah, that renowned prince, of blessed memory, set a
good example before his successors, for he feared the Lord (Jer_26:19), as Noah, who,
being warned of God of things not seen as yet, was moved with fear. Micah's preaching
drove him to his knees; he besought the Lord to turn away the judgment threatened and
to be reconciled to them, and he found it was not in vain to do so, for the Lord repented
him of the evil and returned in mercy to them; he sent an angel, who routed the army of
the Assyrians, that threatened to plough Zion like a field. Hezekiah got good by the
preaching, and then you may be sure he would do no harm to the preacher. These elders
conclude that it would be of dangerous consequence to the state if they should gratify the
importunity of the priests and prophets in putting Jeremiah to death: Thus might we
procure great evil against our souls. Note, It is good to deter ourselves from sin with the
consideration of the mischief we shall certainly do to ourselves by it and the irreparable
damage it will be to our own souls.
JAMISON, "(Mic_3:12).
Morasthite — called so from a village of the tribe Judah.
79

80. Hezekiah — The precedent in the reign of such a good king proved that Jeremiah
was not the only prophet, or the first, who threatened the city and the temple without
incurring death.
mountain of the house — Moriah, on which stood the temple (peculiarly called “the
house”) shall be covered with woods instead of buildings. Jeremiah, in quoting previous
prophecies, never does so without alteration; he adapts the language to his own style,
showing thereby his authority in his treatment of Scripture, as being himself inspired.
CALVIN, "We ought to notice the time, for it might seem strange, that when that
holy king was anxiously engaged in promoting the true worship of God, things were
in so disordered a state as to call for so severe a denunciation. If there ever was a
king really and seriously devoted to the cause of religion, doubtless he was the first
and chief exemplar; he spared no labor, he never seemed to shun any danger or
trouble, whenever religion required this; but we find that however strenuously he
labored, he could not by his zeal and perseverance succeed in making the whole
people to follow him as their leader. What then must happen, when those who ought
to shew the right way to others are indifferent and slothful? In the meantime the
good princes were confirmed by the example of Hezekiah, so that they did not faint
or fail in their minds when they saw that success did not immediately follow his
labors, nor any fruit. For it is a grievous trial, and what shakes even the most
courageous, when they think that their efforts are vain, that their labors are useless,
yea, that they spend their time to no purpose, and thus it happens that many
retrograde. But this example of Hezekiah ought to be remembered by them, so that
they may still go on, though no hope of a prosperous issue appears; for Hezekiah did
not desist, though Satan in various ways put many hinderances in the way, and even
apparently upset all his labors, so that they produced no fruit. So much as to the
time that is mentioned.
The elders said, that Micah had spoken to the whole people, saying, Thus saith
Jehovah, Sion, shall be plowed as a field, We have already seen on what occasion it
was that Micah spoke with so much severity; it was when hypocrites set up their
false confidence and falsely assumed the name of God, as though they held him
bound to themselves. For you, he said, Sion shall be plowed as a field He began with
the temple, and then he added, and Jerusalem shall be in heaps, or a solitude; and
lastly, he said, and the mountain, of the house, that is, of the temple, etc. He
repeated what he had just said, for what else was the mountain of the temple but
Sion? But as this prediction could have hardly been believed by the Jews, the
Prophet, for the sake of confirmation, said the same thing twice. We hence conclude
that it was not a superfluous repetition, but that he might shake with terror the
hypocrites, who had hardened themselves against God’s threatenings, and thought
themselves safe, though the whole world went to ruin.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:18 Micah the Morasthite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah
king of Judah, and spake to all the people of Judah, saying, Thus saith the LORD of
hosts; Zion shall be plowed [like] a field, and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the
mountain of the house as the high places of a forest.
80

81. Ver. 18. Micah the Morashite.] See on Micah 1:1.
Zion shall be ploughed like a field.] See Micah 3:3.
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:18. Micah the Morasthite— The village of Morasthus or
Maresa, was in the tribe of Judah. Micah was the author of that prophesy which we
have now among the twelve minor prophets. The Jews supposed his prophesy to
have been fulfilled in the utter destruction of the second temple by Titus, when
Terentius razed the very foundations of the city and temple, and by that means
fulfilled the prediction of our Blessed Saviour, that there should not be one stone left
upon another.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:18
“Micah the Morashtite prophesied in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and he
spoke to all the people of Judah, saying, ‘Thus says YHWH of hosts, Zion will be
ploughed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps, and the mountain of the
house as the high places of a forest’.”
Jeremiah’s sterling defence had brought to mind the words of previous prophets,
and they consequently pointed back to the prophecy of Micah 3:12, an interesting
indication that the writings of the early prophets were already available to them and
were seen as carrying authority. They brought out that he too had prophesied the
destruction of Jerusalem in the days of Hezekiah (and thus in the latter part of his
ministry). Indeed he had declared that it would be so emptied that it came under the
plough, with Jerusalem being turned into heaps of rubble and the Temple mount
becoming overgrown. He had been no less emphatic than Jeremiah.
19 “Did Hezekiah king of Judah or anyone else in
Judah put him to death? Did not Hezekiah fear
the Lord and seek his favor? And did not the
Lord relent, so that he did not bring the disaster
he pronounced against them? We are about to
bring a terrible disaster on ourselves!”
81

82. BARNES, "Thus might we procure ... - Rather, And we should commit a great
evil against our own souls; i. e., by putting Jeremiah to death, we should commit a sin
which would prove a great misfortune to ourselves.
GILL, "Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him at all to death?....
No, they did not: neither the king, by his own authority; nor the sanhedrim, the great
court of judicature, for the nation; they never sought to take away his life, nor sat in
council about it; they never arraigned him, and much less condemned him:
did he not fear the Lord, and besought the Lord; that is, Hezekiah; he did, as
knowing that Micah was a prophet of the Lord, and sent by him; wherefore he received
his prophecy with great awe and reverence, as coming from the Lord, and made his
supplications to him that he would avert the judgments threatened:
and the Lord repented of the evil which he had pronounced against them?
the king and his people, the city and the temple; and so the threatened evil came not
upon them in their days:
thus might we procure great evil against our souls; should we put Jeremiah to
death: it is therefore much more advisable to do as Hezekiah did, pray unto the Lord to
avert the threatened evil, or otherwise it will be worse with us. This precedent is urged to
strengthen the decree of the council in favour of Jeremiah.
JAMISON, "Hezekiah, so far from killing him, was led “to fear the Lord,” and pray
for remission of the sentence against Judah (2Ch_32:26).
Lord repented — (Exo_32:14; 2Sa_24:16).
Thus — if we kill Jeremiah.
CALVIN, "Having now related what Micah had denounced, they added, Slaying,
did Hezekiah the king of Judah and all Judah slay him? By the example of the pious
King Hezekiah, they exhorted the people to shew kindness and docility, and shewed
that it was an honor done both to God and to his prophets, not to be incensed
against his reproofs and threatenings, however sharply they might have been
goaded or however deeply they might have been wounded. But they further added,
Did he not fear Jehovah? and supplicate the face of Jehovah? and did not Jehovah
repent? They confirmed what Jeremiah had previously said, that there was no other
remedy but to submit themselves calmly to prophetic instruction, and at the same
time to flee to the mercy of God; for by the fear of God here is meant true
conversion; what else is God’s fear than that reverence by which we shew that we
are submissive to his will, because he is a Father and a Sovereign? Whosoever, then,
owns God as a Father and a Sovereign, cannot do otherwise than to submit from the
heart, to his good pleasure. Therefore the elders meant that Hezekiah and the whole
people really turned to God. Now repentance, as it must be well known, contains
two parts — the sinner becomes displeased with himself on account of his vices —
and forsaking all the wicked lusts of the flesh, he desires to form his whole life and
82

83. his actions according to the rule of God’s righteousness.
But they added, that they supplicated, etc. Though Jeremiah uses the singular
number, he yet includes both the people and the king; he seems however to have
used the singular number designedly, in order to commend the king, whose piety
was extraordinary and almost incomparable. There is no doubt but that he pointed
out the right way to others, that they might repent, and also that he humbly
deprecated that vengeance, which justly filled their minds with terror. He, indeed,
ascribed this especially to the pious king; but the same concern is also to be
extended to the chief men and the whole body of the people, as we shall presently
see; did he not then supplicate the face of Jehovah?
This second clause deserves special notice; for a sinner will never return to God
except he has the hope of pardon and salvation, as we shall ever dread the presence
of God, except the hope of reconciliation be offered to us. Hence the Scripture,
whenever it speaks of repentance, at the same time adds faith. They are indeed
things wholly distinct, and yet not contrary, and ought never to be separated, as
some inconsiderately do. For repentance is a change of the whole life, and as it were
a renovation; and faith teaches the guilty to flee to the mercy of God. But still we
must observe that there is a difference between repentance and faith; and yet they
so unite together, that he who tears the one from the other, entirely loses both. This
is the order which the Prophet now follows in saying that Hezekiah supplicated the
face of Jehovah For whence is the desire to pray, except from faith? It is not then
enough for one to feel hatred and displeasure as to his sins, and to desire to be
conformed to God’s will, except he thinks of reconciliation and pardon. The elders
then pointed out the remedy, and shewed it as it were by the finger; for if the people
after the example of Hezekiah and of others repented, then they were to flee to
God’s mercy, and to testify their faith by praying God to be propitious to them.
Hence it follows, that Jehovah repented of the evil which he had spoken against
them The Prophet now makes use of the plural number; we hence conclude that
under the name of King Hezekiah alone he before included the whole people. God
then repented of the evil (173) As to this mode of speaking, I shall not now speak at
large. We know that no change belongs to God; for whence comes repentance,
except from this, — that many things happen unexpectedly which compel us to
change our purpose? one had intended something; but he thought that that would
be which never came to pass; it is therefore necessary for him to revoke what he had
determined. Repentance then is the associate of ignorance. Now, as nothing is hid
from God, so it can never be that he repents. How so? because he has never
determined anything but according to his certain foreknowledge, for all things are
before his eyes. But this kind of speaking, that God repents, that is, does not execute
what he has announced, refers to what appears to men. It is no wonder that God
thus condescendingly speaks to us; but, while this simplicity offends delicate and
tender ears, we on the contrary wonder at God’s indulgence in thus coming down to
us, and speaking according to the comprehension of our weak capacities. We now
perceive how God may be said to repent, even when he does not execute what he had
83

84. denounced. His purpose in the meantime remains fixed, and as James says,
“There is in him no shadow of turning.” (James 1:17.)
But a question may again be raised, How did God then repent of the evil which he
had threatened both to the king and to the people? even because he deferred his
vengeance; for God did not abrogate his decree or his proclamation, but spared
Hezekiah and the people then living. Then the deferring of God’s vengeance is
called his repentance; for Hezekiah did not experience what he had feared,
inasmuch as he saw not the ruin of the city nor the sad and dreadful event which
Micah had predicted.
Now this also is to be noticed, — that the pious king is here commended by the Holy
Spirit, that he suffered himself to be severely reproved, though, as I have already
said, he was not himself guilty. He had, indeed, a burning zeal, and was prepared to
undergo any troubles in promoting the true worship of God; and yet he calmly and
quietly bore with the Prophet, when he spoke of the destruction of the city and
Temple, for he saw that he had need of such a helper. For however wisely may pious
princes exert themselves in promoting the glory of God, yet Satan resists them.
Hence they ever desire, as a matter of no small importance, to have true and faithful
teachers to help, to assist and to strengthen them, and also to oppose their
adversaries; for if teachers are silent or dissemble, a greater ill-will is entertained
towards good princes and magistrates; for when with the drawn sword they defend
the glory of God and his worship, while the teachers themselves are dumb dogs, all
will cry out, “Oh! what does this severity mean? Our teachers spare our ears, but
these do not spare even our blood.” It is, therefore, ever a desirable thing for good
and pious kings to have bold and earnest teachers, who cry aloud and confirm the
efforts of their princes. Such was the feeling of pious Hezekiah, as we may conclude
from this passage. The rest I must defer.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:19 Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him at all
to death? did he not fear the LORD, and besought the LORD, and the LORD
repented him of the evil which he had pronounced against them? Thus might we
procure great evil against our souls.
Ver. 19. Did Hezekiah king of Judah.] Laudable examples are to be remembered;
and, as occasion requireth, imitated. That was a very good one of Constantine the
Great, when the Arians brought accusations against the orthodox bishops, as here
the false prophets did against Jeremiah, he burned them, and said, These
accusations will have proper hearing at the last day of judgment. (a)
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:19
“Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah put him to death? Did he not fear
YHWH, and entreat the favour of YHWH, and YHWH repented him of the evil
which he had pronounced against them? Thus would we commit great evil against
84

85. our own souls.”
And what had the then king done with Micah? Had he and all Judah sought to put
him to death? No, rather they had listened to what he had said and had ‘feared
YHWH,’ responding to the covenant positively and reforming their lives. They had
then called on YHWH’s mercy with the result that YHWH’s anger against them was
stayed. He had changed His mind with regard to His judgment that he was bringing
on them. (If only they had gone a stage further and had themselves truly repented,
the history of Judah might have been different). The argument was important as
indicating the decision of the house of David in regard to a similar situation. It
suggested that the present king Jehoiakim, and his courtiers, should have the same
attitude.
This may have in mind the special deliverance of Jerusalem mentioned in 2 Kings
18-19, or it may simply have in mind an earlier occasion in the early days of
Hezekiah’s reign of which we are unaware. Or indeed both. It is a reminder that
there were genuine ‘revivals’ of which we are not told elsewhere. But the main point
was that a prophet of YHWH had been listened to by both king and people, even
though he had warned of dire things, with no attempt being made to silence the
prophet.
20 (Now Uriah son of Shemaiah from Kiriath
Jearim was another man who prophesied in the
name of the Lord; he prophesied the same things
against this city and this land as Jeremiah did.
BARNES, "This narrative of Urijah’s fate was no part of the speech of the elders, who
would not be likely to contrast the behavior of the reigning king so unfavorably with that
of Hezekiah. Moreover, it would have been a precedent, not for acquitting Jeremiah, but
for putting him to death. Jeremiah, when he reduced the narrative to writing, probably
added this history to show the ferocity of Jehoiakim, and the danger to which he had
been himself exposed.
CLARKE, "Urijah - who prophesied - The process against Jeremiah is finished at
85

86. the nineteenth verse; and the case of Urijah is next brought on, for he was also to be
tried for his life; but hearing of it he fled to Egypt. He was however condemned in his
absence; and the king sent to Egypt, and brought him thence and slew him, and caused
him to have an ignominious burial, Jer_26:21-23.
GILL, "And there was also a man that prophesied in the name of the Lord,....
These are not the words of the same persons continued; because the following instance
is against them; but of some other persons in the sanhedrim, who were on the side of the
priests and prophets; who in effect said, why tell you us of an instance in Hezekiah's
time, when there is so recent an one in the present reign, of a man that prophesied just
as Jeremiah has done, and was put to death, and so ought he? after this manner Kimchi
interprets it; and so Jarchi, who adds, that it is so explained in an ancient book of theirs,
called Siphri; though some think they are the words of the same persons that espoused
the prophet's cause; and observe the following instance with this view; that whereas
there had been one prophet of the Lord lately put to death for the same thing, should
they take away the life of another, it would be adding sin to sin, and bring great evil upon
their souls; and it might be observed, that Hezekiah prevented much evil by the steps he
took; whereas, should they proceed as they had begun in the present reign, they might
expect nothing but ruin, which they might easily see with their own eyes was coming
upon them: others are of opinion that this instance is added by the penman of this book,
either the prophet himself or Baruch, to show the wonderful preservation of him; that
though there had been very lately a person put to death for the very same thing, yet he
was preserved through the good offices of a person mentioned at the close of the
chapter; and which seems to make this account probable. The name of the prophet was
Urijah the son of Shemaiah of Kirjathjearim; which was a city of Judah, Jos_
18:14; but who he was is not known, there being no account of him elsewhere:
who prophesied against this city, and against this land, according to all the
words of Jeremiah; just as he had done, in much the same words, if not altogether; so
that their case was similar.
HENRY 20-24, "Here is an instance of another prophet that was put to death by
Jehoiakim for prophesying as Jeremiah had done, Jer_26:20, etc. Some make this to be
urged by the prosecutors, as a case that favoured the prosecution, a modern case, in
which speaking such words as Jeremiah had spoken was adjudged treason. Others think
that the elders, who were advocates for Jeremiah, alleged this to show that thus they
might procure great evil against their souls, for it would be adding sin to sin.
Jehoiakim, the present king, had slain one prophet already; let them not fill up the
measure by slaying another. Hezekiah, who protected Micah, prospered; but did
Jehoiakim prosper who slew Urijah? No; they all saw the contrary. As good examples,
and the good consequences of them, should encourage us in that which is good, so the
examples of bad men, and the bad consequences of them, should deter us from that
which is evil. But some good interpreters take this narrative from the historian that
penned the book, Jeremiah himself, or Baruch, who, to make Jeremiah's deliverance by
means of the princes the more wonderful, takes notice of this that happened about the
same time; for both were in the reign of Jehoiakim, and this in the beginning of his
reign, Jer_26:1. Observe, 1. Urijah's prophecy. It was against this city, and this land,
86

87. according to all the words of Jeremiah. The prophets of the Lord agreed in their
testimony, and one would have thought that out of the mouth of so many witnesses the
word would be regarded. 2. The prosecution of him for it, Jer_26:21. Jehoiakim and his
courtiers were exasperated against him, and sought to put him to death; in this wicked
design the king himself was principally concerned. 3. His absconding thereupon: When
he heard that the king had become his enemy, and sought his life, he was afraid, and
fled, and went in to Egypt. This was certainly his fault, and an effect of the weakness of
his faith, and it sped accordingly. He distrusted God, and his power to protect him and
bear him out; he was too much under the power of that fear of man which brings a
snare. It looked as if he durst not stand to what he had said or was ashamed of his
Master. It was especially unbecoming him to flee into Egypt, and so in effect to abandon
the land of Israel and to throw himself quite out of the way of being useful. Note, There
are many that have much grace, but they have little courage, that are very honest, but
withal very timorous. 4. His execution notwithstanding. Jehoiakim's malice, one would
think, might have contented itself with his banishment, and it might suffice to have
driven him out of the country; but those are bloodthirsty that hate the upright, Pro_
29:10. It was the life, that precious life, that he hunted after, and nothing else would
satisfy him. So implacable is his revenge that he sends a party of soldiers into Egypt,
some hundreds of miles, and they bring him back by force of arms. It would not
sufficiently gratify him to have him slain in Egypt, but he must feed his eyes with the
bloody spectacle. They brought him to Jehoiakim, and he slew him with the sword, for
aught I know with his own hands. Yet neither did this satisfy his insatiable malice, but he
loads the dead body of the good man with infamy, would not allow it the decent respects
usually and justly paid to the remains of men of distinction, but cast it into the graves of
the common people, as if he had not been a prophet of the Lord; thus was the shield of
Saul vilely cast away, as though he had not been anointed with oil. Thus Jehoiakim
hoped both to ruin his reputation with the people, that no heed might be given to his
predictions, and to deter others from prophesying in like manner; but in vain; Jeremiah
says the same. There is no contending with the word of God. Herod thought he had
gained his point when he had cut off John Baptist's head, but found himself deceived
when, soon after, he heard of Jesus Christ, and said, in a fright, This is John the Baptist.
IV. Here is Jeremiah's deliverance. Though Urijah was lately put to death, and
persecutors, when they have tasted the blood of saints, are apt to thirst after more (as
Herod, Act_12:2, Act_12:3), yet God wonderfully preserved Jeremiah, though he did not
flee, as Urijah did, but stood his ground. Ordinary ministers may use ordinary means,
provided they be lawful ones, for their own preservation; but those that had an
extraordinary protection. God raised up a friend for Jeremiah, whose hand was with
him; he took him by the hand in a friendly way, encouraged him, assisted him, appeared
for him. It was Ahikam the son of Shaphan, one that was a minister of state in Josiah's
time; we read of him, 2Ki_22:12. Some think Gedaliah was the son of this Ahikam. He
had a great interest, it should seem, among the princes, and he used it in favour of
Jeremiah, to prevent the further designs of the priests and prophets against him, who
would have had him turned over into the hand of the people, not those people (Jer_
26:16) that had adjudged him innocent, but the rude and insolent mob, whom they could
persuade by their cursed insinuations not only to cry, Crucify him, crucify him, but to
stone him to death in a popular tumult; for perhaps Jehoiakim had been so reproached
by his own conscience for slaying Urijah that they despaired of making him the tool of
their malice. Note, God can, when he pleases, raise up great men to patronize good men;
and it is an encouragement to us to trust him in the way of duty that he has all men's
87

88. hearts in his hands.
JAMISON, "As the flight and capture of Urijah must have occupied some time, “the
beginning of the reign of Jehoiakim” (Jer_26:1) must not mean the very beginning, but
the second or third year of his eleven years’ reign.
And ... also — perhaps connected with Jer_26:24, as the comment of the writer, not
the continuation of the speech of the elders: “And although also a man that
prophesied ... Urijah ... (proving how great was the danger in which Jeremiah stood, and
how wonderful the providence of God in preserving him), nevertheless the hand of
Ahikam,” etc. [Glassius]. The context, however, implies rather that the words are the
continuation of the previous speech of the elders. They adduce another instance besides
that of Micah, though of a different kind, namely, that of Urijah: he suffered for his
prophecies, but they imply, though they do not venture to express it, that thereby sin has
been added to sin, and that it has done no good to Jehoiakim, for that the notorious
condition of the state at this time shows that a heavier vengeance is impending if they
persevere in such acts of violence [Calvin].
K&D 20-23, "The prophet Urijah put to death. - While the history we have just been
considering gives testimony to the hostility of the priests and false prophets towards the
true prophets of the Lord, the story of the prophet Urijah shows the hostility of King
Jehoiakim against the proclaimers of divine truth. For this purpose, and not merely to
show in how great peril Jeremiah then stood (Gr., Näg.), this history is introduced into
our book. It is not stated that the occurrence took place at the beginning of Jehoiakim's
reign, nor can we infer so much from its being placed directly after the events of that
time. The time is not specified, because it was irrelevant for the case in hand. Jer_26:20.
A man, Urijah the son of Shemaiah - both unknown - from Kirjath-Jearim, now called
Kuriyet el 'Enab, about three hours to the north-west of Jerusalem, on the frontiers of
the tribe of Benjamin (see on Jos_9:17), prophesied in the name of Jahveh against
Jerusalem and Judah very much in the same terms as Jeremiah had done. When King
Jehoiakim and his great men heard this, discourse, he sought after the prophet to kill
him. Urijah, when he heard of it, fled to Egypt; but the king sent men after him,
Elnathan the son of Achbor with some followers, and had him brought back thence,
caused him to be put to death, and his body to be thrown into the graves of the common
people. Hitz. takes objection to "all his mighty men," Jer_26:21, because it is not found
in the lxx, and is nowhere else used by Jeremiah. But these facts do not prove that the
words are not genuine; the latter of the two, indeed, tells rather in favour of their
genuineness, since a glossator would not readily have interpolated an expression foreign
to the rest of the book. The "mighty men" are the distinguished soldiers who were about
the king, the military commanders, as the "princes" are the supreme civil authorities.
Elnathan the son of Achbor, according to Jer_36:12, Jer_36:25, one of Jehoiakim's
princes, was a son of Achbor who is mentioned in 2Ki_22:12-14 as amongst the princes
of Josiah. Whether this Elnathan was the same as the Elnathan whose daughter
Nehushta was Jehoiachin's mother (2Ki_24:8), and who was therefore the king's father-
in-law, must remain an undecided point, since the name Elnathan is of not unfrequent
occurrence; of Levites, Ezr_8:16. ‫ֵי‬‫נ‬ ְ‫בּ‬ ‫ם‬ָ‫ע‬ ָ‫ה‬ (see on Jer_17:19) means the common people
here, as in 2Ki_22:6. The place of burial for the common people was in the valley of the
88

89. Kidron; see on 2Ki_22:6.
CALVIN, "Another example is brought forward, partly different, and partly
alike, — different as to the king, the like as to a Prophet. Uriah, mentioned here,
faithfully discharged his office; but Jehoiakim could not bear his preaching, and
therefore slew him. Some explain the whole in the same manner, as though the
elders designed to shew that the wicked can gain nothing by resisting God’s
prophets, except that by contending they make themselves more and more guilty.
But others think that this part was brought forward by the opposite party, and the
words, “And also,” ‫,וגם‬ ugam, favor this opinion; for they may be taken
adversatively, as though they said, “But there was another Prophet, who did not
speak of the ruin of the city and of the destruction of the Temple with impunity.”
And this opinion seems to be confirmed by what follows in the last verse of the
chapter, Nevertheless the hand of Ahikam, etc.; the particle ‫,אך‬ ak, is properly
nevertheless; but it means sometimes, at least, or only. But in this place, as I shall
shew again presently, it retains, I think, its proper meaning; for the Prophet
declares, that though he was in great danger, yet Ahikam fought so bravely for him,
that at length he gained his cause.
But as to the present passage, both expositions may be admitted; that is, either that
the malignants adduced the death of Uriah in order to overwhelm Jeremiah, — or
that God’s faithful followers intended to shew that there was no reason of acting in
this manner, for the state of things had become worse, since King Jehoiakim had
cruelly slain God’s servant.
But the time ought especially to be noticed. We have seen that this prophecy was
committed to Jeremiah, and also promulgated at the beginning of Jehoiakim’s
reign; but this beginning is not to be confined either to the first or second year; but
as he became tributary to the king of Babylon, he afterwards endeavored to throw
off the yoke and was at length disgracefully dethroned; hence the beginning of his
reign must be during the time that his power was entire. While then Jehoiakim
retained his dignity, Jeremiah was bidden to proclaim this message. However this
may have been, the King Jehoiakim thus enjoyed a tranquil reign; he was at
Jerusalem. It is not therefore said here, that Uriah had threatened the city in his
days; but the history is given as of a present thing. One thing then is evident, that
this discourse was delivered, when King Jehoiakim was not afar off. His palace was
nigh the Temple; his counsellors were present who had come down, as we have seen,
on account of the tumult. For the affair could not be hidden; since the priests and
the false prophets everywhere inflamed the rage of the people. The king’s
counsellors therefore came to quell the disturbances. If this part of the address is to
be ascribed to the defenders of Jeremiah, then they must have been endued with
great courage and firmness, to allege against the king a nefarious murder, and also
to condemn him for a sacrilege, for he had not only done an injury to a holy
Prophet, but had directly opposed God himself. There are on both sides probable
89

90. conjectures; for if we follow this opinion, that the servants of God, who favored
Jeremiah and sought to deliver him from danger, spoke these words, it might be
objected and said, that no such thing is expressed But the narrative goes on
continuously, And there was also a man, etc. Now when different persons speak and
oppose one another, it is usual to mark the change. It seems then that the whole is to
be read connectedly, so that they who first adduced the example of Micah, then
added on the other hand, that Uriah indeed suffered punishment, but that thus a
crime was added to a crime, so that Jehoiakim gained nothing by furiously
persecuting God’s Prophet. And that they did not speak of the consequences, ought
not to appear strange, for the condition of the city and of the people was known to
all, and a more grievous danger was nigh at hand. Hence a simple narrative might
well have been given by them; and as they did not dare to exasperate the mind of the
king, it was the more necessary to leave that part untouched.
But if the other view be more approved, that the enemies of Jeremiah did here rise
against him, and alleged the case of Uriah, there is also some appearance of reason
in its favor; the king was living, his counsellors were present, as we have said. It
might then be, that those who wished the death of Jeremiah, referred to this recent
example in order to have him destroyed, — “Why should he escape, since Uriah was
lately put to death, for the cause is exactly the same? Uriah did not go any farther
than Jeremiah; he seems indeed to have taken the words from his mouth. As, then,
the king did slay him, why should Jeremiah be spared? Why should he escape the
punishment the other underwent, when his crime is more grievous?” It hence
appears that this view can without absurdity be defended, that is, that the enemies
of Jeremiah endeavored to aggravate his case by referring to the punishment the
king inflicted on Uriah, whose case was not dissimilar; and I do not reject this view.
If any approve of the other, that this part was spoken by the advocates of Jeremiah,
I readily allow it; but I dare not yet reject wholly the idea, that Jeremiah was loaded
with prejudice by having the case of Uriah brought forward, who was killed by the
king for having prophesied against the city and the Temple. (174)
Let us now consider the words; There was also a man who prophesied in the name
of Jehovah, etc. If we receive the opinion of those who think that Jeremiah’s enemies
speak here, then the name of Jehovah is to be taken for a false pretense, as though
they had said, “It is a very common thing to pretend the name of God; for every one
who claims to himself the office of teaching, boasts that he is sent from above, and
that what he speaks has been committed to him by God.” Thus they indirectly
condemned Jeremiah; for it was not enough for him to pretend God’s name, as
Uriah, of whom they spoke, had also professed most loudly that he was God’s
prophet, that he brought nothing as his own, and that he had a sure call. But if this
part is to be ascribed to God’s true worshippers, whose object it was to protect and
defend Jeremiah, to speak in the name of Jehovah, as we said yesterday, was not
only to glory on account of the prophetic office, but also to give evidence of
faithfulness and of integrity, so as really and by the effect to prove that he was
God’s prophet, such as he wished to be thought.
90

91. They then added, he prophesied against this city and against this land according to
all the words of Jeremiah If the adversaries of Jeremiah were the speakers, we see
that he was so overpowered, that it was afterwards superfluous to know anything
more of his cause; for another had already been condemned, whose case was in no
way dissimilar or different; “He spoke according to the words of Jeremiah, and he
was condemned, why then should we now hesitate respecting Jeremiah?” We see
how malignantly they turned against Jeremiah this example, as though he was
condemned beforehand in the person of another. But if these were the words of the
godly, they are to be accounted for in another way; what is intimated is, that if
Jeremiah was slain, God’s vengeance would be provoked; for it was more than
enough to shed the innocent blood of one Prophet.
But what appears most consistent with the whole passage is the view given by
Venema; he considers that the 17th verse (Jeremiah 26:17) has been removed from
its place between the 19th and the 20th (Jeremiah 26:19), and that the “princes”
mentioned the case of Micah in favor of Jeremiah, and that “the elders of the land”
adduced the case of Uriah against him, and that notwithstanding this it is at last
added, that Ahikam, one of the princes, succeeded in his deliverance. That chapters
have been transposed in this book is indubitable; the same thing may also have
happened as to verses.
Then the passage would read thus, —
16.Then said the princes and all the people to the priests and to the prophets,
“Against this man there is no judgment of death, for in
18.the name of Jehovah hath he spoken to (or against) us. Micah the Morasthite was
a prophet in the days of Hezekiah, the king of Judah, and he spoke to all the people
of Judah, saying, ‘Thus saith Jehovah of hosts, Sion, being a field, shall be plowed,
and Jerusalem shall become heaps, and the mountain of the house like the heights of
19.a forest.’ Slaying, did Hezekiah, the king of Judah, and all Judah, slay him? did
he not fear Jehovah and intreat the favor of Jehovah? then Jehovah repented as to
the evil which he had pronounced against them; but we are doing a great evil
against our own souls.”
17.Then rose up men from the elders of the land and spoke to the
20.whole assembly of the people, saying, “But there was also a man, who prophesied
in the name of Jehovah, Uriah, the son of Shemaiah,” etc. etc.
This arrangement makes the whole narrative plain, regular, and consistent. The
conclusion comes in naturally, that notwithstanding the adverse speech of the
“elders” Jeremiah was saved by the influence of Ahikam, one of the princes. — Ed.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:20 And there was also a man that prophesied in the name of
91

92. the LORD, Urijah the son of Shemaiah of Kirjathjearim, who prophesied against
this city and against this land according to all the words of Jeremiah:
Ver. 20. And there was also a man.] This seemeth to be the plea of the adverse party,
producing an example opposite to the former, and showing what the way was now,
whatever it had been heretofore. New lords, new laws.
According to all the words of Jeremiah.] Whose contemporary he was, and his
memory was yet fresh bleeding.
COFFMAN, "ARREST AND EXECUTION OF URIAH
"And there was also a man that prophesied in the name of Jehovah, Uriah the son of
Shemaiah of Kiriath-jearim: and he prophesied against this city and against this
land according to all the words of Jeremiah. And when Jehoiachim the king, with all
his mighty men, and all the princes heard his words, the king sought to put him to
death; but when Uriah heard it, he was afraid, and fled, and went into Egypt. And
Jehoiachim the king sent men into Egypt, namely, Elnathan the son of Achbor, and
certain men with him, into Egypt; and they fetched forth Uriah out of Egypt, and
brought him unto Jehoiachim the king, who slew him with the sword, and cast his
dead body into the graves of the common people."
"Uriah ..." (Jeremiah 26:20). This prophet's name is spelled Urijah in the older
versions. Why did not God spare his life also? We do not know; but it could have
been because of his fear, and his flight into Egypt, from which place he would no
longer be able to prophesy against Judah as God had commanded him.
It is clear enough, as Graybill stated it, that, "This account of how Jehoiachim
vented his spleen upon a lesser adversary suggests his intense hatred of Jeremiah,
and gives us reason to believe that he was behind Jeremiah's persecution here."[12]
"Elnathan ..." (Jeremiah 26:22). This man was probably the king's father-in-law (2
Kings 24:8), making the delegation to extradite Uriah from Egypt an impressive
one. The circumstance that favored the success of their mission derived from the
fact that Jehoiachim himself was a vassal of the king of Egypt and thus was likely to
have enjoyed the advantage of the right to extradite wanted persons from Egypt.
"Uriah ..." (Jeremiah 26:23). Nothing is known of this individual except what is
revealed in this tragic account of his death. "Kiriath-jearim, with which Uriah's
name was connected, was located nine miles west of Jerusalem on the road to Jaffa.
The ark of the covenant was once deposited there for a period of twenty years."[13]
"The graves of the common people ..." (Jeremiah 26:23). The king Jehoiachim
dishonored the corpse of Uriah by denying it the honor due to the bodies of true
prophets in order to keep the people from regarding him as a true prophet. "The
prophets had a separate cemetery, as indicated in Matthew 23:29."[14] Jehoiachim
92

93. was busy doing those things that would earn for him "the burial of an ass."
(Jeremiah 22:19).
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:20. There was also a man—Urijah— The discourse of the
elders being finished, a history of those times is here added, and, as many think, by
Jeremiah; hence it was plain in how great danger he was under a wicked king.
Others think that this example of Urijah was produced by the enemies of Jeremiah,
to counteract what was said in his favour from the example of Micah. See
Houbigant and Calmet.
PETT, "Verses 20-24
The Case Of Uriah, The Son Of Shemaiah, Another Faithful Prophet (Jeremiah
26:20-24).
It is quite clear that this was not a part of the defence put forward by the elders, for
it presents the opposite picture to that of Micah, and seeks a different verdict. In the
case of Uriah, the king and his courtiers did not hear and repent, they remorselessly
hunted him down. It may thus be that this was the counter-argument put forward
by Jeremiah’s opponents, countering the argument of the elders. However, as
Jeremiah’s trial appears to have occurred at the beginning of Jehoiakim’s reign it is
probable that the incident with respect to Uriah had not yet happened. And so
alternately we may see this simply as an example introduced by the writer
paralleling Jeremiah’s own case and illustrating the danger that he was in, for that
also happened during the reign of Jehoiakim. It may thus be seen as basically
passing judgment on Jehoiakim who had behaved in a way which was so unlike
Hezekiah. It illustrates therefore the very real danger that Jeremiah was in, but also
the fact that Jeremiah was not ‘alone among the prophets’ in his ministry. There
were other men of God who stood with him.
Jeremiah 26:20
“And there was also a man who prophesied in the name of YHWH, Uriah the son of
Shemaiah of Kiriath-jearim; and he prophesied against this city and against this
land according to all the words of Jeremiah,”
Uriah had, in the Name of YHWH, prophesied in precisely the same way as
Jeremiah. he too had prophesied ‘against the city and against the land’. ‘According
to all the words of Jeremiah’ may simply indicate similarity of message, or it may be
an indication that he obtained much of his message from Jeremiah and his
prophecies. Uriah is otherwise unknown but came from Kiriath-jearim which was a
priestly city on the Benjamin-Judah border and had previously been a chief city of
the Gibeonites in the days of Joshua. It is one of the comparatively few sites that
have been definitely identified without doubt.
93

94. 21 When King Jehoiakim and all his officers and
officials heard his words, the king was determined
to put him to death. But Uriah heard of it and fled
in fear to Egypt.
BARNES, "His mighty men - The commanders of his army; the princes are the
civil officers.
GILL, "And when Jehoiakim the king, with all his mighty men,.... Either his
courtiers, or his soldiers, or both:
and all the princes, heard his words; the words of the Prophet Urijah; not with
their own ears very probably, but from the report of others:
the king sought to put him to death; as being a messenger of bad tidings, tending to
dispirit his subjects, and allay the joy of his own mind upon his advancement to the
throne:
but when Urijah heard it, he was afraid, and fled, and went into Egypt; which
some understand as a piece of prudence in him; but rather it was the effect of
pusillanimity and cowardice: it seems to show want of faith and confidence in the Lord;
and the fear of man, which brings a snare; and besides, it was no piece of prudence to go
to Egypt, whatever it was to flee; since there was such an alliance between the kings of
Egypt and Judah; and the latter, though dependent on the former, yet the king of Egypt
would easily gratify him in delivering up a subject of his, and a person of such a
character.
CALVIN, "It then follows, And when, Jehoiakim the king, and all his mighty men
and the princes, heard his words, etc. This verse seems to favor the opinion of those
who conclude that godly men were the speakers; for they spoke dishonorably of the
king and his counsellors; the king heard and his mighty men, (powerful men,
literally,) and also all the princes; and the king sought to slay him These words,
however, may also be ascribed to the ungodly and the wicked, for they wished to
terrify the common people by first mentioning the king and then the mighty men
and the princes. And to seek to kill him, might also have been excused, even that the
king could not bear such a reproach without revenging it; for he saw that the
Prophet had taken such a liberty as not, to spare the holy city nor the Temple: The
94

95. king then heard, and his mighty men and princes; and then, the king sought to slay
him
But when Uriah heard it, he feared and fled This passage teaches us that even the
faithful servants of God, who strive honestly to fulfill their office, are yet not always
so courageous as boldly to despise all dangers; for it is said that the Prophet feared;
but he was not on this account condemned. This fear was not indeed blameless; but
his fear was such, that he yet continued in his vocation. He might indeed have
pleased the king, but he dreaded such perfidy more than death. He, therefore, so
feared, that he turned not aside from the right course, nor denied the truth., nor
admitted anything unworthy of his dignity or of the character he sustained. His fear
then, though wrong, did not yet so possess the Prophet, but that he was ever faithful
to God in his vocation. It then follows, that he went into Egypt We hence conclude,
that the king’s wrath and cruelty were so great, that the holy man could not find a
corner to hide himself in through the whole land of Judea, nor even in other regions
around. He was therefore forced to seek a hiding place in Egypt.
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:21 And when Jehoiakim the king, with all his mighty men,
and all the princes, heard his words, the king sought to put him to death: but when
Urijah heard it, he was afraid, and fled, and went into Egypt;
Ver. 21. And when Jehoiakim.] This tiger laid hold with his teeth on all the excellent
spirits of the times. See Jeremiah 36:26.
He was afraid, and fled.] Not out of timorousness, but prudence. Tertullian was too
rigid in condemning all kinds of flight in times of persecution. God hath not made
his people as standing buttmarks to be shot at, &c. See Matthew 10:23.
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:21
“And when Jehoiakim the king, with all his mighty-men, and all the princes, heard
his words, the king sought to put him to death, but when Uriah heard it, he was
afraid, and fled, and went to Egypt,”
Uriah’s words had especially upset Judah’s fighting arm (if we take ‘mighty men’ as
soldiers) or Judah’s rich aristocracy (if we take ‘mighty men’ as signifying men of
great wealth). Both alternatives would have seen their positions as undermined by
Uriah’s words. And the result was that they had sought to put him to death, at
which Uriah had, in alarm, fled to Egypt (just as Jeremiah himself would at one
stage go into hiding - Jeremiah 36:26).
PULPIT, "His mighty men. The "mighty men" (gibborim) are not mentioned again
in Jeremiah, and the Septuagint omits the word. But it is clear from Isaiah 3:2 that
the "mighty men" were recognized as an important part of the community. From 1
Chronicles 10:10 it appears that the term indicates a position of high command in
the army, which is in accordance with the notice in 2 Kings 24:16. Went into Egypt.
95

96. Egypt was the natural refuge for a native of Palestine, just as Palestine was for a
native of Egypt. The latter, however, proved to be not a safe asylum for Urijah, as
Pharaoh was the liege lord of Jehoiakim (2 Kings 23:34), and the extradition of
Urijah as a criminal naturally followed.
22 King Jehoiakim, however, sent Elnathan son of
Akbor to Egypt, along with some other men.
BARNES, "Elnathan - Possibly the king’s father-in-law 2Ki_24:8.
GILL, "And Jehoiakim sent men into Egypt,.... To seek for him; and to require the
delivery of him upon being found:
namely, Elnathan the son of Achbor; the father of this man very probably is the
same we read of in Josiah's time, 2Ki_22:12; who is called Abdon in 2Ch_34:20;
and certain men with him, into Egypt; to assist him in taking him, whose names
are not mentioned; Elnathan's is, as being the principal, and to fix an eternal infamy
upon him.
JAMISON, "Jehoiakim sent ... into Egypt — He had been put on the throne by
Pharaoh of Egypt (2Ki_23:34). This explains the readiness with which he got the
Egyptians to give up Urijah to him, when that prophet had sought an asylum in Egypt.
Urijah was faithful in delivering his message, but faulty in leaving his work, so God
permitted him to lose his life, while Jeremiah was protected in danger. The path of duty
is often the path of safety.
CALVIN, "It is afterwards added that the king sent men, even Elnathan, the chief
of the legation, with others. (175) There is no doubt but that Jehoiakim sent to the
king of Egypt and complained that a turbulent man had fled, and that he asked him
to deliver him up as a fugitive. So then he was brought back, not through power, but
through a nefarious compact, for he was betrayed by the king of Egypt.
It is singular that in one MS. the word ‫,מרגלים‬ searchers, spies, is found instead of
‫,מצרים‬ rendered often Egypt, though it comes from a root which means to bind close,
to environ, to beset; and so as a hyphil participle it would be besetters, or
catchers — in modern language, bumbailiffs, which is a corruption for bound
bailiffs. This meaning would exactly suit the passage, “Then the king Jehoiakim sent
men, catchers, with Elnathan the son of Achbor, even these men with him into
96

97. Egypt.” — Ed
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:22
“And Jehoiakim the king sent men to Egypt, namely, Elnathan the son of Achbor,
and certain men with him, to Egypt, and they fetched forth Uriah out of Egypt, and
brought him to Jehoiakim the king, who slew him with the sword, and cast his dead
body into the graves of the common people.”
But he had not been safe there, because Jehoiakim was a vassal of Egypt, and sent
his men there to obtain Uriah’s extradition. And they brought Uriah to the king who
had him executed and then buried ‘among the common people’ that is in the
graveyard where the poor were buried (2 Kings 23:6) in unmarked graves. He was
determined that Uriah would not be remembered. (It is of interest to note that
Jehoiakim himself would subsequently suffer worse ignominy on his death -
Jeremiah 22:18-19).
Elnathan may have been Jehoiakim’s father-in-law (2 Kings 24:8). He was one of
the princes who had listened to Jeremiah’s scroll being read and had responded
from his heart, seeking to dissuade Jehoiakim from burning it (Jeremiah 36:12. ff).
23 They brought Uriah out of Egypt and took him
to King Jehoiakim, who had him struck down
with a sword and his body thrown into the burial
place of the common people.)
BARNES, "Out of Egypt - As Jehoiakim was a vassal of Egypt, he would easily
obtain the surrender of a man accused of treason.
GILL, "And they fetched forth Urijah out of Egypt,.... Having found him, they
seized him, and brought him away, with the leave of the king of Egypt: which, no doubt,
was easily obtained:
and brought him to Jehoiakim the king, who slew him with the sword; very
probably with his own hand; or however it was done by his order, and in his presence,
most likely:
97

98. and cast his dead body into the graves of the common people; either where
they were buried in heaps promiscuously, as some think; or in the common burying
ground; and not where persons of distinction were laid, as prophets, and others (g); this
he did to reflect dishonour upon the prophet.
JAMISON, "graves of the common people — literally, “sons of the people”
(compare 2Ki_23:6). The prophets seem to have had a separate cemetery (Mat_23:29).
Urijah’s corpse was denied this honor, in order that he should not be regarded as a true
prophet.
CALVIN, "It is at length added, that they led up Uriah from Egypt, and brought
him to King Jehoiakim, who slew him with the sword, and cast his dead body into
the graves of the common people, by way of dishonor; for Jeremiah here calls them
the graves of the common people, as we in French call shambles des charniers. The
rich are honorably and splendidly buried at this day, and every one has his own
grave; but when there is a vast number, the bodies are thrown together, for it would
be too expensive to dig a grave for each. It seems also that there was such a practice
in Judea, and that God’s Prophet was buried in this ignominious manner.
Thus they who spoke intimated that the king’s wrath so burned, that he not only put
him to death, but followed up his vengeance, so that a new disgrace awaited the
Prophet, even when dead, for he was cast among the obscure and ignoble common
people.
I have hitherto so explained this passage as to leave it doubtful whether the
probability is that the speakers were Jeremiah’s enemies or his advocates. And
though, as I have declared twice or three times, I reject not the view which is
different from that which I embrace, yet it seems most probable to me that the
words were spoken by the godly men who defended the cause of Jeremiah. All the
various reasons which lead me to this conclusion I will not here specify; for every
one may himself see why I prefer this view. The common consent of almost all
interpreters also influences me, from which I wish not to depart, except necessity
compels me, or the thing itself makes it evident that they were mistaken. But we
have seen from the beginning, that the two examples consecutively follow one
another, and that nothing intervenes; it may hence be supposed, that the enemies of
Jeremiah had previously performed their part. The words themselves then shew
that those who commenced the discourse were those who carried it on. And that
they did not mention the reason why they adduced this example is not to be
wondered at; for the displeasure of the king was feared, and he had given no
common proof, in his treatment of the holy Prophet, how impatiently he bore
anything that trenched on his own dignity. They therefore cautiously related the
matter, and left what they did not express to be collected by those who heard them.
But it was easy from their words to know what they meant, — that God’s vengeance
was to be dreaded; for one Prophet had been slain; what if there was to be no end to
cruelty? would not God at length arise to execute judgment when his servants were
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99. so unworthily treated? As, then, the words are not completed, it seems probable to
me that God’s true servants spoke thus reservedly and cautiously, because they
dared not to express their thoughts openly.
Further, these words, the king sought to slay him, and the king sent men, etc. , are
more suitable when considered as spoken by the defenders of Jeremiah than by the
ungodly and the wicked; and they also named Elnathan, that they might hand down
his name with infamy to future ages. And they lastly added that the Prophet was
brought up from Egypt What was very shameful seems certainly to be set here
before us, that he was forcibly brought back from that land to which he had fled for
an asylum, and also that he was brought to the king, that he smote him with the
sword, that is, cruelly killed him; and further, that being not satisfied with this
barbarous act, he caused him to be ignominiously buried. All these particulars, as I
have said, seem to shew that these words may be more suitably applied to the holy
men who defended the cause of Jeremiah than to his enemies. It now follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:23 And they fetched forth Urijah out of Egypt, and brought
him unto Jehoiakim the king; who slew him with the sword, and cast his dead body
into the graves of the common people.
Ver. 23. And they set forth Uriah out of Egypt.] As they did here Sir John Cheek out
of the Low Countries, and frightened him into a recantation. Not so this Uriah.
And they set forth Uriah out of Egypt.] En collusio principum mundi in parricidio.
Who slew him with the sword.] Without all law, right, or reason. So John Baptist
was murdered, as if God had been nothing aware of him, said that martyr. But
Jehoiakim got as little by this as he did afterwards by burning Jeremiah’s book; or
as Vespasian afterwards did by banishing all the philosophers of his time, because
they spake boldly against his vices and tyranny.
24 Furthermore, Ahikam son of Shaphan
supported Jeremiah, and so he was not handed
over to the people to be put to death.
BARNES, "Ahikam - See the marginal reference. His son Gemariah lent Jeremiah
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100. his room for the public reading of Jehoiakim’s scroll, and another son Gedaliah was
made governor of the land by the Chaldaeans Jer_39:14; the family probably shared the
political views of Jeremiah.
CLARKE, "The hand of Ahikam - was with Jeremiah - And it was probably by
his influence that Jeremiah did not share the same fate with Urijah. The Ahikam
mentioned here was probably the father of Gedaliah, who, after the capture of
Jerusalem, was appointed governor of the country by Nebuchadnezzar, Jer_40:5. Of the
Prophet Urijah, whether he was true or false, we know nothing but what we learn from
this place.
That they should not give him into the hand of the people - Though acquitted
in the supreme court, he was not out of danger; there was a popular prejudice against
him, and it is likely that Ahikam was obliged to conceal him, that they might not put him
to death. The genuine ministers of God have no favor to expect from those who are His
enemies.
GILL, "Nevertheless, the hand of Ahikam the son of Shaphan was with
Jeremiah,.... Though this instance was urged as a precedent to go by, being lately done;
or though the king's cruelty had been so lately exercised in such a manner; yet this man,
who had been one of Josiah's courtiers and counsellors, 2Ki_22:12; stood by Jeremiah,
and used all his power, authority, and influence, in his favour:
that they should not give him into the hand of the people, to put him to
death; that the sanhedrim should not; who, by the last precedent mentioned, might
seem inclined to it; but this great man, having several brothers, as well as other friends,
that paid a regard to his arguments and solicitations; he prevailed upon them not to give
leave to the people to put him to death, who appear to have been very fickle and
mutable; at first they joined with the priests and false prophets against Jeremiah, to
accuse him; but upon the judgment and vote of the princes, on hearing the cause, they
changed their sentiments, and were for the prophet against the priests; and now, very
probably, upon the instance of Urijah being given as a precedent, they altered their
minds again, and were for putting him to death, could they have obtained leave of the
court; and which only Ahikam's interest prevented.
JAMISON, "Ahikam — son of Shaphan the scribe, or royal secretary. He was one of
those whom King Josiah, when struck by the words of the book of the law, sent to
inquire of the Lord (2Ki_22:12, 2Ki_22:14). Hence his interference here in behalf of
Jeremiah is what we should expect from his past association with that good king. His
son, Gedaliah, followed in his father’s steps, so that he was chosen by the Babylonians as
the one to whom they committed Jeremiah for safety after taking Jerusalem, and on
whose loyalty they could depend in setting him over the remnant of the people in Judea
(Jer_39:14; 2Ki_25:22).
people to put him to death — Princes often, when they want to destroy a good
man, prefer it to be done by a popular tumult rather than by their own order, so as to
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101. reap the fruit of the crime without odium to themselves (Mat_27:20).
K&D, "The narrative closes with a remark as to how, amid such hostility against the
prophets of God on the part of king and people, Jeremiah escaped death. This was
because the hand of Ahikam the son of Shaphan was with him. This person is named in
2Ki_22:12, 2Ki_22:14, as one of the great men sent by King Josiah to the prophetess
Hulda to inquire of her concerning the book of the law recently discovered. According to
Jer_39:14; Jer_40:5, etc., he was the father of the future Chaldean governor Gedaliah.
CALVIN, "There is here an adversative particle, and not without reason; for the
contention is pointed out which had so raged that it became difficult to extricate the
holy Prophet from danger. We hence conclude that Jeremiah was in so much peril
that it was with great and arduous effort that Ahikam saved him. There is a
frequent mention of this man in sacred history, and his name will hereafter be found
in several places, and he was left to govern the remnant of the people after the
demolition of the city. (2 Kings 25:22; Jeremiah 39:14.) (176) And there is no doubt
but that he made progress in religion and was an upright man, and that his virtues
were so valued by Nebuchadnezzar that he bestowed on him such an honor. He was
soon afterwards slain by the ungodly and the wicked; but there is nothing related of
him but what is honorable to him. It was indeed an extraordinary act of courage
that he dared to oppose the fury of the whole people, and to check the priests and
the false prophets who had conspired to put the holy man to death.
This is the reason why it is in the last place added, that the hand of Ahikam was
with Jeremiah; though the people were furious, and the priests would by no means
be restrained from persecuting the holy man, yet Ahikam could not be turned from
his holy purpose, but persevered to defend a good cause until Jeremiah escaped in
safety. It is hence said, that his hand was with Jeremiah; for by hand in Scripture is
meant effort, (conatus;) for where there is anything to be done, or any difficulty, the
Scripture uses the word hand But as Ahikam exerted himself to the uttermost, not
only in aiding the holy Prophet by his words, but also in repressing the fury of the
people, and in boldly resisting the priests and the false prophets, the hand in this
place means aid; his hand was with Jeremiah, that is, he aided or helped him, so
that he was not delivered up into the hand of the people
It hence also appears, as we said yesterday, that the tumult of the people was not
immediately allayed, for the false prophets and the priests had so roused their
virulence that they became almost implacable. Here, then, is set before us an
example of courage and perseverance; for it is not enough for us to defend a good
cause when we may do so with safety, except we also disregard all ill-will and
despise all dangers, and resist the fury of the wicked, and undergo contentions and
dangers for God’s servants whenever necessary. We are also taught at the same time
how much weight belongs to the influence of one man when he boldly defends a
good cause and yields not to the madness of the wicked, but risks extremities rather
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102. than betray the truth of God and his ministers. Now follows, —
TRAPP, "Jeremiah 26:24 Nevertheless the hand of Ahikam the son of Shaphan was
with Jeremiah, that they should not give him into the hand of the people to put him
to death.
Ver. 24. Nevertheless the hand of Ahikam.] Who had been one of Josiah’s
counsellors. [2 Kings 22:12] By this man’s authority and help Jeremiah was
delivered, and God rewarded him in his son Gedaliah, made governor of the land. [2
Kings 25:22]
COFFMAN, ""But the hand of Ahikam the son of Shaphan was with Jeremiah, that
they should not give him into the hand of the people to put him to death."
This powerful citizen protected Jeremiah and refused to turn him over to the king
and his followers, knowing full well what the results would have been if he had done
so. He was indeed a powerful man in that period of Jewish history. His son Gedaliah
later become governor of Judah; and "He is mentioned again in circumstances that
reflect great credit upon him and his religion in 2 Kings 22:12-14."[15] What a
wonderful service he provided here for the true faith by his faithful protection of the
true prophet Jeremiah!
PETT, "Jeremiah 26:24
‘But the hand of Ahikam the son of Shaphan was with Jeremiah, that they should
not give him into the hand of the people to put him to death.’
In contrast Jeremiah was protected from the king’s wrath and the wrath of the
people as a result of the activity of Ahikam the son of Shaphan. He was clearly
someone in high authority who took Jeremiah’s side and arranged for his
protection. God often has His representatives in high places. He was one of the five
who, as a young man, went with his father to Huldah the prophetess on behalf of
Josiah when the law book was found in the Temple (2 Kings 22:12). He was also the
father of Gedaliah who would later become governor of Judah after Jerusalem was
destroyed.
PULPIT, "Nevertheless the hand of Ahi-kant, etc.; i.e. in spite of the prepossession
against prophets like Jeremiah which this incident reveals, Ahikam threw all his
influence into the scale of toleration.' The same Ahikam is mentioned in
circumstances which reflect credit on his religion in 2 Kings 22:12-14. One of his
sons, Gemariah, lent Baruch his official room for the reading of the prophecies of
Jeremiah (Jeremiah 36:10); another was the well-known Gedaliah, who became
governor of Judah after the fall of Jerusalem, and who was himself friendly to
Jeremiah (Jeremiah 39:14; Jeremiah 40:5).
COKE, "Jeremiah 26:24. Ahikam— Ahikam was an ancient prince of Judah, who
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103. bore a considerable employment under Josiah. Compare 2 Kings 22:12-14. Gedaliah
was his son; see 2 Kings 25:22 who, as well as his father, had a great regard for
Jeremiah. See ch. Jeremiah 39:14, Jeremiah 40:5.
REFLECTIONS.—1st, They who would be faithful to God in the discharge of their
ministry, must set their faces like a flint, and be above the fear of man.
1. Jeremiah is sent into the courts of the Lord's house, where, on one of their solemn
feasts, the people of the land were assembled out of the cities of Judah, and there, in
the midst of that great congregation, he must deliver his message; and lest their
greatness, their multitude, or their known enmity against such faithful warnings,
might daunt his courage, or warp him to palliate the severity of the threatening, he
is charged not to diminish a word. When we speak for God, we must neither be
afraid nor ashamed to declare his whole counsel, and resolutely abide by the
consequences.
2. The purport of his discourse is, to advise them of the danger of their sins, and the
purpose of God to punish them; to exhort them to a speedy and unfeigned
repentance; to assure them that then God would turn away his anger from them;
but that if they persisted in their impenitence, disobedience to his holy law, and
disregard of his divinely appointed ministers, the consequences would be inevitably
fatal, and their ruin ensue; Jerusalem with the temple, like Shiloh and the
tabernacle there pitched of old, would be given into the hands of her enemies, and
her judgment be so terrible, that it should be the deepest imprecation to say, The
Lord make thee like Jerusalem! Now nothing here could give reasonable offence.
God graciously waited; he offered mercifully to receive them; they had only to
return to him, and then the message breathed nothing but peace and pardon: but
they, who resolved to persist in their iniquities, could not bear to be told of the issue
of them. Note; (1.) There is nothing in the most terrible denunciations of wrath to
quarrel with, especially when the gracious God previously condescends to make
known to us these terrors, in order to lead us to pardon and everlasting peace. But,
(2.) If men will not be warned, they must be damned.
2nd, The plainest and most reasonable admonitions, delivered with the tenderest
affection, and urged with the most solemn weight of God's authority, have no effect
upon the hardened sinner, but to exasperate his corruptions.
1. Jeremiah is arrested for his preaching, and dragged before the magistrates, that
he may be condemned and executed. The ungodly priests and false prophets, who in
all ages and places have been the bitterest enemies and persecutors of the pious,
arose, exasperated at what they heard, and the people, at their instigation, readily
followed them; they seize the poor prophet, and threaten him with immediate death,
either in the rage of pretended zeal, or by form of law. The charge against him is for
falsehood, and blasphemous words spoken against that holy place, because in the
name of the Lord he had said, this house shall be like Shiloh, and this city shall be
desolate without an inhabitant. Such an uproar raised a vast tumult, and all the
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104. people ran together; the tidings of which soon brought up the princes from the
king's house into the temple, and before them, as judges, the criminal is produced,
at the entry of the new gate of the Lord's house, where they sat to hear the cause.
The false prophets and priests, whose hand was ever first in the transgression of
opposing the ministers of truth, stand forth to accuse him, not doubting but to gain
a verdict in their favour, appealing for the truth of their charge to all the people
who had heard Jeremiah's discourse, and demanding judgment against him as most
worthy to die. Note; They who will be zealous for God must sometimes put their
lives in their hand. How often since this have the true preachers of Christ been in
danger by tumultuous mobs, instigated by apostate priests!
2. Jeremiah vindicates himself from the charge, not by denying it, but by
maintaining the truth of what he had spoken. The words were not his own. God had
sent him, and how could he then be silent? Besides, the threatenings only affected
the impenitent. So far therefore from desisting, he urges the admonition that he had
given; Therefore now amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of the
Lord your God, who yet did not disclaim the relation, and was ready instantly, on
their repentance, to reverse the threatenings issued against them. What was urged
with so kind an intention surely deserved not punishment, but praise. However, he
submits to whatever sentence they thought fit to pronounce, but warns them of the
danger of shedding the blood of an innocent man, which would cry for vengeance;
and the still more atrocious guilt of slaying a prophet solely for delivering the words
which of a truth the Lord had sent him to speak, who would not fail condignly to
avenge such a flagrant insult upon himself, as well as such cruel injustice done to his
servant. Note; (1.) To preach boldly, and suffer patiently for well-doing, is the true
spirit of a Christian minister. (2.) We must abide by God's word, nor ever recede a
step, though the greatest loss and damage, yea, though death itself, threaten us for
our fidelity.
3rdly, God knoweth how to deliver his people out of temptation, and, when their
case appears most desperate, to rescue them from the jaws of the lion.
1. Jeremiah is acquitted, notwithstanding the malicious accusations of his enemies.
Such an evidence attended his defence, such a noble simplicity appeared in it, such
approved fidelity, and God himself put such an awe upon the princes and people,
that, though they strangely hardened their hearts against the admonition given, yet
they own God's authority, and dare not condemn the innocent prophet. Note; There
are many on whom the word of God hath so far an influence, as to extort their
assent to its truth, who nevertheless continue unhumbled in their sins.
2. Some of the court, from among the princes, and perhaps with Ahikam at their
head, rose up in the prophet's defence; and, as a precedent, quoted the case of
Micah, who a little before, in the days of Hezekiah, had prophesied as severe things
as ever Jeremiah had done; that Jerusalem should become heaps, the city plowed
like a field, and the temple utterly demolished; yet so far were Hezekiah and his
princes from condemning him to death for his fidelity, that they trembled at God's
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105. word, besought the Lord, repented of their evil deeds; and this was the lengthening
of their prosperity, God accepting their repentance, and withholding the threatened
judgments. And such conduct, they insinuate, in the present case, would be most fit
and becoming; whereas to act otherwise, in shedding innocent blood at the
instigation of exasperated priests, incensed at having their pride, hypocrisy, and
falsehood detected, would procure great evil against their souls, lay them under
heavy guilt, and expose them to God's awful vengeance. Note; (1.) The greatest men
shew their wisdom in hearing and obeying the admonitions of God. (2.) The
dreadful consequences of sin, if nothing else, should deter us from it; if we have little
sense of its evil and malignity, the fear of hell at least should restrain us.
3. Another instance is quoted of a prophet put to death in the present reign, which
some suppose to be a case in point urged by Jeremiah's persecutors in reply to the
former, and in order to obtain his condemnation. Others, that it is the continuation
of the same person's discourse, urging the guilt already brought upon the land by
the murder of one prophet; and that to increase it, by a repetition of the like crime,
could not but hasten their destruction. Others suppose that this anecdote was added
by Jeremiah himself, or whoever collected his prophesies, as an instance of God's
extraordinary interposition in the present case, when so lately, in the same reign,
another holy man, Urijah, met his fate in the discharge of his office; and for the very
same words which Jeremiah had spoken: provoked by his preaching, the king and
his nobles sought to slay him; and, to avoid it, the prophet either prudently
absconded, or rather timorously deserted his post; for men of real grace may at
times be overcome with fear; though usually little is to be got by flight, as in the
present case. Cowardice often exposes those to ruin whom courage might have
extricated from danger. The king sent after him to Egypt, whither he had fled, got
him delivered up as a state-criminal, and slew him, probably with his own hand, at
least commanded it to be done; and, to make the ignominy the greater, and his
prophesies the more disregarded, cast his dead body into the graves of the common
people.
4. Notwithstanding all the pleas of his accusers, Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, 2
Kings 22:12 a man who had lived under pious Josiah, a great man, yet a good man,
and the prophet's friend, stood by him, and prevailed upon the princes not to
deliver him into the hands of the enraged people, whom the priests had inflamed,
and were ready to murder him, as soon as they could obtain permission. Note; God
hath in his hands the hearts of all men, and can raise us up friends in the day of
trial, where we least expected to find them.
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