BOOK I i. The last paragraph is of the nature of an epilogue: it recurs in general substance (though very much varied in details) at the end of I. ii and IV. i. ii. This is the most elaborate of the literary compositions of Jeremiah. I have entitled it The Prophet's Manifesto: as containing his prophetic message in all its fulness. In form it is a rhapsody, or spiritual drama [compare the Isaiah volume, pages viii-xii]; but while all literary forms are fused together in a rhapsody, the form of discourse has greater preponderance in this than in other rhapsodies. The whole falls into seven sections. — 1. The first is made up wholly of God's pleadings with unfaithful Judah: artistically, it is made remarkable by a tour de force of imagery [see note below].—2. The second section holds up to Judah the example of Israel [that is, northern Israel: Jeremiah's usage of · Israel' applies it sometimes to the northern kingdom only, at other times to the chosen people as a whole, now represented by Judah alone]. The close of the section dramatically presents this backsliding Israel repentant and accepted. — 3. All the remaining sections are made up of the Divine word of remonstrance to Judah, and the judgment on Judah which with each section advances nearer. In this third section we have merely warnings: the Divine threats are in the future tense, and the scene dramatically presented is that of voices from a distance giving information of a coming foe, or panic terror at some unknown future. 4. We now have a description of total destruction, but it is in a vision only: between the fragments of the poet's vision God is applying the judgment to the erring people. -5. At the last moment there is such an arrest of judgment as Abraham obtained for Sodom, arrest conditional upon finding one just man: the prophet seeks in vain.-6. With the sixth section the command is given to the enemy to go up, but not make a full end: take away her branches. This moment's respite is used for fresh remonstrances from God. The panic of the people now suggests an enemy drawing nearer and nearer they have started at noon, by dusk they are just upon the city. Yet the last word of the section is a cry Be thou instructed.-7. In the last section all arrest of judgment is abandoned: the very remnant is to be gleaned, and the panicstruck people find the sword of the enemy in every way. The Epilogue is personal to the prophet: compare I. i and IV. i. - Page 10. For my people have committed two evils, etc. From this point there is a remarkable heaping together of the most widely sundered images, for the purpose of expressing the unfaithfulness or misery of the chosen people: cisterns (and broken cisterns) as contrasted with living fountains-the born slave as contrasted with the free son-destruction by the lions [of Egypt] - the trained beast breaking the yoke - the wife playing harlot on every green hill - the noble vine degenerated into wildness the vain washing with soap-the dromedary traversing her ways [flinging herself hither and thither in her heat as contrasted with going straight for her destination] -the wilderness ass refusing the tamer-the ass scenting after her mates [instead of waiting to be approached] — the rutting season. —Withhold thy foot from being unshod: cease bringing thyself into disgrace. As the voluntary removing of the shoe was a sign of reverence, so its forcible removal by others was the deepest disgrace: compare Deuteronomy, chapter xxv. 9. Page 12. I have found it at the place of breaking in: blood found in the close neighbourhood of a broken wall was understood as shed in resisting the thief. Compare Exodus, chapter xxii. 2. Page 15. But I said, How shall I put thee among the children? The Divine speaker goes back to the time of calling Israel as his chosen nation: the call was conditional. BOOK II iii. Discourse merging in rhapsodic dialogue: similarly iv and viii. The dialogue presents a vain repentance: a voice heard from the far land of captivity.— Is there no balm in Gilead? Compare VI. iii for the use of Gilead as a type of fertility. vi, vii. These are prophetic sentences,' or epigrams: short utterances, complete in themselves, and suitable for passing from mouth to mouth. Many of these would belong to the great floating literature of oral prophecy, and would be used by prophetic authors in connection with their own compositions. (Compare Isaiah volume, note on I. ii.) Hence the recurrence of the same sentence,' more or less varied, in different writings of the same or of different prophets. The first sentence on idolatry is worked up into more than one section of the Rhapsody of Zion Redeemed. Clusters of such sentences are found in connection with longer prophecies, just as in the Wisdom books, strings of isolated sayings separate longer essays. Compare Ecclesiasticus and Ecclesiastes volumes of this series. - He hath made the earth by his power, etc. This sentence recurs in the Doom of Babylon (above, page 204). There I have presented it as verse, here as prose: in each case the parallelism is made harmonious with the parallelism of the context. [For the principles of such arrangement see the Isaiah volume, pages 214-7.] BOOK III This group of discourses is unified by the idea of a Missionary Journey, to preach 'the Covenant' in the cities of Judah. It must be remembered that the discovery of the roll of the law in Josiah's reign took place some five years after the date of Jeremiah's call to the prophetic office. The Deuteronomic matter that was the whole or part of this newly discovered roll profoundly affected the devout of Israel, both immediately and ever afterwards. It is this Deuteronomic Covenant that Jeremiah sets out to preach. The sections of this third book put successively: i, the commission to preach the Covenant in the cities; ii, Judah's rejection of it; iii, the persecution of the preacher in his own city of Anathoth, with the reflections that this gives rise to; iv, sentences, epigrammatically conveying the hopeless state of the Lord's heritage; then (▼ and vi) the causes of this national unfaithfulness are found in the infection of surrounding idolatrous nations, and the general pride of people and rulers. Pages 53-4. Is mine heritage unto me as a speckled bird of prey? The idea is of a carrion bird sick herself, and other carrion birds waiting around to devour: the whole suggestive of corrupt Judah surrounded by corrupt idolatrous peoples. — Go ye, assemble all the beasts of the field: evidently the same sentence of floating prophecy (above, page 221) underlies this and Vision VI of Zion Redeemed (Isaiah volume, page 182). vi. Go to Euphrates. It seems to me an impossibility to understand this (as many commentators do) of the river Euphrates: such a journey is obviously incompatible with the Emblem prophecy described. Either there was some village so called near at hand; or else some less important name has been attracted into the well-known name of the great river. [Several places have been suggested, in which the change of letters or pointing would be slight.] BOOK IV i. A Rhapsody of the Drought. This portion of Jeremiah (chapters xiv and xv) is usually interpreted as a Dialogue of Intercession, with no speakers except God and the Prophet. No explanation of the chapters is entirely without difficulty; but the form adopted in the text seems to me the least difficult, |