Commentary on Jeremiah 5.67–6.12

[67] "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, concerning Ahab son of Kolaiah and Zedekiah son of Maaseiah, who prophesy a lie to you in my name: Behold, I will deliver them into the hand of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and he will strike them before your eyes. And a curse will be taken up from them by all the exiles of Judah who are in Babylon, saying: The Lord make you like Zedekiah and like Ahab, whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire; because they have done folly (or: iniquity) in Israel and committed adultery with the wives of their friends (or: fellow citizens), and spoken a lying word in my name, which I did not command them; I am the judge and witness, says the Lord." The Hebrews say that these are the elders who did folly in Israel and committed adultery with the wives of their fellow citizens, to one of whom Daniel says, "You old relic of wicked days," and to the other, "Offspring of Canaan and not of Judah, beauty has deceived you and lust has perverted your heart! Thus you used to do to the daughters of Israel, and they in fear consorted with you; but a daughter of Judah would not endure your wickedness." And what the prophet now says, "and they spoke a lying word in my name, which I did not command them," they think signifies that they so deceived wretched women, who are carried about by every wind of doctrine, as to tell them that, because they were of the tribe of Judah, the Christ was to be born of their seed; and the women, enticed by desire, offered their bodies as if they would be mothers of the Christ. But what is said here, "whom the king of Babylon roasted in the fire," seems to contradict the history of Daniel; for that says they were stoned by the people at Daniel's sentence, while here it is written that the king of Babylon roasted them in the fire. Hence by many, indeed almost all the Hebrews, that very story is not accepted, as if a fable, and is not read in their synagogues. "For how could it be," they say, "that captives had the power to stone their leaders and prophets?" And they rather affirm that what Jeremiah writes is true: that the elders were indeed convicted by Daniel, but the sentence was passed against them by the king of Babylon, who as victor and master had authority over the captives. How many in our flock too, like Ahab and Zedekiah, prophesy a lie in the name of the Lord, do folly in Israel, and commit adultery with the wives of their fellow citizens, who were born in the same city of the church! These the true Nebuchadnezzar will roast in the fire of sin, as the prophet Hosea says: "All adulterers are like an oven heated by the baker." Happy is he who takes up the yoke from his youth and sits alone, because he is filled with bitterness, and can say with David: "I have not sat in the council of the malicious, and with those who do wicked things I will not go in!" And what the prophet now adds, "I am the judge and witness, says the Lord," has this sense: "What I say about the two false prophets, who speak a lying word in my name, which I did not command them, I have by no means learned by hearsay, but I myself know to be true, from whom no one can hide nor escape the truth of my judgment."

[68] "And to Shemaiah the Nehelamite you shall say"; and what follows, "Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel: Because you have sent in your own name letters to all the people who are in Jerusalem," is not in the Seventy; and again they added of their own, "I did not send you in my name," and consequently in order: "and to Zephaniah son of Maaseiah, the priest," and again from the Hebrew, "and to all the priests"; and then the history is woven on: "The Lord has made you priest in place of Jehoiada the priest, to be overseer (or: leader and bishop) in the house of the Lord over every madman who prophesies, to put him in the stocks and in prison (or: in custody and in the cataract," which Symmachus calls mochlon, and Aquila put the Hebrew word itself, sinac). "And now why have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth, who prophesies to you? For he has sent to us in Babylon, saying: It is long; build houses and live in them, and plant gardens and eat their fruit!" Zephaniah the priest, then, read this book in the ears of Jeremiah the prophet. Shemaiah, from the place Nehelam, which is interpreted "torrent," had been carried to Babylon with King Jeconiah and was prophesying falsely to the people that they would quickly return to Jerusalem. That he was a false prophet the following words of Jeremiah show: "Thus says the Lord concerning Shemaiah the Nehelamite: Because Shemaiah has prophesied to you, and I did not send him." Because, then, Jeremiah had sent letters to those who were in Babylon, saying, "Build houses and live in them; plant gardens and eat their fruit; take wives and beget sons!", and after other things had added, "Let not your prophets who are among you and your diviners lead you astray," and then, "for they prophesy falsely to you in my name, and I did not send them, says the Lord," Shemaiah, understanding that it was written against him under the general name of false prophets, sends letters to Jerusalem to Zephaniah son of Maaseiah, the priest, and to the other priests against Jeremiah: why is he not rebuked by Zephaniah the priest, whose office it is to discern between prophets who speak by the Holy Spirit and those who speak by the contrary, and ordered to be shut in prison, so as to pay the penalty for his lie and stop tripping up the people? Jehoiada was the priest who, after the killing of Athaliah, handed the kingdom to Joash and killed the priest of Baal. This then is what he writes: "Why do you not imitate Jehoiada the priest and kill Jeremiah, the false prophet? For the Lord has appointed you in place of Jehoiada, to have care of the temple and especially to discern who speak by the Holy Spirit and who by a demonic one" (the apostle too records that the discernment of spirits is the Lord's gift); "why," he says, "have you not rebuked Jeremiah of Anathoth?" What he himself deserved as a false prophet he turns against the prophet, and forestalls truth by a lie. Hence the sons of darkness are thought wiser than the sons of light in this generation; and while we act patiently and wait for the salvation of the wretched, the heretics forestall us and call us by their own name, the blind leading the blind into the pit. "He has sent," he says, "to us in Babylon, saying: It is long." This is the whole of what grieves him: that Jeremiah wrote the truth against his lie, that the return is far off and they will return to Jerusalem after seventy years, and that therefore they ought to build houses, plant orchards and eat their fruit, take wives and have sons, as the preceding discourse has related. When Zephaniah the priest, to whose name in particular they had been written, received these letters, he read them to Jeremiah, in a way taunting him and rebuking him by the very reading, for daring to write such things to Babylon.

[69] "And the word of the Lord came to Jeremiah, saying: Send to all the exiles, saying: Thus says the Lord concerning Shemaiah the Nehelamite: Because Shemaiah has prophesied to you, and I did not send him, and he has made you trust in a lie, therefore thus says the Lord: Behold, I will visit upon Shemaiah the Nehelamite and upon his seed; there will not be a man of his sitting in the midst of this people, and he will not see the good that I will do to my people, says the Lord, because he has spoken transgression against the Lord." The false prophet Shemaiah, truly "Nehelamite," who had taken foreign and muddy waters from the "torrent," is angry that Jeremiah wrote the truth against his lie, and sends letters to Zephaniah the priest asking why the prophet dared to write the truth, and wants him shut up in prison so that he may not speak. Zephaniah too covertly accuses the prophet when he reads the liar's letter and boasts that he has his accusation. How much more guilty of crime are those who defend false prophets, foster liars, and make others' evil inventions their own sins! Let the false prophet hear, then, and let the priest understand what he himself deserves to hear through him: "Thus says the Lord: Behold, I will visit upon Shemaiah." It is the Lord who says this, not the prophet: that he will visit upon Shemaiah the Nehelamite, not for the liar's healing but for his punishment, according to what is written: "I will visit their iniquities with the rod and their sins with scourges." And he visits not only the false prophet but also his seed, all the disciples whom he deceived by his error. "There will not be," he says, "a man of his sitting in the midst of this people." Let the most wicked stock be wiped out of the assembly of the saints and not sit in the midst of those at rest, he who could not stand with those who stand, nor heard: "If he had stood in my substance." And when the Lord promises the perfection of all virtues when the time of seven is finished, he will not see the good which he claimed for himself in the present time. All this will happen because he spoke transgression against the Lord, saying that, the captivity of sins already loosed, they would return to Jerusalem; to whom the apostle says threateningly: "Already you are filled, already you have become rich; without us you have reigned; and would that you did reign, so that we too might reign with you!"

Book Six. [1] The length of the book of the prophet Jeremiah defeats our purpose of saying much, however briefly. Hence this present sixth book of commentaries on Jeremiah too will contain mystical promises, which the Jews, and our own judaizers, think are to be fulfilled at the end of the world; for they cannot show that they were fulfilled under Zerubbabel. But we, following the authority of the apostles and evangelists, and especially the apostle Paul, show that whatever is promised carnally to the people of Israel has been fulfilled spiritually in us and is being fulfilled today; and that there is no other contest between Jews and Christians than this: that, since both they and we believe that Christ the Son of God was promised, the things that are to happen under Christ are said by us to have been fulfilled and by them to be still to be fulfilled. We, then, who believe that Christ has already come, must show that what is said to be going to happen under Christ has been fulfilled, and that we are the sons of Abraham, of whom it is written, "God is able from these stones to raise up sons to Abraham," to whom the promise was made: "And in your seed all nations will be blessed"; a blessing which the vessel of election, teaching that it was fulfilled in Christ, says: "He did not say, 'and to seeds,' but 'to your seed,' who is Christ." Pray, then, brother Eusebius, to the Lord Jesus Christ, that with the same labor and grace of the Spirit with which we have interpreted the promises of the other prophets, and especially Isaiah, we may also be able to explain those of this prophet, who, however simple and easy he seems in his words, is most profound in the majesty of his meanings.

[2] "The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying: Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, saying: Write for yourself in a book all the words that I have spoken to you! For behold, days are coming, says the Lord, and I will restore the restoration of my people Israel and Judah, says the Lord, and I will bring them back (or: make them sit) in the land that I gave to their fathers, and they will possess it." When the false prophets in Babylon were promising that the people captured with Jeconiah would soon return, and Hananiah son of Azzur was preaching the same in Jerusalem, Jeremiah the prophet asserted that it would indeed happen, not within two years, as they were lying, but when seventy years were finished; and now he is commanded to write in a book and hand down to memory what the Lord foretells is coming. From this it is clear that the time of the prophecy is by no means near, but that these things are to be fulfilled after a long time, when Israel and Judah returned to their land, and what Ezekiel prophesied was to be fulfilled, that two rods would be joined together and King David would rule, of whom he writes: "And my servant David will be king over them, and there will be one shepherd of them all." Whatever we said, then, on that prophecy is to be understood in the present place too, especially since Ezekiel in Babylon and Jeremiah in Jerusalem prophesied the same things at the same time.

[3] "And these are the words that the Lord spoke to Israel and to Judah: For thus says the Lord: We have heard a voice of terror (or: of fear); there is dread and there is no peace. Ask and see whether a male gives birth! Why then have I seen every man with his hand on his loins like a woman in labor, and all faces turned to jaundice?" First sad things are announced, so that after the greatness of evils happy things may follow; for health is more welcome when sickness is driven away, and the greatness of pain is turned into greatness of joys. What he says is this: there will be such fear and such dread that, peace being put to flight, everything will be filled with wars and blood, and a woman's terror will take hold even of men, whose proper task is to fight against enemies, and they will put their hands not to arms but to holding their loins, as a woman in labor holds her flanks and loins. Hence the faces of all will be turned to jaundice, showing the fear of the heart by the pallor of the face. Some interpret this place by tropology, bringing in that testimony, "From fear of you, Lord, we have conceived and been in labor and given birth; we have brought forth the spirit of your salvation on the earth," and compare with this example the apostle's words, "My little children, with whom I am again in labor until Christ is formed in you"; which plainly belongs not to terror but to joy, whereas the present scripture signifies the time of Israel's devastation and ruin.

[4] "Alas, for that day is great, and there is none like it; and it is a time of distress for Jacob, and from it he will be saved." He foretells a time of misery so as to bring in a time of joy. "Though such great evils have gone before," he says, "that the pain of all men is compared to the pain of a woman in labor, yet the time of Jacob's distress, that is, of God's people, will be changed into prosperity, and from that very" (time is understood) "of which the word had spoken he will be saved." Understand "Jacob" as the twelve tribes, which were saved not under Zerubbabel, as some wrongly think, but by the call of the gospel.

[5] "And it will be in that day, says the Lord of hosts, that I will break his yoke from your neck and burst his bonds, and strangers will no longer rule over him, but they will serve (or: work for) the Lord their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them." This is the David whom the Gospel too mentions: that he would grant us that, freed from the hand of our enemies, we might serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all our days. For as the first Adam and the second Adam are written of according to the truth of the body, so the Lord and Savior is also David, because according to the flesh he was of David, holy Mary contributing to him all that he had from the stock of David, while he had his origin and conception from the Holy Spirit. And what he says, "I will break his yoke from your neck and burst his bonds," no doubt is to be understood of the devil under the type of Nebuchadnezzar.

[6] "You therefore, do not fear, my servant Jacob, says the Lord, nor be dismayed, Israel; for behold, I will save you from a far land, and your seed from the land of their captivity; and Jacob will return and be at rest and abound in all things, and there will be none whom he fears, for I am with you, says the Lord, to save you. For I will make a full end among all the nations among which I have scattered you; but of you I will not make a full end, but I will chastise (or: instruct) you in judgment, so that you may not seem to yourself innocent" (or: "and cleansing I will not cleanse you"). This section is not in the Seventy, and in most manuscripts of the common edition it has been added from Theodotion under asterisks. The divine word promises, and more familiarly calls Jacob and Israel "his servant," as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are called "servants of God" (and Moses and the other prophets, and the apostle Paul at the beginning of his letters glories in this title), so that the two and the ten tribes, that is, the twelve, may know that they are to be saved from a far land, the captivity to be loosed, peace restored, and they filled with every abundance, according to what is said in the psalm: "Let there be peace in your strength and abundance in your towers!" And this will be because they will enjoy the presence of the Lord, when the hostile nations that had captured them perish and these are freed from the nations. And he teaches that they were handed over not to punishment but to instruction, so as to be judged as his own, not destroyed as strangers; for he who does not believe is already judged, that is, prejudged to destruction. And what he added, "so that you may not seem to yourself innocent," or, according to Symmachus, "and cleansing I will not cleanse you," or, according to Aquila, "when I have instructed you by judgment, I will by no means make you innocent," signifies that the whole world needs God's mercy, and no one, however holy, goes to the judge without fear; against the new heresy sprung from the old, which thinks that in this age and in this mortal flesh, before this corruptible puts on incorruption and this mortal puts on immortality, there is perfection in anyone, and that one can fulfill all the virtues at once. [7] "For thus says the Lord: Your fracture is incurable, your wound most grievous. There is no one to judge your cause for binding up; there is no use of healing for you. All your lovers have forgotten you; they will not seek you; for I have struck you with the wound of an enemy, with cruel (or: strong) chastisement. Because of the multitude of your iniquity your sins have become hard (or: have been multiplied). Why do you cry out over your fracture? Your pain is incurable; because of the multitude of your iniquity and because of your hard sins I have done these things to you." He speaks as if to a beautiful woman, to whom he had said above, "I will chastise you in judgment, so that you may not seem to yourself innocent"; and by a figure he speaks to Jerusalem: that she has been most grievously wounded by God's judgment and cannot be healed by any other's care than his who struck her ("there is no one," he says, "to judge your cause"), nor can the skin of a scar be drawn over the deep wound. "Wherever you turn, there is no use for you, because you have offended him who is the true and only physician. All your lovers have forgotten you, whether priests or princes or certainly the protection of the angels, by which you were walled about before you offended the Lord. They will not seek you," acting contrary to the apostle, who sought believers and not what belonged to believers; "for I have struck you with the wound of an enemy, with cruel chastisement." A friend strikes one way, an enemy another; a father one way, a foe another: the one beats to correct, the other strikes to kill. Hence the prophet says tearfully: "Lord, do not rebuke me in your fury, nor chasten me in your wrath!" This happened "because, because of the multitude of your iniquity, your sins have become hard." What follows, "Why do you cry out over your fracture? Your pain is incurable because of the multitude of your iniquity," is not in the Seventy, because "because of the multitude of your iniquity and your hard sins" is said a second time, and the copyists thought it had been added from the beginning. And the sense is: "That I struck you with an enemy's wound, that I beat you with cruel chastisement, was done by the multitude of your iniquity and your hard sins, which could not be healed except by the most biting powder, the burning cautery, and the sharpest knife, with which to cut off rotten and incurable flesh. And yet because of the multitude of your iniquity and your hard sins I have done this to you, not by my will, but compelled by the reason of medicine." [8] "Therefore all who devour you will be devoured, and all your enemies will be led into captivity; and those who lay you waste will be laid waste, and all who prey on you I will give for prey. For I will draw a scar over you and heal you of your wounds, says the Lord, because they have called you an outcast (or: scattered), Zion: this is she whom no one sought." We know that these things happened under Zerubbabel too, when the Babylonians and Chaldeans laid waste the Assyrians, that is, Nineveh, and again the Medes and Persians took the Babylonians and Chaldeans, and Babylon was destroyed: then Zion began to have a Lord who sought her, and a scar was drawn over her wound and she was healed of her blows. This is fulfilled more fully and perfectly in Christ. [9] "Thus says the Lord: Behold, I will restore the restoration of the tents of Jacob and have mercy on their dwellings (or: their captivity), and the city will be built on its height, and the temple will be founded according to its order. And from them will come forth praise and the voice of those who play, and I will multiply them and they will not be diminished"; what follows, "and I will glorify them and they will not be made small," is not in the Seventy. "And their sons," he says, "will be as from the beginning, and their congregation will remain before me, and I will visit against all who afflict them. And their leader will be from them, and a prince will be brought forth from their midst, and I will bring him near and he will approach me; for who is this who brings his heart near so as to approach me? says the Lord"; and again what follows in the Hebrew is not in the Greek: "And you will be my people, and I will be your God." Of these a type went before in Zerubbabel and Ezra, when the people returned and the city began to be built on its height and the worship of the temple to be kept, and the rest that is contained in the book of Ezra himself; but it was fulfilled more fully and perfectly in the Lord and Savior and the apostles, when the city was built on its height (of which it is written, "A city set on a hill cannot be hidden") and the temple was founded according to its order and ceremonies, so that whatever was done carnally among the former people might be fulfilled spiritually in the church. Then went forth praise, or thanksgiving (for this is what thoda means), so that all the apostles said, "Grace to you and peace," and the voice of those who play, not with that play in which the people ate and drank and rose up to play, but with that with which David played before the ark of the Lord. And they were multiplied and not diminished, so that the whole world believed in God the Savior; and they were glorified, so that what is written was fulfilled: "Glorious things are spoken of you, city of God!" And her sons, that is, the apostles, were as were from the beginning Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the princes of the Israelite race. Then the Lord visited against all who afflicted the people of God, namely the hostile powers. And their leader was from them (no doubt the Lord and Savior, according to the flesh of the race of Israel), and a prince was brought forth from their midst; the Father brought him near to himself and he approached him, so that the Son said, "I am in the Father and the Father in me"; for no one can so bring his heart near to the Lord, nor be so joined as the Son to the Father. And what he says according to the Hebrew only, and not according to the Seventy, "And you will be my people, and I will be your God," we see fulfilled in deed, in part in Israel and wholly in the multitude of the nations.

[10] "Behold, the whirlwind of the Lord, fury going forth, a rushing storm, will rest on the head of the wicked. The Lord will not turn back the wrath of his indignation until he has done and fulfilled the thought of his heart; in the last of days you will understand these things." The whirlwind of the Lord's fury and the rushing storm and tempest will rest on the head of the wicked, either of the demons or of those who blasphemed the Son of God; and he will not turn back the wrath of his indignation until he has done and fulfilled the thought of his heart, and Jerusalem is surrounded by an army and utterly destroyed. And as a craftsman cannot be understood except when his work is complete, nor the skill of medicine except after health has been obtained, so, when the overthrow of Jerusalem and the rejection of the former people has taken place, then believers will understand that the rejection of the Jews is the occasion of our salvation.

[11] "At that time, says the Lord, I will be God to all the families of Israel (or: to the race of Israel), and they will be my people." Unless the Lord's thought has been fulfilled and his fury has rested on the head of the wicked, the Lord of the universe cannot be God to the families of Israel; and he says this to the remnant that has been saved. But if it is objected to us that it is said, "I will be God to the race of Israel," or "to all the families of Israel," let us take up the example: "If you were sons of Abraham, you would do your father's works"; and the apostle writes, "Consider Israel according to the flesh," from which he teaches that there is another Israel according to the spirit. He, then, is Israel who sees God with the mind, or who is most upright before the Lord; and such an Israel will be the people of God.

[12] "Thus says the Lord: The people that was left by the sword found grace in the wilderness; Israel will go to its rest." The Seventy: "Thus said the Lord: I found warm in the wilderness with those who had perished by the sword; go and do not kill Israel!" Here the Latin manuscripts, laughably, through the ambiguity of the Greek word, translated "lupines" for "warm"; for the Greek thermon means both; and this itself is not in the Hebrew. For there is written hen, which Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion interpreted charin, that is, "grace"; only the Seventy put "warm," thinking the last letter was m. For if we read hen with the letter n, it means "grace"; if with m, it is interpreted "heat." The sense according to the Hebrew is: the Jewish people, which had been left by the Roman sword, or which certainly had been able to escape the wrath of the Lord's fury, found grace in the wilderness of the Gentiles, so as to be saved in the church among the crowd of the nations; hence Israel will go and find its rest, which it had always hoped for, which the oracles of the prophets had promised it. But according to the Seventy the meaning is this: the Lord found the apostles and their companions warm and living in the wilderness of the Gentiles, among those who had been killed by their unbelief and had no warmth of life. Hence the angels and those in the service of God are commanded not to kill all, lest Israel be utterly destroyed; and it is said to them: "Go and do not kill Israel; let there be some who live, some who glow with the ardor of faith, some who escape the cold of unbelief and death, whom the Lord may find in the wilderness!"