XXXV. (1) In THE DAYS JEHOIAKIM. — The prophecy that follows carries us back over a period of about seventeen of years to the earlier period of the prophet’s life and work. Jerusalem was not yet besieged. Jehoiakim had not filled up the measure of his iniquities. The armies of the Chaldæans were, h... [ Continue Reading ]
GO UNTO THE HOUSE OF THE RECHABITES... — The word “house” is used throughout the chapter in the sense of “family.” Among those who had thus taken refuge were the tribe, or sect, or even fraternity known by this name. Their founder was the Jonadab, or Jehonadab, who appears as the ally of Jehu in the... [ Continue Reading ]
THEN I TOOK JAAZANIAH THE SON OF JEREMIAH... — The names (Jaazaniah = Jehovah hears, Jeremiah = Jehovah exalts, Habaziniah = Jehovah gathers) are not without significance, as showing that the Rechabites were sharers in the faith of Israel, perhaps, as an order, conspicuous witnesses for that faith.... [ Continue Reading ]
I BROUGHT THEM INTO THE HOUSE OF THE LORD... — The Temple of Solomon appears from 1 Kings 6:5 to have had, like a cathedral, apartments constructed in its precincts which were assigned, by special favour, for the residence of conspicuous priests or prophets. Huldah the prophetess seems to have dwelt... [ Continue Reading ]
(6-8) WE WILL DRINK NO WINE... — We have here, as it were, the rule of the tribe or order which looked to Jonadab as its founder. Like Samson (Judges 13:4), Samuel (inferentially from 1 Samuel 1:11; 1 Samuel 1:15), and the Baptist (Luke 1:15), they were life-long Nazarites (Numbers 6:1). Jonadab’s i... [ Continue Reading ]
WHEN NEBUCHADREZZAR KING OF BABYLON CAME UP INTO the LAND... — The statement has the character of an apologetic explanation. They had been driven, as the peasants of Judaea had been (Jeremiah 4:6; Jeremiah 8:14), to take refuge from the invading armies, probably in the invasion of Nebuchadnezzar in... [ Continue Reading ]
THEN CAME THE WORD OF THE LORD UNTO JEREMIAH. — Up to this time the prophet had acted on the thought which came into his mind as an inspiration, without apparently more than a partial insight into its meaning. _Now,_ as the words indicate, he passes at once into the prophetic state and speaks the pr... [ Continue Reading ]
WILL YE NOT RECEIVE INSTRUCTION... — The argument of the prophet is naturally an à _fortiori_ one. The words of Jonadab had been kept faithfully as a rule of life for 300 years by his descendants or his order. The words of Jehovah, “rising early and speaking” through His prophets (we note the repeti... [ Continue Reading ]
RETURN YE NOW EVERY MAN FROM HIS EVIL WAY. — The words are more than a general summary of the teaching of earlier prophets, and we find in them an almost verbal reproduction of the burden of Jeremiah’s own preaching, in Jeremiah 25:5, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim, _i.e.,_ before the incident here... [ Continue Reading ]
BECAUSE I HAVE SPOKEN UNTO THEM, BUT THEY HAVE NOT HEARD. — The prophet in part reproduces his own earlier complaint from Jeremiah 7:13; Jeremiah 25:7, a complaint which has been the ever-recurring burden of all teachers of wisdom (Proverbs 1:24) and of all true prophets (Isaiah 65:12; Isaiah 66:4).... [ Continue Reading ]
BECAUSE YE HAVE OBEYED THE COMMANDMENT OF JONADAB YOUR FATHER. — The words decide nothing as to the obligation of the commandment referred to upon others. The law which Jeremiah received as given by God laid down no such rule of life. A righteous life was possible without it (Jeremiah 22:15; Matthew... [ Continue Reading ]
JONADAB THE SON OF RECHAB SHALL NOT WANT A MAN TO STAND BEFORE ME FOR EVER. — Taking the words in their simplest literal sense, they find a fulfilment in the strange unlooked-for way in which the name and customs of the Rechabites have cropped up from time to time. The Jewish historian Hegesippus (s... [ Continue Reading ]