103 lines
6.8 KiB
XML
103 lines
6.8 KiB
XML
<div2 id="Jer.i" n="i" next="Jer.ii" prev="Jer" progress="26.91%" title="Introduction">
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<h2 id="Jer.i-p0.1">Jeremiah</h2>
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<hr/>
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<pb id="Jer.i-Page_398" n="398"/>
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<div class="Center" id="Jer.i-p0.3">
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<p id="Jer.i-p1" shownumber="no"><b>AN</b></p>
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<h3 id="Jer.i-p1.1">EXPOSITION,</h3>
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<h4 id="Jer.i-p1.2">W I T H P R A C T I C A L O B S E
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R V A T I O N S,</h4>
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<h5 id="Jer.i-p1.3">OF THE BOOK OF THE PROPHET</h5>
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<h2 id="Jer.i-p1.4">J E R E M I A H.</h2>
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<hr style="width:2in"/>
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</div>
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<p class="indent" id="Jer.i-p2" shownumber="no"><span class="smallcaps" id="Jer.i-p2.1">The</span>
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Prophecies of the Old Testament, as the Epistles of the New, are
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placed rather according to their bulk than their seniority—the
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longest first, not the oldest. There were several prophets, and
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writing ones, that were contemporaries with Isaiah, as Micah, or a
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little before him, as Hosea, and Joel, and Amos, or soon after him,
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as Habakkuk and Nahum are supposed to have been; and yet the
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prophecy of Jeremiah, who began many years after Isaiah finished,
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is placed next to his, because there is so much in it. Where we
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meet with most of God's word, there let the preference be given;
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and yet those of less gifts are not to be despised nor excluded.
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Nothing now occurs to be observed further concerning prophecy in
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general; but concerning this prophet Jeremiah we may observe, I.
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That he was betimes a prophet; he began young, and therefore could
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say, from his own experience, that it is good for a man to <i>bear
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the yoke in his youth,</i> the yoke both of service and of
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affliction, <scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.2" osisRef="Bible:Lam.3.27" parsed="|Lam|3|27|0|0" passage="La 3:27">Lam. iii. 27</scripRef>.
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Jerome observes that Isaiah, who had more years over his head, had
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his tongue touched with a coal of fire, to purge away his iniquity
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(<scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.3" osisRef="Bible:Jer.6.7" parsed="|Jer|6|7|0|0" passage="Jer 6:7"><i>ch.</i> vi. 7</scripRef>), but that
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when God touched Jeremiah's mouth, who was yet but young, nothing
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was said of the purging of his iniquity (<scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.4" osisRef="Bible:Jer.1.9" parsed="|Jer|1|9|0|0" passage="Jer 1:9"><i>ch.</i> i. 9</scripRef>), because, by reason of his
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tender years, he had not so much sin to answer for. II. That he
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continued long a prophet, some reckon fifty years, others above
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forty. He began in the thirteenth year of Josiah, when things went
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well under that good king, but he continued through all the wicked
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reigns that followed; for when we set out for the service of God,
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though the wind may then be fair and favourable, we know not how
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soon it may turn and be tempestuous. III. That he was a reproving
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prophet, was sent in God's name to tell Jacob of their sins and to
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warn them of the judgments of God that were coming upon them; and
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the critics observe that therefore his style or manner of speaking
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is more plain and rough, and less polite, than that of Isaiah and
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some others of the prophets. Those that are sent to discover sin
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ought to lay aside the enticing words of man's wisdom.
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Plain-dealing is best when we are dealing with sinners to bring
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them to repentance. IV. That he was a weeping prophet; so he is
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commonly called, not only because he penned the Lamentations, but
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because he was all along a mournful spectator of the sins of his
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people and of the desolating judgments that were coming upon them.
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And for this reason, perhaps, those who imagined our Saviour to be
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one of the prophets thought him of any of them to be most like to
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Jeremiah (<scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.5" osisRef="Bible:Matt.16.14" parsed="|Matt|16|14|0|0" passage="Mt 16:14">Matt. xvi. 14</scripRef>),
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because he was <i>a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.</i>
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V. That he was a suffering prophet. He was persecuted by his own
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people more than any of them, as we shall find in the story of this
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book; for he lived and preached just before the Jews' destruction
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by the Chaldeans, when their character seems to have been the same
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as it was just before their destruction by the Romans, when they
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<i>killed the Lord Jesus, and persecuted</i> his <i>disciples,
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pleased not God, and were contrary to all men, for wrath had come
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upon them to the uttermost,</i> <scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.6" osisRef="Bible:1Thess.2.15-1Thess.2.16" parsed="|1Thess|2|15|2|16" passage="1Th 2:15,16">1
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Thess. ii. 15, 16</scripRef>. The last account we have of him in
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his history is that the remaining Jews forced him to go down with
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them into Egypt; whereas the current tradition is, among Jews and
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Christians, that he suffered martyrdom. Hottinger, out of Elmakin,
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an Arabic historian, relates that, continuing to prophesy in Egypt
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against the Egyptians and other nations, he was stoned to death;
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and that long after, when Alexander entered Egypt, he took up the
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bones of Jeremiah where they were buried in obscurity, and carried
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them to Alexandria, and buried them there. The prophecies of this
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book which we have in the first nineteen chapters seem to be the
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heads of the sermons he preached in a way of general reproof for
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sin and denunciation of judgment; afterwards they are more
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particular and occasional, and mixed with the history of his day,
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but not placed in due order of time. With the threatenings are
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intermixed many gracious promises of mercy to the penitent, of the
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deliverance of the Jews out of their captivity, and some that have
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a plain reference to the kingdom of the Messiah. Among the
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Apocryphal writings an epistle is extant said to be written by
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Jeremiah to the captives in Babylon, warning them against the
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worship of idols, by exposing the vanity of idols and the folly of
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idolaters. It is in Baruch, <scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.7" osisRef="Bible:Jer.6.1-Jer.6.30" parsed="|Jer|6|1|6|30" passage="Jer 6:1-30"><i>ch.</i> vi.</scripRef> But it is supposed not to be
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authentic; nor has it, I think, any thing like the life and spirit
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of Jeremiah's writings. It is also related concerning Jeremiah
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(<scripRef id="Jer.i-p2.8" osisRef="Bible:2Macc.2.4" parsed="|2Macc|2|4|0|0" passage="2 Mac. ii. 4">2 Mac. ii. 4</scripRef>) that, when Jerusalem was destroyed by the
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Chaldeans, he, by direction from God, took the ark and the altar of
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incense, and, carrying them to Mount Nebo lodged them in a hollow
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cave there and stopped the door; but some that followed him, and
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thought that they had marked the place, could not find it. He
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blamed them for seeking it, telling them that the place should be
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unknown till the time that God should gather his people together
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again. But I know not what credit is to be given to that story,
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though it is there said to be found in the records. We cannot but
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be concerned, in the reading of Jeremiah's prophecies, to find that
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they were so little regarded by the men of that generation; but let
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us make use of that as a reason why we should regard them the more;
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for they are written for our learning too, and for warning to us
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and to our land.</p>
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</div2> |