XIII
JEREMIAH’S LAMENTATIONS
Lamentations 1-5
We will now take up a brief survey of the book of Lamentations. This book belongs to the third division of the Old Testament, known as the Writings, the Greek Hagiographa. The book of Lamentations is grouped with four other small books and these five are known by the Jews as the Meghilloth. These five books are Songs of Songs, Ruth, Lamentations, Ecclesiastes, and Esther. They are read at special seasons of the year by the Jews, and the book of Lamentations was read, and is still read, on the anniversary of the fall of Jerusalem, which occurred on the ninth day of the fourth month of their year, corresponding to about our August 9. For 2,200 or 2,300 years this book has been read in their assemblies at this time. Not only has it been read, but it has also been quoted by thousands and tens of thousands of Jews who tarry at the Jewish wailing place in Jerusalem. It has voiced the sorrow of the Jewish people over the destruction of their city and its Temple for more than 2,000 years. It will continue to do so until the Jews are brought to Christ and realize that there is no need for the Temple and the ritual; that these were done away by Jesus Christ.
Tradition says that shortly after the fall of Jerusalem, when Jeremiah was partly free, he sat down in a quarry, a few miles north of Jerusalem near the road to Damascus, and there composed these lamentations. The authorship of Jeremiah has been questioned by the critical school, but this tradition goes back as early as the third century before Christ, and the Septuagint Version says at the beginning of this book that Jeremiah wrote these words. The book itself is an elegy on the fall of the city of Jerusalem. Its theme is the destruction of the city and it voices the dismay and sorrow that fell upon the nation at that awful event.
A fine example of an elegy in modern literature is Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Church Yard. Lamentations is also an elegy but composed by a prophet, and as such it has been rather unpopular, is seldom read, seldom used, and seldom preached from.
The form of the book which is not brought out in the translation, is that of an acrostic poem, except the last chapter. The first letter of the first Hebrew word in each verse begins with a corresponding letter in the Hebrew alphabet. There are twenty-two verses each in Lamentations 1-2. In Lamentations 3, sixty-six verses, a multiple of twenty-two. In the fourth, twenty-two. In the fifth, twenty-two.
Now, in [ Lam 1:1], the first word begins with the first Hebrew letter of the alphabet. In [ Lam 1:2] the first letter of the first word is the second Hebrew letter, and so on through the alphabet. Lamentations 2 is the same. In Lamentations 3, the three first lines begin with the first letter, and the second group of three lines begins with the second letter, and so on to the end of that chapter.
The writer chose the word which contained the right letter at the beginning of that word. In many cases it was doubtless a difficult task. Some can hardly imagine Jeremiah taking the time to do that, and yet it is the tradition that he did. It seems to them that his state of mind would hardly lend itself to such a mechanical arrangement of his verse and his thought, but the book is before us, and the tradition is that Jeremiah wrote it, and we must take it as it is. Lamentations 5 is not written in the acrostic form. The first four chapters only are thus arranged.
Now, the style, or form of the verse, is peculiar. The Hebrews had a form of verse, or stanza, which they used to express sorrow and which is called "the lament," or "the dirge." The form of the stanza is this: The first line is of average length, the second line a little shorter; also the next verse, or stanza, has the first line longer than the second, and so on all through the poem, which gives a peculiar funeral dirge effect to their song with a pathetic and melancholy cadence as they repeat it.
I call attention here to a few of these. Notice in [ Lam 1:1]: How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! She is become as a widow, that was great among the nations) She that was a princess among the provinces is become tributary!
Thus, a large part of the poem has that peculiar, pathetic, melancholy, dirge like cadence which expresses, perhaps more accurately than any other form of poetry could express, the feeling that animated the hearts of those people.
The following is an outline of the contents:
I. The desolation and misery of Jerusalem (Lamentations 1).
1. The poem bewails the solitude and desertion of the city; her people are in exile, the enemy has seized her treasures, her glory is departed ([ Lam 1:1-11]). Almost every point of view from which one can look at it is given; almost every possible expression of feeling and emotion are brought out here.
2. The city herself declares the severity of the affliction ([ Lam 1:12-16]). [ Lam 1:12] is regarded as a messianic expression in Handel’s Messiah, and may be likened unto the suffering of Jesus Christ. It is the voice of the city expressing itself through the prophet, calling attention to the unparalleled sorrow through which it has passed.
3. She acknowledges Jehovah’s righteousness and prays for retribution upon her foes ([ Lam 1:17-22]).
II. Jehovah’s anger with his people (Lamentations 2).
1. The stress is laid on the causes of the suffering. Jehovah is her enemy; he has cast off his people, his land, and his sanctuary. That is brought out in [ Lam 2:3] and others. As in other verses of the poem, he turns the kaleidoscope of his imagination upon the awful event and presents it in almost every phase ([ Lam 2:1-9]).
2. The agony of the people in the capital, the contempt of the passers-by, and the malicious triumph of her foes ([ Lam 2:10-17]). Here is doubtless one of the most terrible pictures of a siege to be found in all literature. He speaks about the virgins of Jerusalem; then he speaks about his own sorrow, then about the young children, the babes starving and crying to their mothers for bread and wine.
3. The nations are invited by the prophet to entreat Jehovah on behalf of its dying children. It responds in the prayer of [ Lam 2:18-22].
III. The nation’s complaint and its ground of consolation (Lamentations 3).
1. They bewail their calamities ([ Lam 3:1-20]). Here he seems to call up every phase of it, and uses almost very figure to describe suffering. This section is paralleled in almost every line with some statement of Job where he describes his sufferings. I call attention to [ Lam 3:19]: "Remember mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall." This is the origin of that expression, Sinners whose love can ne’er forget, The wormwood and the gall.
2. They console themselves by the thought of God’s compassion and the grace he may have in the visitation ([ Lam 3:21-39]). Here we have some jewels in this poem. [ Lam 3:22] is one: "It is of Jehovah’s loving-kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not." That means that they are not totally consumed because of the mercy of Jehovah. Jeremiah had said that he would not make a full end, because "his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness." A man who could write that after going through the horrors through which Jeremiah passed, while he was looking upon the deserted city, his own loved capital, has achieved one of the greatest victories of faith that man can possibly achieve.
Everything had been taken away from Jeremiah except his life and God. He had nothing. Then he said, "The Lord is my portion," i.e., "He is enough for me." Another beautiful expression is [ Lam 3:27]: "It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth." This is a fine saying and contains a fine philosophy.
3. The people are invited to confess their guilt and turn to God in penitence ([ Lam 3:40-54]). Here we seem to be reading out of Jeremiah’s own experience. This passage expresses how Jeremiah felt when he was put down into that dungeon, but they did not cut off his life.
4. He becomes more hopeful ([ Lam 3:55-57]).
5. A confidential appeal for vengeance on the nation’s foes ([ Lam 3:58-66]). That is Jeremiah still. Almost every time he is under persecution and affliction he calls for vengeance.
IV. Zion’s past and present contrasted (Lamentations 4).
1. The former splendor, and present humiliation of Zion and its inhabitants ([ Lam 4:1-11]). He contrasts first, the gold that has become dim, the pure gold that is changed. Then the precious sons of Zion are mentioned. Their condition at present is contrasted with their condition in the past. "The daughter of my people" is also mentioned and her condition in the past contrasted with the present. "Become cruel like an ostrich in the wilderness." The infant, the nursing child, is different now. "Its tongue cleaveth to the roof of its mouth for thirst." They that have been reared up in scarlet, now embrace the dunghills, searching for some morsel to appease the pangs of hunger. Her mothers are also contrasted with their past condition.
2. Priests and prophets are so stained by guilt that they find no resting place even among the heathen ([ Lam 4:12-16]). [ Lam 4:13]: "Because of the sins of her prophets and iniquities of her priests that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her." As a result of that they wander as blind men in the streets; they are polluted with blood. Men cannot touch their garments; they say, "Depart ye, unclean, depart! depart! touch not." When they fled away and wandered, men said among the nations, "They shall no more sojourn here." They were so vile that even the heathen nations spurned them.
3. The people cannot escape their pursuers. Egypt has disappointed them, and Zedekiah, the anointed of Jehovah, has failed ([ Lam 4:17-20]). Zedekiah, the anointed of the Lord, was captured by the Chaldeans and treated as if he were little more than an animal.
4. Though Edom may triumph for awhile, Israel’s punishment will be completed and the cup will be passed to the foes ([ Lam 4:21-22]). There is sarcasm here: "The cup shall pass through unto thee also; thou shall be drunken, and shalt make thyself naked."
V. The nation’s appeal for Jehovah’s Compassionate Regard (Lamentations 5).
(As we said, this chapter of the poem is not acrostic; is a little different from the other chapters; and may have been written later, a few years after the people had been in exile.)
1. He calls upon Jehovah to consider the affliction of the people, indicating the nature and severity of that affliction ([ Lam 5:1-18]). Here, again, over and over in a great many different ways and fashions and forms and figures he reiterates the same sad truths and presents the same great sorrows. In [ Lam 5:7] he voices the sentiments of the people that are suffering, both those in the city and those in exile. The complaint was heard by Ezekiel away off in Babylonia! Our fathers sinned, and are not; And we have borne their iniquities. That cry and complaint both Jeremiah and Ezekiel had to meet and answer. It was the cry that the people had to suffer for the sins of their fathers, and of which they were innocent. See Ezekiel 18.
2. Zion’s desolation brings to his mind, by way of contrast, the thought of Jehovah’s abiding power, and on the ground of this he repeats his appeal for help ([ Lam 5:19-22]).
This is the greatest elegy ever written, though it begins in the greatest heights of confidence at the end.
Jeremiah was an ardent patriot, one of the greatest patriots of history. The Hungarian patriot, Kossuth, was worldfamed, but no Kossuth loved his country and suffered more for it than Jeremiah, no Garibaldi ever fought and bled for his nation with truer heart than did this prophet, and no George Washington ever fought and prayed and worked and toiled more than did Jeremiah for his land. But even Jeremiah could not stay the inevitable; he could not save Jerusalem. Savonarola could not save Florence, nor could Kossuth save his country.
Jeremiah was a statesman-prophet, a prophet to the other nations as well as to Israel. He did not confine himself to the narrow realm of his own little nation and country; he saw what was going on throughout all the world and saw God’s hand in history. He was bigger than his people. He took in all the known world in his horizon. He foresaw what was coming and he gave advice to all the nations.
His nature was deeply emotional. No man had greater tenderness of heart than Jeremiah; no man could sympathize more with his people. No man could be more overpowered with sorrow over their sins and their destruction. He even prayed that his eyes might be a fountain of tears, pouring forth their grief and sorrow and if possible wash away the sins of the people. Some of the greatest depths to be found in all human experiences are to be found in Jeremiah. He was the most human and most outspoken of all the prophets. He was not afraid to lay bare his heart. He allows us to see down into its very depths. He laments, he complains, he even complains to Jehovah, and writes his complaints in the inspired Word. He calls for vengeance upon his foes. He feels like accusing God for having called him into the prophetic work. When in the depths of despondence, he curses the day he was born, and actually censures his mother for having brought him forth. He even considers the question of quitting the ministry altogether. He was like a weaned child that has its struggle and cries, but by and by it rests upon its mother’s bosom. So in the latter part of Jeremiah’s life he is at rest, calm and patient. He has had his fight and is quiet. How human he was!
His nature was one of surpassing strength. It is generally considered that one of the fundamental things in Jeremiah’s character was weakness. The fact that when he was called to the ministry he said, "I cannot speak, I am a boy, I am only a youth," does not mean that he was fundamentally weak. It is not a sign of weakness, that a man has a sense of weakness when called to such a work. The keener our sense of weakness, the stronger we are, because it makes us feel our dependence upon God, and we go to him for strength and he is with us and helps us by his Spirit.
Jeremiah was a strong man, one of the strongest the world has ever known from the moral point of view. He never shrank from his duty, even when it brought him face to face with death. There was a fire within him which burned, and when it burned Jeremiah spoke forth, no matter what it cost. The word of God was the very essence of his being. He even tried to prevent the inevitable, and fought for forty years against it – the inevitable, that Judah should perish. He has been described as "a figure cast in brass, dissolved in tears," which expresses better, perhaps, than any other statement, his character. Though all the world was against him he never flinched, he never shrank, he maintained a consistent attitude all that period of nearly fifty years, and never failed.
His prophetic insight was of the profoundest kind. No man saw deeper into humanity than Jeremiah. He was the first man to say, "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked, who can know it?" He got a vision of the higher moral truths of the new dispensation of Jesus Christ, and in his prophecy of the new covenant he reaches greater heights than any other prophet. He saw true religion as no other man had seen it. His grasp of truth was so deep that he became absolutely dependent upon God, and was satisfied to lean on him alone because his people were against him. He was a sublime optimist. His prophecy of the restoration is sufficient comment upon that. He saw the better age clearer than any other prophet; he pictured a better covenant, a new dispensation.
His emotional nature is shown in his literary style, which is free from many adornments, has a great many common figures in it and does not compare with the beauty of Isaiah, nor with the finished and literary elegance of Ezekiel. It expresses his emotional nature. He repeats, he has many favorite phrases. At times he is poetic and there are in the book of Jeremiah a great many passages that are classic and immortal. His style resembles that of the book of Deuteronomy, the highest type of hortatory eloquence, for Jeremiah was influenced mightily by the Book which was discovered in the early part of his career.
From being the most despised of all the prophets, he came to be considered the greatest of all. In the book of 2 Maccabees where Judah is in doubt and difficulty, there appeared to him in vision a man, resplendent in beauty, magnificent in physique, with excellent glory beaming from his countenance. He gives to Judah a golden sword with which to smite his foes. It was Jeremiah. This is only a legend, but it shows the estimation in which he was held. When Jesus Christ came preaching and teaching, the people knew not who he was; some said he was John the Baptist, some said he was Elijah, some said he was Jeremiah. They never mistook him for Ezekiel, Isaiah, or Daniel.
He, in several respects, resembled Jesus Christ:
1. Both appeared at a similar crisis in the history of Israel – forty years before the end of the nation and the Temple.
2. Both were persecuted for predicting the fall of the ceremonial institutions and the ritual.
3. Both were at variance with the accepted orthodoxy of the time, and were regarded as heretical and dangerous.
4. Both showed that there could be a religion without a Temple and ritual, and thus saved religion in the downfall of these institutions.
5. Both made the way open for a positive statement of new doctrine.
6. Both suffered most at the hands of the religious leaders of the time.
7. Both lived lives of seeming failure, and died at the hands of their countrymen.
8. Both might have the words of Isaiah applied to them ([ Isa 53:3]): “A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and as one from whom men hide their face he was despised; and we esteemed him not." Also to both may be applied [ Lam 1:2]: "Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is brought upon me."
QUESTIONS
1. To what division of the Old Testament does this book of Lamentations belong, how is it grouped, and what its special uses by the Jews?
2. What the testimony of tradition and the Septuagint concerning its authorship, what its theme, what its character as literature, and what its artistic features?
3. What can you say of its style, or form of verse? Illustrate.
4. Give the outline of the book.
5. What can you say of Jeremiah as a patriot?
6. What of him as a statesman?
7. What of his emotional nature?
8. What of him as human?
9. What of his strength of nature?
10. What of his prophetic insight?
11. What of his optimism?
12. What of his style?
13. What of his rank among the prophets? Illustrate.
14. What of his resemblances to Christ?