CHAPTER 38

(589 B.C.)

THE PRINCES ACCUSE JEREMIAH; DEMAND DEATH

¹Then Shephatiah the son of Mattan, and Gedaliah the son of Pashur, and Jucal the son of Shelemiah, and Pashur the son of Malchiah, heard the words that Jeremiah had spoken unto all the people, saying (the individuals mentioned in this Verse were high up in government circles; setting themselves against the Will of God, they demanded the life of Jeremiah. They would go to any lengths to stop his voice),

²Thus says the LORD, He who remains in this city shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence: but he who goes forth to the Chaldeans shall live; for he shall have his life for a prey, and shall live. (There was absolutely no doubt as to what the Message said or its intent; therefore, the leaders of Judah, as well as the people, were without excuse.)

³Thus says the LORD, This city shall surely be given into the hand of the king of Babylons army, which shall take it.

⁴Therefore the princes said unto the king, We beseech you, let this man be put to death: for thus he weakens the hands of the men of war who remain in this city, and the hands of all the people, in speaking such words unto them: for this man seeks not the welfare of this people, but the hurt. (One must say this: even in the face of what looked like possible death, Jeremiah never compromised his Message.)

JEREMIAH CAST INTO A MIRY DUNGEON

⁵Then Zedekiah the king said, Behold, he is in your hand: for the king is not he who can do any thing against you. (As is obvious, Zedekiah was a weak king, fearful to stand up for that which was right.)

⁶Then took they Jeremiah, and cast him into the dungeon of Malchiah the son of Hammelech, that was in the court of the prison: and they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in the dungeon there was no water, but mire: so Jeremiah sunk in the mire. (Jeremiah sank in the mire physically, but Zedekiah sank in it morally. The mire to the one was a mantle of glory; to the other, a vesture of shame. Jeremiah was left in this terrible predicament to die of hunger. Such was the cruelty of the haters of Truth; servants of God must not think it a strange thing if God permits such suffering to befall them.)

JEREMIAH RESCUED BY AN ETHIOPIAN

⁷Now when Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, one of the eunuchs which was in the kings house, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the dungeon; the king then sitting in the gate of Benjamin (Ebed-melech the Ethiopian was the kings slave and, no doubt, of African descent. He was used greatly of God in saving Jeremiahs life and, no doubt, was a convert to Israels God. For doing this thing, his life would be spared at the sack of Jerusalem [39:15-18]);

⁸Ebed-melech went forth out of the kings house, and spoke to the king, saying (to do this, he was taking his life in his hands!),

⁹My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the Prophet, whom they have cast into the dungeon; and he is like to die for hunger in the place where he is: for there is no more bread in the city. (This man showed no fear regarding these princes who had determined Jeremiahs death. He calls it exactly as it is: evil. In effect, he is making the king culpable, as well!)

¹⁰Then the king commanded Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, Take from hence thirty men with you, and take up Jeremiah the Prophet out of the dungeon, before he die. (The courage of this Ethiopian stands here in contrast with the cowardice of the king. He boldly and publicly braved the anger of both princes and people and so shamed the king that he obtained authority to deliver the Prophet. So dangerous was this mission that he needed thirty soldiers as a protecting guard.)

¹¹So Ebed-melech took the men with him, and went into the house of the king under the treasury, and took thence old cast clouts and old rotten rags, and let them down by cords into the dungeon to Jeremiah. (This dungeon was a place where water was normally kept, but from which the water had recently been used, leaving nothing but sediment, muck, and mire, which was probably several feet thick. In this gook, Jeremiah had sunk.)

¹²And Ebed-melech the Ethiopian said unto Jeremiah, Put now these old cast clouts and rotten rags under your armholes under the cords. And Jeremiah did so.

¹³So they drew up Jeremiah with cords, and took him up out of the dungeon: and Jeremiah remained in the court of the prison. (The court of the prison certainly was not paradise, but still, it was far, far better than this dungeon.)

ZEDEKIAH SEEKS ADVICE FROM JEREMIAH

¹⁴Then Zedekiah the king sent, and took Jeremiah the Prophet unto him into the third entry that is in the House of the LORD: and the king said unto Jeremiah, I will ask you a thing; hide nothing from me. (Zedekiah knew that Jeremiah was Gods Prophet and that the words he spoke were from the Lord. But yet, he would not heed them, for he loved the praise of men more than the praise of God [Jn. 12:43].)

¹⁵Then Jeremiah said unto Zedekiah, If I declare it unto you, will you not surely put me to death? and if I give you counsel, will you not hearken unto me? (The nobility and elevation of Jeremiahs character appear in this, that in his interview with the king, he did not indignantly denounce the brutality of his enemies and demand their just punishment; neither did he in righteous anger rebuke the king for his cowardly conduct in the matter. On the contrary, he earnestly and affectionately urged the king to save his life and theirs by obeying the Word of the Lord and surrendering to the Chaldeans.)

¹⁶So Zedekiah the king swore secretly unto Jeremiah, saying, As the LORD lives, Who made us this soul, I will not put you to death, neither will I give you into the hand of these men who seek your life. (Who made us this soul, means May God take my life if I take yours.)

A CONDITIONAL PROPHECY

¹⁷Then said Jeremiah unto Zedekiah, Thus says the LORD, the God of Hosts, the God of Israel; If you will assuredly go forth unto the king of Babylons princes, then your soul shall live, and this city shall not be burned with fire; and you shall live, and your house:

¹⁸But if you will not go forth to the king of Babylons princes, then shall this city be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they shall burn it with fire, and you shall not escape out of their hand. (The choice is crystal clear.)

¹⁹And Zedekiah the king said unto Jeremiah, I am afraid of the Jews who are fallen to the Chaldeans, lest they deliver me into their hand, and they mock me. (Zedekiah, as millions, feared man more than he feared God. As a result, he had neither the help of man nor God.)

²⁰But Jeremiah said, They shall not deliver you. Obey, I beseech you, the Voice of the LORD, which I speak unto you: so it shall be well unto you, and your soul shall live.

²¹But if you refuse to go forth, this is the Word that the LORD has shown me (the words, But if you refuse to go forth, proclaim mans free moral agency. The Lord will proclaim the right way to the individual, but will never force a persons will. The very nature of obedience demands free moral agency, or else it is not obedience, but rather slavery.

However, to disobey God sets oneself against Gods perfect order of creation and the Restoration of all things. Catastrophe is always the result!):

²²And, behold, all the women who are left in the king of Judahs house shall be brought forth to the king of Babylons princes, and those women shall say, Your friends have set you on, and have prevailed against you: your feet are sunk in the mire, and they are turned away back. (That which the Holy Spirit was attempting to impress upon Zedekiah [and upon all, for the principle holds] is that the very thing we fear, and which causes us not to obey God, will, in our disobedience, bring the thing feared upon us, and even in a far greater measure.)

²³So they shall bring out all your wives and your children to the Chaldeans: and you shall not escape out of their hand, but shall be taken by the hand of the king of Babylon: and you shall cause this city to be burned with fire. (The rewards for obedience, which have already been enumerated, are grand, while the judgment for disobedience is awful; and yet, Zedekiah, as most, still would not obey.)

ZEDEKIAH FEARS THE PRINCES

²⁴Then said Zedekiah unto Jeremiah, Let no man know of these words, and you shall not die. (Public opinion was not on the side of Jeremiah, hence Zedekiahs fear. Actually, public opinion is seldom, if ever, on the side of the Word of God.)

²⁵But if the princes hear that I have talked with you, and they come unto you, and say unto you, Declare unto us now what you have said unto the king, hide it not from us, and we will not put you to death; also what the king said unto you (in his weakness, the king could not stand up to the princes; therefore, he does not want them to know that he seeks the Word of the Lord from the Prophet):

²⁶Then you shall say unto them, I presented my supplication before the king, that he would not cause me to return to Jonathans house, to die there.

²⁷Then came all the princes unto Jeremiah, and asked him: and he told them according to all these words that the king had commanded. So they left off speaking with him; for the matter was not perceived. (Some have claimed that Jeremiah was not altogether truthful by not relating to these murderers the entirety of the conversation; however, he was under no Scriptural obligation to reveal to these men the entirety of the personal words exchanged between him and Zedekiah.)

²⁸So Jeremiah abode in the court of the prison until the day that Jerusalem was taken: and he was there when Jerusalem was taken. (The court of the prison meant that he was under house arrest, but still had some small measure of freedom.

Regrettably, Zedekiah would not heed the Words given to him from the Lord by Jeremiah; as a result, he would suffer terrible loss, as would the entirety of the city and its people.)