Jeremiah 20:14

JEREMIAH'S THOUGHTS WHILE IN THE STOCKS

"Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed. Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man-child is born unto thee; making him very glad. And let that man be as the cities which Jehovah overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear a cry in the morning, and shouting at noontime; because he slew me not from the womb; and so my mother would have been my grave, and her womb always great. Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labor and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?"

The words of this final paragraph of the chapter are so radically different from the trust and confidence expressed in the previous verses that scholars are at a total loss to understand how they should be interpreted.

PROPOSED SOLUTIONS:

(1) The boldest and most radical solution was proposed a long while ago by Ewald. "He simply moved this bottom paragraph and placed it between Jeremiah 20:6 and Jeremiah 20:7."[19] That, of course, would solve the problem completely. Opposed to this is the fact that the arrangement of the verses as in this chapter is likewise found, "In all the ancient manuscripts of the Hebrew text."[20]

(2) "Some have rejected Jeremiah 20:11-13 as a late doxology interpolated into the text";[21] but the same scholar rejected the idea as absolutely "unnecessary."

(3) Some have even attempted to identify Jeremiah 20:14-18 as the words of Pashhur; "But such an hypothesis has little to commend it."[22]

(4) Still others think that the final paragraph reflects the psychological condition of Jeremiah, "That he could at one time burst into a hymn of praise to God, and then drop into a severe mood of depression." That this is not the true explanation is evident because, if Jeremiah had dropped into such a mood after the exultant words of Jeremiah 20:11-13, God would most assuredly have answered him, as God did upon the occasion of Jeremiah's similar depression in Jeremiah 11:20. Also, if these allegedly alternate moods of depression and exultation were indeed characteristic of this prophet, how could the fact of there never again being a lament be explained? Certainly the conditions for Judah grew worse and worse; and there were far more bitter oppositions to Jeremiah yet to come. No! There has to be another explanation.

Still another explanation, suggested by Green, and also found in the writings of many older scholars is that, "Jeremiah 20:14-18 was spoken before the words of Jeremiah 20:7-13."[23]

Of course, we are already aware that it is not safe to date statements in Jeremiah by their location in this book. Green backed up his conclusion with three arguments, which we believe to be valid: (1) There were no more laments by Jeremiah. This surely indicates that Jeremiah received an answer; and that answer clearly lies in verses Jeremiah 20:11-13. (2) Following this chapter, Jeremiah remained centered in God. (3) Jeremiah's portrayals of the future became brighter and brighter as the situation around him grew blacker and blacker.

Jeremiah 20:11-13 cannot be denied to the prophet Jeremiah, because the vocabulary and style "argue for the originality of the passage."[24]

Matthew Henry, an older scholar, and a man of incredibly extensive reading and understanding stated that Jeremiah 20:14-18, "Seems to be Jeremiah's relation of his thoughts while he was in the ferment he had experienced in the stocks, and out of which his faith and hope had rescued him, rather than a new temptation into which he later fell."[25] He also cited another scripture where a similar thing occurs. "David said in Psalms 31:22, `I said in my grief' I am cut off."[26] Perhaps we should understand of Jeremiah 20:14-18, that they relate what Jeremiah said to himself while in the torture of the stocks.

As Keil noted, "The bitterness of these last verses, rising at last to the cursing of the day of his birth is only intelligible as a consequence of the Pashhur had inflicted upon him."[27]

It was against the Mosaic Law for one to curse one's parents; and Jeremiah carefully avoided such a capital offense. He did not curse his mother, but the day he was born. He did not curse his father, but the man who brought news of his birth to his father (Leviticus 20:9; 24:10-16).

The explanation which we have here proposed for the mention of such awful curses almost in the same breath with Jeremiah 20:11-13 goes all the way back to John Calvin. "The explanation of Calvin was that Jeremiah here related what went through his mind while he was confined by Pashhur and that explanation is plausible, and has been adopted by Grotius, Henry, and others."[28]

Payne Smith pointed out that, "The public ministry of Jeremiah was now, for a time to cease; and, afterward, there would be a long and ominous silence."[29]

Looking back on his long life of preaching and pleading with Judah to repent and turn to the Lord, it was clear enough to the prophet that, in one sense, his life had been totally wasted; and it was that sense of failure that no doubted caused his feelings of despondency when he contemplated it.

It was in this very trait that Jeremiah fell short of being "The Suffering Servant" foretold by Isaiah, Our Lord alone attaining the perfection foretold in Isaiah. That might have been one of the reasons that the Divine Inspiration retained and recorded for our benefit Jeremiah's understandable but nevertheless sinful language of this chapter.

We shall add one more approving witness to the adequacy of the explanation we have adopted here for the appearance of these last five verses in such close proximity to the shout of praise and deliverance in Jeremiah 20:11-13. Jamieson has the following. The contrast between the spirit of this passage and the preceding thanksgiving is to be explained thus. In order to show how great was his deliverance, he subjoins a picture of what his wounded spirit had been previous to his deliverance.[30]

We are aware that this explanation does not answer all of the questions; but it surely comes nearer to doing so than any other explanation this writer has encountered.

That Jeremiah indeed, during his torture at the hands of Pashhur, felt deserted even by God Himself could not be called a sin; for the Holy Christ himself cried from the Cross, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me? But the solemn imprecations and curses leveled against the day he was born, which was a blessing, and a day of rejoicing, must fall into the category of sinful words which every thoughtful person must deplore. Still, we are sure that God forgave him.