Jeremiah 25:26

26. Kings of the north Completing the survey.

Sheshach See also Jeremiah 51:41. In the opinion of many we have here and in Jeremiah 51:1, an example of that cabalistic figure called the atbash. This consisted in substituting for each letter in a word the letter holding the corresponding place counting from the other end of the alphabet, namely, for א (aleph) ת (tav;) for ב (beth) שׁ (shin,) etc. On this plan Sheshach would answer to Babel, which it certainly means; and in Jeremiah 51:1, the words rendered “in the midst of them that rise up,” literally, heart of the risers up, would answer to Chasdim, (Chaldea,) which also seems to be the sense intended. Jerome, in the fourth century, gives this explanation, which he had probably derived from his rabbinical teachers. If this explanation is correct, it is doubtless true, as Dean Smith says, that this is the “oldest known cipher.”

But even if this view be taken, it will still be questioned whether this device was originated by Jeremiah for some purpose of his own, or whether he simply appropriated what was formed to his hand. For the former no good reason can be given, as there was evidently no concealment by means of this name. Besides, there is some sense of incongruity between the character and work of a prophet feeling almost insupportably the burden of the Lord’s message of judgment, and such an artificial, not to say puerile, expedient as this. But if these words were already in common use there is no reason why Jeremiah may not have employed them, especially if the baldness of his reference to Babylon might thus be in any measure relieved. And yet it is more than possible that the origin of these words is altogether of a different character. For instance, as Professor Rawlinson suggests, this name Sheshach may belong to a Babylonian divinity, and for that reason be taken for the land.