Author Archives: Neil

Jeremiah 26 The Prophet, the Temple and the Elders

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Jeremiah 26: 1-19 The Prophet, the Temple and the Elders

Ilya Repin, Cry of the Prophet Jeremiah on the Ruins of Jerusalem (1870)

Ilya Repin, Cry of the Prophet Jeremiah on the Ruins of Jerusalem (1870)

At the beginning of the reign of King Jehoiakim son of Josiah of Judah, this word came from the LORD: 2 Thus says the LORD: Stand in the court of the LORD’s house, and speak to all the cities of Judah that come to worship in the house of the LORD; speak to them all the words that I command you; do not hold back a word. 3 It may be that they will listen, all of them, and will turn from their evil way, that I may change my mind about the disaster that I intend to bring on them because of their evil doings. 4 You shall say to them: Thus says the LORD: If you will not listen to me, to walk in my law that I have set before you, 5 and to heed the words of my servants the prophets whom I send to you urgently– though you have not heeded– 6 then I will make this house like Shiloh, and I will make this city a curse for all the nations of the earth.

 7 The priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of the LORD. 8 And when Jeremiah had finished speaking all that the LORD had commanded him to speak to all the people, then the priests and the prophets and all the people laid hold of him, saying, “You shall die! 9 Why have you prophesied in the name of the LORD, saying, ‘This house shall be like Shiloh, and this city shall be desolate, without inhabitant’?” And all the people gathered around Jeremiah in the house of the LORD.

                10 When the officials of Judah heard these things, they came up from the king’s house to the house of the LORD and took their seat in the entry of the New Gate of the house of the LORD. 11 Then the priests and the prophets said to the officials and to all the people, “This man deserves the sentence of death because he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your own ears.”

 12 Then Jeremiah spoke to all the officials and all the people, saying, “It is the LORD who sent me to prophesy against this house and this city all the words you have heard. 13 Now therefore amend your ways and your doings, and obey the voice of the LORD your God, and the LORD will change his mind about the disaster that he has pronounced against you. 14 But as for me, here I am in your hands. Do with me as seems good and right to you. 15 Only know for certain that if you put me to death, you will be bringing innocent blood upon yourselves and upon this city and its inhabitants, for in truth the LORD sent me to you to speak all these words in your ears.”

 16 Then the officials and all the people said to the priests and the prophets, “This man does not deserve the sentence of death, for he has spoken to us in the name of the LORD our God.” 17 And some of the elders of the land arose and said to all the assembled people, 18 “Micah of Moresheth, who prophesied during the days of King Hezekiah of Judah, said to all the people of Judah: ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, Zion shall be plowed as a field; Jerusalem shall become a heap of ruins, and the mountain of the house a wooded height.’ 19 Did King Hezekiah of Judah and all Judah actually put him to death? Did he not fear the LORD and entreat the favor of the LORD, and did not the LORD change his mind about the disaster that he had pronounced against them? But we are about to bring great disaster on ourselves!”

This passage is traditionally linked with the ‘Temple Sermon of Jeremiah’ in Jeremiah 7 and into chapter 8 based on the dating and the circumstances lined out in the first lines. Jeremiah goes into the temple, the heart of the royal and priestly justification of the people’s favored status and compares the temple to Shiloh, which was an earlier site of the tabernacle site in the time of 1 Samuel. The prophet calls the people back to the two sided covenant of Deuteronomy, ‘If you will do these things, then you will be blessed, if you will not do these things you will be cursed.’ Since the construction of the temple by Solomon there has been a critique of the possibility of relying solely on the temple for maintaining the people’s status with God. For example when God answers Solomon’s prayer in 1 Kings 9, it relates the answer as this:

2 the LORD appeared to Solomon a second time, as he had appeared to him at Gibeon. 3 The LORD said to him, “I have heard your prayer and your plea, which you made before me; I have consecrated this house that you have built, and put my name there forever; my eyes and my heart will be there for all time. 4 As for you, if you will walk before me, as David your father walked, with integrity of heart and uprightness, doing according to all that I have commanded you, and keeping my statutes and my ordinances, 5 then I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever, as I promised your father David, saying, ‘There shall not fail you a successor on the throne of Israel.’

 6 “If you turn aside from following me, you or your children, and do not keep my commandments and my statutes that I have set before you, but go and serve other gods and worship them, 7 then I will cut Israel off from the land that I have given them; and the house that I have consecrated for my name I will cast out of my sight; and Israel will become a proverb and a taunt among all peoples. 8 This house will become a heap of ruins; everyone passing by it will be astonished, and will hiss; and they will say, ‘Why has the LORD done such a thing to this land and to this house?’ 9 Then they will say, ‘Because they have forsaken the LORD their God, who brought their ancestors out of the land of Egypt, and embraced other gods, worshiping them and serving them; therefore the LORD has brought this disaster upon them.'” (1Kings 9:2-9)

Yet in the time of King Jehoiakim this way of understanding the covenant with God is either forgotten or neglected. For the prophet claims of obedience to God’s law/Torah are more important than any human authority. This undercuts the certitude of not only Jehoiakim, but particularly here the priests in the temple where Jeremiah makes his proclamation. Their lives are invested in the maintaining of the centrality of the temple worship and the proclamation of the prophet threatens not only their temple with its words but their livelihood. The react quickly and harshly demanding the death of Jeremiah because he has spoken against the temple and the city and bring him before the leadership of the city. It is a tense picture painted where the priest and temple authorities and the crowd have surrounded the prophet and the city leaders quickly move to bring calm to the situation and hold judgment in the case of this troublesome prophet.

For his part, Jeremiah denies nothing that he is accused of and yet he claims his role as a prophet of God speaking on God’s behalf and still in the hope of both the prophet and God that the people will hear and turn from their ways. What the priests have heard as condemnation is from Jeremiah’s perspective a hope for turning and rescue by God, but the words have fallen on unreceptive ears.  Jeremiah knows that his life rests in these officials’ hands and yet he warns them that if they take his life they will be liable for innocent blood.

The elder’s rely on the precedence of Micah, one of the examples of intertextuality in the Bible. This instance refers back to the prophet Micah who a century earlier had spoken harsh words against the city, and yet Micah was not killed by the leadership then. The ‘elders’ override the ‘priest’ and the historical memory of prophetic witness and Torah piety hold out in this case and the elders too are able to see this as an opportunity for repentance rather than a certain doom. Unfortunately for the people the repentance does not come as the priestly and royal authority are hostile to this message that Jeremiah proclaim.

Jeremiah 26:20-24 The Risk of the Prophetic Challenge

 

                20 There was another man prophesying in the name of the LORD, Uriah son of Shemaiah from Kiriath-jearim. He prophesied against this city and against this land in words exactly like those of Jeremiah. 21 And when King Jehoiakim, with all his warriors and all the officials, heard his words, the king sought to put him to death; but when Uriah heard of it, he was afraid and fled and escaped to Egypt.22 Then King Jehoiakim sent Elnathan son of Achbor and men with him to Egypt, 23 and they took Uriah from Egypt and brought him to King Jehoiakim, who struck him down with the sword and threw his dead body into the burial place of the common people.

 24 But the hand of Ahikam son of Shaphan was with Jeremiah so that he was not given over into the hands of the people to be put to death.

King Jehoiakim is not receptive to Jeremiah’s message, and while Jeremiah apparently has some protection from Ahikam son of Shaphan another prophet, Uriah son of Shemaiah does not. The words of Uriah infuriate the king enough to send men into Egypt to capture, bring the prophet to the king and then to be killed by the king. This is not a welcome time for prophets and death and torture are real possibilities to ensure the message of King Jehoiakim is the dominant message heard.

Images for the Sixth Sunday After Epiphany, Lectionary 6A

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Continuing in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus interprets the commandments. The ideas for many of these images come out of the images in my copy of Luther’s Small Catechism around the fifth, sixth and eighth commandments

William Blake, Moses Receiving the Law (1780)

William Blake, Moses Receiving the Law (1780)

Peter Paul Rubens, Cain Slaying Abel, (1608-1809)

Peter Paul Rubens, Cain Slaying Abel, (1608-1809)

 

Jean-Leon Gerome, Bethsabee (1889 or 1885)

Jean-Leon Gerome, Bethsabee (1889 or 1885)

Michelangelo Merisis da Carvaggio, The Denial of Saint Peter

Michelangelo Merisis da Carvaggio, The Denial of Saint Peter

 

 

 

Images for the Fifth Sunday After Epiphany, Lectionary 5A

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It is more abstract this week, if you want images for the Sermon on the Mount in General look back at the Fourth Sunday after Epiphany. This week is Matthew 5: 13-20: Jesus telling the disciples they are the salt of the earth, light on a lampstand, a city on a hill and unless their righteousness exceeds that of the Pharisees they will not enter the kingdom of heaven.

Salt and Light by Anacre0n@deviantart.com

Salt and Light by Anacre0n@deviantart.com

More of an abstract image, but I found it helpful for my own meditation

Saltfish drying in Iceland

Saltfish drying in Iceland

A reminder that in the ancient world (pre-refrigerators) salt was mainly a preservative rather than a seasoning

candle

City on a Hill by antonisfes@deviantart.com

City on a Hill by antonisfes@deviantart.com

James Tissot, The Pharisee and the Publican (1894)

James Tissot, The Pharisee and the Publican (1894)

 

 

 

Opening a Galaxy-A Poem

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magrathea

In a universe where 42 is the answer to life, the universe and everything
Resides the world of Magrathea where planets are custom made to order
On the factory floor is every world conceivable
Any customer can request a tailor made environment
So long as they have the funds to support the massive building project
Yet, Magrathea itself is contained within the unimaginable expanses
Of a universe which the story allows us to hitch a ride into
And we find worlds taking form in the factory floor of our own minds
Countless imaginations there for the taking from the stories
Contained in books, stories, movies, and some which are our own creations
Even when the words are shared, though the worlds are our own
For such is the elastic nature of words to evoke images in the eye of the mind
And we don’t panic as we hitchhike through galaxies as improbable
As a planet where planets are created and restaurants where that universe ends
And yet once we pick up another story it begins anew

Neil White, 2014

Waiting Rooms-A Poem

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pt-waiting-room

Sitting alone in the waiting room
Waiting to hear good news from the surgeon
That the loved one I committed to their care
Is waiting in recovery for me to come and join them
In that place where the waiting is over
And the journey of recovery begins anew
Rather than being in the uncomfortable limbo
Of the waiting room with those sentenced
To this place where talking heads echo soundlessly
On flatscreens to people who are seeking not information
But distraction from the minutes and hours that tick away
As they sit in the waiting room
Wanting to be somewhere else
But their love holds them here
In hope that this Purgatorial time will soon be over

Neil White, 2014

Jeremiah 25- Drinking the Cup of Wrath

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Jeremiah 25: 1-14- The Voice of Frustration

The Prophet Jeremiah by Michelangelo

The Prophet Jeremiah by Michelangelo

1 The word that came to Jeremiah concerning all the people of Judah, in the fourth year of King Jehoiakim son of Josiah of Judah (that was the first year of King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon), 2 which the prophet Jeremiah spoke to all the people of Judah and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem: 3 For twenty-three years, from the thirteenth year of King Josiah son of Amon of Judah, to this day, the word of the LORD has come to me, and I have spoken persistently to you, but you have not listened. 4 And though the LORD persistently sent you all his servants the prophets, you have neither listened nor inclined your ears to hear 5 when they said, “Turn now, everyone of you, from your evil way and wicked doings, and you will remain upon the land that the LORD has given to you and your ancestors from of old and forever; 6 do not go after other gods to serve and worship them, and do not provoke me to anger with the work of your hands. Then I will do you no harm.” 7 Yet you did not listen to me, says the LORD, and so you have provoked me to anger with the work of your hands to your own harm.

                8 Therefore thus says the LORD of hosts: Because you have not obeyed my words, 9 I am going to send for all the tribes of the north, says the LORD, even for King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon, my servant, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants, and against all these nations around; I will utterly destroy them, and make them an object of horror and of hissing, and an everlasting disgrace. 10 And I will banish from them the sound of mirth and the sound of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom and the voice of the bride, the sound of the millstones and the light of the lamp. 11 This whole land shall become a ruin and a waste, and these nations shall serve the king of Babylon seventy years. 12 Then after seventy years are completed, I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation, the land of the Chaldeans, for their iniquity, says the LORD, making the land an everlasting waste. 13 I will bring upon that land all the words that I have uttered against it, everything written in this book, which Jeremiah prophesied against all the nations. 14 For many nations and great kings shall make slaves of them also; and I will repay them according to their deeds and the work of their hands.

 

After going through Jeremiah for the past several months, for whatever reason writing this chapter I wanted to stop. Twenty five chapters of darkness with little hope is difficult to go through intentionally and I can only imagine the pain that Jeremiah went through in not only bearing the difficult message he is given to bear but also the constant rejection and persecution by his people. Yet, after letting sit for a couple days I was ready to return again to hearing Jeremiah’s words and trying to understand them. This is a chapter that is filled with frustration, broken dreams and lost hope. For twenty three years Jeremiah has spoken the message given to him and for twenty three years it has not been heard and so the time of change is coming. In the frustration there is the promise of an everlasting disgrace, of a falling never to rise again, of a complete loss of joy and gladness. It is a picture of the exile to come, and yet even in the language of everlasting in English comes from the Hebrew ‘olam which doesn’t refer to a timeless future but rather the forseeable future. Regardless the judgment is harsh and at the beginning of the time of exile the prospect of being alienated from one’s homeland and all one knows for seventy years must have seemed like an eternity.

                Jeremiah probably seemed like a traitor to his people and his faith in saying that Nebuchadrezzar was a servant of the Lord, and yet he gives theological significance to the rise of the Babylonian empire and its king. Jeremiah gives voice to what others will not, that God is at work in the movement of nations and that even this pagan empire can be a tool that the Lord is using, and that the chosen people can be the recipients of both the Lord’s blessing and curse. The land and people that were meant to be a light will become darkness, the land of milk and honey will become a waste and ruin, and hope of a new light will have to come at some other time. In this time of the prophet’s heartbreak it is not here.

Jeremiah 25: 15-38- The Cup of Wrath

cup-of-wrath

15 For thus the LORD, the God of Israel, said to me: Take from my hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink it. 16 They shall drink and stagger and go out of their minds because of the sword that I am sending among them.

                17 So I took the cup from the LORD’s hand, and made all the nations to whom the LORD sent me drink it: 18 Jerusalem and the towns of Judah, its kings and officials, to make them a desolation and a waste, an object of hissing and of cursing, as they are today; 19 Pharaoh king of Egypt, his servants, his officials, and all his people; 20 all the mixed people; all the kings of the land of Uz; all the kings of the land of the Philistines– Ashkelon, Gaza, Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod; 21 Edom, Moab, and the Ammonites; 22 all the kings of Tyre, all the kings of Sidon, and the kings of the coastland across the sea;23 Dedan, Tema, Buz, and all who have shaven temples; 24 all the kings of Arabia and all the kings of the mixed peoples that live in the desert; 25 all the kings of Zimri, all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of Media; 26 all the kings of the north, far and near, one after another, and all the kingdoms of the world that are on the face of the earth. And after them the king of Sheshach shall drink.

27 Then you shall say to them, Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: Drink, get drunk and vomit, fall and rise no more, because of the sword that I am sending among you.

28 And if they refuse to accept the cup from your hand to drink, then you shall say to them: Thus says the LORD of hosts: You must drink! 29 See, I am beginning to bring disaster on the city that is called by my name, and how can you possibly avoid punishment? You shall not go unpunished, for I am summoning a sword against all the inhabitants of the earth, says the LORD of hosts.

30 You, therefore, shall prophesy against them all these words, and say to them:

The LORD will roar from on high, and from his holy habitation utter his voice;

he will roar mightily against his fold, and shout, like those who tread grapes,

against all the inhabitants of the earth.

                31 The clamor will resound to the ends of the earth,

for the LORD has an indictment against the nations;

he is entering into judgment with all flesh,

and the guilty he will put to the sword, says the LORD.

                32 Thus says the LORD of hosts:

See, disaster is spreading from nation to nation,

and a great tempest is stirring from the farthest parts of the earth!

                33 Those slain by the LORD on that day shall extend from one end of the earth to the other. They shall not be lamented, or gathered, or buried; they shall become dung on the surface of the ground.

                34 Wail, you shepherds, and cry out; roll in ashes, you lords of the flock,

for the days of your slaughter have come—

and your dispersions, and you shall fall like a choice vessel.

                35 Flight shall fail the shepherds, and there shall be no escape for the lords of the flock.

                36 Hark! the cry of the shepherds, and the wail of the lords of the flock!

For the LORD is despoiling their pasture,

                37 and the peaceful folds are devastated, because of the fierce anger of the LORD.

38 Like a lion he has left his covert; for their land has become a waste because of the cruel sword, and because of his fierce anger.

In this vision of the cup of wrath, where Jeremiah takes it to all the nations beginning in Jerusalem and eventually ending with Babylon which seems as unforgiving a passage as one will find in scripture. The language is so angry it almost spits when it is said and yet perhaps it is precisely this language of cursing that is needed to move beyond the woundedness. As the cup and its wrath and curse pass among all the nations of the region no one is exempted. The sovereignty of God is completely and utterly unquestionable to the prophet. What is the pot to say to its creator when it is used in a way that the pot might find objectionable? To be honest I find this a very distasteful passage, it reveals a dark side of God in Jeremiah’s view that I have difficulty coming to terms with at times. It is a picture of God who is so wrapped up in God’s anger that the wrath must be spread over every nation, that each people is now being held to the same curse as the chosen people. Perhaps it only the language of brokenheartedness, the rage that needs to be given vent. Perhaps it is Jeremiah and others trying to assign theological meaning to the crisis and destruction going on around them. Regardless of where it comes from I know that as a 21st Century American I stand in a very different place than Jeremiah and there are times where I cannot faithfully place myself in his shoes nor give voice to the pain and anger in his words about the brokenness of his people and of all the nations.

Daydream- A Poem

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New Era by Aeon Lux on deviantart.com

New Era by Aeon Lux on deviantart.com

My mind drifts off to another place
I’m raising anchor to sail away from reality
To go wherever the spirit blows
To another world crafted in the corner of my mind
What possibilities and problems reside in this new world?
What monsters have emerged in the air or land or sea?
Is it a place filled with the hustle and bustle of commerce?
Or is it an isolated wilderness, some undiscovered country?
Will it be filled with technology that staggers the imagination?
Or perhaps some magical land in a time before rationality
Wher’er it may be never fear, I shall return
When the klaxon calls of necessity bid me return
But for now my mind is seeking some new adventure

Neil White, 2014

Making Monsters- A Poem

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Monsters of the Mind, by Tirby@deviantart.com

Monsters of the Mind, by Tirby@deviantart.com

Stitching together the fragments of reality and imagination
Combined with the human energy of creativity
To construct our own monsters and demons
As a place to house our fears and concerns
Personifying them into corporeal forms
With mortal bodies that can be slain
For all the monsters found their wilderness banished
Under the unending growth of the cities
Cast aside into another cosmos
Yet without their presence there is an emptiness
And so like Frankenstein we set to work
Exhuming the monsters of the past
Adding a bit of our own devilry
And setting them free to roam
In the open places of our minds.

Is this also a Promethean struggle to rise beyond the limits set for us?
Some new and strange mutation of an original sin
Passed from fathers to sons and mothers to daughters
To need the foul creatures which take our own evil
And carry it as a scapegoat in their misshapen forms?
As the dark shadows of the world become know and its creatures labeled
And the imitation and exaggeration no longer holds our attention
Do we delve ever deeper into our darkness?
Fascinated with our own capacity for the creation
Of the beings to trouble our dreams
The peculiar draw of our nightmares
And our conflicted need for something to fear.

Neil White, 2014

Jeremiah 24-Exile, Figs and Reversals

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Baskets-of-good-and-bad-figs,-Jeremiah-24,-tb092506048-bibleplaces

1 The LORD showed me two baskets of figs placed before the temple of the LORD. This was after King Nebuchadrezzar of Babylon had taken into exile from Jerusalem King Jeconiah son of Jehoiakim of Judah, together with the officials of Judah, the artisans, and the smiths, and had brought them to Babylon. 2 One basket had very good figs, like first-ripe figs, but the other basket had very bad figs, so bad that they could not be eaten. 3 And the LORD said to me, “What do you see, Jeremiah?” I said, “Figs, the good figs very good, and the bad figs very bad, so bad that they cannot be eaten.”
4 Then the word of the LORD came to me: 5 Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: Like these good figs, so I will regard as good the exiles from Judah, whom I have sent away from this place to the land of the Chaldeans. 6 I will set my eyes upon them for good, and I will bring them back to this land. I will build them up, and not tear them down; I will plant them, and not pluck them up. 7 I will give them a heart to know that I am the LORD; and they shall be my people and I will be their God, for they shall return to me with their whole heart.
8 But thus says the LORD: Like the bad figs that are so bad they cannot be eaten, so will I treat King Zedekiah of Judah, his officials, the remnant of Jerusalem who remain in this land, and those who live in the land of Egypt. 9 I will make them a horror, an evil thing, to all the kingdoms of the earth– a disgrace, a byword, a taunt, and a curse in all the places where I shall drive them. 10 And I will send sword, famine, and pestilence upon them, until they are utterly destroyed from the land that I gave to them and their ancestors.

This vision takes place in the time between the initial exile of 598 BCE and the final massive deportation of 587 BCE. In 598 BCE, when the Babylonians come and deal with the people of Judea and the city of Jerusalem without the Judeans being able to effectively oppose them they take the elite of the land into exile leaving Zedekiah to reign in place of the removed Jeconiah. For the elite taken into exile it seems like the ending of everything they know, but they are the basket of good figs. This is the same exile spoken of, for example, in the beginning of the book of Daniel:

3 Then the king commanded his palace master Ashpenaz to bring some of the Israelites of the royal family and of the nobility, 4 young men without physical defect and handsome, versed in every branch of wisdom, endowed with knowledge and insight, and competent to serve in the king’s palace; they were to be taught the literature and language of the Chaldeans. (Dan 1:3-4)

With the officials, the artisans and the smiths taken into exile with King Jeconiah, what remains to surround the newly appointed Zedekiah are those who have risen to fill the void of power left by the removal of the elite. As Binyamin Lau describes it:

Whereas the exiled leaders had the capacity for leadership, their replacements come from the dregs of society, seizing the leadership vacuum as an opportunity to accumulate power. Violence and aggression prevail as paupers become princes overnight. Might makes right. King Zedekiah, young, weak, and bankrupt, cannot control the situation. (Lau, 2013, p. 131)

To those in exile there is now a word of hope. With their homes, wealth, position and status gone now God will act on their behalf to bring them back, to plant and to give them a new heart. Perhaps in the exile they will again find what it means to be the people of God. But for those still in Judah, the new officials of Zedekiah, the city of Jerusalem and the people of the land the nightmare is not over. Zedekiah will be led once again into conflict with Babylon and Babylon’s answer will be decisive. At this time where the people remaining in the land probably look upon those in exile as cursed and themselves as blessed, Jeremiah points to the opposite reality. Their horror still remains to come, they are not yet ready to receive a word of hope. Their course will still rely upon Egypt rather than the Lord. Just as the Assyrians became the instrument of judgment for the northern kingdom of Israel according to the prophets of that time, Babylon is the instrument of God’s judgment for Jeremiah. To oppose Babylon is to oppose God’s will at this time. The baskets of figs, good and bad point to a reality that defies the reality the people are experiencing at the time. The first harvest of the people out of the land become the first-ripe figs and in Jeremiah’s world of absolutes those left on the tree have spoiled and the time when they are swept away is quickly approaching.