Jeremiah 1
Jeremiah 2
Jeremiah 3
Jeremiah 4
Jeremiah 5
Jeremiah 6
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1. There are three or four chapters that especially come to mind as the most important chapters in Jeremiah. There is of course the first chapter which gives us Jeremiah's calling. Chapter 31 has the important passage on the new covenant that is quoted in Hebrews and assumed in the New Testament. Jeremiah 29:11 is one of the most quoted verses in the Bible.
Jeremiah 7 is another one. This is the chapter where Jeremiah indicts those who think that Jerusalem and Judah will be safe because it is the place with God's temple. "This is the temple of the LORD. This is the temple of the LORD. This is the temple of the LORD" (Jer. 7:4). Jeremiah 7 is "The Temple Sermon."
2. It is a little puzzling how to fit Jeremiah 7 with Josiah's reforms. The sense of impending doom feels later than Josiah's early reign. Yet Josiah is said to have done away with some of the things Jeremiah is critiquing. Perhaps Josiah's reforms didn't stick or were not fully implemented? Given the flow of Jeremiah so far, I tend to see this chapter as an indictment of the priestly establishment of Judah in the 610s at the height of Josiah's temple reforms.
Around 621BC, Hilkiah finds the Book of the Law in the temple, and Josiah does something that has never been done in Judges, 1 & 2 Samuel, or 1 & 2 Kings. Josiah restricts sacrifices to the Jerusalem temple. Perhaps this move anticipated the fact that the temple would become the center of second temple Judaism when the temple was rebuilt in 516BC during the second temple period.
The situation of Jeremiah 7 is that there are some who think, "God won't let anyone knock down his house. It's his house, after all. That's where he lives." "God won't let anyone destroy Jerusalem. That's his address. What powerful god let's another god bulldoze his city?" I suppose we at least have to give the high priest credit for having faith in Yahweh's power.
3. But they have no sense of Yahweh's values. Here are Yahweh's values: "If you stop taking advantage of the immigrant, orphan, or widow, if you don’t shed the blood of the innocent in this place, or go after other gods to your own ruin, only then will I will let you dwell in this place, in the land that I gave long ago to your ancestors for all time" (7:6-7).
"Will you steal and murder, commit adultery and perjury, sacrifice to Baal and go after other gods that you don’t know, and then come and stand before me in this temple that bears my name, and say, 'We are safe'?" (7:9-10). This verse seems to allude to the Ten Commandments, which of course were in the Book of the Law just found in the temple.
Instead, they think sacrifices are the key. If they perform all the rituals, everything will be ok. One of the most intriguing verses in the chapter is 7:22. Here, Yahweh reminds them that he gave no commands concerning sacrifices when he brought the Israelites out of Egypt. Some have suggested that the verse indicates Jeremiah knew nothing about Leviticus or the sacrificial parts of the Pentaeuch. The NIV actually added words to get around the conundrum -- "I did not just give commands about sacrifices."
4. Jeremiah reminds the priestly establishment that God let Shiloh be destroyed by the Philistines (7:12-15). This is an event only partially narrated in 1 Samuel 4:1-11. This event of taking the Ark of the Covenant may also stand in the background of Jeremiah's earlier comments about the Ark in Jeremiah 3:16. Jeremiah hates the use of objects, ritual, and the superficial in contrast to the true worship of Yahweh from the heart and actually treating others around you with respect.
The sons of Eli tried to use the Ark as a good luck charm, and God let the Philistines take it. The tabernacle at Shiloh was destroyed. So, the priestly establishment of Jerusalem -- or Josiah -- shouldn't think that Jerusalem is safe just because they've cranked up the sacrifices.
5. Another feature of the chapter is that Topheth in the Valley of Hinnom had been a place where people sacrificed their sons and daughters to Molech. This was particularly true under Josiah's father, Manasseh (2 Kings 23:10). This was an abhorrent practice that Genesis 22 (Abraham and the potential sacrificing of Isaac) implicitly rejects, in my opinion.
Jeremiah foretells that, when Babylon invades, they will take the excess of bodies to this valley where the birds and animals will feed on the carcasses (7:33). This is the Valley ge-Hinnom, that will become the basis for the concept of Gehenna in the New Testament, where the worm does not die and the fire is not quenched (Mark 9:47-48; cf. Isa. 66:24).
6. In short, Jeremiah 7 captures the essence of Jeremiah's prophecies. Judah is facing judgment. She has made some superficial reforms -- refurbishing the temple, making sure the right sacrifices are offered. But she has allowed the worship of other gods to persist, including the offering of young children at Topheth. It is a family affair. The women make cakes for the queen of heaven, Ashtoreth, on a fire lit by the fathers on wood gathered by the children (7:18).
Meanwhile, they do violence toward the weak. They treat with contempt the immigrant, the orphan, the widow, the poor -- the "big four."
Is there an indictment of the evangelical church to be found here? I still believe that the bulk of the evangelical church is sincere in its worship. Its "sacrifices" are genuine. But there are also many, I suspect, who are going after other gods in the form of political idolatry. They are doing violence toward the immigrant, the widow, the orphan, and the poor. They might justify it in the name of things concerning which God gave no command in Scripture.
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