Jeremiah 22:18

Therefore thus saith the LORD concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah; They shall not lament for him, saying, Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! they shall not lament for him, saying, Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(18) They shall not lament for him.—The words contrast the death as well as the life of Jehoiakim with that of Josiah. For him there should be no lamentation such as was made for the righteous king (2Chronicles 35:25), either from kindred mourning, as over a brother or a sister (perhaps, however, as “sister” would not be appropriate to the king, the words are those of a chorus of mourners, male and female, addressing each other), or from subjects wailing over the death of their “lord” and the departure of his “glory.” For the funeral ceremonies of Israel, see 1Kings 13:30; Matthew 9:23; Mark 5:38.

Benson Commentary

Jeremiah 22:18-19. They shall not lament for him, saying, Ah my brother! &c. — “The prophet here repeats part of the funeral ditty or song which the public mourners used to sing at funerals, (see note on Jeremiah 9:17; Jeremiah 20:14, and compare 1 Kings 13:30,) signifying, that neither Jehoiakim, nor his queen or family, should be buried with those solemn lamentations with which the memory of his predecessors, particularly that of his father, had been honoured: see 2 Chronicles 35:25. Saying, Ah Lord! or, Ah his glory! — That is, how is his glory departed and vanished! another burden or chorus of the funeral song. He shall be buried with the burial of an ass — None attending him to his grave, none mourning over him. Or, the meaning is, he shall have no burial: for the carcasses of asses are not buried. Drawn and cast forth, &c. — The expression seems to be taken from the custom of dogs to draw about a carcass before they tear and devour it. Jehoiakim, having been advanced to the kingdom by Pharaoh-necho, king of Egypt, 2 Kings 23:34, followed the fortune of that king, and upon the conquest of Egypt by the Chaldeans, Jeremiah 46:2, after three years’ reign, was taken prisoner by Nebuchadnezzar, and put into irons, Daniel 1:2; 2 Chronicles 36:6. But afterward, it seems, the king of Babylon released him and made him a tributary king. After three years’ obedience, however, Jehoiakim rebelled, in confidence of assistance from Egypt. Soon after which Nebuchadnezzar’s army overran Judea, besieged Jerusalem, and probably took Jehoiakim prisoner in some sally that he made upon them, and killed him, and then cast out his dead body into the highway, denying him the common rites of burial: see 2 Kings 24:1-6. Accordingly, he is said to have slept with his fathers, but not to have been buried with them: see also Joseph. Antiq., lib. 10. cap. 7, 8.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

22:10-19 Here is a sentence of death upon two kings, the wicked sons of a very pious father. Josiah was prevented from seeing the evil to come in this world, and removed to see the good to come in the other world; therefore, weep not for him, but for his son Shallum, who is likely to live and die a wretched captive. Dying saints may be justly envied, while living sinners are justly pitied. Here also is the doom of Jehoiakim. No doubt it is lawful for princes and great men to build, beautify, and furnish houses; but those who enlarge their houses, and make them sumptuous, need carefully to watch against the workings of vain-glory. He built his houses by unrighteousness, with money gotten unjustly. And he defrauded his workmen of their wages. God notices the wrong done by the greatest to poor servants and labourers, and will repay those in justice, who will not, in justice, pay those whom they employ. The greatest of men must look upon the meanest as their neighbours, and be just to them accordingly. Jehoiakim was unjust, and made no conscience of shedding innocent blood. Covetousness, which is the root of all evil, was at the bottom of all. The children who despise their parents' old fashions, commonly come short of their real excellences. Jehoiakim knew that his father found the way of duty to be the way of comfort, yet he would not tread in his steps. He shall die unlamented, hateful for oppression and cruelty.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Boldly by name is the judgment at length pronounced upon Jehoiakim. Dreaded by all around him, he shall soon lie an unheeded corpse, with no one to lament. No loving relative shall make such wailing as when a brother or sister is carried to the grave; nor shall he have the respect of his subjects, Ah Lord! or, Ah his glory!

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

18. Ah my brother! … sister!—addressing him with such titles of affection as one would address to a deceased friend beloved as a brother or sister (compare 1Ki 13:30). This expresses, They shall not lament him with the lamentation of private individuals [Vatablus], or of blood relatives [Grotius]: as "Ah! lord," expresses public lamentation in the case of a king [Vatablus], or that of subjects [Grotius]. Henderson thinks, "Ah! sister," refers to Jehoiakim's queen, who, though taken to Babylon and not left unburied on the way, as Jehoiakim, yet was not honored at her death with royal lamentations, such as would have been poured forth over her at Jerusalem. He notices the beauty of Jeremiah's manner in his prophecy against Jehoiakim. In Jer 22:13, 14 he describes him in general terms; then, in Jer 22:15-17, he directly addresses him without naming him; at last, in Jer 22:18, he names him, but in the third person, to imply that God puts him to a distance from Him. The boldness of the Hebrew prophets proves their divine mission; were it not so, their reproofs to the Hebrew kings, who held the throne by divine authority, would have been treason.

Ah his glory!—"Alas! his majesty."

Matthew Poole's Commentary

Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah; a very bad son of a good father, whose name was Eliakim, by Pharaoh-nechoh turned to Jehoiakim, 2 Kings 23:34, and by him set up. He reigned wickedly, and infinitely oppressed the people for money for Pharaoh-nechoh, that made him king, 22:35. He reigned but eleven years; but rebelling against Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, we read, 2 Kings 24:1,2, he was carried by him into Babylon in fetters, 2 Chronicles 36:6, where, for aught we read, he died. Jehoiachin, or Jeconiah, his son, succeeded him, Jeremiah 22:9, reigning only three months and ten days.

They shall not lament for him; he died not lamented; for as it is not probable his enemies would lament him, so he had disobliged his own people by violence and oppression to that degree, that it is not likely that those of them that were in Babylon made any great lamentation for him.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Therefore thus saith the Lord concerning Jehoiakim,.... This shows who is before spoken of and described; Jehoiakim, the then reigning king in Judah, whose name was Eliakim, but was changed by Pharaoh king of Egypt, when he deposed his brother Jehoahaz or Shallum, and set him on the throne, 2 Kings 23:34;

the son of Josiah king of Judah; and who seems to have been his eldest son, though his brother Jehoahaz reigned before him; for he was but twenty three years of age when he began his reign, and he reigned but three months; and Jehoiakim was twenty five years old when he succeeded him, 2 Kings 23:31; his relation to Josiah is mentioned, not so much for his honour, but rather to his disgrace, and as an aggravation of his wickedness, that having so religious a parent, and such a religious education, and the advantage of such an example, and yet did so sadly degenerate: and it also suggests that this would be no security to him from the divine vengeance; but rather provoke it, to deal more severely with him;

they shall not lament for him; that is, his people, his subjects, shall not lament for him when dead, as they did for his father Josiah; so far from having any real grief or inward sorrow on account of his death, that they should not so much as outwardly express any, or use the common form at meeting together:

saying, ah my brother! or, ah sister! a woman meeting her brother would not say to him, O my brother, what bad news is this! we have lost our king! nor he reply to her, O sister, it is so, the loss is great indeed! for this is not to be understood of the funeral "lessus" at the interment of a king or queen; lamenting them under these appellations of brother or sister, which is denied of this prince. Kimchi thinks it has reference to his relations, as that they should not mourn for him, and say, "ah my brother!" nor for his wife, who died at the same time, though not mentioned, ah sister! both should die unlamented, as by their subjects, so by their nearest friends and relations;

they shall not lament for him, saying, ah lord! or, ah his glory! O our liege lord and sovereign, he is gone! where are his glory and majesty now? where are his crown, his sceptre, his robes, and other ensigns of royalty? So the Targum,

"woe, or alas, for the king; alas, for his kingdom;''

a heavy stroke, a sorrowful melancholy providence this! but nothing of this kind should be said; as he lived not beloved, because of his oppression and violence, so he died without any lamentation for him.

Geneva Study Bible

Therefore thus saith the LORD concerning Jehoiakim the son of Josiah king of Judah; They shall not lament for {l} him, saying, Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! they shall not lament for him, saying, Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!

(l) For everyone will have enough to lament for himself.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

18. Ah my brother! or, Ah sister!] given as the usual formulae in lamenting a death (see 1 Kings 13:30). The second is here inappropriate, but it satisfies the parallelism of the Ḳinah metre of the whole passage.

Ah lord! or, Ah his glory!] the lamentations of subjects and friends, those outside his family.

18, 19. The prediction of the circumstances attendant upon his death. Cp. Jeremiah 36:30, the similarity of which makes it probable that these were among the “many like words” which were added to the original form of the Roll (Jeremiah 36:32) as read to Jehoiakim, and would thus probably be later than the rest of the passage. The prediction was doubtless fulfilled, or it would not have been included in Jeremiah’s prophecies as edited. It is true that we read 2 Kings 24:6 that Jehoiakim “slept with his fathers,” but mention of his burial is significantly omitted.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 18. - Josiah had been bitterly missed and universally lamented (2 Chronicles 35:25); and so, only perhaps with less heartiness in most cases, Jehoiakim's other predecessors (Jeremiah 34:5). The Babylonian kings, too, received the honors of public mourning, e.g. even the last of his race, who surrendered to Cyrus, according to the British Museum inscription translated by Mr. Pinches. Ah my brother! or, Ah sister! The Septuagint omits the latter part of this phrase, apparently because it seemed inappropriate to the death of Jehoiakim; but the parallelism requires a two-membered clause. According to Movers, the funeral procession is to be conceived of as formed of two parts, condoling with each other on having to share the same fate ('Die Phonizier,' 2. 248). Or perhaps mythology may supply a reason; it is possible that the formulae of public mourning were derived from the ceremonies of the Adonia; Adonis was an androgynous deity (Lenormant, 'Lettres assyriologiques,' 2:209), and might be lamented by his devotees as at once "brother" and "sister." (For another view, see Sayco's edition of G. Smith's 'Chaldean Genesis,' p. 267). Ezekiel (Ezekiel 8:13) testifies to the worship of Tammuz, or Adonis, and the highest compliment a king could receive might be to be lamented in the same terms as the sun-god. Jeremiah does not approve this; he merely describes the popular custom. The recognition of the deeply rooted heathenism of the Jews before the Exile involves no disparagement to Old Testament religion; rather it increases the cogency of the argument for its supernatural origin. For how great was the contrast between Jeremiah and his semi-heathen countrymen! And yet Jeremiah's religion is the seed of the faith which overcame the world. Ah lord! or, Ah his glory! Lord is in the Hebrew adon (comp. Adonis and see above). His glory is against the parallelism; we should expect "lady" or "queen." Jeremiah 22:18

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

As punishment for this, his end will be full of horrors; when he dies he will not be bemoaned and mourned for, and will lie unburied. To have an ass's burial means: to be left unburied in the open field, or cast into a flaying-ground, inasmuch as they drag out the dead body and cast it far from the gates of Jerusalem. The words: Alas, my brother! alas, etc.! are ipsissima verba of the regular mourners who were procured to bewail the deaths of men and women. The lxx took objection to the "alas, sister," and left it out, applying the words literally to Jehoiakim's death; whereas the words are but a rhetorical individualizing of the general idea: they will make no death-laments for him, and the omission destroys the parallelism. His glory, i.e., the king's. The idea is: neither his relatives nor his subjects will lament his death. The infinn. absoll. סחוב והשׁלך, dragging forth and casting (him), serve to explain: the burial of an ass, etc. In Jeremiah 36:30, where Jeremiah repeats this prediction concerning Jehoiakim, it is said: His dead body shall be cast out (exposed) to the heat by day and to the cold by night, i.e., rot unburied under the open sky.

As to the fulfilment of this prophecy, we are told, indeed, in 2 Kings 24:6 that Jehoiakim slept with his fathers, and Jehoiachin, his son, was king in his stead. But the phrase "to sleep with his fathers" denotes merely departure from this life, without saying anything as to the manner of the death. It is not used only of kings who died a peaceful death on a sickbed, but of Ahab (1 Kings 22:40), who, mortally wounded in the battle, died in the war-chariot. There is no record of Jehoiakim's funeral obsequies or burial in 2 Kings 24, and in Chr. there is not even mention made of his death. Three years after the first siege of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans, and after he had become tributary to the king of Babylon, Jehoiakim rose in insurrection, and Nebuchadnezzar sent against him the troops of the Chaldeans, Aramaeans, Moabites, and Ammonites. It was not till after the accession of Jehoiachin that Nebuchadnezzar himself appeared before Jerusalem and besieged it (2 Kings 24:1-2, and 2 Kings 24:10). So it is in the highest degree probable that Jehoiakim fell in battle against the Chaldean-Syrian armies before Jerusalem was besieged, and while the enemies were advancing against the city; also that he was left to lie unburied outside of Jerusalem; see on 2 Kings 24:6, where other untenable attempts to harmonize are discussed. The absence of direct testimony to the fulfilment of the prophecy before us can be no ground for doubting that it was fulfilled, when we consider the great brevity of the notices of the last kings' reigns given by the authors of the books of Kings and Chronicles. Graf's remark hereon is excellent: "We have a warrant for the fulfilment of this prediction precisely in the fact that it is again expressly recounted in Jeremiah 36, a historical passage written certainly at a later time (Jeremiah 36:30 seems to contain but a slight reference to the prediction in Jeremiah 22:18-19, Jeremiah 22:30); or, while Jeremiah 22:12, Jeremiah 22:25. tallies so completely with the history, is Jeremiah 22:18. to be held as contradicting it?"