Jeremiah Chapter 22



But this call to awake to righteousness the Lord follows up in Jeremiah 22 by sending the prophet down to the king's house with a further appeal. "Hear the word of the Lord, O king of Judah, that sittest upon the throne of David, thou, and thy servants, and thy people that enter in by these gates: Thus saith the Lord: Execute ye judgment and righteousness, and deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor: and do no wrong, do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, nor the widow, neither shed innocent blood in this place. For if ye do this thing indeed, then shall there enter in by the gates of this house kings sitting upon the throne of David, riding in chariots and on horses, he, and his servants, and his people. But if ye will not hear these words, I swear by myself, saith the Lord, that this house shall become a desolation. For thus saith the Lord unto the king's house of Judah; Thou art Gilead unto me, and the head of Lebanon: yet surely I will make thee a wilderness, and cities which are not inhabited. And I will prepare destroyers against thee, every one with his weapons: and they shall cut down thy choice cedars, and cast them into the fire. And many nations shall pass by this city, and they shall say every one to his neighbour, Wherefore hath the Lord done thus unto to this great city? Then they shall answer, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the Lord their God, and worshipped other gods, and served them. (Ver. 2-9.)

Nor is this all. The various kings of Judah who had reigned during the crisis of the capital come before us successively. Never had a louder wail been heard in the land than when all Judah and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah. "And Jeremiah [we are told expressly in 2 Chron. 35] lamented for Josiah; and all the singing men, and the singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations to this day, and made them an ordinance in Israel; and behold, they are written in the lamentations." But here, long after, the same Jeremiah says of Josiah's son, "Weep ye not for the dead [i.e., Josiah], neither bemoan him; but weep sore for him that goeth away; for he shall return no more, nor see his native country. For thus saith the Lord touching Shallum the son of Josiah king of Judah, which reigned instead of Josiah his father, which went forth out of this place, He shall not return thither any more: but shall die in the place whither they have led him captive, and shall see this land no more." (Ver. 10-12.) Josiah might be mourned justly by a people that lost so godly a king cut off prematurely; but far more deplorable in itself was the lot of his son deposed and carried away into Egypt by Pharaoh-Necho.

Was this all? Far from it. The king of Egypt set up another son of Josiah, changed his name from Eliakim to Jehoiakim; but Nebuchadnezzar bound the guilty monarch in chains, and carried him to Babylon. And his dirge follows: "Woe unto him that buildeth his house by unrighteousness, and his chambers by wrong; that useth his neighbour's service without wages, and giveth him not for his work; that saith, I will build me a wide house and large chambers, and cutteth him out windows ; and it is ceiled with cedar and painted with vermilion. Shalt thou reign, because thou closest thyself in cedar? did not thy father eat and drink, and do judgment and justice, and then it was well with him? He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well with him: was not this to know me? saith the Lord. But thine eyes and thine heart are not but for thy covetousness, and for to shed innocent blood, and for oppression, and for violence, to do it. 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! He shall be buried with the burial of an ass, drawn and cast forth beyond the gates of Jerusalem." (Ver. 13-19.) Who of the kings had lived with less conscience? Who had died with more shame? No lamentation for him but an ass's burial (i.e., base exposure) beyond the gates of Jerusalem. For the innocent blood he shed, the Lord would not pardon. See Jeremiah 36:30.

But had not Jehoiakim a son? Wretched was he, Jehoiachin, who succeeded to his father's guilt and misery. How could he be said to sit upon the throne of David? He reigned in Jerusalem but three months before the lion came up from his thicket and the destroyer of the Gentiles was on his way, the avenger under divine Providence of one who did evil in the sight of Jehovah, according to all that his father had done. "Go up to Lebanon and cry; and lift up thy voice in Bashan, and cry from the passages: for all thy lovers are destroyed. I spake unto thee in thy prosperity; but thou saidst, I will not hear. This hath been thy manner from thy youth, that thou obeyedst not my voice. The wind shall eat up all thy pastors, and thy lovers shall go into captivity: surely then shalt thou be ashamed and confounded for all thy wickedness. O inhabitant of Lebanon, that makest thy nest in the cedars, how gracious shalt thou be when pangs come upon thee, the pain as of a woman in travail! As I live, saith the Lord, though Coniah the son of Jehoiakim king of Judah were the signet upon my right hand, yet would I pluck thee thence; and I will give thee into the hand of them that seek thy life, and into the hand of them whose face thou fearest, even into the hand of Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and into the hand of the Chaldeans. And I will cast thee out, and thy mother that bare thee, into another country, where ye were not born; and there shall ye die. But to the land whereunto they desire to return, thither shall they not return. Is this man Coniah a despised broken idol? is he a vessel wherein is no pleasure? wherefore are they cast out, he and his seed, and are cast into a land which they know not? O earth, earth, earth, hear ye the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord, Write ye this man childless, a man that shall not prosper in his days: for no man of his seed shall prosper, sitting upon the throne of David, and ruling any more in Judah." (Ver. 20-30.)

Thus the roll is complete: for he with whom the chapter opens was the last king of Judah, Zedekiah, before the capital finally sunk, and the sanctuary was burnt, and the king of the Chaldees had all given into his hand. The answer to his message brings before us the sad group, miserable successors of the righteous king taken away from the evil now come.