During these years, Jeremiah's prophecies resembled those of Amos and Micah. He sought to bring social consciousness to the rich and well-to-do regarding the poor and marginalized. We can see that in the first six chapters of the book of Jeremiah.
In 609 BCE, Josiah was killed in battle by the Babylonians. His son Jehoahaz took over, but only lasted three months before being deported. Josiah's other son, Jehoiakim, became king. During this time, Jeremiah's prophecies were about the doom and judgment coming for God's people. Jeremiah discouraged the positivity of the people. He told the people they would be ruled by the Babylonians for a long time.
Though known for his prophecies of doom, Jeremiah did bring hope to the people. God would not forget the people and the covenant relationship. We can see his prophecies of doom and hope in the rest of the chapters of Jeremiah.
If we look at specific verses from these periods of time, we can see the messages of doom and hope. I will outline them below.
Hope
18:1-12
23:9-32
32:1-15
Doom
1:1-19
Doom
1:1-19
2:1-13
4:23-28
5:1-5
7:1-34
8:18–9:3
20:7-13
I appreciated your outline of the Jeremiah. In the true style of Lament Jeremiah gives us his list of complaints and yet somehow still ends in a word of hope. This is not often pointed out about Jeremiah. I wonder if we know Jeremiah for his doom and gloom because we, like his own people, do not want to hear the message of moral conviction and the predictions of what will come if we don't change our ways?
ReplyDeleteYou always do such a nice job of succinctly giving the history of what we've read/heard for the week at the beginning of your posts! This week was no different! I wonder if the book of Jeremiah would have been different if it had been happy, happy, happy all the way through until the doom started. I do see glimmers of doom in the hope, and hope in the doom -- what would it be like if it was one then the other? How would we read that differently?
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed your post. I like how you point out that, while Jeremiah is indeed known for his messages of doom, he finds ways to remind his audience that God won't abandon God's people. I also appreciate how clearly you outline Jeremiah.
ReplyDeleteGreat title to your post! I completely agree with Melissa’s comment on how your introduction is a great history focused outline, before reading her comment, I was going to say I like how you give us nice background knowledge of the history of Jeremiah. I will have to go back and check out your older posts! I appreciated your informative introduction on Jeremiah. The prophecies of doom stood out to me. (Irrelevant side note: reminded the Seattle Seahawk’s legion of boom) I think it is more appropriate to call Jeremiah the Prophet of Doom since there are more examples of doom compared to hope. Thank you for sharing your insight on the prophets and separating the hope from the doom.
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