Lexi Zambito

The Personal Lament of the Despairing Yet Obedient Prophet in Jeremiah 20:7–18

Lexi Zambito

The prophet Jeremiah lived in a time of great turmoil in Judah: the Northern Kingdom had just fallen, and Jerusalem was on the brink of destruction. God sends Jeremiah as a prophet to foretell the impending destruction at the hands of the Babylonians and call the people to turn away from their sins of idolatry and child sacrifice. The people reject Jeremiah, calling him a false prophet and refusing to listen to his predictions. Thus, Jeremiah laments his fate as a rejected prophet in 20:7–18. With provocative imagery of having been seduced by God, Jeremiah describes how he has no choice but to obey God and proclaim His word, even though this makes him the object of scorn and derision from his friends. According to the Deuteronomistic Historian, if you obeyed God, you were blessed, and if you disobeyed God, you were cursed (Deut 6:1–2). Jeremiah feels abandoned by God because, though he obeys God, he is cursed, while his fellow citizens disobey God and live lives of prosperity. This leads Jeremiah to curse the very day on which he was born in a rejection of the call to be a prophet received in the womb. It is obeying God that brings Jeremiah so much anguish, but he has no other choice. Jeremiah feels no remorse for the city of Jerusalem, but laments that he is the one that has to be an object of derision. Jeremiah’s lament in 20:7–18 expresses his despair about his fate as a prophet, worsened by the contradiction between his compulsion to speak the word of God, which brings him suffering, and the pressure to remain silent from his friends, who prosper.

Jeremiah is a commoner from a minor priestly family who served at a shrine outside of Jerusalem. The Book of Jeremiah emphasizes that he is destined from the womb to be a prophet, and Jeremiah himself has no say in the matter. There are parallels between Jeremiah and Moses, as Jeremiah initially objects to God’s call due to his lack of

speaking ability (Jer 1:6). 1 Among Jeremiah’s original audience, this would have evoked thoughts of Moses’s initial rejection of God’s call for him to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, as Moses also objects on the grounds that he is not a good speaker (Exod 4:10). Moses has Aaron to speak for him and thus answers God’s call, but Jeremiah answers God’s call because he has no choice. He is born to be God’s prophet, despite his personal reluctance. In answer to his divine call, Jeremiah begins to prophesy during Josiah’s reign from 639 to 609 B.C., before the fall of Jerusalem to the Babylonians, and he continues until the dreaded fall actually occurs in 587. 2 Jeremiah is thus an eyewitness to the destructive events he predicts.

Because the temple had been saved from destruction at the hands of the Assyrians in 722 B.C., there was a common presumption among the people that the temple would never be destroyed. God promised David that his dynasty would last forever (2 Sam 7:8–16), and therefore the people believed that the temple, built by David’s son Solomon, would also last forever. Jeremiah did not share in this presumption, because while Yahweh was always faithful to His promises, the people were not always so faithful. The covenant depended on their moral uprightness. 3 Jeremiah thus warned the people about the imminent danger and advised that they submit to Babylon. Although Jeremiah disliked Babylon, he labeled Judah as the primary cause of the nation’s coming destruction. In the prophet’s view, Jerusalem’s destruction would be a just punishment for the people’s sins. During a time when everyone projected blame onto Babylon for Judah’s fate, Jeremiah blamed Judah itself and called for personal accountability. The Judahites denounced Jeremiah as a false prophet because he contradicted all the other prophets. Nothing about which he had prophesied had happened yet, and therefore the people had no reason to trust in his harsh prophesying. Because the people rejected him, Jeremiah bemoaned his sufferings in many of his oracles (e.g., 11:1–12:6, 14:1–15:9). It was his inescapable fate, destined for him while he was still in the womb.

Despite their belief that no one could destroy the temple, the people of Jerusalem were nonetheless desperate, as the Babylonians

1 William Holladay, “The Background of Jeremiah’ s Self-Understanding: Moses, Samuel, and Psalm 22,” Journal of Biblical Literature 83, no. 2 (1964): 154. 2 Corrine Carvalho, Reading Jeremiah: A Literary and Theological Commentary (Macon: Smyth & Helwys Publishing, 2016), 2. 3 Ibid., 49. 18

had surrounded the city in a siege for a decade, beginning in 597 B.C. They anticipated another awful siege like the one they had experienced at the hands of the Assyrians. Because of their growing sense of desperation, many people resorted to child sacrifice as a way to appease the gods (e.g., Jer 19:4–5). Jeremiah had specifically prophesied against the temptation to offer child sacrifice and emphasized how angry such an injustice would make God (Jer 19:6–13). 4 He already viewed Jerusalem’s coming fate as punishment for its sins, so by committing the great sin of child sacrifice, the city’s people only compounded the judgment already hanging over them.

Jeremiah 20:7–18 falls in the middle of the book, right as Nebuchadnezzar’s forces surround the city. Immediately before these verses, God instructs Jeremiah to get a potter’s earthenware flask and bring it to the entrance of the Potsherd Gate (19:1–2). The Lord then informs Jeremiah that He will cause great evil to befall that place because of Judah’s numerous and glaring sins against His commandments, namely, idolatry and child sacrifices to Baal (19:3–5). The practice of child sacrifice utterly abhors God, and thus He will make Judah and Jerusalem fall to their enemies (19:7). The Jews who die will be left unburied, and animals and humans alike will eat their corpses, desperate for food while under siege (19:7,9). God tells Jeremiah to smash the potter’s flask in front of the people (19:10). This irreparable damage to the flask is the same damage that will be inflicted upon the city and its people because of their unfaithfulness (19:11). Jeremiah then goes to the court of the temple to relay this message to the people, and the priest Pashhur puts Jeremiah in the stocks for his prophecy (20:1–2). When Jeremiah is released the next morning, he renames Pashhur “Terror on every side” and tells him that Jerusalem will be handed over to the Babylonians (20:3). They will slaughter the people and take the rest captive, including Pashhur himself, who will live and die in Babylon (20:3–6). Jeremiah implies that Pashhur, because he refuses to listen to Jeremiah’s prophecies, is personally responsible for the coming destruction. 5 Jeremiah’s conversation with Pashhur is the first time in the book that Babylon is mentioned by name, concretizing the impending destruction, as well as elucidating that Nebuchadnezzar is being specifically used by God to enact judgment on His people (20:4). 6

4 Ibid., 63. 5 Leslie C. Allen, Jeremiah: A Commentary (Louisville: Westminster John Knox Press, 2008), 228. 6 Ibid. VOLUME XV (2022) 19

The political situation of Judah, Jeremiah’s personal history, and the account of God’s wrath due to child sacrifice contextualize Jeremiah’s lament in 20:7–18. In his lament, Jeremiah mourns his fate as a prophet, because the people, who do not realize that their own sinfulness will cause the ruin of Judah, reject him. Jeremiah 20:7–18 is a self-contained lament in which he complains not about the impending destruction of the city, but about his own fate as a rejected prophet. Rather than expressing a compassionate cry for help on behalf of his city, Jeremiah begs God to take vengeance on his fellow citizens and bring them to justice. 7 Jeremiah’s imprisonment by Pashhur in the preceding verses illuminates the immediate events that prompt the emotional and desolate lament.

In 20:7–18, Jeremiah laments his fate as a prophet, because God has seduced him, which invites on Jeremiah the scorn of his people. There is an accusatory tone as Jeremiah shakes his fists at God for having overcome him, saying, “[Y]ou seduced me, Lord” (v. 7a). This image of seduction is reminiscent of how a lover is overcome by the beloved. Jeremiah accuses God of seducing him, but Jeremiah himself says that he allowed it to happen and he seems to suggest that part of him wanted it to happen, saying, “I let myself be seduced” (v. 7a). Jeremiah willingly participates, as being close to God is “attractive,” but he only later realizes the full implications of what this closeness to God means for his life. 8 Jeremiah cannot fight against God’s seductive power anymore, admitting that God is “too strong” for him and has “prevailed” over him (v. 7b). Because God “prevailed,” Jeremiah is “an object of laughter” and all the people “mock him” for his adherence to proclaiming God’s messages (v. 7c). The people do not share Jeremiah’s concerns that the temple may be destroyed, and they do not realize that their sinfulness will cause their devastation. This impending destruction results in Jeremiah lamenting, “Whenever I speak, I must cry out, violence and outrage I proclaim” (v. 8a). God compels Jeremiah to “cry out” against Judah’s current state of affairs with oracles of destruction to rouse the people from their willful ignorance. Jeremiah, however, is caught between God, who demands that he prophesy, and his enemies, who would have him remain silent. 9 He proclaims, “the word of the Lord has brought [Jeremiah] reproach

7 Carvalho, Reading Jeremiah, 65. 8 Ibid. 9 Jonathan Magonet, “Jeremiah’s Last Confession (Jeremiah 20:7–18),” European Judaism: A Journal for the New Europe 32, no. 1 (1999): 51. 20

and derision all day long, ” and this from his friends, who believe him to be a false prophet, as the destruction of which he warns them has not yet happened (v. 8b). Whenever Jeremiah grows weary of being an object of derision, he resolves to “not mention [God]” and to “no longer speak in his name” (v. 9a). When Jeremiah vows to no longer speak for God, however, “it is as if fire is burning in [his] heart, imprisoned in [his] bones” (v. 9b). This fire, which usually indicates a fever in the psalms of lament, refers here in v. 9 to an unbearable mental burden. 10 Jeremiah “grow[s] weary holding back” and simply “cannot” refuse God (v. 9c). The prophet is incapable of refusing God, as to do so induces an intolerable physical and mental burden. God’s messages are simply too urgent to be contained within the prophet.

Jeremiah hears “the whisperings of many ” who say, “Terror on every side! Denounce! Let us denounce him!” (v. 10a). Jeremiah’s friends, although they condemn him as a false prophet, are nonetheless frightened by his oracles of destruction. In v. 10, Jeremiah calls the reader back to 20:3, in which, just after he is released from the stocks, he renames the priest Pashhur “terror on every side” because of his refusal to listen to Jeremiah’s prophecies. Pashhur and the rest of Jeremiah’s friends “are on the watch for any misstep of [his]” to serve as a confirmation that Jeremiah is a false prophet (v. 10b). Jeremiah’s enemies think, “Perhaps he can be tricked; then we will prevail and take our revenge on him” (v. 10c). They want to trick Jeremiah so that his blunder can be used as evidence against his veracity as a prophet. They desire to take their “revenge on him,” because Jeremiah warns them that the destruction of the city will be a direct result of their sinfulness. Jeremiah compounds the ridicule by the fact that the destruction of Jerusalem does not happen until at least ten years after he starts prophesying. 11

Although Jeremiah is mocked, “the Lord is with [him], like a mighty champion” (v. 11a). God is like a warrior in battle who defends Jeremiah against his enemies, and as a result, “[his] persecutors will stumble, they will not prevail” (v. 11a). The repetition of the word “prevail” here reminds the reader of how God “prevailed” over Jeremiah in v. 7. In this case, however, Jeremiah’s enemies will not prevail over him, because he has already succumbed to God. Jeremiah

10 Allen, Jeremiah, 231. 11 Elizabeth Achtemeier, Jeremiah (Atlanta: John Knox Press, 1987), 63.

is free from enslavement to the world and to himself, and “he has his life totally from the hand of God,” who is “faithful and good and is working out a purpose of salvation.”12

References to honor and shame are interlaced throughout the passage. Jeremiah experiences shame because he does not have a family, as God commands him in 16:2, “Do not take a wife and do not have sons and daughters in this place” because they will die of disease and famine. Jeremiah’s not taking a wife or having children serves as a warning to the Judahites of the impending destruction, and it also results in a lower social status for Jeremiah. In the “failure” of Jeremiah’s enemies to trick him, “they will be put to utter shame, to lasting, unforgettable confusion” (v. 11b). Although Jeremiah experiences shame now, his enemies will experience shame at the destruction of their households and the decimation of their city at the hands of foreign invaders, the very events about which Jeremiah attempts to warn them with his prophecies and the example of his life. 13 Jeremiah praises God’s just judgment, saying, “Lord of hosts, you test the just, you see mind and heart” (v. 12a). Jeremiah knows that God will reward him for his faithfulness, and asks God to avenge him, requesting, “Let me see the vengeance you take on them” (v. 12b). He desires to see his enemies shamed as they have shamed him, and Jeremiah justifies this request by saying, “for to you [God] I have entrusted my cause” (v. 12). Although Jeremiah speaks of his vindication by God while his enemies are put to shame in vv. 11 and 12, the surrounding text contradicts this. Jeremiah’s enemies have not been put to shame, and God has not saved Jeremiah from ridicule or punishment. 14 There is a contrast here between what Jeremiah knows to be true about God and his actual lived experience of serving Him. Jeremiah, however, has placed all of his trust in the Lord and will therefore be saved from the same lasting confusion to which his friends will be subjected. Jeremiah praises God for his salvation: “Sing to the Lord, praise the Lord, for he has rescued the life of the poor from the power of the evildoers!” (v. 13).

After thanking God for the vindication that will one day be his, Jeremiah reverts to lamenting his fate as a prophet, as his vindication has not yet come. Verses 14–18 communicate a tone of despair that,

12 Ibid., 64. 13 Carvalho, Reading Jeremiah, 65. 14 Magonet, “Jeremiah’s Last Confession,” 49.

despite Jeremiah’s unwavering faith in Yahweh, is directed at God. 15 Jeremiah laments, “Cursed be the day on which I was born! May the day my mother gave me birth never be blessed!” (v. 14). This is no small curse for Jeremiah’s original audience, because to curse something in ancient Israel meant to wish that it had never existed at all. 16 Jeremiah wishes that he had never existed, as he was born solely to be God’s prophet, the very role that makes him an object of scorn and derision. 17 Jeremiah curses not only the day of his birth but “the one who brought the news to [his] father, ‘A child, a son, has been born to you!’ filling him with great joy” (v. 15). He wishes that this messenger of the good news of his birth were wiped from existence and wishes a terrifying life upon him: “Let that man be like the cities which the Lord relentlessly overthrew; let him hear war cries in the morning, battle alarms at noonday” (v. 16). Jeremiah wants the messenger to be constantly on guard against his enemies with the threat of destruction ever hanging over his head, just as Jeremiah has to be constantly vigilant against his supposed friends who seek to harm him. Jeremiah curses the messenger “because he did not kill [Jeremiah] in the womb!” (v. 17a). Jeremiah’s fate as a prophet is so unbearable that he wishes that the messenger had committed the vile act of killing a child in its mother’s womb. This act of evil that Jeremiah wishes had happened is ironically similar to the sin of child sacrifice for which he condemns Judah in chapter 19. Despite cursing the day of his birth and the messenger, Jeremiah is careful not to curse his mother or father, as that would have been a terrible sin in Israel, nor does he curse God, as that would have been blasphemy. 18

In concluding his lament, Jeremiah contrasts vv. 17–18 with the beginning verses of the passage. In vv. 7–9, Jeremiah possesses the word of God like a pregnant woman whose baby is due imminently and who cannot keep from going into labor, but in vv. 14–18 Jeremiah wants to remain in the womb forever. 19 If the messenger had killed him in the womb, “then [his] mother would have been [his] grave, her womb confining [him] forever” (v. 17b). The image of a child dead inside its mother’s womb is unnatural and reviling, as the womb

15 Jack Lundbom, “The Double Curse in Jeremiah 20:14–18,” Journal of Biblical Literature 104, no. 4 (1985): 589. 16 Achtemeier, Jeremiah, 65. 17 Ibid. 18 Ibid. 19 Magonet, “Jeremiah’s Last Confession,” 54.

usually symbolizes “fertility, prosperity, and virility.”20 Jeremiah’s current fate as a prophet is so dreadful that he wishes he had died in his mother’s womb, which is usually a secure place of life and growth, but which Jeremiah desires to distort into a place of death. Jeremiah questions, “Why did I come forth from the womb, to see sorrow and pain, to end my days in shame?” (v. 18). The word “shame” reminds the reader of v. 11, in which God shames Jeremiah’s enemies. Once again, Jeremiah contrasts God’s promises of vindication with his lived reality as a scorned prophet. He wonders what the point of his life is. Most scholars believe that this question in v. 18, rather than being addressed to his parents or to the messenger, is really directed at Yahweh. 21

The material that comes after 20:7–18 is ironic, because Nebuchadnezzar surrounds and attacks the city, which is precisely what Jeremiah prophesies and against which he urges the people to defend themselves by living justly. Now that the events of his prophecies are coming true, Jeremiah’s enemies beg him to ask God for help. King Zedekiah sends Pashhur and Zephaniah to Jeremiah to have him communicate with the Lord and ask whether or not God will free them from Nebuchadnezzar (21:1–2). They ask whether God will perform “wonderful works” for them as He has done before, but they seem to forget that, because of their unfaithfulness, they do not merit such mercy from God (21:2). Instead of receiving the answer they hope for, Jeremiah says that God Himself will turn against Jerusalem and cause a great pestilence to afflict the city (21:6). The king and the rest of the survivors will be turned over to the Babylonians to be killed (21:7). Here, God gives the people an option: stay in Jerusalem and die, or leave and surrender to the Babylonians and live (21:8–9). Nebuchadnezzar will set the city on fire, utterly destroying it (21:10). This chapter following Jeremiah’s lament ends with a call to the Davidic line for justice on behalf of the oppressed (21:11–14). If they do not enact justice for the poor and the oppressed, God will destroy them in His fury. It is too late for Jerusalem, however, as they already had a chance to be helped by God through faithfulness to Him. They cannot expect God, after having done nothing for Him, to save them in a time of distress. They must be faithful to God always, and not only when it is expedient for them.

20 Carvalho, Reading Jeremiah, 65. 21 Lundbom, “Double Curse,” 591. 24

Jeremiah’s prophecies are so urgent because the Northern Kingdom of Israel has already fallen, and the Southern Kingdom is at risk of experiencing the same fate. The people do not believe that their city will be destroyed as punishment for their sins; rather, they believe that as long they have the temple, they will be free from the same decimation experienced by Israel. The people have done nothing to honor God’s presence but have instead turned to idolatry and child sacrifice. The question is not so much a matter of how much God is with His people, but about how much the people are with their God. This is why Jeremiah urgently calls the people to conversion and laments the scorn he must suffer due to his divinely appointed role as a prophet and his compulsion to prophesy. He is caught between doing God’s will and sounding blasphemous or keeping silent about his prophecies for the sake of his countrymen and disobeying God. Jeremiah wishes he had never been born because of the utter mockery and derision to which he is subjected. Jeremiah is caught in a tough relationship with God. Although he never doubts in his prophecies or that he is doing the will of God, it often seems that Jeremiah suffers for doing God’s will while his friends are living in prosperity even though they have turned away from God. Jeremiah does not understand why he is suffering even though he is doing everything right, and this is such a relatable experience for modern readers.

In life it can feel like we are doing our very best in serving God, our families, and our communities, but we do not experience peace or joy. Serving God is often very difficult, and this comes as no surprise when we reflect on our Lord on the cross. We can be tempted towards despair, as Jeremiah is, when the good works we perform seemingly produce no fruit. The despair and anguish of Jeremiah is especially relatable for those undergoing sickness, family strife, or trauma. Things happen to us that are painfully out of our control, and the best we can do is move forward slowly by doing what God asks of us in each individual moment. Here, a modern audience can learn from Jeremiah in that despite his despair, embarrassment, anguish, and desperation, he never once stops doing the will of God. He does not understand why he is an object of mockery, why people who are supposed to be his friends do not listen to him, or why God permits him to undergo such painful experiences. Jeremiah even curses the day he was born and wishes it had never happened. Jeremiah wrestles with God and contends with his fate, but nevertheless, he knows that he was born for a purpose—to be God’s prophet—and thus keeps doing

the work the Lord requires of him. He does not perform this work without complaint, but rather with vulnerable prayer that expresses just how deeply he is wounded by his role in life. With Jeremiah and Christ, who was wounded in His Passion for the saving work He was sent to accomplish, we are often wounded by what God calls us to do. Despite his anguish and woundedness, Jeremiah never forgets that God fashioned him in the womb for a specific purpose, and this serves as a great reminder to those who feel as though their lives are hopeless that they, too, have been created for a purpose. Although serving God is often burdensome and painful, He will never abandon those who are faithful to Him, even in their distress.