That same year, in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year, in the fifth month, Hananiah the son of Azzur, the prophet, who was of Gibeon, spoke to me in Yahweh’s house, in the presence of the priests and of all the people, saying, “Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel, says, ‘I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon. Within two full years I will bring again into this place all the vessels of Yahweh’s house, that Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon took away from this place, and carried to Babylon. I will bring again to this place Jeconiah the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, with all the captives of Judah, who went to Babylon,’ says Yahweh; ‘for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon.’ ”
Then the prophet Jeremiah said to the prophet Hananiah in the presence of the priests, and in the presence of all the people who stood in Yahweh’s house, even the prophet Jeremiah said, “Amen! May Yahweh do so. May Yahweh perform your words which you have prophesied, to bring again the vessels of Yahweh’s house, and all those who are captives, from Babylon to this place. Nevertheless listen now to this word that I speak in your ears, and in the ears of all the people: The prophets who have been before me and before you of old prophesied against many countries, and against great kingdoms, of war, of evil, and of pestilence. The prophet who prophesies of peace, when the word of the prophet happens, then the prophet will be known, that Yahweh has truly sent him.”
Then Hananiah the prophet took the bar from off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck, and broke it. Hananiah spoke in the presence of all the people, saying, “Yahweh says: ‘Even so I will break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon from off the neck of all the nations within two full years.’ ” Then the prophet Jeremiah went his way.
Then Yahweh’s word came to Jeremiah, after Hananiah the prophet had broken the bar from off the neck of the prophet Jeremiah, saying, “Go, and tell Hananiah, saying, ‘Yahweh says, “You have broken the bars of wood, but you have made in their place bars of iron.” For Yahweh of Armies, the God of Israel says, “I have put a yoke of iron on the neck of all these nations, that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; and they will serve him. I have also given him the animals of the field.” ’ ”
Then the prophet Jeremiah said to Hananiah the prophet, “Listen, Hananiah! Yahweh has not sent you, but you make this people trust in a lie. Therefore Yahweh says, ‘Behold, I will send you away from off the surface of the earth. This year you will die, because you have spoken rebellion against Yahweh.’ ”
So Hananiah the prophet died the same year in the seventh month.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 The Prophet relates here with what haughtiness, and even…
The Prophet relates here with what haughtiness, and even fury, the false prophet Hananiah came forward to deceive the people and to proclaim his trumperies, when yet he must have been conscious of his own wickedness. It hence clearly appears how great must be the madness of those who, being blinded by God, are carried away by a satanic impulse. The circumstances of the case especially shew how great a contempt of God was manifested by this impostor; for he came into the Temple, the priests were present, the people were there, and there before his eyes he had the sanctuary and the ark of the covenant; and we know that the ark of the covenant is everywhere represented as having the presence of God; for God was by that symbol in a manner visible, when he made evident the presence of his power and favor in the Temple. As Hananiah then stood before God’s eyes, how great must have been his stupidity to thrust himself forward and impudently to announce falsehood in the name of God himself! He had yet no doubt but that he falsely boasted that he was God’s prophet.
And he used the same words as Jeremiah did, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel Surely these words ought to have been like a thunderbolt to him, laying prostrate his perverseness, even had he been harder than iron; for what does Jehovah of hosts mean? This name expresses not only the eternal existence of God, but also his power, which diffuses itself through heaven and earth. Ought not Hananiah then to have trembled when any other had alleged God’s name? But now, though he derided and laughed to scorn the prophetic office as well as God’s holy name, he yet hesitated not to boast that God was the author of this prophecy, which was yet nothing but an imposture. And he added, the God of Israel, so that he might be in nothing inferior to Jeremiah. This was a grievous trial, calculated not only to discourage the people, but also to break down the firmness of the holy Prophet. The people saw that God’s name was become a subject of contest; there was a dreadful conflict, “God has spoken to me;” “Nay, rather to me.” Jeremiah and Hananiah were opposed, the one to the other; each of them claimed to be a Prophet. Such was the conflict; the name of God seemed to have been assumed at pleasure, and flung forth by the devil as in sport.
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As to Jeremiah, his heart must have been grievously wounded, when he saw that unprincipled man boldly profaning God’s name. But, as I have already said, God in the meantime supported the minds of the godly, so that they were not wholly cast down, though they must have been somewhat disturbed. For we know that God’s children were not so destitute of feeling as not to be moved by such things; but yet God sustained all those who were endued with true religion. It was indeed easy for them to distinguish between Jeremiah and Hananiah; for they saw that the former announced the commands of God, while the latter sought nothing else but the favor and plaudits of men.
But with regard to Hananiah, he was to them an awful spectacle of blindness and of madness, for he dreaded not the sight of God himself, but entered the Temple and profaned it by his lies, and at the same time assumed in contempt the name of God, and boasted that he was a prophet, while he was nothing of the kind. Let us not then wonder if there be many mercenary brawlers at this day, who without shame and fear fiercely pretend God’s name, and thus exult over us, as though God had given them all that they vainly prattle, while yet it may be fully proved that they proclaim nothing but falsehoods; for God has justly blinded them, as they thus profane his holy name. We shall now come to the words:
And it was in the same year, even in the fourth of Zedekiah’s reign, etc. The fourth year seems to have been improperly called the beginning of his reign. We have said elsewhere, that it may have been that God had laid up this prophecy with Jeremiah, and did not design it to be immediately published. But there would be nothing strange in this, were the confirmation of his reign called its beginning. Zedekiah was made king by Nebuchadnezzar, because the people would not have been willing to accept a foreigner. He might indeed have set one of his own governors over the whole country; and he might also have made a king of one of the chief men of the land, but he saw that anything of this kind would have been greatly disliked. He therefore deemed it enough to take away Jeconiah, and to put in his place one who had not much power nor much wealth, and who was to be his tributary, as the case was with Zedekiah. But in course of time Zedekiah increased in power, so that he was at peace in his own kingdom. We also know that he was set over neighboring countries, as Nebuchadnezzar thought it advantageous to bind him to himself by favors. This fourth year then might well be deemed the beginning of his reign, for during three years things were so disturbed, that he possessed no authority, and hardly dared to ascend the throne. This then is the most probable opinion.
He says afterwards, that Hananiah spoke to him in the presence of the priests and of the whole people Hananiah ought at least to have been touched and moved when he heard Jeremiah speaking, he himself had no proof of his own call; nay, he was an impostor, and he knew that he did nothing but deceive the people, and yet he audaciously persisted in his object, and, as it were, avowedly obtruded himself that he might contend with the Prophet, as though he carried on war with God. He said, Broken is the yoke of the king of Babylon, that is, the tyranny by which he has oppressed the people shall be shortly broken. But he alluded to the yoke which Jeremiah had put on, as we shall presently see. The commencement of his prophecy was, that there was no reason for the Jews to dread the present power of the king of Babylon, for God would soon overthrow him. They could not have entertained hope of restoration, or of a better condition, until that monarchy was trodden under foot; for as long as the king of Babylon bore rule, there was no hope that he would remit the tribute, and restore to the Jews the vessels of the Temple. Hananiah then began with this, that God would break the power of the king of Babylon, so that he would be constrained, willing or unwilling, to let the people free, or that the people would with impunity extricate themselves from the grasp of his power. He then adds, —
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 5, 6, 8, 10, 14, 17 After that the land hast rested, as Lev. 25:2.
After that the land hast rested, as Lev. 25:2.
This was a city in Benjamin belonging to the sons of Aaron, Josh. 21:17.
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When Jeremiah began to bear these bonds and yokes.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 Jer 28:1 And it came to pass the same…
Jer 28:1 And it came to pass the same year, in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the fourth year, [and] in the fifth month, [that] Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet, which [was] of Gibeon, spake unto me in the house of the LORD, in the presence of the priests and of all the people, saying,
Ver. 1. And it came to pass the same year,] scil., Wherein Jeremiah spake to Zedekiah and the priests. {Jer 27:12}
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In the beginning.] In his first year, dividing his reign into three parts.
That Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet,] i.e., The pretended prophet. Dictum κατα δοξαν. A priest he seemeth to have been by his country, Gibeon, {Jos 21:13; Jos 21:17} and a prophet he taketh upon him to be, preacheth pleasing things through flattery, and for filthy lucre likely. He saw how ill Uriah and Jeremiah had sped by telling the truth. He resolveth, therefore, upon another course. These false prophets would ever, with the squirrel, build and have their holes open to the sunny side: ever keep in with the princes and please the people.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17 Here is a great appearing difficulty, viz. how the…
Here is a great appearing difficulty, viz. how the fourth year could be called
the beginning of Zedekiah’s reign, who reigned in all but eleven years, which if they be divided into three parts, the fourth year can hardly be in any propriety called the beginning of his reign. Many things are said to untie this knot, which by such as are curious may be read both in the English Annotations and in Mr. Pool’s Synopsis, I shall only repeat what seemed to both them, and seemeth also to me, the best solution. Though it be said in the fourth year, yet it is not said, in the fourth year of Zedekiah’s reign; they therefore think, that the fourth year of the sabbatical course is here intended. The Jews had a kind of jubilee every seventh year, it was a year when the land was to rest, and not be tilled, Lev 25:1-4, and in that year they were to release their debtors and servants, Deu 15:1; which notion of this fourth year is very probable, if the year wherein the city was besieged was a sabbatical year, or year of rest. For if Zedekiah’s first year were the fourth of the seven that made the sabbatical circle, his third year was another sabbatical year, and his tenth another, presently after which the city was taken.
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Of this
Hananiah we read no more in Scripture; it is probable from the place where he lived, which was one of the cities of the priests, that he was a priest, but no more than a pretended prophet. He comes to Jeremiah in the temple, where he was wont to deliver his prophecies, to confront him in the presence both of the priests and the people, saying,
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Matthew Henry 1710 · Public Domain On vv1, 10 This struggle between a true prophet and a false…
This struggle between a true prophet and a false one is said here to have happened in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah, and yet in the fourth year, for the first four years of his reign might well be called the beginning, or former part, of it, because during those years he reigned under the dominion of the king of Babylon and as a tributary to him; whereas the rest of his reign, which might well be called the latter part of it, in distinction from that former part, he reigned in rebellion against the king of Babylon. In this fourth year of his reign he went in person to Babylon (as we find, Jer 51:59), and it is probable that this gave the people some hope that his negotiation in person would put a good end to the war, in which hope the false prophets encouraged them, this Hananiah particularly, who was of Gibeon, a priests' city, and therefore probably himself a priest, as well as Jeremiah. Now here we have,
I. The prediction which Hananiah delivered publicly, solemnly, in the house of the Lord, and in the name of the Lord, in an august assembly, in the presence of the priests and of all the people, who probably were expecting to have some message from heaven. In delivering this prophecy, he faced Jeremiah, he spoke it to him (Jer 28:1), designing to confront and contradict him, as much as to say, "Jeremiah, thou liest." Now this prediction is that the king of Babylon's power, at least his power over Judah and Jerusalem, should be speedily broken, that within two full years the vessels of the temple should be brought back, and Jeremiah, and all the captives that were carried away with him, should return; whereas Jeremiah had foretold that the yoke of the king of Babylon should be bound on yet faster, and that the vessels and captives should not return for 70 years, Jer 28:2-4. Now, upon the reading of this sham prophecy, and comparing it with the messages that God sent by the true prophets, we may observe what a vast difference there is between them. Here is nothing of the spirit and life, the majesty of style and sublimity of expression, that appear in the discourses of God's prophets, nothing of that divine flame and flatus. But that which is especially wanting here is an air of piety; he speaks with a great deal of confidence of the return of their prosperity, but here is not a word of good counsel given them to repent, and reform, and return to God, to pray, and seek his face, that they may be prepared for the favours God had in reserve for them. He promises them temporal mercies, in God's name, but makes no mention of those spiritual mercies which God always promised should go along with them, as Jer 24:7, I will give them a heart to know me. By all this it appears that, whatever he pretended, he had only the spirit of the world, not the Spirit of God (Co1 2:12), that he aimed to please, not to profit.
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II. Jeremiah's reply to this pretended prophecy. 1. He heartily wishes it might prove true. Such an affection has he for his country, and so truly desirous is he of the welfare of it, that he would be content to lie under the imputation of a false prophet, so that their ruin might be prevented. He said, Amen; the Lord do so; the Lord perform thy words, Jer 28:5, Jer 28:6. This was not the first time that Jeremiah had prayed for his people, though he had prophesied against them, and deprecated the judgments which yet he certainly knew would come; as Christ prayed, Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, when yet he knew it must not pass from him. Though, as a faithful prophet, he foresaw and foretold the destruction of Jerusalem, yet, as a faithful Israelite, he prayed earnestly for the preservation of it, in obedience to that command, Pray for the peace of Jerusalem. Though the will of God's purpose is the rule of prophecy and patience, the will of his precept is the rule of prayer and practice. God himself, though he has determined, does not desire, the death of sinners, but would have all men to be saved. Jeremiah often interceded for his people, Jer 18:20. The false prophets thought to ingratiate themselves with the people by promising them peace; now the prophet shows that he bore them as great a good-will as their prophets did, whom they were so fond of; and, though he had no warrant from God to promise them peace, yet he earnestly desired it and prayed for it. How strangely were those besotted who caressed those who did them the greatest wrong imaginable by flattering them and persecuted him who did them the greatest service imaginable by interceding for them! See Jer 27:18. 2. He appeals to the event, to prove it false, Jer 28:7-9. The false prophets reflected upon Jeremiah, as Ahab upon Micaiah, because he never prophesied good concerning them, but evil. Now he pleads that this had been the purport of the prophecies that other prophets had delivered, so that it ought not to be looked upon as a strange thing, or as rendering his mission doubtful; for prophets of old prophesied against many countries and great kingdoms, so bold were they in delivering the messages which God sent by them, and so far from fearing men, or seeking to please them, as Hananiah did. They made no difficulty, any more than Jeremiah did, of threatening war, famine, and pestilence, and what they said was regarded as coming from God; why then should Jeremiah be run down as a pestilent fellow, and a sower of sedition, when he preached no otherwise than God's prophets had always done before him? Other prophets had foretold destruction did not come, which yet did not disprove their divine mission, as in the case of Jonah; for God is gracious, and ready to turn away his wrath from those that turn away from their sins. But the prophet that prophesied of peace and prosperity, especially as Hananiah did, absolutely and unconditionally, without adding that necessary proviso, that they do not by wilful sin put a bar in their own door and stop the current of God's favours, will be proved a true prophet only by the accomplishment of his prediction; if it come to pass, then it shall be known that the Lord has sent him, but, if not, he will appear to be a cheat and an impostor.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv1–17 And it came to pass the same year,.... That…
And it came to pass the same year,.... That the prophet was bid to make yokes and bonds, and send them to the neighbouring kings, whose ambassadors were in Zedekiah's court; and when he spoke the things related in the preceding chapter to Zedekiah, the priests, and people:
in the beginning the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah; perhaps in the first year of his reign:
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in the fourth year, and in the fifth month; not in the fourth year of Zedekiah's reign, though the Septuagint and A table versions so render it; since his reign was but eleven years in all, and therefore the fourth could not be called with so much propriety the beginning of his reign: though, according to Jarchi, it was the fourth of Zedekiah's reign, the same year in which he paid a visit to the king of Babylon, Jer 51:59; and was not only confirmed in his kingdom by him, but, according to the same writer, had it enlarged, and was made king over five neighbouring kings; and so this, though the fourth of his reign over Judah, was the first of his enlarged dominions: but rather this was the fourth year of the sabbatical year, or the fourth after the seventh year's rest of the land, as Kimchi observes; which was the first of Zedekiah's reign, who reigned eleven years, and the temple was destroyed at the end of a sabbatical year; in which he is followed by many, though there is nothing in the text or context that directs to it. Some divide Zedekiah's reign into three parts, the beginning, and middle, and end; and so what was done within the first four years of his reign might be said to be in the beginning of it. Others think that here are two distinct dates; that the former respects the things in the preceding chapter, which were in the beginning of his reign; and the latter that affair of Hananiah, which was in the fourth year of it. But Noldius (m), after Glassius (n), gets clear of the difficulties of this text, by rendering the words, "and it was from that year, the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah king of Judah, unto the fourth year of his reign"; that is, the prophet went on for the space of four years, signifying the will of the Lord by words and types; when in the fifth month of the fourth year, which was the month of Ab, answering to part of our July and of August,
Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet; the false prophet, as the Targum, Septuagint, Syriac, and Arabic versions call him,
which was of Gibeon; a city of the priests; so might be a priest, though not the high priest, as some have thought:
spake unto me in the house of the Lord, in the presence of the priests,
and of all the people; he came to the temple, where Jeremiah was, to confront him; and he addressed himself to him, the priests and all the people being present, who were come thither to minister and worship:
saying; as follows:
(m) Concord. Ebr. Partic. p. 143. No. 677. (n) Philolog. Sacr. l. 4. p. 625.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv1, 12, 13, 17 Hananiah's false prophecy: Jeremiah's answer, ver. 1-9. Hananiah breaks…
Hananiah's false prophecy: Jeremiah's answer, ver. 1-9. Hananiah breaks Jeremiah's yoke: he foretells an iron yoke, and Hananiah's death, ver. 10-17.
The fourth year - Perhaps the fourth year of the sabbatical course is here intended. Of Gibeon - it is probable from the place where he lived, which was one of the cities of the priests; that he was a priest.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 9, 10, 13, 15, 16, 17 One of those pretended prophets spoken of on the…
CHAPTER XXVIII
One of those pretended prophets spoken of on the preceding
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chapter, having contrasted and opposed Jeremiah, receives an
awful declaration that, as a proof to the people of his having
spoken without commission, he should die in the then current
year; which accordingly came to pass its the seventh month,
1-17.
NOTES ON CHAP. XXVIII
Verse 1. And it came to pass the same year - the fifth month] Which commenced with the first new moon of August, according to our calendar. This verse gives the precise date of the prophecy in the preceding chapter; and proves that Zedekiah, not Jehoiakim, is the name that should be read in the first verse of that chapter.
Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet] One who called himself a prophet; who pretended to be in commerce with the Lord, and to receive revelations from him. He was probably a priest; for he was of Gibeon, a sacerdotal city in the tribe of Benjamin.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv1, 5, 10, 15 Jer 28:1-4. And it came to pass the same…
Jer 28:1-4. And it came to pass the same year — Namely, the same in which the preceding prophecy was delivered; for the words manifestly refer to the time specified at the beginning of the foregoing chapter, and confirm the conjecture there made, that Jehoiakim is put there, by a mistake in the copies, for Zedekiah: see note on Jer 26:1, where the fourth year of Jehoiakim’s reign is termed the beginning of it. Hananiah the son of Azur the prophet — That is, a pretended prophet. Being of Gibeon, a city belonging to the priests, it is probable he was a priest as well as Jeremiah; spake unto me in the house of the Lord — Delivered publicly, and solemnly, and in the name of the Lord, what he wished to be considered as a true prediction; in the presence of the priests and of the people — Who probably were expecting to have some message from Heaven. In delivering this reigned prophecy, Hananiah designed to confront and contradict Jeremiah. His prediction is, that the king of Babylon’s power, at least over Judah and Jerusalem, should be speedily broken; that within two full years the vessels of the temple should be brought back, and Jeconiah, and all the captives that were carried away with him, should return; whereas Jeremiah had foretold that the yoke of the king of Babylon should be bound on yet faster, and that the vessels and the captives should not return for seventy years.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 6, 10, 16 In the beginning ... Zedekiah - Probably a gloss…
In the beginning ... Zedekiah - Probably a gloss put into the margin to explain “the same year,” from where it has crept into the text.
Gibeon - A city of priests Jos 21:17. Hananiah was probably a priest as well as a prophet. He chose either a Sabbath or a new moon, that he might confront Jeremiah not only in the presence of the priests, but also of all the people. He used Jer 28:2 the solemn formula which claims direct inspiration.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 6, 9, 10, 12, 13, 17 Juda. So far Sanctius joins with the former chapter,…
Juda. So far Sanctius joins with the former chapter, improperly. In the 4th year, seems rather an interpolation; though the Septuagint omit in the beginning, &c., to reconcile the passage; and others date the 4th year from the last sabbatical one, which is quite unusual. See chap. xxvii. 1. (Calmet) --- Sedecias reigned 11 years, so that the 4th might be said to be the beginning. (Worthington) --- Prophet. Septuagint, "false prophet," to explain the meaning: the original denotes any prophet. (St. Jerome) (Haydock)
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 15, 16 broken the yoke--I have determined to break: referring to…
broken the yoke--I have determined to break: referring to Jeremiah's prophecy (Jer 27:12).
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 13, 16 HANANIAH’S FALSE PROPHECY, Jer_28:1-4.
HANANIAH’S FALSE PROPHECY, Jer_28:1-4.
1. Beginning… fourth year — From this it appears that the term “beginning” was extended so as to include the “fourth.” There is no necessity for regarding this an error in the text, as does Dean Smith. If, as would seem to be the case, Zedekiah did not become fully established in his kingdom until his fourth year, such an extension of the term “beginning” would be most natural.
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Hananiah — Not otherwise known; but as he belonged to Gibeon, which was a city of the priests, it has been conjectured that he, like Jeremiah, belonged to a priestly family. Hence, there may be special significance in the statement that he confronted Jeremiah in the presence of the priests.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 3, 4, 7, 11, 12, 13, 14, 16, 17 1. in the beginning, etc.] See on Jer_27:1. If,…
1. in the beginning, etc.] See on Jer_27:1. If, as seems likely, the utterance of Hananiah which follows was on the same day on which Jeremiah appeared in public, wearing a yoke on his neck (Jer_27:2), and that the messengers from abroad (ib. 3) had not yet departed, we can realise the effect which Hananiah’s words of direct contradiction to Jeremiah’s forecast (ib. 16) would produce.
Hananiah] one of the prophets of the national party, whose unauthorized predictions of peace and safety were among the severest trials to which Jeremiah had to submit. For the relation of the false to the true prophets see Intr. pp. xxxii. f.; Jer_23:9, Jer_29:8-9; Jer_29:31-32. Cp. Ezekiel 13.
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Gibeon] El Jib, about five miles N.W. of Jerusalem. It was one of the cities of the priests (Jos_21:17).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 15, 16 (1) And it came to pass the same year…
XXVIII.
(1) And it came to pass the same year . . .—The chapter stands in immediate sequence with that which precedes and confirms the conclusion that the name Jehoiakim in Jer_27:1 is simply a transcriber’s mistake. Of the Hananiah who appears as the most prominent of the prophet’s adversaries, we know nothing beyond what is here recorded. He was clearly one of the leaders of the party of resistance whom we have seen at work trying to form an alliance with the neighbouring rations in Jeremiah 27, and whose hopes had been revived by the accession of Pharaoh Hophra (Apries) to the throne of Egypt in B.C. 595. The mention of Gibeon suggests two or three thoughts not without interest :—(1) It was, like Anathoth, within the tribe of Benjamin, about six or seven miles from Jerusalem, and so the antagonism between the true prophet and the false in Jerusalem may have been the revival of older local conflicts. (2) Gibeon, like Anathoth, was one of the cities of priests (Jos_21:17), and Hananiah was probably, therefore, a priest as well as prophet. (3) As still retaining the venerable relics of a worship that had passed away; it had also once been the sanctuary of Jehovah (1Ch_16:39). There the old tabernacle stood which had been with the people in the wilderness—which had been removed from Shiloh when the sacred ark was taken (2Ch_1:3). There Solomon, at the beginning of his reign, offered a stately sacrifice (1Ki_3:4). Ought not the prophet who had grown up in the midst of those surroundings to have learnt that no place, however sacred, could count on being safe from the changes and chances of time, all fulfilling the righteous purposes of God? The occasion on which he now appears was probably one of the new moon, Sabbath, or other feast-days on which the courts of the Temple were crowded.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 8, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16 Hananiah"s false prophecy; his reprimand from Jeremiah; and his…
Hananiah"s false prophecy; his reprimand from Jeremiah; and his fate. The preciseness of the date in ver. 1 is to emphasize the supernatural character of Jeremiah"s prediction. The latter was uttered in the fifth month of the fourth year of Zedekiah, and Hananiah died in the seventh month of the same year (ver. 17).
In the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah. It seems strange that the fourth year of a reign which only lasted eleven years in all should be called "the beginning. Is it not probable that the clause was interpolated here by a later copyist on account of Jer_27:1, where at present a similar clause (see note) is found? Originally placed in the margin as a gloss upon the words "the same year," it would very easily find its way into the text. Hananiah... the prophet (see on ver. 15). Gibeon. This was a priestly city, (Jos_21:17) so that Hananiah was probably himself a priest like Jeremiah (Jer_1:1) and Pashur. (Jer_20:1) The modern El Jib, on an isolated, rocky hill, doubtless represents the ancient Gibeon. In the presence of the priests and of all the people. Apparently the event took place on either a new moon or a Sabbath, when the people would throng to the temple.
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Vers. 1-17. The story of Hananiah the prophet.
Hananiah, priest and professional prophet, now presents himself as the rival and opponent of Jeremiah. A rude and shallow man, he probably thrusts himself forward unasked, as the representative of the popular prophets of smooth things whom it is the true prophet"s painful duty to refute and rebuke. His own conduct and Jeremiah"s behavior to him are both clearly brought before us in this chapter.
I THE CONDUCT OF HAVANIAH.
1. He utters a pleasing prophecy. He promises a speedy overthrow of the tyranny of Nebuchadnezzar. Even Jeremiah heartily echoes the wish that the prediction could be true. It is always easiest to prophesy smooth things, to soothe and flatter rather than convince men of sin and persuade them to accept the darker truths.
2. Hananiah speaks with great positiveness. He boldly claims the authority of God for what he says (ver. 2). His assertions are definite, minute, inherently consistent. Daring assumptions such as those of Hananiah carry the unthinking as by storm. A brazen face, a loud voice, a positive assertion, are enough to convince many people without the slightest ground in reason. You have only to say a thing very strongly and to repeat it very often, and the mere force of utterance will make way for it where calm, measured reasoning quite fails. Hananiah is definite in detail. People have a tendency to believe what they can understand clearly and imagine vividly. We must be warned, therefore,
(1) that they who make the loudest claims to speak for God may have least right to do so;
(2) that the truth of a statement must be measured, not by the vehemence with which it is asserted, but by the strength of the grounds on which it rests; and
(3) that the reality of things cannot be ascertained by reflection on the consistency, clearness, and fullness of our subjective ideas about them.
3. Hananiah manifests a stupid insolence under contradiction. He cannot reason with Jeremiah, he cannot refute the great prophet"s words, he has no new thoughts to contribute; he can only repeat his former assertion with loud words and passionate actions. He is a poor, unintellectual creature, whose notion of controversy is like that of foolish people we sometimes meet with people who imagine that to argue is just to repeat an assertion with dogged obstinacy. Hananiah loses his temper and behaves with rudeness to Jeremiah. The last refuge of the helpless controversialist is insolence and abuse.
II THE BEHAVIOR OF JEREMIAH TO HANANIAH.
1. He heartily assents to the false prophet"s desire for the happiness of the nation. "Jeremiah said, Amen: the Lord do so," etc. (ver. 6). He had been accused of a traitorous wish to see his country humiliated. No charge could be more false. The preacher who feels it his duty to threaten Divine punishments to wicked men should not be accused of wishing them evil. He may speak with grief and regret, as God also punishes reluctantly. (Eze_33:11)
2. Jeremiah appeals to the example of the older prophets. He is true to their teaching, while Hananiah contradicts it. This appeal should be unanswerable to one who, like Jeremiah"s opponent, professes to be the successor of these men. Amongst men who believe in the Bible the appeal to Scripture should be a first resort. How can a Christian teacher maintain his ground if he is contradicting this highest authority? Jeremiah was fond of "the old paths," the traditions and examples of earlier prophets. There is a consistency in prophecy, a common spirit, common ideas and principles in the prophets, and in revelation generally.
3. Jeremiah appeals to the confirmation of facts. (Ver. 9) He dares to await the verdict of history; he challenges Hananiah to do the same. We are too hasty in following the loud and pushing popular spirits of the hour. Wait and see the issue of their work when the first excitement has died away.
4. Jeremiah meets the insolence of Hananiah with quiet courtesy. He calmly reasons with him at first. When he finds his opponent proof against arguments which only rouse his temper, he quietly leaves him. There are times when men are too heated for argument, and there are men with whom it is always useless to argue. Under such circumstances the interest of truth, our own rightful dignity, and charity to our opponent, caution us to leave him in silence.
5. Jeremiah reiterates his prediction at a later time, with more stringent threats, and pronounces a solemn sentence of death on Hananiah. This he does after receiving fresh communications from Heaven and under the urgency of a Divine commission. It is always our duty to forgive our enemies; but if they are also the enemies of God, we may recognize the justice of God"s judgment on them. It is to be noted that Jeremiah did not compass the death of Hananiah; he only foretold it, and this under a Divine impulse. The words of Jeremiah were verified. Hananiah died long before events proved the futility of his own prophecy. Perhaps this was best for him. His death is a solemn warning to people who may be tempted to sacrifice truth for popularity.
HOMILIES BY A.F. MUIR Vers. 1-17. How to answer those who oppose the truth.
Where the light is there will be the deepest shadow; the truth is ever sharply defined against falsehood. Just when it was most important that the will of God and the real position of Israel should be ascertained, there were many striving to deceive and misrepresent. The behavior of Jeremiah on this occasion was twofold.
I ACCORDING TO HUMAN KNOWLEDGE AND JUDGMENT.
1. With moderation. "Amen: the Lord do so." Under such trying circumstances the behavior of the prophet is praiseworthy in the extreme. The contradiction and indignity to which he had been subjected might have excused a hot rejoinder. He is willing to have the dispute settled in a very effectual way. Meanwhile he is careful to make it clear that he too desired what his opponent had prophesied. This was the disposition of the Master, and should be copied by all his disciples. "A soft answer turneth away wrath;" "The servant of the Lord must not strive, but be gentle unto all men.
2. By an appeal to the great principle that the event will determine the truth of their predictions or the wisdom of their conduct. (Vers. 8, 9) This was an appeal to the conscience of his opponent.
3. Quiet submission to the will of God. "And the prophet Jeremiah went his way." When there is no sign of reasonableness in our antagonists, or no prospect of immediate success, it is well to submit quietly and to wait God"s time. This is the test of spiritual reality. True Christianity will show itself in earnest, unobtrusive actions and patient waiting for Christ. The most eloquent enforcement of the gospel is a quiet, consistent life.
II AS INSPIRED. Whilst he had no direct message he was silent. But God, who will not leave his servants without a witness, and who resents the slightest dishonor to which they are subjected, came to his rescue. The whole attitude of the prophet is now changed. With certainty he recovers also his vivacity, energy, and fearless power of denunciation. He is now the minister of judgment.
1. To the nation. The yoke of wood gives place to one of iron. The complicity of the people in the guilt of the false prophet must be punished. Their resistance to the will of God and disbelief of his servant involves them in a heavier sentence. So it is with all impenitence and rejection of God"s Word. The position of the transgressor cannot remain the same. With each step he plunges into deeper guilt and more fearful judgment.
2. To the originator of the offense. In this case the sentence is proportionately heavier and more immediate. Death is pronounced against the offending prophet with terrible brevity and clearness. There is ever a distinction between offenders and those who cause them to often& Primacy in disobedience will ensure a special and unmistakable mark of God"s anger. This announcement of doom, simple as it was in itself, must have been appalling to its hearer, whose inner sense of degradation and falseness would enhance its force. It is possible that the time and manner of this communication may have been intended to awaken repentance; failing which it was carded into effect. All around us such judgments are taking place, and it is well for men to examine what manner of spirit they are of ere they presume to occupy sacred offices or to set themselves against the laws of God"s kingdom. M.
HOMILIES BY D. YOUNG Vers. 1-17. A false prophet and his fate.
I HANANIAH"S PRESUMPTION. Note his direct challenge to the true prophet. He seeks out Jeremiah in the house of Jehovah, "in the presence of the priests and of all the people." A prophet was, of course, bound to make his utterances in public, but Hananiah waited his chance until he found an opportunity of bearding the hated Jeremiah in as open a way as possible. He speaks explicitly in the Name of Jehovah. He is not afraid to take the great Name in vain. Let us be warned lest we heedlessly utter, under the pretended authority of God, what is nothing more than the daring imagination of our own hearts. The false prophet Ventures on the very figure which had been employed by the true prophet. It would almost seem as if Jeremiah had habitually borne something in the shape of a yoke, and if so, it must have been a very irritating sight to the false prophets. Little wonder that, under the pretence of a prophetic mission, he ventured on the removal of this yoke. Above all things, there is the confident assertion with respect to time. Notwithstanding all the manifest difficulties of the achievement, Hananiah is not afraid to say that in two years Judah will again be firmly resting on its old foundations. Thus from all these indications of presumptuous action, we have an illustration of how confident heretics are in their error. Too often we are doubtful and partial in our statements of truth. We lack that faith and that thorough-going assertion of the truths God has revealed which are so necessary to make those truths full of operative and irresistible force. Hananiah here is as confident as he can be in all his deadly errors. He has not the least fear of plunging into the greatest responsibilities with regard to definite predictions. He passes from the ground of mere expostulations and remonstrances, and ventures on statements which in a very short time must either make him or ruin him. Let us learn from our enemies, and labor to be confident and determined in our assertion of truth, seeing there is no lack of determination on the part of those who have cast in their lot with error.
II HANANIAH"S PERSISTENCE. It is very noticeable that Jeremiah does not meet him in anything of an angry or denouncing manner. It would have well pleased the true prophet to see the predictions of the false prophet brought about; for it is made abundantly evident that the sufferings of his country were an unspeakable grief to Jeremiah. An angry reply served no good purpose. The true prophet could manifest a dignified patience, and leave time to vindicate both the validity of his prophetic claim and his fidelity in speaking the truth. Meantime, he can only recommend Hananiah to consider well the lessons of history, and how the prophets of old had spoken of stern dealings with many wicked nations. Unfortunately, bad men are hardly ever discriminating students of history. Hananiah was here given an opportunity of repentance, if only he had chosen to avail himself of it. But so full was he of his own devices that gentle treatment only increased his audacity, and he drew public attention more than ever to himself by removing the symbolic yoke from Jeremiah"s neck. That he was allowed to do all this should teach us a lesson of patience and trust when we see wicked men pursuing, undisturbed, their chosen path. They are only climbing higher that their ultimate ruin may become more widely manifest.
III HANANIAH"S DOOM. The first result of his presumptuous conduct is to bring a more emphatic prophecy with regard to the captives. The second is to bring s sentence of death on the false prophet himself. He who has dealt rashly with the ordering of times and seasons is to know by a bitter experience that God has these times and seasons in his own hands. He is to die within the year. Notice the sin which he is charred with committing. He is doomed to death, not simply for the falsehood or the profanity, but for this, that he had taught rebellion against Jehovah. His words were an incitement to make a useless and premature attempt at liberation. God"s prediction with regard to the captivity in Babylon had in it the nature of a command.
IV HANANIAH"S DEATH. It came very quickly. Two months at the outside was the space between the utterance of a false rebellious statement and the confirming of a true one. The death came at such an interval as was very impressive. Compare the relations between Jeremiah and Hananiah here with those between Peter and Ananias. Both Hananiah and Ananias dealt presumptuously with the holiest of things. Y.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv11, 13, 16 And the prophet Jeremiah went his way.
Jer_28:11
And the prophet Jeremiah went his way.
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Self in service
(with Jer_26:14):--We couple these passages together, because they lead our minds to the same important thought, namely, the laying aside of self by the servants of the Lord. Hananiah takes the yoke from off Jeremiah s neck, and breaks it, and so discredits him and his prophecy in the presence of the people. And the prophet Jeremiah went his way. He left it to God to vindicate His own honour, which He did very soon--very terribly. Before the princes also, in chap. 26., he tells out uncompromisingly all the truth of God; he knew that he did so at the peril of his life. As for me,--he was not insensible to personal suffering, still himself he was as nothing--behold I am in your hand, do with me as seemeth meet unto you. By this complete abnegation of self on the part of the prophet, we are led to consider some matters connected with self in our service. There is a young period in the Christians life, when we are deceived by not seeing self at all; when we have no dread of it; when we never even suspect its existence. At this time, we mistake its energies for spiritual life, and often seek to carry out what is really the Lords work, in the powers and energies of the flesh, i.e. self. There is a period farther on, when we detect self partially. The Spirit of God has led us onward in our education, and raised our standard, making us watchful and distrustful of self to some degree. Then comes a yet more advanced stage, when we see self to such an extent as to make us dread it greatly when we see it ever intrusive, ever substituting motives low and mean for what should be holy and high; and we wage war with this self, fully determined to put it down. There is also yet a more advanced state, when we have attained such a knowledge of the power of self that, while we war with, and repress it, we have come to know that here we shall never have done with it, and look forward to full deliverance only when we reach that land where there is perfect freedom.
I. The wrong operations of self in service. Much that we do may be done from the action of mere natural feelings--there may be nothing of God in it at all A man may be gratifying only his own natural energy in all that seems so earnest and true. And when we allow self to influence us, we shall be subjected to disturbing influences. Self-love will be easily wounded in the rough contact with opposers of the truth. And our judgment will be warped. It is very hard to be calm, and judicial, when under the influence of strong personal feelings, and where personal interests are concerned. Self will also drive us on too far. We shall not know when to go our way. We need not go far to detect some of the evil effects which flow from this wrong operation of self in service. It gives the enemy occasion to blaspheme. Satan continually attempts to confound persons and principles; men will look at the imperfect way in which we have manifested the principle, and not at the principle itself. Our infirmities become mixed up with the cause of God, and so far as they can, bring it into disrepute. And thus that saying becomes true--religion suffers more from her friends than her enemies.
II. The expulsion of self from service. How can this be done? In the most favourable of cases only by degrees. But what is a man to do?
1. He must seek for enlightenment on this subject from the Holy Spirit.
2. Let him seek for a more perfect sympathy with Christ. If we have this, we shall become assimilated with Him--we shall grow like Him; His mind will transfuse itself into our mind--and the principles, on which He acted, will become ours.
3. And then the seeking for a true knowledge of our own insignificance is very important in putting down self. We both think and act sometimes as though we were the first cause; and not only the first cause, but the final object also--as if all were to be by us, and for us--the axe thinks that it is doing all the work, and is independent of the one that heweth therewith. The very learning our insignificance will be helpful; and, when we have learned it in some degree, it will keep us, in proportion as the lesson has been learned, to our proper place. (P. B. Power, M. A.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v1 CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES.—For Chronology of the Chapter, &c.,…
CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES.—For Chronology of the Chapter, &c., vide preceding chapter. The words (Jer_28:1). “In the beginning of the reign,” and immediately described as “in the fourth year,” accords with the common mode of reckoning by dividing a term into two halves. And as Zedekiah reigned eleven years, this date was in the first half—at “the beginning” therefore.
Personal Allusions.—Jer_28:1. “Hananiah the son of Azur.” Nothing known of him; but being “of Gibeon,” one of the cities of the priests, he was most probably of the order.
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Geographical Reference.—Jer_28:1. “Gibeon.” A priestly city (Jos_21:17; 1Ki_3:4), now called El-Jib, and situate about 40 stadia north-west of Jerusalem.
Manners and Customs.—Jer_28:10. “Hananiah took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck:” vide notes on chap. Jer_2:20; Jer_5:5.
Literary Criticisms.—Jer_28:5. “Jeremiah.” Notice that the name appears throughout this chapter in its abbreviated form, יִרְמְיָה, instead of יִרְמְיָהוּ. Marked specially as “Jeremiah the prophet,” in order more strongly to mark the distinction between him as the true prophet of God in contrast with “Hananiah the prophet.”
Jer_28:8. “Evil.” Some MSS. give the reading רָעָב, famine, instead of רָעָה, calamity, evil.
HOMILETIC SURVEY OF THE CHAPTER
LYING PROPHECY DISTINGUISHED FROM TRUE
Both Hananiah and Jeremiah are styled prophets. Men are not distinguished from each other, as false or true, by a difference of titles, but by a difference of deeds; and it is the responsibility of hearers to “try the spirits” and choose between the counterfeit and the true.
The effrontery and offensiveness of Hananiah in selecting such a scene, and when surrounded by such hearers (Jer_28:1), for a display of his pseudo-prophetic mission in opposition to Jeremiah (for he “spake unto me;” it was a kind of personal attack on Jeremiah), is in remarkable contrast with Jeremiah’s meekness (Jer_28:6-9).
I. General characteristics of false messages. Hananiah illustrates the ministry of lies by which arrogant teachers delude the people.
1. Divine authority is blasphemously assumed. Hananiah prefixes to his words the most solemn formula by which inspiration is claimed. Rome equally dares to speak in the Name of God. Lying teachers always fortify their theories by an imposing seriousness and confidence which tends to deceive the simple.
2. False messages are usually pleasant to their hearers (Jer_28:2-4). Possibly Hananiah may have fostered this pleasant prospect within himself until he imagined its truth. “Deceiving and being deceived.” Bad men, and they who neglect salvation, who wish good as the issue of a life of evil, find it possible to persuade themselves that good cometh. And false prophets are always at hand to quiet fear and lull apprehension.
3. Extreme emphasis is needed to make doubtful messages seem really true (Jer_28:10-11). A lie needs strong language to make it sound like truth. Hananiah had to act with startling boldness in order to keep up his delusion. Deceivers are driven to great daring, in word and deed, in order to encourage the credulity they entice.
4. Defeat ultimately covers the false prophet with shame. The lying words fail in fulfilment (Jer_28:8-9); and the righteous judgment of God asserts itself in their personal destruction (Jer_28:15-17).
II. Distinguishing features of true prophecy. Jeremiah represents here the faithful teacher of Divine oracles and salutary truths.
1. The people’s present good is tenderly desired. Even though the pleasant messages are false, he would gladly say, “Amen, the Lord do so,” to all words of hope. The prophet of God may not be able to predict good, yet he would fain do so if he dared; for he wishes only the well-being even of those against whom he witnesses in God’s name. (Comp. chap. Jer_8:21.)
2. Yet, no delusion can be permitted. He may not say, “Peace, peace, when there is no peace.” And he is too fully convinced of the falsity of alluring hopes to sanction them (Jer_28:7-9). If houses are being reared on sands, he must foretell the destroying storm.
3. God’s own message, however unwelcome, must be proclaimed (Jer_28:12-14); even though it tell of “yokes of iron” and tyrannical despotism. To soften down God’s terrible messages into “smooth things” is a crime against fidelity to God and duty to man.
4. Liars must be refuted by the messenger of truth (Jer_28:15). This is no task to be coveted, and it requires courage; but false leaders have to be “withstood to the face,” and told frankly that they lie! Paul thus withstood Peter, and Luther thus withstood the Pope and his emissaries, and honest believers have ever since had like services to perform. Deceivers must be met in personal confutation and their heresies demolished.
5. Vindication is on the side of truth (Jer_28:17). Jeremiah thus received another Divine assurance of his mission, and an additional encouragement to prosecute his work with confidence and boldness as the prophet of Jehovah.
COMMENTS AND HOMILETIC OUTLINES ON CHAPTER 28
Jer_28:3. Within two full years. Probably this period was fixed by Hananiah in the belief that the international confederacy being formed would within that time defeat Nebuchadnezzar.
Jer_28:11. Theme: SELF IN SERVICE. “And the prophet Jeremiah went his way.”
This, compared with Jer_26:14, leads to the same truth; laying aside of “self” in God’s service when called upon to give testimony for Him. Hananiah takes the yoke, breaks it, thus discredits Jeremiah’s prophecy in the presence of the people, yet all we read is—“Jeremiah went his way.” Left it to God to vindicate His own honour; which He soon did very terribly.
So before the princes (in 26) he tells out uncompromisingly all the truth, though he knew he did it at the peril of his life. He was not insensible to suffering, still himself—he was nothing. He tells them that if they slay him they will bring innocent blood upon them, and there leaves the matter. This suggests—
I. The complete abnegation of self in service.
1. There is a period in the Christian life when the existence of “self” is unsuspected. Then we mistake its energies for those of the spiritual life. We may carry on the Lord’s work without suspicion as to the principle on which we carry it on.
2. Further on, there occurs a partial detection of “self.” The Spirit of God has led us onward in our education, partly purified our mental vision, raised our standard, made us watchful, distrustful of “self.”
3. It is a more advanced stage when we see “self” enough to dread it greatly; see it to be ever intrusive, substituting mean and low motives.
4. Yet higher, when we have attained to such knowledge of “self” that we war with it and repress it, yet know that we shall never be wholly done with it till heavenly life be gained.
II. See the workings of “self” in service. The wrong workings of “self.” Much we do may be from mere natural feeling; nothing of God in it; and work that seems earnest and true may be the gratification of natural energy. Allowing “self” thus to influence us, we shall be subject to its disturbing influences—
1. Self-love will be easily wounded by the opposition which meets us.
2. Our judgment will be warped by personal feeling and our self-interests being imported,
3. “Self” will drive us too far; we shall not know when “to go our way;” we shall be for seeing more than the case requires; for passing beyond testimony for God to testimony for ourselves; wanting to secure our own honour and importance.
We cannot separate ourselves from our service; what we are will tell on it. Failure in service is generally the consequence of failure in “self.” And “self” can gratify itself upon what was originally God’s: because His message i rejected we look upon the case as if we were rejected, and then lose sight of the grievous injury done to God in the apparent one done to us!
All denominational rancour comes of the wrong operation of “self” in service. It leads to the confounding persons with principles. And our imperfections bring the cause of God into disrepute.
III. The expulsion of “self” from service.
1. HOW TO BE DONE? This is a work of degrees.
(1.) By enlightenment of the Holy Ghost; showing a man himself, and where “self” works ill results.
(2.) By sympathy with Christ. This will make “self” fall out of prominence.
(3.) By learning our own insignificance. We have inflated thoughts of our own self-importance.
(4.) We need realisation that we are simply instruments; persons to be used. We sometimes act as if all were by us and for us; the cause and object of all.
2. Happy results will flow.
(1.) We shall leave things without undue pushing. Do what is needful, and then have faith in truth that it will act by its own weight. Truth put in front, we shall retire avoiding undue prominence of ourselves, which often offends men and mars our work.
2. We shall leave our sayings and doings for God to fructify. Much has to be left before they will fructify; left to themselves and to God. As with the sower, seeds spring up “he knoweth not how.”
(3.) Restlessness of self is thus quieted; we wait the order of events, not grasping an unripened harvest.
(4.) We must not think God’s affairs suffer because we have to “go our way.” When we have gone, He remains. Often the consciousness of having borne testimony is all we can attain to; all we can do; all we are required to do: we may “go our way.”
IV. “Self” has a right place in service.
1. Our energies and faculties were given to us for use. Jesus could assert Himself: as in the Temple when He drove out the money-changers. Jeremiah returned, when his “yoke of wood” was broken, with a “yoke of iron.”
2. Yet, in all the energy which circumstances may require, the action of mere human feeling need not be seen. That which is truly for God will commend itself as such. Consecrated “self,” taught by the Holy Ghost, will show that there is a time for every purpose under heaven; a time to keep silence as well as to speak, a time to act and testify, and also a time “to go our way.”—Constructed and condensed from “Breviates,” by Rev. P. B. Power, M.A.
Jer_28:13. Theme: THE TWO YOKES. “Thus saith the Lord, Thou hast broken the yokes of wood, but thou shalt make for them yokes of iron.”
Jeremiah taught by symbols: hid his mantle in the earth, broke earthen pot, &c. The preacher to-day would evoke harsh criticism if he ventured on any such symbolic action.
Opposition of false prophets assailed him. Always so. If there be a Christ, there will arise an Antichrist; if a Simon Peter, there will arise a Simon Magus; if a Luther, an Eckius. Yet the gates of hell shall not prevail against the Gospel, mighty though the sophistries of opponents be.
I. Men must wear some yoke. In every stage of life—childhood, youth, manhood; and in every station of life—servants, masters, &c.
1. God has made and sustains us, and asks that we submit to His will.
2. With our passions and propensities, if we break the yoke it is meet we should wear, and do not serve God, we at once bend our necks to another yoke and serve slavishly our own selves.
II. Christ’s yoke is an easy one to wear. Only as a “yoke of wood.”
1. The yoke of Christ is a right one. Serve Jesus Christ, and it is found that the Christian law is perfection itself.
2. The yoke of Christ is framed in our interest. To believe in Christ is the highest wisdom; to repent of sin is the most delightful necessity; to follow after holiness is the most blissful pursuit; to become a servant of Christ is to be made a king and priest unto God. His is a blessed life.
3. Christ’s yoke is not exacting. He, in His grace, always gives us of His bounty when He asks of us our duty. A sinner must believe; it is his own act; the Holy Spirit never believes for anybody, yet the Holy Spirit gives the faith which the man exercises towards God. He must repent; yet Christ is exalted to “give repentance.”
4. It is an easy yoke. Never did a man wear it but he always loved to wear it. The life of a Christian is not chafed and galled by vexatious prohibitions. Though the duties of holiness are irksome to men who are not holy, grace makes the heart rejoice in it. See Addenda: “CHRIST’S YOKE EASY.”
5. The bright example of Christ makes the yoke pleasant to bear. He Himself has carried the very yoke we bear, and we have blessed fellowship with Him in this. See Addenda: “CHRIST’S EXAMPLE.”
6. All who have borne Christ’s yoke have had grace given equal to the weight of the burden. Never heard a complaint of aged Christian against Christ or against His yoke. Wolsey regretted that he had not “served God with half the zeal he had served his king,” but none has ever bewailed the zeal with which he followed Christ!
7. Christians who have borne this yoke always desire to get their children into it. They long that their sons also may serve the Lord. Often men say, “I do not want my sons to follow my trade, it is wearying, its pay is small,” &c.
III. Those who refuse Christ’s easy yoke will have to wear a worse one.
“Yokes of iron.”
Adam wore an easy yoke in Paradise: he broke it, and himself and his posterity had to wear “iron yokes” ever since.
1. Turning from the right road, from the cry of rectitude, because it threatens shame or loss, will entail vaster after-losses.
2. Backsliders, by putting off the yoke of Christianity, have not improved their condition.
3. They who refuse the Bible and follow tradition. Do these perverts of the true Christian religion get an easier yoke? No; there are penances and mortifications, &c.
4. The self-righteous who attempt to work their own way to heaven. Self-righteousness is an iron yoke indeed.
5. Unbelievers, who will not believe the simple revelation of God, presently find themselves committed to systematic misbeliefs, which distract reason, oppress the heart, and trammel the conscience.
6. Lovers of pleasure. Pleasure often means lust, and gaiety means crime; and self-indulgence brings beggary and degradation.
In the last tremendous day of Christ’s coming to judgment, the Christian’s yoke will be as a chain of gold about his neck; but sin, pleasure, will be as an iron yoke, a burden of enslaving woe.—C. H. Spurgeon.
Jer_28:15. Theme: TRUST PLACED IN LIES. “The Lord hath not sent thee; but thou makest this people to trust in a lie.”
I. Vastness of individual influence. “Thou makest this people,” &c. For good or ill.
II. Dastardly cruelty of deception. Like the leading of unsuspecting children along a flowery path to a precipice. “Makest them trust in a lie!”
III. Perilous readiness to rely on fair words. Not merely to listen, or to find pleasure in hearing, but to “trust.” Man is stupidly incautious. The syren’s song charms him, so he trusts her leading, goes alter her even to death!
IV. Appalling arrogance of falsity. “The Lord hath not sent thee, yet,” &c. Without any Divine commission, nevertheless Hananiah assumed the airs and wielded the influence of a messenger of God.
V. Conflict of falsehood with truth. “Thou makest them trust in a lie, though the Lord hath not sent thee.”
1. It was war against the true word of God.
2. It was successful conflict with truthful teaching.
3. It illustrates the lying ministry which has been in all ages active.
4. It shows the hindrances amid which God’s messengers work.
Jer_28:16. Theme: THE SOLEMN WARNING. “This year thou shall die.”
That we must die is certain, but the hour is hid. Yet, if some prophet could open to us the Divine decrees, it is quite possible one or other of us would see this sentence.
I. Possibility of this event. This year we may die.
1. For our life is the greatest uncertainty in the world (Jas_4:13-14).
2. Because thousands have died the last year (Ecc_3:2, “a time to die”).
3. Thousands will certainly die this year, and we may be of the number.
4. Though we be young; for the regions of the dead are crowded with those who have died in youth.
5. Though we have not finished our education.
6. Though we be in health and vigour.
7. Though we be full of business.
8. Though we be not prepared for it.
9. Though we deliberately delay preparation.
10. Though we be unwilling to admit the thought.
11. Though we may strongly hope the contrary.
12. Though we promise ourselves many years of pleasure (Luk_12:19-20).
II. Important consequences should we die this year.
1. If we die unpardoned, unrenewed, we should be for ever cut off from the pleasures of this present life.
2. We shall have no pleasures to substitute for those we lose.
3. All our hopes, as to the present life, will for ever perish.
4. We shall be deprived for ever of all the means of salvation (Ecc_9:10).
5. All our hopes of heaven will eternally vanish (Pro_11:7).
To conclude—
i. How awful the thought of dying if we are yet in our sins! Let us use the interval for salvation.
ii. How pleasing the thought, and how happy the consequences, if we are believers in Christ, that eternal redemption is so near!—Hannam.
Theme: ON THE NEW YEAR. “This year thou shalt die.”
The unexpected death of this false prophet is an instance of the extraordinary interposition of the Almighty. But the event holds lessons of universal extent and application—
i. That it is “in God we live and move and have our being.”
ii. That the period of death of each individual is known to and appointed by Him.
Observe—
I. This sentence is doubtless expressive of the decision of God concerning many this year.
1. The page of history affords no record of a single year in which death desisted from his work of destruction, or the insatiable grave said, “It is enough.” More than twenty millions die every year.
2. The last year of many is now commenced. The aged; bowed down with the weight of years, &c. In the meridian of life, though bound to earth by tenderest associations. Thousands in the very morning of life, though hearts beat high with hope, &c.
3. Various are the means by which God’s design will be executed: through the failure of nature; sickness; accidents; after protracted illness; suddenly and without warning; retire at night to rest but called into eternity before morning; or leave their homes in the morning never more to return alive.
II. No individual can be certain that this does not express God’s decision concerning himself.
1. Utterly impossible for us to know who are, or who are not, included in God’s appointments.
2. The circumstances of some render it most probable that this year will be their last—the old, the infirm, &c.
3. Doubtless, those who think least of death, and confidently reckon on future years, will find this sentence fulfilled.
III. It is the duty and interest of all to use wisely the gracious hours they enjoy.
1. A solemn question arises: What is it to die? Not merely to cease from cheering scenes of earth, &c., but to pass from this state of being into the immediate presence of our Maker and Judge to “give account” (2Co_5:10). It is to be rewarded (Rev_7:14) or doomed (Mar_9:49).
2. Surely it is the duty of each to ask, Am I prepared to die? The word of God declares that “except ye repent,” &c. (Luk_13:3); “that he who believeth not,” &c. (Mar_16:16); that “without holiness,” &c. (Heb_12:14); that “except born of the Spirit,” &c. (Joh_3:5). Let each ask, Am I thus prepared?
3. Let this year be commenced with earnest preparation. Never can a more favourable opportunity present itself.—J. Bunter, A.D. 1828.
See Addenda: THE AVERAGE OR LIFE.
ADDENDA TO CHAP. 28: ILLUSTRATIONS AND SUGGESTIVE EXTRACTS
Jer_28:13. CHRIST’S YOKE EASY. Queen Elizabeth carried the crown in the procession of her sister Mary at the coronation, and she remarked that it was very heavy; but some one standing by told her it would not be heavy when she had to wear it herself. So the precepts which some men do but carry in their hands seem very heavy; but when a man comes to know Christ and to love Him, those very precepts become light and easy.—Spurgeon.
A man shall carry a b cket of water on his head and be very tired of the burden; but the same man when he dives into the sea shall have thousands of buckets on his head without perceiving their weight, because he is in the element and it entirely surrounds him. The duties of holiness are very irksome to men, who are not in the element of holiness; but when once those men are cast into the element of grace, then they bear ten times more and feel no weight, but are refreshed thereby with joy unspeakable.—Spurgeon.
CHRIST’S EXAMPLE. Have you never read in Grecian story how the Grecian soldiers on their long marches grew exceedingly weary, and wished that the war were closed, they felt so dispirited? But there was a man whom they almost adored as a god—Alexander himself, and they saw him always sharing their toil. If the road was rough, the monarch walked with them; if they were short of water, Alexander would share their thirst. At the sight of him every man grew strong. Oh! it is grand to the believer to feel that, if there be a trial or a difficulty in the Christian life, Christ has borne it, and Christ is with us bearing it still.
Jer_28:16. THE AVERAGE OF LIFE. “The average of life has altered. If a man now lives a hundred years, we go miles to see him. There is but one apple where there were five blossoms. The sexton rings the bell merrily at first; at last he tolls it.
“Men in these days undergo suffering, and great wear and tear of brain and physical powers. Not one of the hundreds of the brainworkers use any moderation. Of printers, few ever live to fifty. The watchmaker shortens his own life as he measures the hours and minutes for others. The chemist breathes in death. The shoemaker wears out his life at the last. The foundryman breathes in filings. The miller breathes in dust as he toils at the grist. The mason digs his own grave with his trowel. What you do, do quickly; “for this year thou shalt die.”—T. De Witt Talmage, D.D., A.D. 1872.
The past is a dream,
The future a breath,
The present a gleam
From birth unto death.—Oriental.
“Men should strive to live well, not to live long.”—Earl of Stirling.
“Then let us fill
This little interval, this pause of life,
With all the virtues we can crowd into it.”
—Addison.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
Alexander MacLaren 1905 · Public Domain On v13
Jeremiah
YOKES OF WOOD AND IRON
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Jer 28:13.
I suppose that I had better begin by a word of explanation as to the occasion of this saying. One king of Judah had already been carried off to Babylon, and the throne refilled by his brother, a puppet of the conquerors. This shadow of a king, with the bulk of the nation, was eager for revolt. Jeremiah had almost single-handed to stem the tide of the popular wish. He steadfastly preached submission, not so much to Nebuchadnezzar as to God, who had sent the invaders as chastisement. The lesson was a difficult one to learn, and the people hated the teacher. In the Jerusalem of Jeremiah’s day, as in other places and at other times, a love of country which is not blind to its faults and protests against a blatant militarism, was scoffed at as ‘unpatriotic,’ ‘playing into the hands of the enemy,’ ‘seeking peace at any price,’ whilst an insane eagerness to rush to arms without regard to resources or righteousness was called a ‘spirited foreign policy.’ So Jeremiah had plenty of enemies.
He had adopted a strange way of enforcing his counsel, which would be ridiculous to-day, but was natural and impressive then and there. He constantly for months went about with an ox-yoke on his neck, as a symbol of the submission which he advocated. One day, in the temple, before a public assembly, a certain Hananiah, a member of the opposite faction, made a fierce attack on the prophet and his teaching, and uttered a counter-prophecy to the effect that, in two years, the foreign invasion would be at an end, and all would be as it used to be. Our prophet answered very quietly, saying in effect, ‘I hope to God that it may be true; the event will show.’ And then Hananiah, encouraged by his meekness, proceeded to violence, tore the yoke off his shoulders and snapped it in two, reiterating his prophecy. Then Jeremiah went away home.
Soon after, the voice which he knew to be God’s, and not his own thoughts, spoke within him, and gave a much sharper answer. God declared, through Jeremiah, the plain truth that, for a tiny kingdom like Judah to perk itself up in the face of a world-conquering power like Babylon, could only bring down greater severity from the conqueror. And then he declared that Hananiah, for rebellion-not against Babylon, but against God, the true King of Israel-would be taken from the earth. He died in a couple of months.
My text forms the first word of this divine message. I have nothing more to do with its original application. It gives a picturesque setting to a very impressive and solemn truth; very familiar, no doubt, but none the less because of its familiarity needing to be dinned into people’s ears. It is that to throw off legitimate authority is to bind on a worse tyranny. To some kind of yoke all of us must bend our necks, and if we slip them out we do not thereby become independent, but simply bring upon ourselves a heavier pressure of a harder bondage. The remainder of my remarks will simply go to illustrate that principle in two or three cases of ascending importance. I begin at the bottom.
I. We have the choice between the yoke of law and the iron yoke of lawlessness.
We all know that society could not be held together without some kind of restraints upon what is done, and some stimulus to do what is apt to be neglected. Even a band of brigands, or a crew of pirates, must have some code. I have read somewhere that the cells in a honeycomb are circles squeezed by the pressure of the adjacent cells into the hexagonal shape which admits of contiguity. If they continued circles there would be space and material lost, and no complete continuity. So, in like manner, you cannot keep five men together without some mutual limitations which are shaped into a law. Now, as long as a man keeps inside it, he does not feel its pressure. A great many of us, for instance, who are in the main law-abiding people, do not ever remember that there is such a thing as restrictions upon our licence, or as obligations to perform certain duties; for we never think either of taking the licence or of shirking the duties. The yoke that is accepted ceases to press. Once let a man step outside, and what then? Why, then, he is an outlaw; and the rough side of the law is turned to him, and all possible terrors, which people within the boundary have nothing to do with, gather themselves together and frown down upon him. The sheep that stops inside the pasture is never torn by the barbed wires of the fence. If you think of the life of a criminal, with all its tricks and evasions, taking ‘every bush to be an officer,’ as Shakespeare says; or as the first of the brood who was the type of them all said, ‘Every man that seeth me shall kill me’: if you think of the sword that hangs over the head of every law-breaker, and which he knows is hanging by a hair; if you think of men in counting-houses who have manipulated the books of the firm, and who durst not be away from their desks for a day lest all should come to light; and if you think of the punishment that follows sooner or later, you will see that it is better to bear the light yoke of the law than the heavy yoke of crime. Some men buy their ruin very dearly.
So much for the individual. But there is another aspect of this same principle on which I venture to say a word, although it is only a word, in passing. I do not suppose that there are many of my hearers who are likely to commit overt breaches of the law. But there are a great many of us who are apt to neglect the obligations of citizenship. In a community like ours, laziness, fastidiousness, absorption in our own occupations, and a number of other more or less reputable reasons, tempt many to stand aloof from the plain imperative obligations of every citizen in a free country. Every man who thus neglects to do his part for the common weal does his part in handing over the rule of the community to the least worthy. You will find-as you see in some democratic countries to-day, where the cultivated classes, and the classes with the sternest morality, have withdrawn in disgust from the turmoil-the mob having the upper hand, the least worthy scrambling into high places, and the community suffering, and bearing a heavier yoke, by reason of the unwillingness of some to bear the yoke and do the duty of a citizen. Vice lifts up its head, morality is scouted, self-interest is pursued unblushingly, and the whole tone of public opinion is lowered. Christian men and women, remember that you are members of a community, and you bear the yoke of responsibility therefore; and if you do not discharge your obligation, then you will have a heavier burden still to bear.
I need not remind you, I suppose, of how this same thesis-that we have to choose between the yoke of law and the iron yoke of lawlessness-is illustrated in the story of almost all violent revolutions. They run the same course. First a nation rises up against intolerable oppression, then revolution devours its own children, and the scum rises to the top of the boiling pot. Then comes, in the language of the picturesque historian of the French Revolution, the type of them all-then comes at the end ‘the whiff of grapeshot’ and the despot. First the government of a mob, and then the tyranny of an emperor, crush the people that shake off the yoke of reasonable law. That is my first point.
II. Let me take a higher illustration;-we have to choose between the yoke of virtue and the iron yoke of vice.
We are under a far more spiritual and searching law than that written in any statute-book, or administered by any court. Every man carries within his own heart the court, the tribunal; the culprit and the judge. And here too, if law is not obeyed, the result is not liberty, but the slavery of lawlessness.
No man can ponder his own nature and make without feeling that on every fibre of him is stamped a great law which he is bound to obey, and that on every fibre of him is impressed the necessity of part of his nature coercing, restraining, or spurring other parts of it. For, if we take stock of ourselves, what do we find? The broad basis of the pyramid, as it were, is laid in the faculties nearest the earth, the appetites which are inseparable from our corporeal being, and these know nothing about right or wrong, but are utterly blind to such distinctions. Put a loaf before a hungry man, and his mouth waters, whether the loaf belongs to himself or whether it is inside a baker’s window.
Then above these, as the next course of the pyramid, there are other desires, sentiments, affections, and emotions, less grossly sensuous than those of which I have been speaking, but still equally certain to be excited by the presence of their appropriate object, without any consideration of whether law is broken or kept in securing of it. Above these, which are, so to speak, branded on their very foreheads with the iron of slavery, stand certain faculties which are as clearly anointed to rule as the others are intended to serve. There is reason or intelligence, which is evidently meant to be eyes to these blind instincts and emotions of desire, and there is what we call the power of will, that stands like an engine-driver with his hand upon the lever which will either stop the engine or accelerate its revolutions. It says to passions and desires ‘Go!’ and they go; and, alas! it sometimes says ‘Halt!’ and they will not halt. Then there is conscience, which brings to light for every man something higher than himself. A great philosopher once said that the two sublimest things in the universe were the moral law and the starry heavens; and that law ‘I ought’ bends over us like the starry heavens with which he associated it. No man can escape from the pressure of duty, and on every man is laid, by his very make, the twofold obligation, first to look upwards and catch the behests of that solemn law, and then to turn his eyes and his strength inwards and coerce or spur, as the case may be, the powers of his nature, and rule the kingdom within himself.
Now, as long as a man lets the ruling parts of his nature guide the lower faculties, he feels comparatively no pressure from the yoke. But, if he once allows beggars to ride on horseback whilst princes walk- sense and appetite and desire, and more or less refined forms of inclination, to take the place which belongs only to conscience interpreting duty-then he has exchanged the easy yoke for one that is heavy indeed.
What does a man do when, instead of loyally accepting the conditions of his nature, and bowing himself to serve the all-embracing and all-penetrating law of duty, he sets up inclination of any sort in its place? What does he do? I will tell you. He unships the helm; he flings compass and sextant overboard; he fires up the furnaces, and screws down the safety-valve, and says, ‘Go ahead!’ And what will be the end of that, think you? Either an explosion or a crash upon a reef; and you may take your choice of which is the better kind of death-to be blown up or to go down. Keep within the law of conscience, and let it govern all inclinations, and most of all the animal part of your nature; and you will feel little pressure, and no pain, from the yoke. Shake it off, and there is fulfilled in the disobedient man the threatening of my text, which rightly translated ought to be, ‘Thou hast broken the yokes of wood, and thou hast made instead of them yokes of iron.’
For do you think it will be easy to serve the base-born parts of your nature, when you set them on the throne and tell them to govern you? Did you never hear of such a thing as a man’s vices getting such a hold on him that, when his weakened will tried to shake them off, they laughed in his face and said, ‘Here we are still’? Did you never hear of that other solemn truth-and have you never experienced how true it is?-that no man can say, ‘I will let my inclination have its fling this once’? There are never ‘this onces.’ or very, very seldom. When you are glissading down a snowy Alpine slope, you cannot stop when you like, though you strike your alpenstock ever so deep into the powdery snow. If you have started, away you must go. God be thanked! the illustration does not altogether apply, for a man can stop if he will repent, but he cannot stop unless he does. Did you never hear that a teaspoonful of narcotic to-day will have to be a tablespoonful in a week or two, to produce the same effect? Are there not plenty of men who have said with all the force that a weakened will has left in it, ‘I will never touch a drop of drink again, as long as I live, God helping me’?-and they have gone down the street, and they have turned in, not at the first or the second public-house, but at the fourth or the fifth. Ah! brother, ‘they promised them liberty, but they are the servants of corruption.’ Fix this in your minds. ‘He that committeth sin is the slave of sin,’ of the sin that he commits. Do not put off the easy yoke of obedience to conscience and duty, or you will find that there is an iron one, with many a sharp point in its unpolished surface rubbing into your skin and wounding your shoulders. ‘It’s wiser to be good than bad. It’s safer to be meek than fierce.’ ‘Thou hast broken the yokes of wood’; it is not difficult to do that; ‘thou hast made instead of them yokes of iron.’ That is my second point.
III. Lastly, we have the choice between the yoke of Christ and the iron yoke of godlessness.
You may think that to be a very harsh saying, and much too vehement an antithesis. Let me vindicate it according to my own belief in a sentence or two. It seems to me that for civilised and cultivated Europe at this day, the choice lies between accepting Jesus Christ as the Revealer of God, or wandering away out into the wastes of uncertainty, or as they call it nowadays, agnosticism and doubt. I believe myself, and I venture to state it here-though there is not time to do more than state it-that no form of what is now called Theism, which does not accept the historic revelation of God in Jesus Christ as the ‘master-light of all our seeing,’ will ever be able to sustain itself permanently in the face of present currents of opinion. If you do not take Christ for your Teacher, you are handed over either to the uncertainty of your own doubts, or to pinning your faith to some man and enrolling yourself as a disciple who is prepared to swallow down whole whatsoever the rabbi may say, and so giving to him what you will not give to Jesus; or else you will sink back into utter indolence and carelessness about the whole matter; or else you will go and put your belief and your soul into the hands of a priest, and shut your eyes and open your mouth and take whatever tradition may choose to send you. The one refuge from all these, as I believe, is to go to Him and learn of Him, and so take His yoke upon your shoulders.
But, let me say further, it is better to obey Christ’s commandments than to set ourselves against them. For if we will take His will for our law, and meekly assume the yoke of loyal and loving obedience to Him, the door into an earthly paradise is thrown open to us. His yoke is easy, not because its prescriptions and provisions lower the standard of righteousness and morality, but because love becomes the motive; and it is always blessed to do that which the Beloved desires. When ‘I will’ and ‘I ought’ cover exactly the same ground, then there is no kind of pressure from the yoke. Christ’s yoke is easy because, too, He gives the power to obey His commandments. His burden is such a burden {as I think one of the old fathers puts it} as sails are to a ship or wings to a bird. They add to the weight, but they carry that which carries them. So Christ’s yoke bears the man that bears it. It is easy, too, because ‘in,’ and not only after or for, ‘keeping of it there is great reward’; seeing that He commands nothing which is not congruous with the highest good, and bringing along with it the purest blessing. Instead of that yoke, what has the world to offer, or what do we get to dominate us, if we cast off Christ? Self, the old anarch self, and that is misery. To be self-ruled is to be self-destroyed.
There is no need that I should remind you of how it is better to accept Christ’s providences than to kick against them. Sorrow to which we submit loses all its bitterness and much of its sadness. Kicking against the affliction makes its sharp point penetrate our limbs. The bird that will dash itself against the wires of its cage beats itself all bloody and torn. Let us take the providence and it ceases to be hard.
One last word;-we all carry an iron yoke upon our shoulders. For, hard as it is for us preachers to get our friends that listen to us to believe and realise it, ‘We all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.’ That yoke is on us all. And I, for my part, believe that no man by his own efforts can cast it off, but that the attempt to do so often brings greater strength to the sins that we seek to cast out, just as the more you mow the grass, the thicker and the stronger it grows. So I come with the great message which Jesus Christ Himself struck as the keynote and prelude of His whole ministry, when in the synagogue He said, ‘The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me . . . to preach deliverance to the captives, and the opening of the prison to them that are bound.’ He, and He only, will break every yoke and let the oppressed go free. And then He addresses us, after He has done that, with the immortal words, the sweetness of whose sound, sweet as it is, is less than the sweetness of their sense: ‘Take My yoke upon you . . . and ye shall find rest to your souls.’ Oh, brother! will you not answer, ‘O Lord! truly I am Thy servant. Thou hast loosed my bonds, and thereby bound me for ever to wear Thy yoke’; as the slave clings to his ransomer, and delights to serve him all the days of his life?
Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. R. Dummelow 1909 · Public Domain On v1 1-11. Opposition of Hananiah and the false prophets.
1-11. Opposition of Hananiah and the false prophets.
2. Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel] a formula of Jeremiah's, and hence, perhaps, assumed by Hananiah as implying an equal claim to inspiration.
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6. Amen: the Lord do so] i.e. would that it might be so.
7-9. Hananiah's forecasts of peace being in opposition to those of his predecessors, the presumption is against him, and can only be removed by the fulfilment of his predictions (the test laid down in Deu_18:22), which assuredly is not to take place.
10. See on Jer_27:2.
12-17. Hananiah rebuked and punished.
13. Hananiah's act by inciting Zedekiah and his people to resistance only makes the servitude which they will have to undergo harsher.
17. The seventh month] cp. Jer_28:1.
J. R. Dummelow, A Commentary on the Holy Bible (Macmillan, 1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On vv1, 15, 17 fifth month
fifth month
i.e. August.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Arno C. Gaebelein 1922 · Public Domain On v1 1. Hananiah, the false prophet (Jer 28:1-11)
CHAPTER 28
1. Hananiah, the false prophet (Jer 28:1-11)
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2. The judgment of Hananiah (Jer 28:12-17)
Jer 28:1-11. One of these lying prophets became very bold, and declared that he had a message from the Lord that the yoke of the Babylonian king was to be broken, and that within two years the temple vessels would be brought back. Jeremiah said “Amen”--let it be so! But he knew it could not be so, for the Lord had spoken to him; he gives a test. Then Hananiah became still more arrogant. Jeremiah had about his neck the yoke (Jer 27:2). Hananiah took it off and broke it and declared again that within two years the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar should be broken. What applause he must have earned from the unbelieving masses about him!
Jer 28:12-17. Instead of yokes of wood there should be yokes of iron, the prophet tells Hananiah. He exposes him as a deceiver whom the Lord had not sent, and announces his fate, that he should die this same year. He died in the seventh month of the same year.
Arno C. Gaebelein, The Annotated Bible (1913–1922) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv1, 12 Hananiah’s False Prophecy
Hananiah’s False Prophecy
v. 1. And it came to pass the same year, in the beginning of the reign of Zedekiah, king of Judah, that is, in the first half of his reign, after he had become fully established in his position, in the fourth year and in the fifth month, that Hananiah, the son of Azur, the prophet, a member of a family of priests, which was of Gibeon, a city some eight miles northwest of Jerusalem, spake unto me in the house of the Lord in the presence of the priests and of all the people, saying, in a false message modeled after the true revelations given the real prophets,
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v. 2. Thus speaketh the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, saying, I have broken the yoke of the king of Babylon, which the country had then borne for about ten years.
v. 3. Within two full years, literally, "years of days," that is, after the years would be completed down to the last day, will I bring again into this place all the vessels of the Lord’s house that Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, took away from this place and carried them to Babylon, 2Ki 24:13;
v. 4. and I will bring again to this place Jeconiah, the son of Jehoiakim, king of Judah, with all the captives of Judah that went into Babylon, saith the Lord, 2Ki 24:14-15; for I will break the yoke of the king of Babylon. This was a bold move on the part of the false prophet, intended to offset and neutralize the clear proclamation which Jeremiah had made concerning the length of the coming captivity.
v. 5. Then the prophet Jeremiah said unto the prophet Hananiah in the presence of the priests and in the presence of all the people that stood in the house of the Lord, for, having the truth on his side, he possessed the boldness which a true servant of the Lord should always exhibit,
v. 6. even the prophet Jeremiah said, Amen, that is, So be it! The Lord do so; the Lord perform thy words which thou hast prophesied to bring again the vessels of the Lord’s house, and all that is carried away captive, from Babylon into this place! Jeremiah was personally in the heartiest accord with this, idea of the early restoration of the captives and of the Temple vessels; nothing would have pleased him better than to have this fortunate turn of events come true.
v. 7. Nevertheless hear thou now this word that I speak in thine ears, in a most emphatic manner, and in the ears of all the people;
v. 8. The prophets that have been before me and before thee of old, as Isaiah, Joel, Hosea, Amos, and others, prophesied both against many countries and against great kingdoms, of war and of evil, of misfortune and calamity of every kind, and of pestilence.
v. 9. The prophet which prophesieth of peace, when the word of the prophet shall come to pass, then shall the prophet be known that the Lord hath truly sent him. That is, the fulfillment of a prophecy such as had been made by Hananiah would be the best proof of his having spoken the truth. But from the start the presumption of truth is in favor of the prophecies of calamity, since they are connected with danger to him who brings the message. Prophecies of good fortune may be flattery and have the object of providing their maker with pleasant conditions; it is necessary, therefore, to wait for results before accepting them.
v. 10. Then Hananiah, the prophet, took the yoke from off the prophet Jeremiah’s neck, which he wore by God’s order, Jer 27:2, and brake it, an act of audacity and impertinence with which he intended to strengthen his position over against the people.
v. 11. And Hananiah spake in the presence of all the people, saying, in another base falsehood. Thus saith the Lord, Even so will I break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, from the neck of all nations within the space of two full years. He thought that the bold repetition of his false prophecy, together with the symbolic act which accompanied it, would cause the people to believe him without question. And the prophet Jeremiah went his way, leaving the justification of his prophecy to the Lord for the present. In many cases it is the part of true wisdom for believers not to reply to bold statements on the part of the adversaries, but to leave the vindication of the Lord’s honor to the Lord Himself.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 3, 5, 8, 10, 12, 15 General Information:
General Information:
Hananiah claims to speak for God.
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in the fourth year and the fifth month
This is the fifth month of the Hebrew calendar. It is during the dry season. It is during the last part of July and the first part of August on Western calendars. This was after Zedekiah had been king for three years. (See: Hebrew Months and Ordinal Numbers)
Azzur
This is the name of a man. (See: How to Translate Names)
Yahweh of hosts ... says this
Jeremiah often uses these words to introduce an important message from Yahweh. See how you translated this in Jeremiah 6:6.
I have broken the yoke imposed by the king of Babylon
Hananaiah speaks of the people being in slavery as if they were oxen on which the Babylonians had put yokes to make them do heavy work. AT: "I have made it so you are no longer slaves of the king of Babylon" or "I have set you free from slavery to the king of Babylon" (See: Metaphor)
translationWords
year
reign
Zedekiah
king
kingdom of Judah
Hananiah
Gibeon
house of God
priest
Yahweh of hosts
God
Israel
yoke
Babylon
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 10, 12, 15 28:1-17 Soon after the events of ch 27, a…
28:1-17 Soon after the events of ch 27, a false prophet named Hananiah publicly confronted Jeremiah in the Temple courtyard. Each prophet gave what he claimed was a message from the Lord, but only Jeremiah’s prediction came true.
28:1 The people were in the Temple, so it was probably the occasion of one of the annual fall festivals, either the Day of Atonement (Lev 23:26-32) or the Festival of Shelters (Lev 23:33-36).
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.