2). YHWH Calumniates The False Prophets And Questions What They Teach, Explaining What The Results Of Their Prophesying Will Be, And Emphasising That They Were Not Sent Or Enlightened By Him (Jeremiah 23:13-22).
Jeremiah now compares the prophets of Judah with the prophets who had brought doom on Israel, people who had no doubt become a byword in Judah as evidence of prophets who could go astray. And he sees little to choose between them. They walk in the same evil ways, and encourage others to do so as well, with the result that instead of converting the people from wickedness they make them worse. Indeed they were making them like the inhabitants of Sodom and Gomorrah, the two cities which were destroyed by YHWH for their extreme wickedness in the time of Abraham (Genesis 18-19), and were now synonymous with evil.
As a result YHWH will feed them with a bitter diet, because that is precisely the consequence of the type of teaching that they provide, a teaching which certainly does not come from Him but is simply a vision from their own hearts. They proclaim ‘peace and wellbeing', and promise to those who are stubborn in heart that ‘no evil will come on them'. But they can only do this because, whatever they may profess, they have not stood in the council of YHWH. Had they done so they would have known that a tempest was coming forth which would burst on their heads, as a result of the anger of YHWH, a tempest which would not cease until all that He purposes has been brought about. They may not at present understand this, but eventually they will understand it perfectly because it will have happened to them. And that is why if they had genuinely stood in His council they would rather be seeking to turn the people to YHWH's word and away from evil, because they would have known.
“And I have seen folly in the prophets of Samaria,
They prophesied by Baal, and caused my people Israel to err.
In the prophets of Jerusalem also I have seen a horrible thing,
They commit adultery, and walk in lies,
And they strengthen the hands of evildoers,
So that none returns from his wickedness,
They are all of them become to me as Sodom,
And their inhabitants as Gomorrah.”
All agreed that there had been folly in the prophets of Samaria. Those prophets had supported the folly of their priests who had set up images in their temples, and they had had their own priesthood, and their own feasts, and had indulged in a syncretistic Yahwism which included consorting with Baal and Asherah and other gods and goddesses. Thus it had come as no surprise to Judah that YHWH should brand them as fools and punish them. Their view would be that they had deserved it for having forsaken Temple worship and having deserted the son of David. But, they would have thought, surely it was different in Judah. There they had the one Temple, and the legitimate priesthood, and regularly celebrated the feasts established by Moses, and while it was certainly necessary for them to admit that they had modernised it a little by the introduction of novelties such as nature gods in order to satisfy everyone, all in all they were confident that they gave YHWH what they thought He wanted, daily sacrifices, offerings of incense, and priestly recognition. What more could any God want?
But Jeremiah soon disillusions them. That was precisely Jeremiah's point, that he had seen ‘a horrible thing' in Jerusalem, the place which should especially have been kept free from all taint. While it may be that the folly of their prophets was not outwardly like that of Israel, it was just as real underneath. It was revealed in their spiritual and physical adultery, their willingness to countenance the worship of ‘Baal (Lord) YHWH' and Asherah, the way that they deceived the people with lies under the guise of prophecy, and the way in which they prophesied in support of influential and powerful men, in order that they might achieve their ends, ‘strengthening the hands of evildoers'. And the result was that none returned from their wickedness because instead of making them feel guilty and repentant, the false prophets were encouraging them in their sins. Thus no one was returning from his wickedness to YHWH. And the consequence was that He saw them as being as wicked as Sodom and Gomorrah, which was not on the whole a good thing if one thought of what had happened to them.
Indeed as we have seen earlier, YHWH considered that they were doubly guilty because they had failed to take notice of the warning given as a result of what had happened to their northern cousins (Jeremiah 3:6-10).
‘Therefore thus says YHWH of hosts concerning the prophets:
“Behold, I will feed them with wormwood,
And make them drink the water of gall,
For from the prophets of Jerusalem,
Ungodliness is gone forth into all the land.
And it was because from these ‘prophets of Jerusalem' (as contrasted and compared with the ‘prophets of Samaria') had gone forward ungodliness into all the land, that YHWH of the hosts of Heaven and earth had decreed concerning these prophets that they should feed on wormwood and drink of gall (compare Jeremiah 9:15), in other words would experience bitter things.
Both wormwood and gall had the same characteristic, that they were very bitter, and even poisonous, and both regularly symbolised awful judgment (see for the wormwood varieties of plant Amos 5:7; Amos 6:12; Proverbs 5:4; Lamentation Jeremiah 3:15. For the gall plant see Jeremiah 8:14; Hosea 10:14; Deuteronomy 29:18; Amos 6:12; Lamentations 3:19). Drinking gall probably has in mind an extract from the colocynth gourd fruit.
‘Thus says YHWH of hosts,
“Do not listen to the words of the prophets who prophesy to you,
They teach you what is vain,
They speak a vision of their own heart,
And not out of the mouth of YHWH.”
So through Jeremiah YHWH now called on His people to turn their backs on these false prophets and not to listen to them, because their preaching was empty and was useless, and because their visions came from their own hearts and not out of the mouth of YHWH. But He would have known that He was talking to a brick wall because the people were smug in what they saw as their perfect acceptability. And meanwhile Jeremiah must have been feeling it very deeply, especially when the people attacked him for being unfair to the false prophets.
Note the characteristics of a false prophet:
1. He teaches what is empty and useless (although very pleasing to the ear). Jeremiah 23:16.
2. He does not receive his message from God (Jeremiah 23:16; Jeremiah 23:18; Jeremiah 23:21).
3. He makes false promises to those who treat God lightly (Jeremiah 23:17).
4. He ignores it when men are being stubborn in their opposition to God's ways (Jeremiah 23:17).
5. He fails to turn the people from their evil ways leaving them self-satisfied (Jeremiah 23:14; Jeremiah 23:22).
“They say continually to those who despise me,
‘YHWH has said, You will have peace,'
And to every one who walks in the stubbornness of his own heart,
They say, ‘No evil will come upon you'.”
And these prophets were continually proclaiming to the very people who demonstrated by their injustice and oppression that they despised YHWH, that they would have peace and well-being. And to those who stubbornly refused to obey YHWH's covenant they were giving the assurance that ‘No evil will come on you'. How foolish they were. For had they really seen into YHWH's mind they would have known that the very opposite was true. However, the people enjoyed their message for it coincided with their own thinking that they were perfectly satisfactory to God and could carry on doing just what they wanted.
There is an interesting hint in the verb ‘they say' of the difference in their activity from that of genuine prophets. It is a different word from that used of when YHWH's prophets speak, perhaps suggesting that these prophets speak glibly on their own initiative. They speak from their own wisdom and not from the wisdom of YHWH.
“For who has stood in the council of YHWH,
That he should perceive and hear his word?
Who has marked my word,
And heard it?”
YHWH now lays down His challenge. Which of them had stood in the Heavenly Council as His ways were being unveiled? Which of them had really perceived and heard His word? Which of them had taken note of His word and heard it? And the answer was none of them (apart of course from Jeremiah), for had they done so they would have seen things very differently.
The ‘Heavenly council' in Hebrew thought consisted of YHWH's court in the heavenlies where He was surrounded by holy beings. It was a council from which only true prophets could obtain the facts without distortion. See 1 Kings 22:19; Job 1-2; Job 15:8; Psalms 82:1; Psalms 89:6-7; Isaiah 6:1-8; Amos 3:7.
“Behold, the tempest of YHWH,
Wrath, is gone forth,
Yes, a whirling tempest,
It will burst on the head of the wicked.”
And what had been the verdict of this Heavenly Council? It had been that the wrath of YHWH would come forth like a great tempest (a tempest of YHWH), yes like a whirling tempest, and it would burst on the all the heads of the wicked. Thus the Heavenly Council had come to a very different decision from that propounded by the false prophets. It had seen a picture of the world being turned upside down because of what was coming on it.
“The anger of YHWH will not return,
Until he has executed,
And until he has performed the intents of his heart,
In the latter days you will understand it perfectly.”
And when that tempest began it would not cease until it had run its course. The anger of YHWH would go forth and not return until He had performed the intents of His heart, that is until what He had purposed had been fulfilled. And in later days they would understand it perfectly for they would have experienced it for themselves, and they would have begun to think through the truth of what he was saying (which was why Jeremiah's prophecies were preserved). ‘The latter days' simply means ‘later days', the latter days of their own experience when all that had been warned about had actually happened and they were in exile. In other words their theological graduation would be as a result of having experienced God's judgment, not from listening to the prophets.