The words of Jeremiah the son of Hilkiah, of the priests that [were] in Anathoth in the land of Benjamin:
Ver. 1. The words a of Jeremiah.] Piscator rendereth it Acta Ieremiae, The Acts of Jeremiah, as we say, "The Acts of the Apostles," which book also, saith one, might have been called in some sense The Passions of the Apostles, who were for the testimony of Jesus "in deaths often." And the same we may safely say of Jeremiah, who, although he were not omnis criminis per totam vitam expers - which yet great Athanasius b affirmeth of him - that is, free from all fault, for he had his outbursts, and himself relateth them, yet he was Iudaeorum integerrimus - as of Phocion it is said that he was Atheniensum integerrimus - a man of singular sanctimony and integrity; good of a little child, a young saint, and an old angel; an admirable preacher, as Keckerman c rightly calleth him, and propoundeth him for a pattern to all preachers of the gospel. Nevertheless, this incomparable prophet proved to be a man of many sorrows, πολυπαθεστατος, as Isidor Pelusiot, d a most calamitous person, as appeareth by this book, and one that had his share in sufferings from, and fellow sufferings with, his ungrateful countrymen, as much as might be. Nazianzen saith most truly of him, that he was the most compassionate of all the prophets; e witness that pathetical wish of his, Jeremiah 9:1,3, "Oh that my head were waters," &c.; and that holy resolve, Jeremiah 13:17, "But if ye will not hear it, my soul shall weep in secret places for your pride, and mine eye shall weep sore and run down with tears, because the Lord's flock is carried away captive." It was this good man's unhappiness to be a physician to a dying state -
“ Tunc etenim docta plus valet arte malum. ”
Long time he had laboured among this perverse people, but to very small purpose, as himself complaineth, Jer 27:13-14 after Isaiah, Isa 49:4 whom he succeeded in his office as a prophet, some scores of years between, f but with little good success. For as in a dying man his eyes wax dim, and all his senses decay, till at length they are utterly lost, so fareth it with commonwealths, quando suis fatis urgentur, when once they are ripe for ruin; the nearer they draw to destruction, the more they are overgrown with blindness, madness, security, obstinace, such as despiseth all remedies, and leaveth no place at all for wholesome advice and admonition. Lo, this was the case of those improbi et reprobi - "reprobate silver shall men call them" Jer 6:30 - with whom our prophet had to do. Moses had not more to do with the Israelites in the wilderness than Jeremiah had with these "stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears," Act 7:51 as good at "resisting the Holy Ghost" as ever their fathers were. The times were not unlike those described by Tacitus, concerning which Casaubon saith, Quibus nulla unquam aut virtutum steriliora, aut virtutibus inimiciora, that no times were ever more barren of virtues, or greater enemies to virtues. And to say sooth, how could they be much better, when the book of the law was wanting for over sixty years, and the whole land overspread with the deeds of darkness? Josiah indeed, that good young king - by the advice of this prophet Jeremiah, who was younger than himself, but both full of zeal g - did what he could to reform both Church and state, but he, alas! could not do it; the Reformation in his days was forced by him, and their was foul work in secret, as appeareth by Zephaniah, who was our prophet's contemporary; it met with much opposition both from princes, priests, and people, who all had been woefully habituated and hardened in their idolatry under Manasseh and Ammon. Unto which also, and other abominations not a few they soon relapsed when once Josiah was taken away, and his successors proved to be such as countenanced and complied with the people in all their impieties and excesses. This prophet therefore was stirred up by God to oppose the current of the times and the torrent of vices; to call them to repentance, and to threaten the seventy years' captivity, which because they believed not, neither returned unto the Lord, came upon them accordingly, as is set forth in the end of this prophecy. Whence Procopius, Isidor and others, have gathered that, besides this prophecy and the Lamentations, Jeremiah wrote the first and second book of Kings. h But that is as uncertain as that he was stoned to death by the Jews in Egypt, or that the Egyptians afterwards built him an honourable sepulchre, and resorted much unto it for devotion sake; whenas R. Solomon thinketh, from Jeremiah 44:28, that Jeremiah together with Baruch, returned out of Egypt unto Judea, and there died.
The son of Hilkiah.] The high priest who found the book of the law, say the Chaldee paraphrast and others; but many think otherwise, and the prophet himself addeth,
Of the priests that were at Anathoth.] "Poor Anathoth," Isa 10:30 renowned as much by Jeremiah as little Hippo was afterwards by great Augustine, bishop there. The Targum tells us that Jeremiah was one of the twenty-four chieftains of the temple. i A priest he was, and so an ordinary teacher, before he acted as a prophet; but his countrymen of Anathoth evil entreated him.
In the land of Benjamin.] Some three miles from Jerusalem.
a Verba sive res.
b Serm. 4 contra Arianos.
c De Rhet. Eccles., cap. ult.
d Lib. i., Epist. 298.
e Prophetarum omnium ad commiserationem propensissimus. - Orat 17, ad cives.
f Vide Oecolamp.
g Iosias a zelo ignis divini nomen habet: Significat autem Ieremias altidudinem Dei, vel exaltatum a Deo.
h Isodor, Doroth., Epiphan.
i Ex praepositis templi. Innuitur in ipsum rectius potuisse competere propheticum munus, quam in multos alios vel ex aula, vel ex caula vocatos.