Week 28 - Jeremiah 35-37, 2nd John (July 9 - July 15)
Notes
Jeremiah 35: Temple Side Rooms
a not-often discussed feature of the Temple is featured a couple of times in this week’s reading. surrounding the inner-complex of the temple (holy place and the most holy place) within the courtyard are side rooms that are typically used for storage, but in a couple stories this week are used for meetings
They are described in the passage detailing how Solomon built the temple in 1st Kings:
1st Kings 6:5 Against the walls of the main hall and inner sanctuary he built a structure around the building, in which there were side rooms.
One of these rooms is the location of the meeting that God directed Jeremiah to have the Rekabites
Jeremiah 35:1 This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord during the reign of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah: 2 “Go to the Rekabite family and invite them to come to one of the side rooms of the house of the Lord and give them wine to drink.”
The Rekabites refuse to drink the wine because one of their ancestors had made their family promise never to drink it. God uses this example to show what Judah’s obedience SHOULD have looked like. there is also an element of greater to lesser here as well. The Rekabites’ life that they are obedient to is so very austere - the conditions that God had placed on the Israelites are much easier. God is showing the people of Judah a group of people who can bear much heavier and more uncomfortable commands faithfully to chastise them for being so disobedient to his law.
Reminder: The events that we’re reading about now in Jeremiah just barely precede the calamitous destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar in 586 BC. When we read of events occurring at the temple, know that they are some of the last events that will ever occur while Solomon’s magnificent temple stands.
JEREMIAH 36, Burning the scroll
Jehoiakim, king of Judah, shows great contempt for Jeremiah and Judah in chapter 36. He had banned Jeremiah from the temple (verse 5). When God gave a direct message to Jeremiah which he was instructed to write down. He could not go himself to present it to the king. He had to send his scribe Baruch.
Though Baruch’s message is initially received with deference by some of the officials in Jehoakim’s court, the king himself will not be so humble
Jeremiah 36:22 It was the ninth month and the king was sitting in the winter apartment, with a fire burning in the firepot in front of him. 23 Whenever Jehudi had read three or four columns of the scroll, the king cut them off with a scribe’s knife and threw them into the firepot, until the entire scroll was burned in the fire. 24 The king and all his attendants who heard all these words showed no fear, nor did they tear their clothes.
Jehoakim’s actions may seem pedantic, but destroying a written prophecy would have likely been a pretty common way of attempting to prevent it from coming true in the ancient world
In a sense, by cutting and burning Jeremiah's scroll the king is performing an execration ritual. Early in the second millennium the Egyptians had the practice of writing down the names of cities to be attacked on clay bowls or figurines and, after reciting appropriate spells, smashing them. The writing down of a prophecy like Jeremiah had done was a means of effectuating it (just as speaking it would be). By burning the scroll je hoiakim hopes to undo or take away the effect of the pronouncement.
- IVP Bible Background Commentary, P. 670
In the end, Jeremiah and Baruch have to write another copy of the prophecy, which would have been neither easy nor inexpensive.
Jeremiah 37:Jeremiah’s imprisonment and
Jeremiah gets picked on a lot! He is known as the mourning prophet because he so frequently expresses his sadness over his people and his own reception as a prophet and personal situation. His complaints are not unjustified! The events of chapter 37 are happening just months before Jerusalem gets destroyed. Jeremiah’s prophecies of doom - specifically here, his message that the Egyptian army who has come to help Judah will fail and the Babylonians will return - is making the rulers of Judah extremely angry. So they find a reason to throw him in a jail of sorts. It is actually an attic in the house of one of Zedekiah’s officials
Since Jeremiah was accused of attempting to defect to the enemy, it may be presumed that his cell was in an undesirable portion of the house of Jonathan the secretary. Quite likely the architecture of a house built near a gate area or the temple complex would include some small alcoves among the ceiling vaults. These cramped spaces would probably have been too small for a man to stand erect and might well have been poorly ventilated.
- IVP Bible Background Commentary, P 671.
Jeremiah’s resilience through these trials is commendable, even if he does express his displeasure and sadness often. It appears that Zedekiah hoped that by locking Jeremiah up in this cramped place, he could get Jeremiah to change his tune about the future of Jerusalem. He summons Jeremiah and asks “Is there any word from the Lord” and Jeremiah’s response is HILLARIOUS
Jeremiah 37:17 “Yes,” Jeremiah replied, “you will be delivered into the hands of the king of Babylon.”’
Zedekiah gives up, lets Jeremiah out into the courtyard and orders that he be fed.
2nd John:
Nature of the Letter. Second John may function as an official letter, the sort that *high priests could send to Jewish leaders outside Palestine. The length is the same as that of 3 John; both were probably limited to this length by the single sheet of papyrus on which they were written. In contrast to most *New Testament letters, most other ancient letters were of this length.
Situation. Second John addresses the problem of the same secessionists that 1 John addressed. The secessionists’ inadequate view of *Christ was probably either a compromise with *synagogue pressure (see the introduction to Gospel of John) or a relativization of Jesus to allow more compromise with paganism (see the introduction to Revelation)—probably the latter. For the secessionists, Jesus was a great prophet like John the Baptist and their own leaders, but he was not the supreme Lord in the flesh (cf. 1 Jn 4:1-6; Rev 2:14, 20). Some propose that they may have been affiliated with or forerunners of Cerinthus (who distinguished the divine Christ and the human Jesus, like some modern theologians) or the Docetists (who claimed that Jesus only seemed to be human). All these compromises helped the false teaching’s followers better adapt to their culture’s values what remained of Christianity after their adjustments, but led them away from the truth proclaimed by the eyewitnesses who had known Jesus firsthand.
Keener, Craig S.. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (p. 716). InterVarsity Press.