WHEN THE PRIEST Pashhur son of Immer, the chief officer in the temple of the LORD, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things, 2he had Jeremiah the prophet beaten and put in the stocks at the Upper Gate of Benjamin at the LORD’s temple. 3The next day, when Pashhur released him from the stocks, Jeremiah said to him, “The LORD’s name for you is not Pashhur, but Magor-Missabib. 4For this is what the LORD says: ‘I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends; with your own eyes you will see them fall by the sword of their enemies. I will hand all Judah over to the king of Babylon, who will carry them away to Babylon or put them to the sword. 5I will hand over to their enemies all the wealth of this city—all its products, all its valuables and all the treasures of the kings of Judah. They will take it away as plunder and carry it off to Babylon. 6And you, Pashhur, and all who live in your house will go into exile to Babylon. There you will die and be buried, you and all your friends to whom you have prophesied lies.’”
7O LORD, you deceived me, and I was deceived;
you overpowered me and prevailed.
I am ridiculed all day long;
everyone mocks me.
8Whenever I speak, I cry out
proclaiming violence and destruction.
So the word of the LORD has brought me
insult and reproach all day long.
9But if I say, “I will not mention him
or speak any more in his name,”
his word is in my heart like a fire,
a fire shut up in my bones.
I am weary of holding it in;
indeed, I cannot.
10I hear many whispering,
“Terror on every side!
Report him! Let’s report him!”
All my friends
are waiting for me to slip, saying,
then we will prevail over him
and take our revenge on him.”
11But the LORD is with me like a mighty warrior;
so my persecutors will stumble and not prevail.
They will fail and be thoroughly disgraced;
their dishonor will never be forgotten.
12O LORD Almighty, you who examine the righteous
and probe the heart and mind,
let me see your vengeance upon them,
for to you I have committed my cause.
13Sing to the LORD!
Give praise to the LORD!
He rescues the life of the needy
from the hands of the wicked.
14Cursed be the day I was born!
May the day my mother bore me not be blessed!
15Cursed be the man who brought my father the news,
who made him very glad, saying,
“A child is born to you—a son!”
16May that man be like the towns
the LORD overthrew without pity.
May he hear wailing in the morning,
a battle cry at noon.
17For he did not kill me in the womb,
with my mother as my grave,
her womb enlarged forever.
18Why did I ever come out of the womb
to see trouble and sorrow
and to end my days in shame?
Original Meaning
THE CHAPTER MAY BE DIVIDED into two parts: a prose account of Jeremiah’s arrest and public humiliation (20:1–6), and a lengthy and poignant personal lament/complaint (20:7–18). The poetic lament perhaps combines material from two different settings, put together with the account of his humiliating incarceration to illustrate his emotional response. There is no reason to doubt, of course, that the bitter words of the lament reflect the way a person might react to human indignities. Nevertheless, it may not have been first composed by Jeremiah while in the stocks but something he took (and adapted?) from the traditional forms of lament/complaint and applied to his circumstances. Whatever the origin(s) of these verses, they serve to illustrate the pain and frustration of the prophet as he suffers abuse at the hands of the religious establishment.
No date is provided for the chapter, but there is indirect evidence for the events in the reign of Jehoiakim (609–598 B.C.). The prediction that Pashhur will die in captivity in Babylon implies a date before 597. The majority of narrative accounts that are set in the period before Zedekiah’s reign come from Jehoiakim’s time as ruler. One cannot make too much of this, however, since the next chapter (which refers to a second Pashhur) dates to the reign of Zedekiah. Possibly the word against Pashhur the priest anticipates the fall of the city in 587/586. In either case, chapter 20 sums up a decisive period in Jeremiah’s prophetic career as it is now laid out in the prophetic book; the painful prayer in 20:7–18 is the last in a series of personal laments/complaints, and it brings the wounded feelings of the prophet to a boiling point.
20:1–6. Pashhur,1 the priest who orders Jeremiah beaten and placed in the stocks, is from a well-known priestly division (Immer, 1 Chron. 24:14). He represents the religious establishment, especially the priests who care for and officiate at the temple. In fact, he is described as the “chief officer” at the temple. This probably means among other things that he heads the security detail for the large complex, providing oversight for the levitical personnel who keep the gates and who restrict access to and activities within the temple courts. Perhaps his role as chief officer explains his choice of the Upper Gate of Benjamin for the place of Jeremiah’s temporary incarceration in the stocks. He controls that area; moreover, that location (likely on the north side of the temple complex) bears a lot of traffic.
Pashhur is from a segment of the population who prove to be some of Jeremiah’s most persistent persecutors. The humiliation of being placed in the stocks2 and beaten by a priest may have been especially galling for Jeremiah, since he too is from a priestly family. With the temple looming in the background, Jeremiah’s treatment is portrayed as God’s judgment on him, carried out by the priests who care for God’s house. Upon his release, Jeremiah gives Pashhur a new name, “Magor-Missabib,” which in Hebrew means “terror all around.” This term occurs elsewhere in Jeremiah to describe the plight of Judah when the foe from the north comes against the state and its capital city (Jer. 6:25; cf. 46:5; 49:29).
Jeremiah announces in the name of the Lord that Pashhur has “prophesied lies” and that he will enter Babylon as a captive (v. 6). This is an interesting use of the verb “to prophesy.” Pashhur is by profession a priest; there is no record about his speaking. Perhaps his actions against Jeremiah are a form of prophecy; they were most definitely “symbolic,” in a sense not unlike Jeremiah’s visit to the Valley of Hinnom and his coming to the temple complex to prophesy (19:14–15). Indeed, Jeremiah’s prophetic witness in the temple may have prompted his arrest and thrashing. As a priest, however, Pashhur almost certainly took the opportunity to speak a word of judgment in public about Jeremiah and his actions. These would take the form of repudiating Jeremiah’s words and actions and claiming divine judgment on him.
20:7–18. Jeremiah’s lament is linked contextually to his humiliating and painful experience in the stocks. His words are by now (for sequential readers of the book) familiar, yet at the same time shocking.3 The prophet is persecuted because of “the word of the LORD” (20:8). His persecutors lie in wait to ambush him and ridicule him with his own phrase, “terror on every side” (20:10), as if to say that Jeremiah is a deluded madman who speaks incessantly about terror to come. In his frustration and bitterness Jeremiah accuses God of “deceiving” him (20:7), a strong term that can also refer to seduction.4 The prophet has reached his wits’ end and is unable to articulate a sense that God will rescue him from this situation.
This dilemma is excruciating for Jeremiah. God’s word is like a fire within him, and he is unable to resist the urge to speak, even if the “violence and destruction” of which he speaks brings ridicule and physical harassment. His frustration with God comes in the fact that Pashhur, a priest of God(!), had spoken against him and humiliated him in public. Had not God promised to be with Jeremiah and to protect him? Yet God’s own official representative has carried out this attack on him.
Verse 11 affirms that God is indeed strong to save. In context this means that the prophet’s persecutors will fail. The next verse affirms that God is an infallible Judge and will see to the judgment of the persecutors. Jeremiah’s prayer in this respect takes on the form of setting his “cause” (rib) before God.
Bridging Contexts
PERSECUTION OF THE RIGHTEOUS. The account of Pashhur’s humiliation of Jeremiah is but one in a long series of scriptural accounts of the persecution of the righteous. It is important to be clear here: Jeremiah is righteous, not perfect. There is a difference. He seeks to be faithful to the prophetic call given him by God. To this extent he is righteous. He is also innocent of criminal activity. In ancient Israel, someone who was innocent when accused of a crime was called righteous (ṣaddiq).
Yet when Jeremiah is ridiculed and persecuted because of his prophetic calling, he becomes moody, seeking vindication in the public’s eye because of his humiliation. His laments (including 20:7–13) make clear the reason for his persecution. From Joseph to David, and in a prophetic line from Elijah straight to Jeremiah, God’s servants have faced opposition and persecution. David complained to God about his circumstances with respect to Saul’s irrational persecution of him. Elijah fled to Mount Horeb to inform the Lord that he was the only one left who was zealous for the Lord, and Jezebel was after him (1 Kings 19:1–18). Disciples cry to God for sustenance and deliverance because their circumstances may require it!
Indeed, one can move forward through the line of faithful witnesses to John the Baptizer and the early Christian martyrs. The English term martyr is based on the Greek word for those who “bear witness” in times of persecution. This Greek word was applied to early Christians who gave testimony to their faith, often at the point of the sword. Christ himself is the greatest example of the phenomenon of righteous suffering, although his suffering is redemptive in a way that the others are not (see further under Contemporary Significance).
Jeremiah’s lament/complaint takes up the voice of the innocent sufferer, whose words are common in the book of Psalms. To whom else can one turn with the burdens of the heart, if not to God? Jeremiah prays like the saints of the Psalter, who pour out their hearts to God. That Jeremiah’s lament/complaint turns accusatory toward God probably results from two additional factors. (1) The more certain factor is the call of Jeremiah (Jer. 1:5–19), where the young prophet-to-be is assured of God’s protection and ultimate vindication. “Where is God’s vindication?” he must have wondered while in the stocks and the object of ridicule. (2) More subjectively perhaps, Jeremiah’s human frailty makes him feel that God is finally responsible for his fate. Close to the end of his endurance, he wonders why God has led him down this path; and if God has so led him, will he be stretched beyond his limits and be abandoned after all?
Shame. Shame was a powerful mechanism in the ancient world, and Jeremiah suffers public shame for his attempt to be faithful to his prophetic call. In moving to a modern context, it may be important to explore the different ways in which shame is or (increasingly) is not influential. Is there a modern counterpart to the social force of shame in antiquity? It remains more or less in force in many non-Western settings, but it appears increasingly less influential in the modern West. In any case, Jeremiah’s humanity is exposed for what it is: a condition where physical and emotional pain reach intense levels and he is in need of divine grace. Can God know how Jeremiah feels? Here is a bridge to Christology and a point of contact for all generations.
Contemporary Significance
REDEMPTIVE SUFFERING. It should not take much imagination on the part of Christians to see the parallels between Jeremiah’s suffering and that of Christ’s humiliation and suffering. Religious leaders complained about Christ and sought to trap him. He was humiliated in public and ultimately crucified. His cry of dereliction from the cross was taken directly from a psalm of lament/complaint (Ps. 22:1; Matt. 27:46; Mark 15:34). Perhaps most important, even the fate of the Son of God was cast into the hands of the Father, who seemed withdrawn at the moment.
But we should not rob Jeremiah of his humanity and the poignancy of his life by simply jumping to the New Testament and comparing him with Christ. He and other righteous sufferers are not “just like Christ.” Their suffering, however poignant and unjust, is not redemptive for other people, although it can be instructive. One may, however, describe the prophet’s life as a via dolorosa5 precisely because his public life and that of Christ are part of a larger pattern. Jeremiah suffers because he is a prophet of God. His suffering shares the suffering of God’s people, and it is prophetic in the sense that it points to the perfect Mediator, whose suffering is representative of guilty and innocent suffering alike.
Those who oppose God’s Word will oppose Jeremiah. It is the prophetic office that adorns Jeremiah’s life and leads him down the path of suffering. In his public ministry Jesus brings the prophetic office of the Old Testament to fruition, and through his Sonship fills out the significance of a prophetic ministry in profound ways.
There is much to learn from the frank expression of Jeremiah’s human limitations. One may—with Christ’s help—bear innocent suffering with a certain grace. But it is no failure of Jeremiah’s that he feels crushed by the burdens of the prophetic office. What he gets finally is a taste of the insidious opposition to the Word of God that cloaks itself in all manner of religiosity and patriotism. He experiences the sinking feeling that not only is all lost but that God seems involved in his pain. It will take the humiliation of Christ for the redemptive element of suffering to emerge, but in his own way Jeremiah suffers on our behalf. He demonstrates what it is like to feel the burdens of human failure and personal frustration as a part of his calling, and he does so to instruct us about the cost of discipleship and also for a testimony that God is faithful still—beyond our finite comprehension and in spite of our complaints.
Recently Carlos Lavernia, a Texan convicted of rape, had his conviction overturned after having served fifteen years in prison. Because some supporters kept pestering the relevant court system, DNA testing was finally done on the semen and blood samples taken from the scene of the rape, and the tests proved his innocence with respect to the crime. Two things stood out in his statement upon the release of the findings. (1) He expressed thankfulness to God for finally being set free from responsibility for this crime. (2) But he also felt deep anger at the cost (in terms of time, emotions, reputation) inflicted on him by a wrong conviction and punishment. He recounted briefly how many times during his incarceration he doubted whether he would ever be vindicated. He questioned God’s goodness too. Time and time again he wrote letters to protest his innocence. But he never gave up on his hope or on God.
Mr. Lavernia has been convicted of other crimes, so he has not been freed from incarceration. There is a lot about him still unknown to the public; nevertheless, he has served fifteen years in jail for a crime he did not commit. For fifteen years he wrote letters and offered prayers. At times he thought no one heard them, but he was wrong. So may it be with the heartfelt laments of God’s children.