(This will be added to the text of the next book as an addenda. On the static site, it is the last lesson in the series for Jeremiah.)[That site is now closed.]
If not Jeremiah, these five poems have be the work of a friend. They are too obviously written by an eyewitness to the Siege of Jerusalem in 586 BC. This is a common form of Hebrew literature, where the chapters and verses are acrostic, each beginning with a different Hebrew character in alphabetical order (except chapter 5). The rhythm is Hebrew elegy, also called threnody in English. The title of the book comes from various translations. In Hebrew, it would be more like “Alas!”
Jerusalem was the symbol of God’s revelation to mankind. After the Fall, man’s only hope was to seek God’s redemption. The path to redemption was bringing glory to His name, honoring Him as Creator and Lord. In typical Ancient Near Eastern fashion, this was a personal matter. Each living human is personally responsible to Him for not embarrassing, but building up His reputation. While the requirements were somewhat fuzzy for most of humanity, God chose this one nation as the recipients of a more precise and accurate revelation of what He requires of everyone. He held them to a higher standard, but reaped a far greater reward. They were given His personally edited version of revelatory legends, a precise code of ritual and community standards, along with His personal divine Presence. Jerusalem was built to accommodate the center of God’s earthly manifestation; it was the home of Jehovah’s glory. If there was any place in human space to get the real truth, it was Jerusalem.
Israel was more of a mission than a people; they rejected that identity. In the end, they served more to obfuscate than reveal the truth. His Chosen People had let it go to their heads, not their hearts. These five poems indicate the depth of loss and sorrow from a highly prophetic and literate soul, fully aware of what the people had thrown away.
Chapter 1: The desolate city mourns, now empty and in ruins. This is no mere anthropomorphism, but a functional image of how things work. Intellectual facts won’t help much if you get everything morally wrong. The Hebrew concept of Creation is a living thing. While the level of consciousness is debatable, the thread of intelligence is clearly the moral fabric by which all things in this universe operate. Modern man rejects this concept and the universe responds appropriately with God’s curses on sin. We lack the grand sense of scale of human history the ancients took for granted; our modern sensibilities are entirely too immediate. This blinds us to the moral truth exposed in God’s Word: Creation suffers when we sin, but will outlast our petty concerns as we are crushed under God’s wrath.
While the poet blends here the image of the city and occupants, it is more in the sense of corporate consciousness. The mission was her reason for standing on that ancient stone ridge. Too late the people of Judah become conscious of their sin, crying out to God for a salvation no longer available to them. It was bad enough when the glory of the Lord left some time before, but with her people gone, the city has little reason left to live. Now empty, she cannot die; she is left weeping alone.
Chapter 2:The imagery shifts a bit to emphasize the whole Kingdom of Judah. The futile defense of the land itself brought a massive slaughter. The long siege saw children ravaged by starvation, people eating those children and any number of horrific scenes. None of this was necessary. How often had Israel defeated her enemies, even when vastly outnumbered in the field? God destroyed everyone opposed to His revelation. Now that Judah has become the enemy of that truth, she is the one destroyed while her enemies stand by taunting without lifting a finger. It’s too late to weep for sin; all that’s left is sorrow for the loss of what might have been.
Chapter 3: This is more like some of the better Psalms. Each letter of the alphabet gets three short verses in order. This is the complaint of a righteous individual, rare among the Judeans in that time. The man first unloads the sorrow about his dire situation. Then he notes that God is faithful and will carry through everything He promises. However, only those who live a penitent awareness can survive to see those promises come true. So this symbolic man calls on God for a chance to repent and renew the covenant. In due time, the door of Heaven will open again. The duty of man is to wait on God in His own time to decide what and when things shall be.
Chapter 4: You can’t eat gold. Precious metals and jewels aren’t worth much during a siege. Instead, there is an endless feast of misery, gorging on sorrow. How silly it is for people to worry about someone ritually unclean when the whole city is damned in her sins! So the poet describes graphically what he sees during the siege, the shocking images of starvation and disease. Worst of all is the petty competition over anything edible when there truly is nothing left life for but perhaps the spite of one’s enemies. Thus, the last few lines note how Edom watches from the sidelines, but she is next.
Chapter 5: Terse but loaded with deep imagery, this last poem is the most depressing. The poet notes they had sold themselves into moral slavery long ago, mentioning both Assyria and Egypt. In each case, the rampaging empires could not have touched God’s People had they not abandoned the mission. Now it’s all over except falling into the grave; survivors are abused until they drop into the dust. The poet ends with one final call for the only possible answer: If God does not call us out of death, we cannot hope to live.
