Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
Jeremiah, because he prophesies in the temple the destruction thereof, is seized and made a defendant on a capital charge; but he is rescued by Ahikam.
Vulgate Text: Jeremiah 26:1-24
1. In the beginning of the reign of Joakim son of Josiah king of Judah, this word came from the Lord, saying: 2. Thus says the Lord: Stand in the court of the house of the Lord, and speak to all the cities of Judah, from which they come to worship in the house of the Lord, all the words which I have commanded you to speak to them: do not withhold a word, 3. if perhaps they may hear and each one turn from his evil way: and I may repent of the evil which I plan to do to them because of the wickedness of their pursuits. 4. And you shall say to them: Thus says the Lord: If you will not hear Me, to walk in My law which I gave you, 5. to hear the words of My servants the prophets, whom I sent to you, rising early and sending, and you have not heard: 6. I will make this house like Shiloh, and I will make this city a curse to all the nations of the earth. 7. And the priests and the prophets and all the people heard Jeremiah speaking these words in the house of the Lord. 8. And when Jeremiah had finished speaking all that the Lord had commanded him to speak to all the people, the priests and the prophets and all the people seized him, saying: He shall surely die. 9. Why has he prophesied in the name of the Lord, saying: This house shall be like Shiloh: and this city shall be desolated, so that there shall be no inhabitant? And all the people gathered against Jeremiah in the house of the Lord. 10. And the princes of Judah heard these words: and they went up from the king's house to the house of the Lord, and sat at the entrance of the new gate of the house of the Lord. 11. And the priests and the prophets spoke to the princes and to all the people, saying: The sentence of death belongs to this man; because he has prophesied against this city, as you have heard with your ears. 12. And Jeremiah said to all the princes and to all the people, saying: The Lord sent me to prophesy against this house and against this city all the words which you have heard. 13. Now therefore make your ways and your pursuits good, and hear the voice of the Lord your God: and the Lord will repent of the evil which He has spoken against you. 14. But as for me, behold, I am in your hands: do to me what is good and right in your eyes. 15. But know and understand that if you kill me, you will bring innocent blood upon yourselves and upon this city and its inhabitants: for in truth the Lord sent me to you, to speak in your ears all these words. 16. And the princes and all the people said to the priests and to the prophets: There is no sentence of death for this man: because he has spoken to us in the name of the Lord our God. 17. Then certain men from the elders of the land rose up and said to the whole assembly of the people, saying: 18. Micah of Moresheth was a prophet in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and he said to all the people of Judah, saying: Thus says the Lord of hosts: Zion shall be plowed like a field; and Jerusalem shall become a heap of stones: and the mountain of the house shall become the high places of a forest. 19. Did Hezekiah king of Judah and all Judah condemn him to death? Did they not fear the Lord and entreat the face of the Lord: and the Lord repented of the evil which He had spoken against them? Therefore we are doing great evil against our own souls. 20. There was also a man prophesying in the name of the Lord, Uriah son of Shemaiah from Kiriath-jearim: and he prophesied against this city and against this land, according to all the words of Jeremiah. 21. And king Joakim and all his mighty men and all his princes heard these words: and the king sought to kill him. And Uriah heard it and was afraid, and fled and went into Egypt. 22. And king Joakim sent men into Egypt, Elnathan son of Achbor, and men with him into Egypt. 23. And they brought Uriah out of Egypt: and brought him to king Joakim, and he struck him with the sword: and cast his body into the graves of the common people. 24. Therefore the hand of Ahikam son of Shaphan was with Jeremiah, so that he would not be delivered into the hands of the people to be killed.
Verse 2
2. TO ALL THE CITIES — to the men of all the cities of Judah, who come to Jerusalem to the temple, to worship and serve God there.
Verse 3
3. AND LET ME REPENT OF THE EVIL — that I may revoke the sentence of evil and vengeance decreed against them: see chapter 18, verse 8.
Verse 5
5. RISING IN THE NIGHT — promptly and vigilantly, as one who rises in the night. It is a catachresis: see what was said at chapter 25, verses 3 and 4.
Verse 6
6. I WILL MAKE THIS HOUSE LIKE SHILOH — I will overthrow the temple as Shiloh was overthrown, where the Ark formerly was, about which I spoke at chapter 7, verse 12.
Verse 8
8. THE PRIESTS AND PROPHETS SEIZED HIM (Jeremiah). — He calls the Scribes and doctors of the law "prophets." So the Chaldean and Vatablus. Jeremiah was here a type of Christ, who was likewise accused by the Scribes as a destroyer of the same temple, says Theodoret; and similarly the Jews cried out against Christ: "His blood be upon us," just as here Jeremiah threatens them, verse 15.
Verse 9
9. WHY HAS HE PROPHESIED IN THE NAME OF THE LORD? — Why has Jeremiah pretended to prophesy in the name of the Lord? Why has he covered his fabrications and dreams with the name and oracle of the Lord?
SO THAT THERE SHALL BE NO (that is, so that there shall be no) INHABITANT.
Verse 10
10. THE NEW GATE, etc. — The Chaldean says it was the eastern gate, which had been newly built by Jotham, 2 Kings 15:33. This gate had seven other names, which Castro enumerates. There, says St. Jerome, judgments were exercised, and therefore this case of Jeremiah was tried there.
Verse 11
11. THE SENTENCE OF DEATH BELONGS TO THIS MAN — that is, Jeremiah is guilty of death, and in judgment must be condemned to death by the judges, as a blasphemer and false prophet, because he prophesies the destruction of the holy temple and city.
Verse 12
12. THE LORD SENT ME. — Note the prudence of Jeremiah, to be imitated by every confessor and martyr: that he says he follows the faith and law of God; second, his charity, when he exhorts them to repentance, so that through it they may escape destruction; third, his humility, when he says: "I am in your hands"; fourth, his fortitude and freedom, when he says God will avenge his death; fifth, the security of a good conscience, relying on which he does not fear death before God.
AGAINST THE HOUSE — concerning the house of God, or the temple. AGAINST THE CITY — concerning the city; for thus the Hebrew אל (el), that is "to," is often taken for "concerning."
Verse 14
14. DO TO ME (he says) WHAT IS GOOD IN YOUR EYES. — So St. Martin, as Sulpicius attests, when asked by a robber whether he was not afraid, steadfastly replied: "Never have I been so secure, because I know that the mercy of the Lord will be present in trials; but rather I grieve for you, who are unworthy of Christ's mercy, since you practice robbery." Jeremiah acted in the same manner.
Verse 15
15. IF YOU KILL ME (he says), YOU WILL BRING INNOCENT BLOOD UPON YOURSELVES — that is, to your own ruin. For my blood will cry out against you and against Jerusalem, and will demand vengeance from God, as the blood of Abel cried out against Cain.
Verse 16
16. THERE IS NO SENTENCE OF DEATH FOR THIS MAN — he is not guilty of death.
Verse 18
18. MICAH. — See Micah chapter 3, verse 12. ZION (that is, Jerusalem laid waste and desolated) SHALL BE PLOWED LIKE A FIELD (that is, it shall be so desolated that it becomes arable, so that it can be plowed), AND THE MOUNTAIN OF THE HOUSE (of the Lord, namely Mount Moriah on which the temple stood, shall become) THE HIGH PLACES OF FORESTS — it shall be so abandoned that it will become wild, and be filled with thickets and trees like a forest. Arias Montanus, and from him Castrius, think that in the phrase "shall be plowed" there is an allusion to the ancient custom whereby, when they wished to utterly destroy a city they had conquered, they would drive a plow through it. On this Horace, Book 1, Ode 18, writes:
"And the insolent army would impress A hostile plow upon the walls."
And Isidore, Book 15, chapter 1, says: "A city is founded by the plow, and overturned by the plow." But the Hebrews did not plow hostile cities, but sowed them with salt when they wished to utterly destroy them, as is evident from Judges 9:45. The former sense is therefore simpler and truer.
So Ovid, Epistle 1 of the Heroines, sings:
Now there is a harvest where Troy once stood, and the soil, Rich with Phrygian blood, luxuriates for the sickle to cut.
Verse 20
20. THERE WAS ALSO URIAH — that is, if we kill Jeremiah, we will commit a crime similar to that by which the prophet Uriah, a true prophet of God, was recently slain by king Joakim, on account of which the king and nobles incurred the hatred and envy of all. So Theodoret, Hugo, St. Thomas, Lyranus, and Sanchez. But these are forced to supply some things and add conjectures to the text. Whence, second, more simply Vatablus, Lyranus, Dionysius, Prado, and Castro think that after the sentence of the elders was pronounced in favor of Jeremiah's cause, an opposing vote is here given; therefore these are the words of those priests who accused Jeremiah: whence they bring forward this example, contrary to the example of Micah cited by the elders; namely, the punishment and killing of the prophet Uriah carried out by Joakim, who was then reigning, to prove that Jeremiah likewise ought to be killed. For there seems to be here a kind of deliberation, in which various persons express various opinions, each his own; whence this disagreement was finally resolved by Ahikam, by freeing Jeremiah.
Verse 21
21. AND KING JOAKIM HEARD — in the first year of his reign, at its beginning; for these things happened in the same first year of Joakim, as is evident from verse 1, when Uriah had already been slain.
Verse 22
22. AND KING JOAKIM SENT MEN INTO EGYPT — who with the consent of Pharaoh (whose friend and tributary Joakim was) would bring Uriah back from Egypt to Judea, to be punished with death; for without the consent of Pharaoh no one would have dared to use force against Uriah in Egypt or compel him to return.
Verse 23
23. IN THE GRAVES OF THE COMMON PEOPLE. — Note: Distinguished men and prophets had their own tombs, with titles appropriate to each; but the poor and strangers were buried in a common field, in the valley of Kidron purchased for this purpose, in a common burial ground or public ossuary, 2 Kings 23:6. Thus Uriah was buried in disgrace among the poor and common people.
A wondrous and almost incredible thing about the son of this Uriah is related in a letter recently found in a library of Sardinia, attributed to St. Athanasius Bishop of Caesaraugusta, who was converted to Christ by St. James the Apostle in Spain; and in the Life of Blessed Peter, first Bishop of Braga (who was likewise a disciple of St. James), written by Caledonius, who governed the Church of Braga as Bishop in the year of the Lord 260, as Hugo of Portugal reports in the year of the Lord 1100, in a letter cited by Francisco Bivarius in his Commentary on the Chronicle of L. Dexter, at the year of Christ 37, number 7. Namely, that this Uriah begot a son who was a Prophet, who was called Samuel Junior, or Malachi Senior, on account of his gravity of character and beauty of countenance, and after Jerusalem was devastated by Nebuchadnezzar, he was sent by the same with other Jews of various tribes to Spain, where he lived for twenty years and then died. For it is asserted that after 627 years, during which he lay dead in his tomb, he was raised to life by St. James the Apostle when he came to Spain, and instructed by him in the mysteries of the Christian faith, and named Peter, was sent to Braga, where he founded the Church of Braga and established it with apostolic spirit, and at last died a glorious martyrdom. Let credibility rest with the authors already cited.
Verse 24
24. THE HAND OF AHIKAM — the patronage and help of Ahikam (who was a great man under Josiah, 2 Kings 22:12) freed Jeremiah, as a brother unjustly condemned to death; whence in Hebrew Ahikam means "brother of the risen one."