II. How FAB THE Rechabites WERE REALLY FBAisED. After all, Rechabite and Israelite were really the same sort of beings. If they had exchanged places, they would haye exchanged conduct. The Israelite was quite capable of sticking, with utmost tenacity, to some external rule. And the Rechabite, we may be quite sure, was equally incapable, with the Israelite, of obeying the commandments of God. But the Rechabite was to be praised in this that he recognized an authority outside of his own wishes. The law under which he lived might not go very far; but it operated with certainty so far as it did go. The Rechabite would have died rather than violate the ancestral prohibition. God ever recognizes conformity to law as a good thing. We must, therefore, not go seeking in these Rechabites more than God has appointed us to find. The one good thing in them was singled out to point a most humiliating lesson and vindicate the need of a severe chastisement. Compared with the benefits of Jehovah toward Israel, what had Jonadab done for the Rechabites ? — Y.
Vers. 18, 19. — Qod's recognition of the Rechabite obedience. This is just in accor- dance with what we might expect. The Rechabites, when they have been used to put Israel to shame, are not allovf^ed to go away without a sufScient stamp on their noble conduct. The Divine estimate of that conduct is sufficiently shown by the words Jeremiah is authorized to speak.
I. God will always recognize a sPiRrr of obbdibnok. Here we lay emphasis, not so much on actual obedience, as on a spirit of obedience. As to actual obedience, there may be dispute of claim and conflict as to authorities. But the spirit of obedience is one running through the whole of life. And God must have seen the spirit of obedience very strong in these Rechabites. Perhaps it is not too much to say that, if they bad been in the place of Israel, it would have been a sore grief to them that they were not able properly to obey the commandments of Jehovah. Their obedience was tried, it must be remembered, not in the ordinary associations of life, but in extraordi- nary and difficult circumstances. They showed the stuff that martyrs are made of, and if God specially recognized their obedience in what was only a matter of external con- duct, how sure we may be that he will recognize all obedience that goes deeper I The thing he would have us do is to find out the right Master, right Teacher, right Leader, and then follow him to the death.
IL 1'he PABTictTLAB PROMISE WHICH GoD HAKES HEBE. Ycry likely, in a cert^n sense, it was literally fulfilled. We must take " for ever " in the limited meaning so often found in the Scriptures, and then we shall have no difficulty in believing that the Bechahites for many generations had a special providence surrounding them. Bui recollecting the spiritual significance of prophecy, we may take " for evw " in iU largest
OH. xxxvi. 1— 32.J THE BOOK- OF THE PllOt'HKT JEREMIAH.
103
8en86. The essence of the promise is not fulfilled to sons of Jonadab according to the flesh. Promises to natural succession were only to serve a temporary purpose. As all who have a spirit of trust in them are reckoned children of Abraham, so all who have in them the spirit of obedience may be reckoned children of Jonadab. Where the spirit of obedience is, knowledge of God's will becomes easy. Where the spirit oi obedience is, actual obedience becomes easier and easier and more a matter of satis- tactioQ. — Y.
EXrOSITION.
CHAPTERS XXXVL— XXXVIII. Nabbatite ov Events pbecediko thb
SlESE OF JeBUSALEM.
CHAPTER XXXVI. Thb Boll or Prophecy oestboted bt Jehoiaeim. In the fourth year of Jehoiakim (which, it is important to remember, was the first of Nebucliadnezzar) Jeremiah was directed to write down all his previous revelations, from the beginning of bis ministry to the present day. Such, at least, is the literal meaning of vers. 1, 2 ; but it would seem thai the literal meaning can hardly be the right one. First of all, a historically ao- eurate reproduction of tlie prophecies would not have suited Jeremiah's object, which was not historical, but practical ; he desired to give a salutary shock to the people by bringing before them the fatal consequencci of their evil deeds. And uext, it appears from ver. 29 that tlie purport of the roll which the king burned was tliat the King of Babylon should " come and destroy this land ; " whereas it is clear that Jeremiah had uttered many other important declara- tions in the course of his already long ministry.
Now, it is remarkable, and points the way to • solution of the problem, that oh. XIV. Is said (ver. 1) to have been written in the very same year to which the narrative before us refers, and that it is mainly con- cerned with the invasion of Nebuchadnezzar and its consequences (indeed, entirely so, if we admit that ch. xxv. 12, 26 have received interpolation).
Is not thit the prophecy which Jeremiah dictated to Baruoh ? ' and is not ver. 2 a loose,
' There is a striking confirmation of this fiew ill the relation of ch. vii. to ch. xxvi., the former containing the propheoy shortly gummed up in the latter.
inaccurate statement due to a later editor ? That the prophetic as well as the historical books have passed through various phases (without detriment to their religious value) is becoming more and more evident. The ■eventh and eighth chapters of Isaiah, and the tliirty-seventh and thirty-eighth of the same book, have demonstrably been brought into their present shape by an editor (see Cheyne's 'Prophecies of Isaiah,' vol. i.) ; is it not highly reasonable to conjecture that these narrative chapters of Jeremiah have, to a greater or less extent, passed through a similar process (see below on ver. 6)? (The main point of this theory— that relative to ch. xxv. — has been brought forward by Dr. H. Griitz, in his ' Monats- Bchrift fur Gescliichte uud Wisseiischaft des Judenthums,' vol. xxiii. p. 298, etc.)
Ver. 4, — Bamch. Already mentioned as Jeremiah's attendant, in ch. xxxii. 12. He appears to have been of high rank (see on ver. 15), as Josepljus, indeed, expressly states (' Ant,,' x. 9, 1). Maaseiah, bis grand- father, was governor of the city (2 Chron. xxxiv. 8), and Seraiah his brother (oh. li. 59) held some equally honourable, tliough not 80 easily definable, position in the court.
Ver. 5, — I am shut up. Not so ; Jeremiah was not detained by material force. Some strong reason he had (perhaps of a cere- monial kind), but as it was irrelevant to the narrative, it is not given. Render, I am detained (same verb as in 1 Sam. xii. 7).
Ver. 6. — TTpon the fasting-day. The mention of the fast-day suggests that ver. 9 is out of its place, which again confirms the view that the narrative before us has received its present form from an editor. In the ears of aU Judah (see ver. 9).