What does Jeremias Chapter 11 say, and which statements belong to its speaker?

Atlas of Saints · Chapter summary

The covenant commission recalls Egypt and required hearing. Strange-god conspiracy leads to rejected prayers and burning olive tree. The revealed plot and entrusted cause precede Anathoth’s sentence.

Chapter breakdown

Jeremias 11 commissions covenant speech to Juda and Jerusalem: a curse attends failure to hear. Egypt's iron furnace, commanded hearing and doing, reciprocal belonging and the oath of milk-and-honey land are recalled, with Jeremias answering Amen. City and street proclamation repeats unheeded warnings and wicked hearts bringing covenant words upon them.

A conspiracy returns to fathers' iniquities and strange gods, voiding Israel and Juda's covenant. Inescapable evils meet unheard cries, and sacrificial gods cannot save. Gods match cities and Baalim altars streets. Jeremias must not pray or praise; the beloved's wickedness in the house prompts a question whether holy flesh removes boasted crimes. A named beautiful, fruitful olive tree burns at a word's noise, with the planting Lord pronouncing evil for sacrifices to Baalim.

The Lord shows doings formerly unknown to the speaker. Like a meek lamb carried to a victim, he recalls counsels to put wood on his bread, cut him from living land and erase his name. Neither poisoning nor a tree with fruit appears in this admitted wording. His cause is revealed to just judging Sabaoth, who tries reins and hearts, with a request to see revenge. The edition defines Sabaoth as hosts or armies and revenge as prediction approving justice rather than imprecation; its heading separately supplies Christ typology. Men of Anathoth seeking his life threaten prophecy. Sword for young men, famine for sons and daughters and no remains are pronounced upon them in visitation's year, without adding an actual escape or extending the referent to every resident.

The story inside

Opening: The covenant commission recalls Egypt and required hearing. Development: Strange-god conspiracy leads to rejected prayers and burning olive tree. Conclusion: The revealed plot and entrusted cause precede Anathoth’s sentence.

Lessons worth keeping

1
The covenant commission recalls Egypt and required hearing.
2
Strange-god conspiracy leads to rejected prayers and burning olive tree.
3
The revealed plot and entrusted cause precede Anathoth’s sentence.

Test your recall

Which images and requests does the speaker use, and what does the chapter leave unresolved?

Source edition and notes

Douay–Rheims, revised by Richard Challoner (1749–1752). Project Gutenberg no. 1581. Locators refer to lines in the admitted pg1581.txt edition. Source notes may include Challoner commentary.

Lines 85141–85152
11:3. And thou shalt say to them: Thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: Cursed is the man that shall not hearken to the words of this covenant, 11:4. Which I commanded your fathers in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, from the iron furnace, saying: Hear ye my voice, and do all things that I command you: and you shall be my people, and I will be your God: 11:5. That I may accomplish the oath which I swore to your fathers, to give them a land flowing with milk and honey, as it is this day. And I answered and said: Amen, O Lord.
Lines 85167–85177
11:9. And the Lord said to me: A conspiracy is found among the men of Juda, and among the inhabitants of Jerusalem. 11:10. They are returned to the former iniquities of their fathers, who refused to hear my words: so these likewise have gone after strange gods, to serve them: the house of Israel, and the house of Juda have made void my covenant, which I made with their fathers. 11:11. Wherefore thus saith the Lord: Behold I will bring in evils upon them, which they shall not be able to escape: and they shall cry to me, and I will not hearken to them.
Lines 85183–85189
11:13. For according to the number of thy cities were thy gods, O Juda: and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem thou hast set up altars of confusion, altars to offer sacrifice to Baalim. 11:14. Therefore do not thou pray for this people, and do not take up praise and prayer for them: for I will not hear them in the time of their cry to me, in the time of their affliction.
Lines 85195–85202
11:16. The Lord called thy name, a plentiful olive tree, fair, fruitful, and beautiful: at the noise of a word, a great fire was kindled in it, and the branches thereof are burnt. 11:17. And the Lord of hosts that planted thee, hath pronounced evil against thee: for the evils of the house of Israel, and of the house of Juda, which they have done to themselves, to provoke me, offering sacrifice to Baalim.
Lines 85207–85219
11:19. And I was as a meek lamb, that is carried to be a victim: and I knew not that they had devised counsels against me, saying: Let us put wood on his bread, and cut him off from the land of the living, and let his name be remembered no more. 11:20. But thou, O Lord of Sabaoth, who judgest justly, and triest the reins and the hearts, let me see thy revenge on them: for to thee have I revealed my cause. Sabaoth.... That is, of hosts or armies, a name frequently given to God in the scriptures.—Ibid. Thy revenge.... This was rather a prediction of what was to happen, with an approbation of the divine justice, than an imprecation.
Lines 85221–85230
11:21. Therefore thus saith the Lord to the men of Anathoth, who seek thy life, and say: Thou shalt not prophesy in the name of the Lord, and thou shalt not die in our hands. 11:22. Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts: Behold I will visit upon them: their young men shall die by the sword, their sons and their daughters shall die by famine. 11:23. And there shall be no remains of them: for I will bring in evil upon the men of Anathoth, the year of their visitation.