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BIBLE STUDY LESSON 02

SERIES P --- YHVH’S PROPHETS

WARNINGS

THE LESSON OF THE LOINCLOTH

From Jeremiah 13:1-14; 16:1-13; 17:19-27

[Go and buy a linen loincloth,] Adonai said to me one day. [Wear it, but don’t wash it.] I bought the loincloth as Adonai had instructed; I wore it but did not wash it. Then Adonai gave me further instructions concerning the loincloth. [Take the loincloth which you bought and which you are wearing, and hide it in a crack in the rocks out by the Euphrates River,] He said. I followed these instructions completely, hiding the loincloth in a crack in the rocks by the Euphrates River. Time passed and Adonai spoke to me again. [Go out to the river and get the loincloth,] He said. I went to the river and dug the loincloth from the crack in the rocks where I had hidden it. The loincloth was rotting and was no longer any good. [This is a lesson about the way I will cause the pride of Judah and Jerusalem to rot,] Adonai said. [Because these wicked people refuse to listen to Me instead of their own desires and foreign idols, they shall become useless, like this rotting loincloth. As a loincloth clings to the man who wears it, so I intend that Judah and Israel should cling to Me. They were once My people who honoured My Name and brought glory to Me, but then they refused to listen to Me. Tell these people that all their jugs will be filled with wine. They will boast that they already know this, for they have all that they need. But you must tell them that the wine you speak of is not the wine of prosperity but the wine of bewilderment and confusion. The king on David’s throne, the priests and prophets and all the people will drink this wine. I will dash these people together, even fathers and sons. I will spare no one, not even for pity or compassion.] YHVH spoke to me another time. This is what He said, [You must not marry or have children while you are living here. The children born here, along with their parents, will die of the plague. Nobody will mourn their death; they will not be buried but will lie on the ground and eventually become fertilizer. As they die from war and famine, their bodies will become food for the birds and beasts. You must not mourn or weep for them or try to comfort them, for I have withdrawn My love and mercy from them. Great people and humble people shall die here and not be buried; no one will mourn for them. No one will prepare food for the mourners or send drink to comfort one for the death of his parents. You must give a sign to the people to remind them of the sorrow to come. Your sign will be to stay away from their feasts and parties, not even to eat with them. For I, Adonai of hosts, YHVH Elohiym of Israel, will bring laughter to an end in this land. There will be no more voice of mirth, or voice of gladness, or the voices of bride and bridegroom. Naturally the people will wonder why you are telling them these things, and why I will do all these terrible things to them. They will ask what sin they have done to bring these things upon them. You shall tell them how their ancestors sinned by forsaking Me, going after foreign gods and worshiping them. You shall tell them how much worse they have been than their ancestors, following their own stubborn will and turning away from Me. Because of this, I will throw them out of this land into a strange land which they and their ancestors never knew. There they may serve other gods day and night, and I will show them no mercy.] Another time Adonai spoke to me and said, [Go and stand in the gates of Jerusalem where the kings of Judah enter and depart. Tell them, ‘Listen! Listen to the Word of Adonai, you kings and people of Judah and Jerusalem who come through these gates. Adonai Commands you to honour the Shabbat day and live. Make it a holy day, as I Commanded your ancestors. But they would not listen and refused to learn from Me. ‘If you will listen and bring no burdens through these gates on the Shabbat day, honouring it and keeping it for My use, I will let your nation live on, with David’s descendants ruling here in Jerusalem, riding in and out of these gates on horses and in chariots, and Jerusalem will remain here forever. ‘Then people shall come from all the surrounding areas -- the cities of Judah and Benjamin, the Shephelah, the hill country, and the Negeb -- bringing their offerings and frankincense to the house of Adonai. But if you do not honour Me and keep My Shabbat day holy, I will burn this city, starting a fire at its gates which will spread to its palaces without any hope of putting it out.’]

COMMENTARY

WORD PICTURES FROM JEREMIAH

[Actions speak louder than words,] cautions a familiar saying. The prophets of ancient Israel knew the wisdom of this advice. Often, they drove home their words by acting them out symbolically. Jeremiah especially knew the power of visual aids and images. By giving object lessons, he aroused the curiosity of his audience. The sight of the prophet wearing an oxen’s yoke around his neck caught the attention of those who would have been unwilling to listen to his gloomy warnings. In this way, the people heard Jeremiah’s real message: Put yourselves under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar before he destroys you! When Jeremiah compared the Israelites to his rotted loincloth, the people began to realize that their relationship to YHVH was meant to be as close as a loincloth to a man. But the prophet’s loincloth was rotted and useless, and they were forced to ask themselves if they had become just as useless to YHVH. To describe the state of YHVH’s people, Jeremiah turned to what he had learned and loved as he grew up in the country town of Anathoth. His speeches were full of the life of nature, shepherding and farming. His people, who did not follow YHVH’s Laws, were much different from the stork, turtledove, swallow and crane that he knew. These birds migrated each year at YHVH’s appointed times. In the same way, the prophet noticed the contrast between the shrubs struggling to survive in the desert and the trees thriving by river banks. With these familiar sights, he contrasted the lives of people trusting in human strength to the lives of people trusting in YHVH. Jeremiah separated himself from the ordinary lives of those who married and had families, but he was always alert to the activities around him. To illustrate his messages, he used examples from the ways of mourners, the dances of merrymakers, and the customs of a bride and groom. He watched the silversmith at work, refining silver with varying degrees of purity, and he could say his people were like impure silver, for Adonai had rejected them. Some of Jeremiah’s word pictures make more sense with the help of background information. The boiling pot in one vision probably referred to a pot set in an open-air hearth, which was a circle of stones with an opening toward the north; just as the north wind blew upon the fire, so the northern countries would blow destruction on Judah. Jeremiah pictures the coming of death as entering through a window; many people in ancient times believed that diseases came through open windows. Jeremiah did not only speak and act in parables. He himself was a living parable. He had been called [a fortified city, an iron pillar and bronze walls.]

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