_A BROKEN COVENANT_
xxi. 1-10, xxxiv., xxxvii. 1-10.
"All the princes and people ... changed their minds and reduced to
bondage again all the slaves whom they had set free."--JER. xxxiv.
10, 11.
In our previous chapter we saw that, at the point where the fragmentary
record of the abortive conspiracy in the fourth year of Zedekiah came to
an abrupt conclusion, Jeremiah seemed to have regained the ascendency he
enjoyed under Josiah. The Jewish government had relinquished their
schemes of rebellion and acquiesced once more in the supremacy of
Babylon. We may possibly gather from a later chapter[131] that Zedekiah
himself paid a visit to Nebuchadnezzar to assure him of his loyalty. If
so, the embassy of Elasah ben Shaphan and Gemariah ben Hilkiah was
intended to assure a favourable reception for their master.
The history of the next few years is lost in obscurity, but when the
curtain again rises everything is changed and Judah is once more in
revolt against the Chaldeans. No doubt one cause of this fresh change
of policy was the renewed activity of Egypt. In the account of the
conspiracy in Zedekiah's fourth year, there is a significant absence
of any reference to Egypt. Jeremiah succeeded in baffling his
opponents partly because their fears of Babylon were not quieted by
any assurance of Egyptian support. Now there seemed a better prospect
of a successful insurrection.
About the seventh year of Zedekiah, Psammetichus II. of Egypt was
succeeded by his brother Pharaoh Hophra, the son of Josiah's
conqueror, Pharaoh Necho. When Hophra--the Apries of Herodotus--had
completed the reconquest of Ethiopia, he made a fresh attempt to carry
out his father's policy and to re-establish the ancient Egyptian
supremacy in Western Asia; and, as of old, Egypt began by tampering
with the allegiance of the Syrian vassals of Babylon. According to
Ezekiel,[132] Zedekiah took the initiative: "he rebelled against him
(Nebuchadnezzar) by sending his ambassadors into Egypt, that they
might give him horses and much people."
The knowledge that an able and victorious general was seated on the
Egyptian throne, along with the secret intrigues of his agents and
partisans, was too much for Zedekiah's discretion. Jeremiah's advice
was disregarded. The king surrendered himself to the guidance--we
might almost say, the control--of the Egyptian party in Jerusalem; he
violated his oath of allegiance to his suzerain, and the frail and
battered ship of state was once more embarked on the stormy waters of
rebellion. Nebuchadnezzar promptly prepared to grapple with the
reviving strength of Egypt in a renewed contest for the lordship of
Syria. Probably Egypt and Judah had other allies, but they are not
expressly mentioned. A little later Tyre was besieged by
Nebuchadnezzar; but as Ezekiel[133] represents Tyre as exulting over
the fall of Jerusalem, she can hardly have been a benevolent neutral,
much less a faithful ally. Moreover, when Nebuchadnezzar began his
march into Syria, he hesitated whether he should first attack
Jerusalem or Rabbath Ammon:--
"The king of Babylon stood at the parting of the way, ... to use
divination: he shook the arrows to and fro, he consulted the teraphim,
he looked in the liver."[134]
Later on Baalis, king of Ammon, received the Jewish refugees and
supported those who were most irreconcilable in their hostility to
Nebuchadnezzar. Nevertheless the Ammonites were denounced by Jeremiah
for occupying the territory of Gad, and by Ezekiel[135] for sharing
the exultation of Tyre over the ruin of Judah. Probably Baalis played
a double part. He may have promised support to Zedekiah, and then
purchased his own pardon by betraying his ally.
Nevertheless the hearty support of Egypt was worth more than the
alliance of any number of the petty neighbouring states, and
Nebuchadnezzar levied a great army to meet this ancient and formidable
enemy of Assyria and Babylon. He marched into Judah with "all his
army, and all the kingdoms of the earth that were under his dominion,
and all the peoples," and "fought against Jerusalem and all the cities
thereof."[136]
At the beginning of the siege Zedekiah's heart began to fail him. The
course of events seemed to confirm Jeremiah's threats, and the king,
with pathetic inconsistency, sought to be reassured by the prophet
himself. He sent Pashhur ben Malchiah and Zephaniah ben Maaseiah to
Jeremiah with the message:--
"Inquire, I pray thee, of Jehovah for us, for Nebuchadnezzar king of
Babylon maketh war against us: peradventure Jehovah will deal with us
according to all His wondrous works, that he may go up from us."
The memories of the great deliverance from Sennacherib were fresh and
vivid in men's minds. Isaiah's denunciations had been as
uncompromising as Jeremiah's, and yet Hezekiah had been spared.
"Peradventure," thought his anxious descendant, "the prophet may yet
be charged with gracious messages that Jehovah repents Him of the evil
and will even now rescue His Holy City." But the timid appeal only
called forth a yet sterner sentence of doom. Formidable as were the
enemies against whom Zedekiah craved protection, they were to be
reinforced by more terrible allies; man and beast should die of a
great pestilence, and Jehovah Himself should be their enemy:--
"I will turn back the weapons of war that are in your hands, wherewith
ye fight against the king of Babylon and the Chaldeans.... I Myself
will fight against you with an outstretched hand and a strong arm, in
anger and fury and great wrath."
The city should be taken and burnt with fire, and the king and all
others who survived should be carried away captive. Only on one
condition might better terms be obtained:--
"Behold, I set before you the way of life and the way of death. He
that abideth in this city shall die by the sword, the famine, and the
pestilence; but he that goeth out, and falleth to the besieging
Chaldeans, shall live, and his life shall be unto him for a
prey."[137]
On another occasion Zephaniah ben Maaseiah with a certain Tehucal ben
Shelemiah was sent by the king to the prophet with the entreaty, "Pray
now unto Jehovah our God for us." We are not told the sequel to this
mission, but it is probably represented by the opening verses of chapter
xxxiv. This section has the direct and personal note which characterises
the dealings of Hebrew prophets with their sovereigns. Doubtless the
partisans of Egypt had had a severe struggle with Jeremiah before they
captured the ear of the Jewish king, and Zedekiah was possessed to the
very last with a half-superstitious anxiety to keep on good terms with
the prophet. Jehovah's "iron pillar and brasen wall" would make no
concession to these royal blandishments: his message had been rejected,
his Master had been slighted and defied, the Chosen People and the Holy
City were being betrayed to their ruin; Jeremiah would not refrain from
denouncing this iniquity because the king who had sanctioned it tried to
flatter his vanity by sending deferential deputations of important
notables. This is the Divine sentence:--
"I will give this city into the hand of the king of Babylon,
And he shall burn it with fire.
Thou shalt not escape out of his hand;
Thou shalt assuredly be taken prisoner;
Thou shalt be delivered into his hand.
Thou shalt see the king of Babylon, face to face;
He shall speak to thee, mouth to mouth,
And thou shalt go to Babylon."
Yet there should be one doubtful mitigation of his punishment:--
"Thou shalt not die by the sword;
Thou shalt die in peace:
With the burnings of thy fathers, the former kings that were
before thee,
So shall they make a burning for thee;
And they shall lament thee, saying, Alas lord!
For it is I that have spoken the word--it is the utterance of
Jehovah."
King and people were not proof against the combined terrors of the
prophetic rebukes and the besieging enemy. Jeremiah regained his
influence, and Jerusalem gave an earnest of the sincerity of her
repentance by entering into a covenant for the emancipation of all
Hebrew slaves. Deuteronomy had re-enacted the ancient law that their
bondage should terminate at the end of six years,[138] but this had
not been observed: "Your fathers hearkened not unto Me, neither
inclined their ear."[139] A large proportion of those then in slavery
must have served more than six years;[140] and partly because of the
difficulty of discrimination at such a crisis, partly by way of
atonement, the Jews undertook to liberate all their slaves. This
solemn reparation was made because the limitation of servitude was
part of the national Torah, "the covenant that Jehovah made with their
fathers in the day that He brought them forth out of the land of
Egypt"--_i.e._ the Deuteronomic Code. Hence it implied the renewed
recognition of Deuteronomy, and the restoration of the ecclesiastical
order established by Josiah's reforms.
Even Josiah's methods were imitated. He had assembled the people at
the Temple and made them enter into "a covenant before Jehovah, to
walk after Jehovah, to keep His commandments and testimonies and
statutes with all their heart and soul, to perform the words of this
covenant that were written in this book. And all the people entered
into the covenant."[141] So now Zedekiah in turn caused the people to
make a covenant before Jehovah, "in the house which was called by His
name,"[142] "that every one should release his Hebrew slaves, male and
female, and that no one should enslave a brother Jew."[143] A further
sanction had been given to this vow by the observance of an ancient
and significant rite. When Jehovah promised to Abraham a seed
countless as the stars of heaven, He condescended to ratify His
promise by causing the symbols of His presence--a smoking furnace and
a burning lamp--to pass between the divided halves of a heifer, a
she-goat, a ram, and between a turtle-dove and a young pigeon.[144]
Now, in like manner, a calf was cut in twain, the two halves laid
opposite each other, and "the princes of Judah and Jerusalem, the
eunuchs, the priests, and all the people of the land, ... passed
between the parts of the calf."[145] Similarly, after the death of
Alexander the Great, the contending factions in the Macedonian army
ratified a compromise by passing between the two halves of a dog. Such
symbols spoke for themselves: those who used them laid themselves
under a curse; they prayed that if they violated the covenant they
might be slain and mutilated like the divided animals.
This covenant was forthwith carried into effect, the princes and
people liberating their Hebrew slaves according to their vow. We
cannot, however, compare this event with the abolition of slavery in
British colonies or with Abraham Lincoln's Decree of Emancipation. The
scale is altogether different: Hebrew bondage had no horrors to
compare with those of the American plantations; and moreover, even at
the moment, the practical results cannot have been great. Shut up in a
beleaguered city, harassed by the miseries and terrors of a siege, the
freedmen would see little to rejoice over in their new-found freedom.
Unless their friends were in Jerusalem they could not rejoin them, and
in most cases they could only obtain sustenance by remaining in the
households of their former masters, or by serving in the defending
army. Probably this special ordinance of Deuteronomy was selected as
the subject of a solemn covenant, because it not only afforded an
opportunity of atoning for past sin, but also provided the means of
strengthening the national defence. Such expedients were common in
ancient states in moments of extreme peril.
In view of Jeremiah's persistent efforts, both before and after this
incident, to make his countrymen loyally accept the Chaldean supremacy,
we cannot doubt that he hoped to make terms between Zedekiah and
Nebuchadnezzar. Apparently no tidings of Pharaoh Hophra's advance had
reached Jerusalem; and the non-appearance of his "horses and much
people" had discredited the Egyptian party, and enabled Jeremiah to
overthrow their influence with the king and people. Egypt, after all her
promises, had once more proved herself a broken reed; there was nothing
left but to throw themselves on Nebuchadnezzar's mercy.
But the situation was once more entirely changed by the news that
Pharaoh Hophra had come forth out of Egypt "with a mighty army and a
great company."[146] The sentinels on the walls of Jerusalem saw the
besiegers break up their encampment, and march away to meet the
relieving army. All thought of submitting to Babylon was given up.
Indeed, if Pharaoh Hophra were to be victorious, the Jews must of
necessity accept his supremacy. Meanwhile they revelled in their respite
from present distress and imminent danger. Surely the new covenant was
bearing fruit. Jehovah had been propitiated by their promise to observe
the Torah; Pharaoh was the instrument by which God would deliver His
people; or even if the Egyptians were defeated, the Divine resources
were not exhausted. When Tirhakah advanced to the relief of Hezekiah, he
was defeated at Eltekeh, yet Sennacherib had returned home baffled and
disgraced. Naturally the partisans of Egypt, the opponents of Jeremiah,
recovered their control of the king and the government. The king sent,
perhaps at the first news of the Egyptian advance, to inquire of
Jeremiah concerning their prospects of success. What seemed to every one
else a Divine deliverance was to him a national misfortune; the hopes he
had once more indulged of averting the ruin of Judah were again dashed
to the ground. His answer is bitter and gloomy:--
"Behold, Pharaoh's army, which is come forth to help you,
Shall return to Egypt into their own land.
The Chaldeans shall come again, and fight against this city;
They shall take it, and burn it with fire.
Thus saith Jehovah:
Do not deceive yourselves, saying,
The Chaldeans shall surely depart from us:
They shall not depart.
Though ye had smitten the whole army of the Chaldeans that
fight against you,
And there remained none but wounded men among them,
Yet should they rise up every man in his tent,
And burn this city with fire."
Jeremiah's protest was unavailing, and only confirmed the king and
princes in their adherence to Egypt. Moreover Jeremiah had now formally
disclaimed any sympathy with this great deliverance, which Pharaoh--and
presumably Jehovah--had wrought for Judah. Hence it was clear that the
people did not owe this blessing to the covenant to which they had
submitted themselves by Jeremiah's guidance. As at Megiddo, Jehovah had
shown once more that He was with Pharaoh and against Jeremiah. Probably
they would best please God by renouncing Jeremiah and all his works--the
covenant included. Moreover they could take back their slaves with a
clear conscience, to their own great comfort and satisfaction. True,
they had sworn in the Temple with solemn and striking ceremonies, but
then Jehovah Himself had manifestly released them from their oath. "All
the princes and people changed their mind, and reduced to bondage again
all the slaves whom they had set free." The freedmen had been rejoicing
with their former masters in the prospect of national deliverance; the
date of their emancipation was to mark the beginning of a new era of
Jewish happiness and prosperity. When the siege was raised and the
Chaldeans driven away, they could use their freedom in rebuilding the
ruined cities and cultivating the wasted lands. To all such dreams there
came a sudden and rough awakening: they were dragged back to their
former hopeless bondage--a happy augury for the new dispensation of
Divine protection and blessing!
Jeremiah turned upon them in fierce wrath, like that of Elijah against
Ahab when he met him taking possession of Naboth's vineyard. They had
profaned the name of Jehovah, and--
"Therefore thus saith Jehovah:
Ye have not hearkened unto Me to proclaim a release every one
to his brother and his neighbour:
Behold, I proclaim a release for you--it is the utterance of
Jehovah--unto the sword, the pestilence, and the
famine;
And I will make you a terror among all the kingdoms of the
earth."
The prophet plays upon the word "release" with grim irony. The Jews
had repudiated the "release" which they had promised under solemn oath
to their brethren, but Jehovah would not allow them to be so easily
quit of their covenant. There should be a "release" after all, and
they themselves should have the benefit of it--a "release" from
happiness and prosperity, from the sacred bounds of the Temple, the
Holy City, and the Land of Promise--a "release" unto "the sword, the
pestilence, and the famine."
"I will give the men that have transgressed My covenant into
the hands of their enemies....
Their dead bodies shall be meat for the fowls of heaven and
for the beasts of the earth.
Zedekiah king of Judah and his princes will I give into the
hand of ... the host of the king of Babylon, which
are gone up from you.
Behold, I will command--it is the utterance of Jehovah--and
will bring them back unto this city:
They shall fight against it, and take it, and burn it with
fire.
I will lay the cities of Judah waste, without inhabitant."
Another broken covenant was added to the list of Judah's sins,
another promise of amendment speedily lost in disappointment and
condemnation. Jeremiah might well say with his favourite Hosea:--
"O Judah, what shall I do unto thee?
Your goodness is as a morning cloud,
And as the dew that goeth early away."[147]
This incident has many morals; one of the most obvious is the futility
of the most stringent oaths and the most solemn symbolic ritual.
Whatever influence oaths may have in causing a would-be liar to speak
the truth, they are very poor guarantees for the performance of
contracts. William the Conqueror profited little by Harold's oath to
help him to the crown of England, though it was sworn over the relics
of holy saints. Wulfnoth's whisper in Tennyson's drama--
"Swear thou to-day, to-morrow is thine own"--
states the principle on which many oaths have been taken. The famous
"blush of Sigismund" over the violation of his safe-conduct to Huss
was rather a token of unusual sensitiveness than a confession of
exceptional guilt. The Christian Church has exalted perfidy into a
sacred obligation. As Milman says[148]:--
"The fatal doctrine, confirmed by long usage, by the decrees of
Pontiffs, by the assent of all ecclesiastics, and the acquiescence of
the Christian world, that no promise, no oath, was binding to a
heretic, had hardly been questioned, never repudiated."
At first sight an oath seems to give firm assurance to a promise; what
was merely a promise to man is made into a promise to God. What can
be more binding upon the conscience than a promise to God? True; but
He to whom the promise is made may always release from its
performance. To persist in what God neither requires nor desires
because of a promise to God seems absurd and even wicked. It has been
said that men "have a way of calling everything they want to do a
dispensation of Providence." Similarly, there are many ways by which a
man may persuade himself that God has cancelled his vows, especially
if he belongs to an infallible Church with a Divine commission to
grant dispensations. No doubt these Jewish slaveholders had full
sacerdotal absolution from their pledge. The priests had slaves of
their own. Failing ecclesiastical aid, Satan himself will play the
casuist--it is one of his favourite parts--and will find the traitor
full justification for breaking the most solemn contract with Heaven.
If a man's whole soul and purpose go with his promise, oaths are
superfluous; otherwise, they are useless.
However, the main lesson of the incident lies in its added testimony
to the supreme importance which the prophets attached to social
righteousness. When Jeremiah wished to knit together again the bonds
of fellowship between Judah and its God, he did not make them enter
into a covenant to observe ritual or to cultivate pious sentiments,
but to release their slaves. It has been said that a gentleman may be
known by the way in which he treats his servants; a man's religion is
better tested by his behaviour to his helpless dependents than by his
attendance on the means of grace or his predilection for pious
conversation. If we were right in supposing that the government
supported Jeremiah because the act of emancipation would furnish
recruits to man the walls, this illustrates the ultimate dependence of
society upon the working classes. In emergencies, desperate efforts
are made to coerce or cajole them into supporting governments by which
they have been neglected or oppressed. The sequel to this covenant
shows how barren and transient are concessions begotten by the terror
of imminent ruin. The social covenant between all classes of the
community needs to be woven strand by strand through long years of
mutual helpfulness and goodwill, of peace and prosperity, if it is to
endure the strain of national peril and disaster.
FOOTNOTES:
[131] li. 59, Hebrew Text. According to the LXX., Zedekiah sent
another embassy and did not go himself to Babylon. The section is
apparently a late addition.
[132] xvii. 15.
[133] xxvi. 2.
[134] Ezek. xxi. 21.
[135] xxv. 1-7.
[136] xxi. 1-10. The exact date of this section is not given, but it is
closely parallel to xxxiv. 1-7, and seems to belong to the same period.
[137] xxi. 1-10.
[138] Deut. xv. 12. Cf. Exod. xxi. 2, xxiii. 10.
[139] xxxiv. 14.
[140] xxxiv. 13.
[141] 2 Kings xxiii. 3.
[142] xxxiv. 15.
[143] xxxiv. 9.
[144] Gen. xv.
[145] xxxiv. 19.
[146] Ezek. xvii. 17.
[147] Hosea vi. 4.
[148] Milman's _Latin Christianity_, viii. 255.