Jeremiah Denounces the Priests
After this lesson, Jeremiah was bidden give his countrymen one further warning. He was to take the potter’s vessel, and was to summon the elders and the priests to go with him out from Jerusalem to “the valley of the son of Hinnom.” There he was once more to preach repentance. If in the end he prevailed not, he was to break the vessel, and proclaim the doom of the city.
The prophet did as he was commanded, crying out at the close of his unheeded exhortation, “Thus will I do unto this place, saith the Lord, and to the inhabitants thereof, and even make this city as Tophet:
“And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judith, shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink-offerings unto other gods.”
“And the houses of Jerusalem, and the houses of the kings of Judith, shall be defiled as the place of Tophet, because of all the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense unto all the host of heaven, and have poured out drink-offerings unto other gods.”
The priests and elders were much enraged by this speech of Jeremiah. They clamored around him with threats: he was beaten, and then seized and placed in the stocks, so as to shame him before all men.
Comments