Jeremiah, like Isaiah, tells the period during which he prophesied. He must have been born 40 to 50 years after Isaiah's death,—-late in Manasseh’s reign. Half of the writing prophets were now past and gone; Jonah, Amos, Joel, Hosea, Micah, Nahum and Isaiah had all rendered their testimonies and gone from the world; Zephaniah and Habakkuk were living in Jeremiah's time but there is no record of the voice or pen of a prophet for the span of about seventy years between Isaiah's and Jeremiah's testimonies.
During the reign of Manasseh (years) a fearful advance was made in departure from God, as may be seen from 2 Kings 21 and 2 Chronicles 73. Manasseh, however, humbled himself in the last years of his life, but his son Amon, who reigned only two years, imitated his father's evil ways. Then came Josiah to the throne at the age of 8, and when he was 20 or 21 God called Jeremiah into His service. It was then B.C. 628 or 629.
Jeremiah continued to speak and write for God for 40 years, until the eleventh year of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah, when Jerusalem was destroyed. He was not taken away to Babylon but remained with a few in the land of Israel, and was taken to Egypt afterward. How long he lived, the Scriptures do not tell.
His very name is of special interest; it is believed to mean "Jab is exalted"—-a suitable name for one who so often brought the name Jehovah into his ministry.
In Jeremiah's. prophecy we shall not. find the wide measure of the purposes of God which was revealed through Isaiah; his portion was rather to stand and testify in sorrow amid the increasing moral darkness, the growing iniquity, of the professed people of God, until at length they were swept away in judgment, the king if Babylon being God's instrument for the chastening of His erring people.
Jeremiah tells us, with becoming humility, of his commission as a prophet; he felt his own unfitness for the task that awaited him, but was blessedly assured by God that He knew him, and had purposed before his birth to use him in His service; He would be with His confessedly weak servant, would direct him to whom to go, and what to say; further, Jeremiah need not fear the outcome of his ministry, for "I am with thee to deliver thee," was Jehovah's promise (verse 8). Would that all the servants of God would deeply profit by what we here learn of the incompetency of man at best, and the all-sufficiency of the mighty One in whose name they seek to labor.
Two symbols were brought to the prophet's notice (verses 11-16) — (a) a rod of an almond tree, the Hebrew name of which was formed from a word meaning "to watch" or "to awaken'', the almond tree being the earliest tree to show signs of life in the spring; and (b) a seething pot.
The tree rod was a token that God would be watchful over His word, to perform it, and the seething pot, whose face was from, not toward the north (new translation), was to show that out of the north should evil break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land. Sentence had been pronounced and would shortly be executed upon guilty Jerusalem and the cities of Judah (verses 15-16).
Jeremiah was therefore to testify against the whole land, its kings, its princes, its priests and its people. They would rebel against his message, and try to do him harm, but should not overcome him for "f am with thee to deliver thee" (verse 19), precious word, twice given,