Stories of the Prophets (Before the Exile) by Landman, Isaac

Therefore, he could see nothing but the fall and untimely death of Jehoiakim, and he added, "They shall not lament over him, saying one to another, 'Oh, my brother!' or 'Oh, my sister!' They shall not wail for him, saying, 'Oh, Lord!' or 'Oh, his glory!' but shall be glad when he is 'buried as an ass is buried, drawn out and cast forth.'"

On that very day came the news of the Battle of Carchemish. It was one of the epoch-making struggles of ancient history. Victory perched proudly on the banner of Nebuchadrezzar and Necho was utterly routed, fleeing toward Egypt, the Babylonians in hot pursuit.

Within that very year all signs of Egyptian rule in Syria and Palestine were wiped out. "The king of Babylon had taken from the brook of Egypt unto the river Euphrates all that pertained to the king of Egypt." Judah became a Babylonian province and Jehoiakim but the shadow of a king.

CHAPTER IX.

Nebuchadrezzar had taken up his headquarters where Pharaoh-Necho had encamped at Riblah, and there received the homage of the little Syrian and Palestinian states that he had wrested from Egypt.

To Jeremiah's great surprise, Jehoiakim sent a secret embassy to Nebuchadrezzar vowing allegiance to Babylon.

Jehoiakim's submission pleased Jeremiah. He saw in it a splendid opportunity for Judah. All that was needed now was to keep the people in the path of right. Their future, he felt, could be worked out well enough as long as the country was at peace, free from the ravages of war.

But here Jeremiah was met by a new difficulty. Josiah's reformation, followed by his death and the quick changes in the country's political fortunes, had not worked out very satisfactorily. People began to doubt the wisdom of the whole proceeding.

In the first place, some said that God was displeased at Josiah's overriding the traditional forms of worship. The opportunity for God to show that displeasure was at Megiddo, and, therefore, Josiah lost his life there. All the people, it was plain, had not yet arrived at the conception of God held by a Jeremiah or Josiah.

Again, there were others who fell back into the old reasoning that the gods of the other nations were mightier than Judah's God, and, therefore, they fell back into the old idolatrous ways. They were merely awaiting the opportunity to worship the other gods publicly as some of them were already doing privately.

Then, again, there were many who believed that the new Book of the Law and the new order of things prohibiting sacrifices in any place except the Temple in Jerusalem, did not permit of enough sacrificing to God, and, therefore, was He again visiting the land with the rod of Egypt and Babylonia.

And, opposing all these, Jeremiah and his followers were positive in their hearts and souls that sacrifices were by no means the all-important feature of the worship of God, but, as Jeremiah had reminded the people on the day of the Great Passover, God asked them only to obey His voice and to live in accordance with the moral law that He had commanded them.