The bookâs heading
Jeremiahâs distinctive theology of the word of God â its âword theologyâ, in shorthand â begins to show itself in the bookâs opening verses, where we find two subjects introduced: the words of Jeremiah (v. 1) and the word of the LORD (v. 2). The way these two subjects are related to one another is important, and deserves careful examination:
The words of Jeremiah son of Hilkiah, one of the priests living in Anathoth in the territory of Benjamin, being the word of the LORD that came to him [âÄĆĄer hÄyĂą dÄbar-yhwh âÄlĂąw] in the thirteenth year of the reign of Josiah son of Amon, king of Judah.
The opening of verse 2 contains some unusual syntax, and in the four other places in Jeremiah where this atypical expression is found (Jer. 14:1; 46:1; 47:1; 49:34), it clearly functions as a new sentence, as in the TNIV/NIV: âThe word of the LORD came to himâ. But here in Jeremiah 1:2 it is in the wrong place to be a new sentence, because the relative particle âÄĆĄer does not act as an absolute beginning (as it does in 14:1), but rather subordinates what follows to verse 1. As a result, versions like the ESV/RSV have made it a relative clause: âto whom the word of the LORD cameâ. However, this solution also has its problems, as it wrongly makes Jeremiah the focus of the verse. The referent of the relative particle âÄĆĄer is not Jeremiah, but the words of Jeremiah, as the Septuagint version suggests.2
In my judgment verse 2 is not an opening after the atypical pattern of Jeremiah 14:1, but rather follows the pattern of one of the most common headings used throughout the book, such as at Jeremiah 1:4: âthe word of the LORD came to meâ (wayÄhĂź dÄbar-yhwh). It has lost its normal shape, however, because it has been attached to another heading in verse 1, giving the book a double title. In other words, two titles have been joined into one, and the second title has been altered so as to prevent it from being read as a second and subsequent statement. These are two different ways of saying the same thing.
We may conclude that the double title of the book is making a close identification between two things: the words of Jeremiah, and the word of God that came to him.3 At one level this is not a difficult idea, and a phrase such as âHearing the Word of God in the words of Isaiahâ can be used with no further qualification.4 And yet, Jeremiah challenges us to take a closer look. What precisely does it mean to identify the words, plural, of Jeremiah with the word, singular, of God? Does this restrict the word of God in this book to the words of Jeremiah, so that only those things Jeremiah said count as the word of God? On the contrary, the sense is quite different: verse 1 implies that every word in the book that follows is one of the words of Jeremiah, whether Jeremiah is reported as having said it or not. This implication is borne out by the addition in the Masoretic version of an inclusio to bind together the material between Jeremiah 1:1 (âThe words of Jeremiahâ) and Jeremiah 51:64 (âThe words of Jeremiah end hereâ). This clearly demarcates the limits of the words of Jeremiah, embracing the entire book except for its final chapter, a version of 2 Kings 25.5
âThe word of the LORDâ in verse 2, as we shall see, means the message from God, and so we are being told that Jeremiahâs words â that is, the words contained in the book of Jeremiah â make up this message. But how closely is this message tied to the words of Jeremiah? Was Jeremiah free to express the message he received from God in any words he liked, or is there an exact form of words that count as the word of God? Most of us read Jeremiah in translation, and in replacing Jeremiahâs words with English equivalents inevitably something of the original meaning will be lost or altered. For Muslims this would be unacceptable, and the Qurâan cannot be translated. But for Christians the Bible is translatable. So what is it about Jeremiahâs words that make them count as the word of God? Is it their divine origin? Is it their particular content? Is it the person who says them?
Whatever the answers to these questions â and we shall return to them â Jeremiah unmistakeably draws our attention to the theology of the word of God at the very outset.
The prevalence of the word of God in the book of Jeremiah
Jeremiah abounds in âword of the LORDâ language, more so than in any other book. This abundance takes three main forms: a general affinity for word vocabulary, the prominent use of markers of direct speech, and a frequent emphasizing of divine speech.
First, the vocabulary of word and words is used more liberally in Jeremiah than in any other major Old Testament book.6 In the rest of the Old Testament we can identify a second tier of word-heavy writings consisting of Deuteronomy â which is a major source for Jeremiahâs language and theology â and books with significant Deuteronomic influence.7
Secondly, Jeremiah is replete with formulas that mark and give formal structure to direct speech, mostly the speech of God. The three most important formulas are used to introduce poetic oracles, narrative episodes and major book divisions respectively. The first of these formulas is usually labelled the Messenger Formula; the latter two are variously labelled, but because I shall be referring to them often I have given them informal labels: the Narrative Formula and the Disjunctive Heading, respectively.
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The most well known of these formulas is the phrase âThus says the LORDâ. Its label, the Messenger Formula, is somewhat misleading since it is not always used by messengers; it is a simple formula to mark a citation of anotherâs words.8 It is used to introduce prophetic oracles, in both poetry and prose, as well as the interpretation of symbolic actions. It is quite strikingly abundant, being found 155 times in Jeremiah, which is more often than the rest of the Old Testament books combined.9
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The principal Narrative Formula is the phrase âThe word of the LORD came to Jeremiah, sayingâ or, if Jeremiah is the speaker, âThe word of the LORD came to me, sayingâ.10 This phrase is used to introduce new episodes within the main storyline of the narrative,11 and it occurs some 23 times in Jeremiah. Ezekiel uses it twice as often, but it occurs almost nowhere else in the Old Testament.
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Perhaps the most important of these formulas is âthe word that came to Jeremiah from the LORDâ; I shall call this the Disjunctive Heading.12 It is not a sentence proper but a heading that stands over a divine word or a narrative leading up to a divine word. It is completely unique to Jeremiah, and marks a major break, or disjunction, in the narrative. Its function is to link the material it introduces into the overarching narrative framework of the book.13
We shall return to these formulas, especially the Disjunctive Headings, in our next chapter, because they have been used to structure the final form of the book. As Mark Biddle has argued, they âsubsume entire discourses under the heading of YHWH speechâ and ultimately convert what were once oracles, sermons and narratives addressed to a range of audiences into a single written message from the LORD.14
Thirdly, the expression usually translated âdeclares the LORDâ, or âoracle of the LORDâ (nÄâum yhwh) deserves separate mention. It has no structuring significance, but simply adds emphasis to a divine word. And once again it is strikingly preponderant in Jeremiah: with 167 uses Jeremiah accounts for over 60% of all cases of this expression in the Bible.15 There is another reason for noting this third feature of the bookâs word language, and that is the fact that many of the structural formulas mentioned above are associated with a later stage in the composition of the book; they are more frequent in the MT edition than in the earlier edition which underlies the Septuagint (the LXXV); and their Deuteronomic flavour is pronounced. It might be possible to conclude from this that Jeremiahâs word theology was a late development, not native to the prophetâs thought. However, the prominence of the expression âdeclares the LORDâ in every level and stage of the book suggests that this is not the case. We might say that the bookâs interest in the word of God grew along with the book itself, but this growth was nothing more than the continuation of an interest central to the book from the beginning. This point will become increasingly clear as we examine more of the book in later chapters.
Let me summarize this welter of statistics. The book of Jeremiah, even more so than its spiritual parent Deuteronomy, is rich in the language of word and words. And when it comes to expressions referring to the speech of God, Jeremiah is unparalleled in the richness and diversity of its language. What is more, this language is not randomly scattered throughout, but serves two main functions. It pro...