![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](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-21-320.jpg)
![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."](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-22-320.jpg)
![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:—](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-23-320.jpg)
!["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](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-24-320.jpg)
![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](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-25-320.jpg)
![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](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-26-320.jpg)
![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"—](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-29-320.jpg)
![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](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-30-320.jpg)
![CHAPTER XII
JEREMIAH'S IMPRISONMENT
xxxvii. 11-21, xxxviii., xxxix. 15-18.
"Jeremiah abode in the court of the guard until the day that
Jerusalem was taken."—Jer. xxxviii. 28.
"When the Chaldean army was broken up from Jerusalem for fear of
Pharaoh's army, Jeremiah went forth out of Jerusalem to go into the
land of Benjamin" to transact certain family business at Anathoth.
[149]
He had announced that all who remained in the city should perish,
and that only those who deserted to the Chaldeans should escape.
In these troubled times all who sought to enter or leave Jerusalem
were subjected to close scrutiny, and when Jeremiah wished to pass
through the gate of Benjamin he was stopped by the officer in
charge—Irijah ben Shelemiah ben Hananiah—and accused of being
about to practise himself what he had preached to the people:
"Thou fallest away to the Chaldeans." The suspicion was natural
enough; for, although the Chaldeans had raised the siege and
marched away to the south-west, while the gate of Benjamin was on
the north of the city, Irijah might reasonably suppose that they had
left detachments in the neighbourhood, and that this zealous
advocate of submission to Babylon had special information on the
subject. Jeremiah indeed had the strongest motives for seeking
safety in flight. The party whom he had consistently denounced had
full control of the government, and even if they spared him for the
present any decisive victory over the enemy would be the signal for
his execution. When once Pharaoh Hophra was in full march upon](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-32-320.jpg)
![Jerusalem at the head of a victorious army, his friends would show
no mercy to Jeremiah. Probably Irijah was eager to believe in the
prophet's treachery, and ready to snatch at any pretext for arresting
him. The name of the captain's grandfather—Hananiah—is too
common to suggest any connection with the prophet who withstood
Jeremiah; but we may be sure that at this crisis the gates were in
charge of trusty adherents of the princes of the Egyptian party.
Jeremiah would be suspected and detested by such men as these.
His vehement denial of the charge was received with real or feigned
incredulity; Irijah "hearkened not unto him."
The arrest took place "in the midst of the people."[150] The gate was
crowded with other Jews hurrying out of Jerusalem: citizens eager to
breathe more freely after being cooped up in the overcrowded city;
countrymen anxious to find out what their farms and homesteads
had suffered at the hands of the invaders; not a few, perhaps,
bound on the very errand of which Jeremiah was accused, friends of
Babylon, convinced that Nebuchadnezzar would ultimately triumph,
and hoping to find favour and security in his camp. Critical events of
Jeremiah's life had often been transacted before a great assembly;
for instance, his own address and trial in the Temple, and the
reading of the roll. He knew the practical value of a dramatic
situation. This time he had sought the crowd, rather to avoid than
attract attention; but when he was challenged by Irijah, the
accusation and denial must have been heard by all around. The
soldiers of the guard, necessarily hostile to the man who had
counselled submission, gathered round to secure their prisoner; for a
time the gate was blocked by the guards and spectators. The latter
do not seem to have interfered. Formerly the priests and prophets
and all the people had laid hold on Jeremiah, and afterwards all the
people had acquitted him by acclamation. Now his enemies were
content to leave him in the hands of the soldiers, and his friends, if
he had any, were afraid to attempt a rescue. Moreover men's minds
were not at leisure and craving for new excitement, as at Temple
festivals; they were preoccupied, and eager to get out of the city.
While the news quickly spread that Jeremiah had been arrested as](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-33-320.jpg)
![he was trying to desert, his guards cleared a way through the crowd,
and brought the prisoner before the princes. The latter seem to have
acted as a Committee of National Defence; they may either have
been sitting at the time, or a meeting, as on a previous occasion,
[151] may have been called when it was known that Jeremiah had
been arrested. Among them were probably those enumerated later
on:[152] Shephatiah ben Mattan, Gedaliah ben Pashhur, Jucal ben
Shelemiah, and Pashhur ben Malchiah. Shephatiah and Gedaliah are
named only here; possibly Gedaliah's father was Pashhur ben Immer,
who beat Jeremiah and put him in the stocks. Both Jucal and
Pashhur ben Malchiah had been sent by the king to consult
Jeremiah. Jucal may have been the son of the Shelemiah who was
sent to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch after the reading of the roll. We
note the absence of the princes who then formed Baruch's audience,
some of whom tried to dissuade Jehoiakim from burning the roll;
and we especially miss the prophet's former friend and protector,
Ahikam ben Shaphan. Fifteen or sixteen years had elapsed since
these earlier events; some of Jeremiah's adherents were dead,
others in exile, others powerless to help him. We may safely
conclude that his judges were his personal and political enemies.
Jeremiah was now their discomfited rival: a few weeks before he
had been master of the city and the court. Pharaoh Hophra's
advance had enabled them to overthrow him. We can understand
that they would at once take Irijah's view of the case. They treated
their fallen antagonist as a criminal taken in the act: "they were
wroth with him," i.e. they overwhelmed him with a torrent of abuse;
"they beat him, and put him in prison in the house of Jonathan the
secretary." But this imprisonment in a private house was not mild
and honourable confinement under the care of a distinguished
noble, who was rather courteous host than harsh gaoler. "They had
made that the prison," duly provided with a dungeon and cells, to
which Jeremiah was consigned and where he remained "many
days." Prison accommodation at Jerusalem was limited; the Jewish
government preferred more summary methods of dealing with
malefactors. The revolution which had placed the present](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-34-320.jpg)
![government into his hands or else to silence him. Jeremiah in the
court of the guard was really carrying on a struggle in which neither
side either would or could give quarter. He was trying to revive the
energies of the partisans of Babylon, that they might overpower the
government and surrender the city to Nebuchadnezzar. If he had
succeeded, the princes would have had a short shrift. They struck
back with the prompt energy of men fighting for their lives. No
government conducting the defence of a besieged fortress could
have tolerated Jeremiah for a moment. What would have been the
fate of a French politician who should have urged Parisians to desert
to the Germans during the siege of 1870?[153] The princes' former
attempt to deal with Jeremiah had been thwarted by the king; this
time they tried to provide beforehand against any officious
intermeddling on the part of Zedekiah. They extorted from him a
sanction of their proceedings.
"Then the princes said unto the king, Let this man, we pray thee, be
put to death: for he weakeneth the hands of the soldiers that are
left in this city, and of all the people, by speaking such words unto
them: for this man seeketh not the welfare of this people, but the
hurt." Certainly Jeremiah's word was enough to take the heart out of
the bravest soldiers; his preaching would soon have rendered further
resistance impossible. But the concluding sentence about the
"welfare of the people" was merely cheap cant, not without parallel
in the sayings of many "princes" in later times. "The welfare of the
people" would have been best promoted by the surrender which
Jeremiah advocated. The king does not pretend to sympathise with
the princes; he acknowledges himself a mere tool in their hands.
"Behold," he answers, "he is in your power, for the king can do
nothing against you."
"Then they took Jeremiah, and cast him into the cistern of Malchiah
ben Hammelech, that was in the court of the guard; and they let
Jeremiah down with cords. And there was no water in the cistern,
only mud, and Jeremiah sank in the mud."](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-38-320.jpg)
![The depth of this improvised oubliette is shown by the use of cords
to let the prisoner down into it. How was it, however, that, after the
release of Jeremiah from the cells in the house of Jonathan, the
princes did not at once execute him? Probably, in spite of all that
had happened, they still felt a superstitious dread of actually
shedding the blood of a prophet. In some mysterious way they felt
that they would be less guilty if they left him in the empty cistern to
starve to death or be suffocated in the mud, than if they had his
head cut off. They acted in the spirit of Reuben's advice concerning
Joseph, who also was cast into an empty pit, with no water in it:
"Shed no blood, but cast him into this pit in the wilderness, and lay
no hand upon him."[154] By a similar blending of hypocrisy and
superstition, the mediæval Church thought to keep herself unstained
by the blood of heretics, by handing them over to the secular arm;
and Macbeth having hired some one else to kill Banquo was
emboldened to confront his ghost with the words:—
"Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake
Thy gory locks at me."
But the princes were again baffled; the prophet had friends in the
royal household who were bolder than their master: Ebed-melech
the Ethiopian, an eunuch, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the
cistern. He went to the king, who was then sitting in the gate of
Benjamin, where he would be accessible to any petitioner for favour
or justice, and interceded for the prisoner:—
"My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have
done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the cistern;
and he is like to die in the place where he is because of the famine,
for there is no more bread in the city."
Apparently the princes, busied with the defence of the city and in
their pride "too much despising" their royal master, had left him for a
while to himself. Emboldened by this public appeal to act according
to the dictates of his own heart and conscience, and possibly by the](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-39-320.jpg)
![presence of other friends of Jeremiah, the king acts with unwonted
courage and decision.
"The king commanded Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, Take with
thee hence thirty men, and draw up Jeremiah the prophet out of the
cistern, before he die. So Ebed-melech took the men with him, and
went into the palace under the treasury, and took thence old cast
clouts and rotten rags, and let them down by cords into the cistern
to Jeremiah. And he said to Jeremiah, Put these old cast clouts and
rotten rags under thine armholes under the cords. And Jeremiah did
so. So they drew him up with the cords, and took him up out of the
cistern: and he remained in the court of the guard."
Jeremiah's gratitude to his deliverer is recorded in a short paragraph
in which Ebed-melech, like Baruch, is promised that "his life shall be
given him for a prey." He should escape with his life from the sack of
the city—"because he trusted" in Jehovah. As of the ten lepers
whom Jesus cleansed only the Samaritan returned to give glory to
God, so when none of God's people were found to rescue His
prophet, the dangerous honour was accepted by an Ethiopian
proselyte.[155]
Meanwhile the king was craving for yet another "word of Jehovah."
True, the last "word" given him by the prophet had been, "Thou
shalt be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon." But now
that he had just rescued Jehovah's prophet from a miserable death
(he forgot that Jeremiah had been consigned to the cistern by his
own authority), possibly there might be some more encouraging
message from God. Accordingly he sent and took Jeremiah unto him
for another secret interview, this time in the "corridor of the
bodyguard,"[156] a passage between the palace and the Temple.
Here he implored the prophet to give him a faithful answer to his
questions concerning his own fate and that of the city: "Hide nothing
from me." But Jeremiah did not respond with his former prompt
frankness. He had had too recent a warning not to put his trust in
princes. "If I declare it unto thee," said he, "wilt thou not surely put](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/5824191-250617131028-b7a7e9fb/85/Architecture-For-The-Commons-Participatory-Systems-In-The-Age-Of-Platforms-Jose-Sanchez-40-320.jpg)
Architecture For The Commons Participatory Systems In The Age Of Platforms Jose Sanchez
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- 6. ARCHITECTURE FOR THE COMMONS Architecture for the Commons dives into an analysis of how the tectonics of a building is fundamentally linked to the economic organizations that allow them to exist. By tracing the origins and promises of current technological practices in design, the book provides an alternative path, one that reconsiders the means of achieving complexity through combinatorial strategies. This move requires reconsidering serial production with crowdsourcing and user content in mind.The ideas presented will be explored through the design research developed within Plethora Project, a design practice that explores the use of video game interfaces as a mechanism for participation and user design. The research work presented throughout the book seeks to align with a larger project that is currently taking place in many different felds:The Construction of the Commons. By developing both the ideological and physical infrastructure, the project of the Commons has become an antidote to current economic practices that perpetuate inequality. The mechanisms of the production and governance of the Commons are discussed, inviting the reader to get involved and participate in the discussion.The current political and economic landscape calls for a reformulation of our current economic practices and alternative value systems that challenge the current market monopolies. This book will be of great interest not only to architects and designers studying the impact of digital technologies in the feld of design but also to researchers studying novel techniques for social participation and cooperating of communities through digital networks.The book connects principles of architecture, economics and social sciences to provide alternatives to the current production trends. Jose Sanchez is anArchitect,Game Designer andTheorist based in Detroit,Michigan.He is the director of the Plethora Project (www.plethora-project.com), a research studio investing in the future of the propagation of architectural design knowledge. He is the creator of the award-winning video game Block’hood, a city simulator exploring notions of ecology, entropy,and interdependence,and the creator of Common’hood,a video game social platform that enables the authoring of architectural design within Creative Commons. He is also the co-creator of Bloom, a crowd sourced interactive installation which was the winner of the Wonder Series hosted by the City of London for the 2012 Olympics. He has taught in renowned institutions in the United States and in Europe, including the Architectural Association in London,The Bartlett School of Architecture at University College London, at the University of Southern California, and is currently at the University of Michigan where he is an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture. His research “Gamescapes” explores generative interfaces in the form of video games, speculating on modes of intelligence augmentation, combinatorics and open systems as design mediums.
- 8. ARCHITECTURE FOR THE COMMONS Participatory Systems in the Age of Platforms Jose Sanchez
- 9. First published 2021 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park,Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN and by Routledge 52Vanderbilt Avenue, NewYork, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint of theTaylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2021 Jose Sanchez The right of Jose Sanchez to be identifed as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identifcation and explanation without intent to infringe. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Sanchez, Jose, 1980- author. Title:Architecture for the commons / Jose Sanchez. Description: NewYork : Routledge, 2020. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifers: LCCN 2019057773 (print) | LCCN 2019057774 (ebook) | ISBN 9781138362352 (hardback) | ISBN 9781138362369 (paperback) | ISBN 9780429432118 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH:Architectural design—Philosophy. | Information commons. Classifcation: LCC NA2500 .S145 2020 (print) | LCC NA2500 (ebook) | DDC 729/.01—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019057773 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019057774 ISBN: 978-1-138-36235-2 (hbk) ISBN: 978-1-138-36236-9 (pbk) ISBN: 978-0-429-43211-8 (ebk) Typeset in Bembo by Apex CoVantage, LLC
- 10. To Catherine
- 12. CONTENTS List of fgures viii Acknowledgments xii Introduction: a call for a post-2008 architecture 1 1 Architectural progress 13 2 The coalescence of parts 33 3 In defense of parts 57 4 Immaterial architectures 86 5 Reconstruction through self-provision 110 Index 128
- 13. FIGURES I.1 Parametric Urbanism by Research led by Patrik Schumacher. Design proposal led by Ursula Frick and Thomas Grabner at the University of Innsbruck,Austria 2 I.2 Architecture model of the Lewis Residence by Frank Gehry 5 1.1 and 1.2 Buckminster Fuller holding up tensegrity sphere. Tensegrity demonstrates his principle of ephemeralization, where structural stability is achieved with fewer materials 16 1.3 Quinta Monroy, Elemental by Alejandro Aravena.The initial construction is later completed by homeowners 28 2.1 Relativity Space 3-D printing facility 34 2.2 Aeon 1 Engine by Relativity Space. Engine is manufactured using 3-D printing technology, greatly reducing the number of parts 35 2.3 Bricktopia by Map13 utilizing RhinoVault by Philippe Block. The project displays how the discrete brick units conform to the simulated vault confguration 37 2.4 Monolith Interface for voxel-based modeling developed by Andrew Payne 40 2.5 Graded 3-D printed material intensities produced with Monolith developed by Panagiotis Michalatos 40 2.6 3-D printed CHAIR by Zaha Hadid and Patrik Schumacher in collaboration with STRATASYS, 3-D printed on the Stratasys Objet1000 Multi-Material 3-D Printer 41 2.7 The Heydar Aliyev Center in Baku by Zaha Hadid Architects. The design demonstrates Schumacher’s view of parametric articulation, interpolating the building with the landscape.The project portrays the dissolution of tectonics, where details are minimized in favor of the fuidity of form 42
- 14. Figures ix 2.8 Diagram of the jigsaw puzzle analogy referring to the result of post rationalizing geometry for CNC milling fabrication 47 2.9 Topological Optimization technique used for the design of a metallic joint manufactured through 3-D printing technology 48 2.10 Contour Crafting manufacturing. Extruder is able to print layers of viscous material such as concrete 48 2.11 USH Sinusoidal Wall by XtreeE built using contour crafting manufacturing 49 2.12 Thames Gateway as an urban feld courtesy Zaha Hadid Architects.The image was used in the cover of The Politics of Parametricism by Matthew Poole and Manuel Shvartzberg in reference to swarm systems 52 2.13 Detail of iPhone utilizing the Pentalobe Screws designed by Apple 53 3.1 “The Universal House is based on a fully integrated building system made of self-interlocking discrete blocks which can be plugged in in any direction, as for the cladding panels.” u-Cube/ Universal House, Philippe Morel, 2009 58 3.2 Philippe Morel/EZCT Architecture & Design, Chair Model ‘T1-M’ after 860 generations (86,000 structural evaluations). “Studies on Optimization: Computational Chair Design using Genetic Algorithms (with Hatem Hamda and Marc Schoenauer)” 59 3.3 Holistic set (jigsaw puzzle) vs non-holistic set (LEGO) 63 3.4 3-D model of hierarchical hexagonal press-ft structure, in “Additive Assembly of Digital Materials” by Jonathan Ward, MIT Center for Bits and Atoms 65 3.5 Digital material structure case studies. Confgurations in the form of a bridge, boat and shelter. Drawings presented in axonometric, top and side view. Research project by Benjamin Jenett, Daniel Cellucci, Christine Gregg and Kenneth Cheung 66 3.6 Logic Matter by Skylar Tibbits, MIT. Logic Matter is a system of passive mechanical digital logic modules for self-guided assembly of large-scale structures 66 3.7 Bloom the Game by Jose Sanchez and Alisa Andrasek.The project is an open-ended building system made out of identical units.The formations of the project are created by the crowds that engage with them 68 3.8 Bloom the Game by Jose Sanchez and Alisa Andrasek. Kids interacting with the piece for the London 2012 Olympic Games 69 3.9 Diagram of discrete parts and proposals for a multiplicity of design assemblies based on the combinatorics of the system. Gilles Retsin Architecture,Tallinn Architecture Biennale Installation, 2017 69 3.10 Tallinn Architecture Biennale installation composed of discrete units by Gilles Retsin Architecture, 2017 70
- 15. x Figures 3.11 Diagram of hybrid model with discrete identical units (white) and bespoke units (gray) 70 3.12 “Free Universal Construction Kit” by Golan Levin and Shawn Sims. Matrix of connections between different families of discrete units 71 3.13 “Free Universal Construction Kit” by Golan Levin and Shawn Sims.Assembly connecting units from multiple sets 71 3.14 Braun Lectron System by Georg Gregor, 1960s.The kit offers a series of building blocks for electronics that can be combined using a magnetic connection 73 3.15 Braun Lectron System by Georg Gregor, 1960s.The kit offers a series of building blocks for electronics that can be combined using a magnetic connection 73 3.16 Little Bits, designed and created by Ayah Bdeir.The toy is an Open Source library of modular electronics that snap together using magnets 74 3.17 Little Bits, designed and created by Ayah Bdeir. Little Bits, operating as a discrete system, relies in the combinatorial possibilities discovered by crowds to design electronics 75 3.18 MIT Center for Bits and Atoms and NASA Ames Research Center. BILL-E robotic platform by Benjamin Jenett and Kenneth Cheung. Discrete lattice built by small distributed robotic system 76 3.19 “PizzaBot (2018) is a fully autonomous construction system that explores possibilities for automation in the building sector. B-Pro Research Cluster 4, the Bartlett School of Architecture, UCL.Tutors: Gilles Retsin, Manuel Jimenez Garcia,Vicente Soler. Students: Mengyu Huang, Dafni Katrakalidi, Martha Masli, Man Nguyen,Wenji Zhang” 77 3.20 Ramon Weber, Samuel Leder, Distributed Robotic Assembly for Timber Structures, 2018 78 3.21 Semi-Lattice Structure used by Christopher Alexander in “The City is not a Tree” in 1965. Diagrams redrawn by Nikos Salingaros, copyright Christopher Alexander and the Center for Environmental Structure 81 4.1 Grasshopper plug-in for Rhino designed by David Rutten. The programming language is contained in discrete units that can be connected to perform parametric functions. Each unit, following the principles of Object-Oriented Programming, is a self-contained object with inputs and outputs 92 4.2 Grasshopper plug-in for Rhino designed by David Rutten.The connection between units establishes a functional assembly 92 4.3 Architecture Mobile drawing byYona Friedman.Architecture is considered as a reversible reconfgurable structure 95
- 16. Figures xi 4.4 6x6 M Demountable House by Jean Prouvé. Prouvé’s projects seek to establish protocols of deployment and reversibility, scaling elements to the capacity of human assembly 96 4.5 FolditVideo Game by University of Washington Center for Game Science.The game allows players to contribute to scientifc discovery by solving protein-folding puzzles within a video game environment 100 4.6 Flatwriter, 1967, was a computer program conceived byYona Friedman to enable the user to design the plan of his future home (self-planning) in theVille Spatiale, or for a citizen to redesign his neighborhood in theVille Spatiale 103 4.7 Block by Block initiative by UN-Habitat using Minecraft video game to rebuild and envision real-world development 104 4.8 Cities Skyline video game by Colossal Order. Urban city simulation 104 4.9 Block’hood video game by Jose Sanchez, Plethora Project. Urban simulation based on ecology and interdependence of inhabitants. Educational platform 105 4.10 Block’hood video game by Jose Sanchez, Plethora Project. Urban simulation based on ecology and interdependence of inhabitants. Educational platform 105 4.11 and 4.12 Common’hood video game by Jose Sanchez, Plethora Project. Fabrication video game simulation based on ideas of scarcity. The game is a platform to aid self-provisioning of architecture 106 5.1 Open Source Ecology overview sheet of Micro-House prototype 1 120 5.2 Microhouse 1 Development Board by Open Source Ecology. Open Source framework to contribute to the design and detailing of housing units and machines 120 5.3 WikiHouse by Alastair Parvin 2012. Open Source construction set 121 5.4–5.6 Hospederia de la Entrada, Cooperativa Amereida, Ciudad Abierta, Ritoque, Chile 123
- 17. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This book has been the result of many years of conversations and discussions between a generation of architects that have found the need to expand the fram- ing of technology in architecture.The notion of Discrete Architecture, as discussed in this volume, has been a collective project that remains diverse in its motiva- tions and expectations.At it’s core, is an interest to question and actively redefne the socio-political role of the tools we architects use.The group that has framed Discrete Architecture has been composed of peers such as Gilles Retsin, Daniel Koehler, Rasa Navasaityte, Phillippe Morel, Emmanuelle Chiappone-Piriou, Mol- lie Claypool, Ryan Manning and Manuel Jimenez Garcia. Beyond the advocacy for a discrete methodology, it has been central for this project to engage in public forums where I would like to acknowledge the earnest feedback of Mario Carpo, Frederic Migayrou, Casey Rehm, Marrikka Trotter, Damjan Jovanovic,Viola Ago, Ramon Weber, Manja van de Worp, Igor Pantic and Soomeen Hahm, who have contributed to the defnition of what we have denominated Discrete Design. Architecture for the Commons is a book that departs from the collective project of the discrete agenda and aims to frame the larger socioeconomical imperatives present in our current information society. The social awareness that drives this project was founded in my education at the Universidad in Chile and has been a motivation through my years in academia in London and Los Angeles. It has been at the Architectural Association in London, within the Design Research Labora- tory, where a critical approach toward parametric design has initially developed, in particular by a generation that studied under Patrik Schumacher, who has always been a generous respondent to the criticism presented throughout symposiums and conversations. This book would not be possible without a strong community of architects,the- orists and technologists who have engaged with fragments of this book throughout many years,in particular theAcadia community where I would like to acknowledge
- 18. Acknowledgments xiii the support provided in conversations by KathyVelikov,Jason Kelly-Johnson,Adam Marcus,Andrew Kudless,Andrew Payne, Kory Beig, Dana Cupkova, LaurenVasey, Branko Kolarevic, Behnaz Farahi,Aldo Sollazzo and Ersela Kripa. The direction taken in this volume since early versions of the manuscript has received generous support and feedback from a large group of people who helped me fnd the angle to discuss my concerns regarding technology,social issues and the economy. I would like to thank the feedback from Peggy Deamer, Marcelyn Gow, Skylar Tibbits, Gilles Retsin, Mollie Claypool and Daniel Köhler, who provided critical feedback at different points of the development of the manuscript. There is also an important number of institutions that have facilitated the dis- cussions of the content of this volume with faculty and students.These include the Bartlett School of Architecture, with the support of Frederic Migayrou, Bob Sheil, Marcos Cruz, Mario Carpo and Roberto Botazzi;The Architectural Asso- ciation, with the support of Alicia Nahmad; The Institute for Advanced Archi- tecture of Catalonia, with the support of Areti Markopoulou and Tomaz Diez; California College of Arts, with the support of Adam Marcus, Nataly Gattegno and Jason Kelly-Johnson; Berkeley School of Architecture with the support of Ronald Rael; Texas A&M School of Architecture with the support of Gabriel Esquivel; and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with the support of Paloma Gonzales Rojas. For the last six years, it has been my own institution,The School of Architecture at the University of Southern California,that has supported me and encouraged me to continue with and complete this contribution. I am thankful to all the faculty but in particular to those who made time out of their busy schedules to discuss with me early versions of the manuscript and my ideas, includingVittoria di Palma, Diane Ghirardo, Jim Steele, Alvin Huang, Amy Murphy, Kim Coleman, Chuck Lagreco,Victor Regnier, Doris Sung and Alex Robinson. Alongside my colleagues, there have been many students and alumni that have engaged with my ideas and contributed to the formulations presented in this book. Out of many students over the last eight years of academia,I would like to thank for their contributions Joshua Dawson,Gentaro Makinoda,JingboYan,Decheng Zeng, Lienny Ruiz, George Tsakiridis, Efthymia Kotsani and Mingfeng Xia. I would also like to acknowledge the ideas of infuential people throughout my career who have inspired and challenged the ideas presented in this book. These include Casey Reas, Peggy Deamer, Karsten Schmidt,Will Wright and Neil Gershenfeld. The time and effort to complete this book wouldn’t have been possible without the support of a design team that has engaged and developed the ideas of my design studio, the Plethora Project. I would like to profoundly thank the support of Satrio Dewantono, Brendan Ho, Kellan Cartledge, Jiachen Wei and in particular of Ban Sheni, who has helped me directly in the structuring of this publication. I would also like to thank colleagues in Chile who contributed to projects and discussions connected to ideas in this book; these include Camilo Guerrero, Matias Honorato, Diego Pinochet and FelipeVeliz.
- 19. xiv Acknowledgments I would also like to acknowledge the fantastic work of Ryan Tyler Martinez who designed the cover of this book. I would like to express my profound gratitude to my family in Chile for all of their support and especially their sacrifces due to the physical distance between us: my parents JoseVictor Sanchez andYolanda Recio,and my siblings Graciela Sanchez, César Sanchez,Belen Sanchez and Juan Pablo Sanchez.Finally,this publication would not have come to fruition without my partner,Catherine Griffths,who has discussed with me every single idea presented here.This publication would not have been pos- sible without her scrutiny and encouragement. I’m eternally thankful.
- 20. Other documents randomly have different content
- 21. 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
- 22. 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."
- 23. 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:—
- 24. "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
- 25. 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
- 26. 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
- 27. 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
- 28. 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
- 29. 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"—
- 30. 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
- 31. 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.
- 32. CHAPTER XII JEREMIAH'S IMPRISONMENT xxxvii. 11-21, xxxviii., xxxix. 15-18. "Jeremiah abode in the court of the guard until the day that Jerusalem was taken."—Jer. xxxviii. 28. "When the Chaldean army was broken up from Jerusalem for fear of Pharaoh's army, Jeremiah went forth out of Jerusalem to go into the land of Benjamin" to transact certain family business at Anathoth. [149] He had announced that all who remained in the city should perish, and that only those who deserted to the Chaldeans should escape. In these troubled times all who sought to enter or leave Jerusalem were subjected to close scrutiny, and when Jeremiah wished to pass through the gate of Benjamin he was stopped by the officer in charge—Irijah ben Shelemiah ben Hananiah—and accused of being about to practise himself what he had preached to the people: "Thou fallest away to the Chaldeans." The suspicion was natural enough; for, although the Chaldeans had raised the siege and marched away to the south-west, while the gate of Benjamin was on the north of the city, Irijah might reasonably suppose that they had left detachments in the neighbourhood, and that this zealous advocate of submission to Babylon had special information on the subject. Jeremiah indeed had the strongest motives for seeking safety in flight. The party whom he had consistently denounced had full control of the government, and even if they spared him for the present any decisive victory over the enemy would be the signal for his execution. When once Pharaoh Hophra was in full march upon
- 33. Jerusalem at the head of a victorious army, his friends would show no mercy to Jeremiah. Probably Irijah was eager to believe in the prophet's treachery, and ready to snatch at any pretext for arresting him. The name of the captain's grandfather—Hananiah—is too common to suggest any connection with the prophet who withstood Jeremiah; but we may be sure that at this crisis the gates were in charge of trusty adherents of the princes of the Egyptian party. Jeremiah would be suspected and detested by such men as these. His vehement denial of the charge was received with real or feigned incredulity; Irijah "hearkened not unto him." The arrest took place "in the midst of the people."[150] The gate was crowded with other Jews hurrying out of Jerusalem: citizens eager to breathe more freely after being cooped up in the overcrowded city; countrymen anxious to find out what their farms and homesteads had suffered at the hands of the invaders; not a few, perhaps, bound on the very errand of which Jeremiah was accused, friends of Babylon, convinced that Nebuchadnezzar would ultimately triumph, and hoping to find favour and security in his camp. Critical events of Jeremiah's life had often been transacted before a great assembly; for instance, his own address and trial in the Temple, and the reading of the roll. He knew the practical value of a dramatic situation. This time he had sought the crowd, rather to avoid than attract attention; but when he was challenged by Irijah, the accusation and denial must have been heard by all around. The soldiers of the guard, necessarily hostile to the man who had counselled submission, gathered round to secure their prisoner; for a time the gate was blocked by the guards and spectators. The latter do not seem to have interfered. Formerly the priests and prophets and all the people had laid hold on Jeremiah, and afterwards all the people had acquitted him by acclamation. Now his enemies were content to leave him in the hands of the soldiers, and his friends, if he had any, were afraid to attempt a rescue. Moreover men's minds were not at leisure and craving for new excitement, as at Temple festivals; they were preoccupied, and eager to get out of the city. While the news quickly spread that Jeremiah had been arrested as
- 34. he was trying to desert, his guards cleared a way through the crowd, and brought the prisoner before the princes. The latter seem to have acted as a Committee of National Defence; they may either have been sitting at the time, or a meeting, as on a previous occasion, [151] may have been called when it was known that Jeremiah had been arrested. Among them were probably those enumerated later on:[152] Shephatiah ben Mattan, Gedaliah ben Pashhur, Jucal ben Shelemiah, and Pashhur ben Malchiah. Shephatiah and Gedaliah are named only here; possibly Gedaliah's father was Pashhur ben Immer, who beat Jeremiah and put him in the stocks. Both Jucal and Pashhur ben Malchiah had been sent by the king to consult Jeremiah. Jucal may have been the son of the Shelemiah who was sent to arrest Jeremiah and Baruch after the reading of the roll. We note the absence of the princes who then formed Baruch's audience, some of whom tried to dissuade Jehoiakim from burning the roll; and we especially miss the prophet's former friend and protector, Ahikam ben Shaphan. Fifteen or sixteen years had elapsed since these earlier events; some of Jeremiah's adherents were dead, others in exile, others powerless to help him. We may safely conclude that his judges were his personal and political enemies. Jeremiah was now their discomfited rival: a few weeks before he had been master of the city and the court. Pharaoh Hophra's advance had enabled them to overthrow him. We can understand that they would at once take Irijah's view of the case. They treated their fallen antagonist as a criminal taken in the act: "they were wroth with him," i.e. they overwhelmed him with a torrent of abuse; "they beat him, and put him in prison in the house of Jonathan the secretary." But this imprisonment in a private house was not mild and honourable confinement under the care of a distinguished noble, who was rather courteous host than harsh gaoler. "They had made that the prison," duly provided with a dungeon and cells, to which Jeremiah was consigned and where he remained "many days." Prison accommodation at Jerusalem was limited; the Jewish government preferred more summary methods of dealing with malefactors. The revolution which had placed the present
- 35. government in power had given them special occasion for a prison. They had defeated rivals whom they did not venture to execute publicly, but who might be more safely starved and tortured to death in secret. For such a fate they destined Jeremiah. We shall not do injustice to Jonathan the secretary if we compare the hospitality which he extended to his unwilling guests with the treatment of modern Armenians in Turkish prisons. Yet the prophet remained alive "for many days"; probably his enemies reflected that even if he did not succumb earlier to the hardships of his imprisonment, his execution would suitably adorn the looked-for triumph of Pharaoh Hophra. Few however of the "many days" had passed, before men's exultant anticipations of victory and deliverance began to give place to anxious forebodings. They had hoped to hear that Nebuchadnezzar had been defeated and was in headlong retreat to Chaldea; they had been prepared to join in the pursuit of the routed army, to gratify their revenge by massacring the fugitives and to share the plunder with their Egyptian allies. The fortunes of war belied their hopes; Pharaoh retreated, either after a battle or perhaps even without fighting. The return of the enemy was announced by the renewed influx of the country people to seek the shelter of the fortifications, and soon the Jews crowded to the walls as Nebuchadnezzar's vanguard appeared in sight and the Chaldeans occupied their old lines and re-formed the siege of the doomed city. There was no longer any doubt that prudence dictated immediate surrender. It was the only course by which the people might be spared some of the horrors of a prolonged siege, followed by the sack of the city. But the princes who controlled the government were too deeply compromised with Egypt to dare to hope for mercy. With Jeremiah out of the way, they were able to induce the king and the people to maintain their resistance, and the siege went on. But though Zedekiah was, for the most part, powerless in the hands of the princes, he ventured now and then to assert himself in minor matters, and, like other feeble sovereigns, derived some consolation
- 36. amidst his many troubles from intriguing with the opposition against his own ministers. His feeling and behaviour towards Jeremiah were similar to those of Charles IX. towards Coligny, only circumstances made the Jewish king a more efficient protector of Jeremiah. At this new and disastrous turn of affairs, which was an exact fulfilment of Jeremiah's warnings, the king was naturally inclined to revert to his former faith in the prophet—if indeed he had ever really been able to shake himself free from his influence. Left to himself he would have done his best to make terms with Nebuchadnezzar, as Jehoiakim and Jehoiachin had done before him. The only trustworthy channel of help, human or divine, was Jeremiah. Accordingly he sent secretly to the prison and had the prophet brought into the palace. There in some inner chamber, carefully guarded from intrusion by the slaves of the palace, Zedekiah received the man who now for more than forty years had been the chief counsellor of the kings of Judah, often in spite of themselves. Like Saul on the eve of Gilboa, he was too impatient to let disaster be its own herald; the silence of Heaven seemed more terrible than any spoken doom, and again like Saul he turned in his perplexity and despair to the prophet who had rebuked and condemned him. "Is there any word from Jehovah? And Jeremiah said, There is: ... thou shalt be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon." The Church is rightly proud of Ambrose rebuking Theodosius at the height of his power and glory, and of Thomas à Becket, unarmed and yet defiant before his murderers; but the Jewish prophet showed himself capable of a simpler and grander heroism. For "many days" he had endured squalor, confinement, and semi- starvation. His body must have been enfeebled and his spirit depressed. Weak and contemptible as Zedekiah was, yet he was the prophet's only earthly protector from the malice of his enemies. He intended to utilise this interview for an appeal for release from his present prison. Thus he had every motive for conciliating the man who asked him for a word from Jehovah. He was probably alone with Zedekiah, and was not nerved to self-sacrifice by any
- 37. opportunity of making public testimony to the truth, and yet he was faithful alike to God and to the poor helpless king—"Thou shalt be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon." And then he proceeds, with what seems to us inconsequent audacity, to ask a favour. Did ever petitioner to a king preface his supplication with so strange a preamble? This was the request:— "Now hear, I pray thee, O my lord the king: let my supplication, I pray thee, be accepted before thee; that thou do not cause me to return to the house of Jonathan the secretary, lest I die there. "Then Zedekiah the king commanded, and they committed Jeremiah into the court of the guard, and they gave him daily a loaf of bread out of the bakers' street." A loaf of bread is not sumptuous fare, but it is evidently mentioned as an improvement upon his prison diet: it is not difficult to understand why Jeremiah was afraid he would die in the house of Jonathan. During this milder imprisonment in the court of the guard occurred the incident of the purchase of the field at Anathoth, which we have dealt with in another chapter. This low ebb of the prophet's fortunes was the occasion of Divine revelation of a glorious future in store for Judah. But this future was still remote, and does not seem to have been conspicuous in his public teaching. On the contrary Jeremiah availed himself of the comparative publicity of his new place of detention to reiterate in the ears of all the people the gloomy predictions with which they had so long been familiar: "This city shall assuredly be given into the hand of the army of the king of Babylon." He again urged his hearers to desert to the enemy: "He that abideth in this city shall die by the sword, the famine, and the pestilence; but he that goeth forth to the Chaldeans shall live." We cannot but admire the splendid courage of the solitary prisoner, helpless in the hands of his enemies and yet openly defying them. He left his opponents only two alternatives, either to give up the
- 38. government into his hands or else to silence him. Jeremiah in the court of the guard was really carrying on a struggle in which neither side either would or could give quarter. He was trying to revive the energies of the partisans of Babylon, that they might overpower the government and surrender the city to Nebuchadnezzar. If he had succeeded, the princes would have had a short shrift. They struck back with the prompt energy of men fighting for their lives. No government conducting the defence of a besieged fortress could have tolerated Jeremiah for a moment. What would have been the fate of a French politician who should have urged Parisians to desert to the Germans during the siege of 1870?[153] The princes' former attempt to deal with Jeremiah had been thwarted by the king; this time they tried to provide beforehand against any officious intermeddling on the part of Zedekiah. They extorted from him a sanction of their proceedings. "Then the princes said unto the king, Let this man, we pray thee, be put to death: for he weakeneth the hands of the soldiers that are left in this city, and of all the people, by speaking such words unto them: for this man seeketh not the welfare of this people, but the hurt." Certainly Jeremiah's word was enough to take the heart out of the bravest soldiers; his preaching would soon have rendered further resistance impossible. But the concluding sentence about the "welfare of the people" was merely cheap cant, not without parallel in the sayings of many "princes" in later times. "The welfare of the people" would have been best promoted by the surrender which Jeremiah advocated. The king does not pretend to sympathise with the princes; he acknowledges himself a mere tool in their hands. "Behold," he answers, "he is in your power, for the king can do nothing against you." "Then they took Jeremiah, and cast him into the cistern of Malchiah ben Hammelech, that was in the court of the guard; and they let Jeremiah down with cords. And there was no water in the cistern, only mud, and Jeremiah sank in the mud."
- 39. The depth of this improvised oubliette is shown by the use of cords to let the prisoner down into it. How was it, however, that, after the release of Jeremiah from the cells in the house of Jonathan, the princes did not at once execute him? Probably, in spite of all that had happened, they still felt a superstitious dread of actually shedding the blood of a prophet. In some mysterious way they felt that they would be less guilty if they left him in the empty cistern to starve to death or be suffocated in the mud, than if they had his head cut off. They acted in the spirit of Reuben's advice concerning Joseph, who also was cast into an empty pit, with no water in it: "Shed no blood, but cast him into this pit in the wilderness, and lay no hand upon him."[154] By a similar blending of hypocrisy and superstition, the mediæval Church thought to keep herself unstained by the blood of heretics, by handing them over to the secular arm; and Macbeth having hired some one else to kill Banquo was emboldened to confront his ghost with the words:— "Thou canst not say I did it. Never shake Thy gory locks at me." But the princes were again baffled; the prophet had friends in the royal household who were bolder than their master: Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, an eunuch, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the cistern. He went to the king, who was then sitting in the gate of Benjamin, where he would be accessible to any petitioner for favour or justice, and interceded for the prisoner:— "My lord the king, these men have done evil in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet, whom they have cast into the cistern; and he is like to die in the place where he is because of the famine, for there is no more bread in the city." Apparently the princes, busied with the defence of the city and in their pride "too much despising" their royal master, had left him for a while to himself. Emboldened by this public appeal to act according to the dictates of his own heart and conscience, and possibly by the
- 40. presence of other friends of Jeremiah, the king acts with unwonted courage and decision. "The king commanded Ebed-melech the Ethiopian, saying, Take with thee hence thirty men, and draw up Jeremiah the prophet out of the cistern, before he die. So Ebed-melech took the men with him, and went into the palace under the treasury, and took thence old cast clouts and rotten rags, and let them down by cords into the cistern to Jeremiah. And he said to Jeremiah, Put these old cast clouts and rotten rags under thine armholes under the cords. And Jeremiah did so. So they drew him up with the cords, and took him up out of the cistern: and he remained in the court of the guard." Jeremiah's gratitude to his deliverer is recorded in a short paragraph in which Ebed-melech, like Baruch, is promised that "his life shall be given him for a prey." He should escape with his life from the sack of the city—"because he trusted" in Jehovah. As of the ten lepers whom Jesus cleansed only the Samaritan returned to give glory to God, so when none of God's people were found to rescue His prophet, the dangerous honour was accepted by an Ethiopian proselyte.[155] Meanwhile the king was craving for yet another "word of Jehovah." True, the last "word" given him by the prophet had been, "Thou shalt be delivered into the hand of the king of Babylon." But now that he had just rescued Jehovah's prophet from a miserable death (he forgot that Jeremiah had been consigned to the cistern by his own authority), possibly there might be some more encouraging message from God. Accordingly he sent and took Jeremiah unto him for another secret interview, this time in the "corridor of the bodyguard,"[156] a passage between the palace and the Temple. Here he implored the prophet to give him a faithful answer to his questions concerning his own fate and that of the city: "Hide nothing from me." But Jeremiah did not respond with his former prompt frankness. He had had too recent a warning not to put his trust in princes. "If I declare it unto thee," said he, "wilt thou not surely put
- 41. me to death? and if I give thee counsel, thou wilt not hearken unto me. So Zedekiah the king sware secretly to Jeremiah, As Jehovah liveth, who is the source and giver of our life, I will not put thee to death, neither will I give thee into the hand of these men that seek thy life. "Then said Jeremiah unto Zedekiah, Thus saith Jehovah, the God of hosts, the God of Israel: If thou wilt go forth unto the king of Babylon's princes, thy life shall be spared, and this city shall not be burned, and thou and thine house shall live; but if thou wilt not go forth, then shall this city be given into the hand of the Chaldeans, and they shall burn it, and thou shalt not escape out of their hand. "Zedekiah said unto Jeremiah, I am afraid of the Jews that have deserted to the Chaldeans, lest they deliver me into their hand, and they mock me." He does not, however, urge that the princes will hinder any such surrender; he believed himself sufficiently master of his own actions to be able to escape to the Chaldeans if he chose. But evidently, when he first revolted against Babylon, and more recently when the siege was raised, he had been induced to behave harshly towards her partisans: they had taken refuge in considerable numbers in the enemy's camp, and now he was afraid of their vengeance. Similarly, in Quentin Durward, Scott represents Louis XI. on his visit to Charles the Bold as startled by the sight of the banners of some of his own vassals, who had taken service with Burgundy, and as seeking protection from Charles against the rebel subjects of France. Zedekiah is a perfect monument of the miseries that wait upon weakness: he was everybody's friend in turn—now a docile pupil of Jeremiah and gratifying the Chaldean party by his professions of loyalty to Nebuchadnezzar, and now a pliant tool in the hands of the Egyptian party persecuting his former friends. At the last he was afraid alike of the princes in the city, of the exiles in the enemy's
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