A guide to Jeremiah

Who wrote Jeremiah, and when?

Jeremiah, recorded by his scribe Baruch. Prophesied about 627–580 BC, from Josiah to after the fall of Jerusalem.

Jeremiah was a priest's son from Anathoth, a village near Jerusalem, called as a young man in about 627 BC during the reign of Josiah. He prophesied for over forty years, through the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BC and into the years after, when he was taken to Egypt against his will. Chapter 36 describes how his scribe Baruch wrote down his words at his dictation, how the king burned the scroll, and how Jeremiah dictated it again. Most Christians and Jews accept that the book comes from Jeremiah through Baruch. Scholars note that it was arranged and edited after the prophet's time, and that the ancient Greek version is shorter and ordered differently, so its final shape may have been settled a little later.

Who was Jeremiah written to?

Judah and Jerusalem in their last decades before Babylon, and the exiles after.

Jeremiah spoke to Judah and Jerusalem in the kingdom's last decades. Josiah's reform had briefly cleaned up worship, but after his death in 609 BC the nation slid back into idolatry, injustice and political scheming. Babylon replaced Assyria as the dominant empire, and Judah's kings kept switching sides between Babylon and Egypt. Many people believed the temple made the city untouchable, and popular prophets promised peace. Jeremiah's hearers were therefore confident, offended and often hostile. After the city fell, his words reached a second audience: the exiles in Babylon, to whom he wrote a letter (see chapter 29), and the frightened survivors left in the land who wanted to flee to Egypt.

What was happening at the time?

Jeremiah began under the reforming king Josiah and lived through the reigns that undid the reform. He warned for forty years that Babylon would destroy the city, was beaten, imprisoned and thrown in a cistern for it, and watched it happen in 586 BC. He then told the survivors to submit to Babylon and was dragged to Egypt. His book is a mix of sermons, laments and narrative, not in strict order.

Why was Jeremiah written?

To explain the exile as God’s judgment on a broken covenant, and to promise restoration and a new covenant.

The book explains a disaster. Why would God let his own city and temple be destroyed? Jeremiah answers that Judah broke the covenant made at Sinai, and that the exile is judgment, not bad luck or a weak God. But judgment is not the last word. Jeremiah promises a return after seventy years, a righteous branch from David's line, and a new covenant in which God writes his law on people's hearts and forgives their sin (see chapter 31). He wants readers to accept discipline honestly, to stop trusting false comfort, and to hope in God's faithfulness. In the wider story of the Bible, Jeremiah's new covenant is the promise Jesus picks up at the Last Supper, and the letter to the Hebrews builds on it at length.

How to read Jeremiah today

Do not expect the book to run in date order; it gathers sermons, poems, letters and stories from different years. Begin with chapter 1 for Jeremiah's call, then read chapters 7, 18 and 29 for his message, and chapters 31 to 33 for the promises. Chapters 36 to 45 tell his story as a narrative and are easier going. Watch for his so-called confessions, the raw prayers in chapters 11 to 20 where he argues with God, and notice that God lets him be that honest. Do not force every threat into fulfilment on a schedule; some are conditional on how the people respond. As you read, pray for the courage to say hard things kindly, and to keep going when faithfulness is not rewarded.

The key verse in Jeremiah

But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My law in their minds, and write it on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

Passages worth knowing in Jeremiah

• Jeremiah 1

  Jeremiah’s call

  Before I formed you in the womb I knew you.

• Jeremiah 2

  Broken cisterns

  Israel has forsaken the fountain of living waters.

• Jeremiah 7

  The temple sermon

  Do not trust in the temple while living unjustly.

• Jeremiah 18

  The potter’s house

  God shapes and reshapes nations.

• Jeremiah 29:11-13

  Plans to give you a future and a hope

  Written to exiles told to settle in for seventy years.

• Jeremiah 31:31-34

  The new covenant

  The law written on hearts; fulfilled in Jesus.

• Jeremiah 38

  Jeremiah in the cistern

  The cost of speaking the truth.

The main themes of Jeremiah

• Judgment for covenant-breaking
• The cost of prophecy
• Honest lament
• The new covenant
• Hope beyond exile

An outline of Jeremiah