Background
Chapter 19 ends with Jeremiah standing in the court of the temple and repeating that the troubles ahead were coming because of Judah's wickedness. Chapter 20 begins with the reply. Pashur, an officer of the temple, hears what Jeremiah is saying, has him beaten, and puts him in the stocks overnight. The Church's chapter heading sums up the first half: “Jeremiah is smitten and put in the stocks—He prophesies that all Judah will be taken captive by Babylon.”
Jeremiah faced “continuous opposition and insult from the priests (20:2),” and he was himself of a priestly family, “of the priests that were in Anathoth” (Jer. 1:1), so the man who strikes him here is a fellow priest, not a foreigner or a king. The chapter then turns from public confrontation to private prayer. Verses 7–18 are among the poetic laments or complaints scattered through chapters 11–20, “passages [that] reveal the emotional and spiritual turmoil Jeremiah experienced during his difficult ministry.”
Lehi, who began to prophesy in Jerusalem “in the commencement of the first year of the reign of Zedekiah” (1 Ne. 1:4), met the same reception: the Jews mocked him and “sought his life” (1 Ne. 1:19–20), and Nephi records that they had cast Jeremiah into prison (1 Ne. 7:14).
The thread through the chapter
This chapter asks what a prophet does when the word of God costs him everything and the results look like defeat. Jeremiah's answer comes in three movements, and the third undoes the comfort of the second.
In verses 1–6, he is struck, confined, and released, and he does not retreat: he gives his tormentor a new name and tells him what is coming. In verses 7–13, he turns that frustration toward God: he complains, resolves to be silent, finds that he cannot, and ends by praising the Lord who is with him. Then verses 14–18 plunge again, into a curse on the day of his birth. The chapter does not resolve the tension between verses 13 and 14, and that is its honesty. The same man who says “Sing unto the LORD” has, a line later, wished he had never been born. What holds the two together is verse 9: the word he tried to stop speaking will not stay in.
Tap any highlighted phrase to open a note beneath its versein the margin.
Pashur and the stocks
Pashur son of Immer, a priest and the chief officer in the Lord's house, heard Jeremiah prophesying these things. He had Jeremiah beaten and put in the stocks at the upper Benjamin Gate of the temple. The next day he let him out, and Jeremiah said, “The Lord has not named you Pashur, but Magor-missabib” (Terror on Every Side). “The Lord says: I will make you a terror to yourself and to all your friends; you will watch them fall by the sword. I will give all Judah to the king of Babylon, who will carry them off to Babylon and kill them with the sword. I will hand over all this city's wealth and everything the kings of Judah have stored up. And you, Pashur, and everyone in your house will go into captivity. You will go to Babylon and die there, and be buried there, you and all your friends to whom you prophesied lies.”
1 Now Pashur the son of Immer the priest, who was also chief governor in the house of the LORD, heard that Jeremiah prophesied these things.
2 Then Pashur smote Jeremiah the prophet, and put him in the stocks that were in the high gate of Benjamin, which was by the house of the LORD.
3 And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah unto him, The LORD hath not called thy name Pashur, but Magor-missabib.
4 For thus saith the LORD, Behold, I will make thee a terror to thyself, and to all thy friends: and they shall fall by the sword of their enemies, and thine eyes shall behold it: and I will give all Judah into the hand of the king of Babylon, and he shall carry them captive into Babylon, and shall slay them with the sword.
5 Moreover I will deliver all the strength of this city, and all the labours thereof, and all the precious things thereof, and all the treasures of the kings of Judah will I give into the hand of their enemies, which shall spoil them, and take them, and carry them to Babylon.
6 And thou, Pashur, and all that dwell in thine house shall go into captivity: and thou shalt come to Babylon, and there thou shalt die, and shalt be buried there, thou, and all thy friends, to whom thou hast prophesied lies.
Jeremiah's complaint, and his praise
“Lord, you enticed me, and I let myself be enticed; you were stronger than I and you prevailed. I am a laughingstock all day, and everyone mocks me. Every time I speak I have to shout about violence and destruction, and the Lord's word has brought me only insult and scorn. So I said, ‘I will not mention him or speak in his name any more.’ But his word is in my heart like a fire burning in my bones. I am worn out trying to hold it in; I cannot. I hear many whispering, ‘Terror on every side! Report him! Let's report him!’ Even my close friends are waiting for me to slip: ‘Maybe he'll be tricked, and we can overcome him and take our revenge.’ But the Lord is with me like a dreaded warrior; my persecutors will stumble and not prevail. They will be deeply shamed, with a disgrace that will not be forgotten. Lord of hosts, you who test the righteous and see the heart and mind, let me see your vengeance on them, for to you I have committed my cause. Sing to the Lord! Praise the Lord! He has rescued the life of the poor from the hands of the wicked.”
7 O LORD, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me.
8 For since I spake, I cried out, I cried violence and spoil; because the word of the LORD was made a reproach unto me, and a derision, daily.
9 Then I said, I will not make mention of him, nor speak any more in his name. But his word was in mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay.
10 For I heard the defaming of many, fear on every side. Report, say they, and we will report it. All my familiars watched for my halting, saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him.
11 But the LORD is with me as a mighty terrible one: therefore my persecutors shall stumble, and they shall not prevail: they shall be greatly ashamed; for they shall not prosper: their everlasting confusion shall never be forgotten.
12 But, O LORD of hosts, that triest the righteous, and seest the reins and the heart, let me see thy vengeance on them: for unto thee have I opened my cause.
13 Sing unto the LORD, praise ye the LORD: for he hath delivered the soul of the poor from the hand of evildoers.
Cursed be the day
“Cursed be the day I was born! May the day my mother bore me never be blessed. Cursed be the man who brought my father the news, ‘A son is born to you!’ and made him so glad. May that man be like the cities the Lord overthrew without pity; may he hear an outcry in the morning and a battle cry at noon, because he did not kill me in the womb, so that my mother would have been my grave and her womb forever swollen. Why did I come out of the womb to see trouble and sorrow, and to end my days in shame?”
14 Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.
15 Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad.
16 And let that man be as the cities which the LORD overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide;
17 Because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb to be always great with me.
18 Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?
Seeing Christ in Jeremiah 20
Jeremiah's suffering for the Lord's word places him among the prophets whom the Lord's people rejected, yet he was “allowed to see the coming of the Savior and the restoration of God's church and people in the latter days.” The opposition in this chapter is the opposition Lehi met in the same city: the Jews mocked him because his testimony “manifested plainly of the coming of a Messiah, and also the redemption of the world,” and Nephi adds that “the tender mercies of the Lord are over all those whom he hath chosen” to make them mighty “unto the power of deliverance” (1 Ne. 1:19–20). Jeremiah's own anchor is the same promise: “the Lord is with me” (Jer. 20:11), the words with which he was called (Jer. 1:19).
Worth exploring next
- The other laments in the book, listed in the Church's scripture helps as Jer. 11:18–12:6; Jer. 15:10–21; Jer. 17:9–10, Jer. 17:14–18; Jer. 18:18–23; and Jer. 20:7–12 with Jer. 20:14–18.
- Jeremiah's call and the promise that he would not be overcome, Jer. 1:4–19.
- Lehi's reception in the same city, 1 Ne. 1:18–20, and Samuel the Lamanite's words on how a people treats its prophets, Hel. 13:24–26.
Sources & further reading
- “Jeremiah”, Bible Dictionary.
- Chapter 24: The Babylonian Captivity (Jeremiah 20–22; 24–29; 32; 34–45; 52; Lamentations), Old Testament Student Manual: 1 Kings–Malachi (2003).
- The Holy Scriptures (Latter-day Saint editions), text and chapter headings, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
- Carl Friedrich Keil, Biblical Commentary on the Prophecies of Jeremiah, Trans. David Patrick and James Kennedy. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1874–1880; in Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament, online at Bible Hub.
- Jeremiah 1–3; 7; 16–18; 20, Scripture Helps: Old Testament.
- Jeremiah 20: Jeremiah’s Troubles, Old Testament Seminary Student Study Guide (2002), 159–60.
- Jeffrey R. Holland, “A Teacher Come from God”, general conference, Apr. 1998.
- Westminster Leningrad Codex (the Masoretic Hebrew text), Read in the Hebrew–English interlinear on Bible Hub.