Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 43:172 (Oct 1886)
Article: Jeremiah, The Prophet Of Personal Godliness: A Study In Hebrew Religion
Author: Archibald Duff, Jr.

BSac 43:172 (Oct 1886) p. 652

Jeremiah, The Prophet Of Personal Godliness: A Study In
Hebrew Religion

Archibald Duff

Ten years ago Professor Park urged me to study the individual theology of each prophet. The keen-eyed veteran theologian foresaw that the Old Testament must soon be used historically, and therefore wished the quarrying of the individual stones for the new building to be in hand.

The place of Jeremiah is not indeed upon the foundation line of such a building, but far up in the wall; indeed he is even a keystone in a sub-arch, or a top-stone in the early stage. Quarrying, however, does not always seem to the outside beholder to follow the true order which the stones in the wall must follow; and quarry-men know that many stones are usually in hand together. A study of Jeremiah may prepare the way for studies of earlier men.

The excellent treatise of Professor Guthe, “De Jeremiana Foederis Notione,” discusses thoroughly one main feature of Jeremiah’s teaching, but fails to present the whole, or to discover the centrally characteristic feature, as I think will presently appear. Indeed Guthe criticises himself adversely when he quotes Hosea as really the first prophet of the covenant. Jeremiah was the pupil of Hosea in this prophesying. And yet he was far more. Among the noble searchers after what the spirit in them did signify, Jeremiah, beginning from the “covenant” prophecy, dug down far deeper than all before him, until he struck on life’s very foundation stone itself; for he saw and said that only persons can experience

BSac 43:172 (Oct 1886) p. 653

God’s love, and only persons can express it. Since his day there has been ever a singularly wider recognition that this prophet touched, felt, proclaimed, the very rock whereon God and man stand together. Jeremiah was the prophet to whom men likened Jesus, and to whom Paul, and the writer to the Hebrews, turned for words that touch the soul to the quick. To Jew and Christian he has been among the prophets not the most brilliant, but the most human.

My task now is to explain this by showing that Jeremiah’s characteristic proclamation was:—

God’s love is altogether for persons; and personal love for God and his beloved is the only godliness.

As we enter the Prophet-preacher’s audience-hall to listen, let us gather as preliminary a few notes that stand written on the threshold.

1. We need not throw aside the long-used popular epithet “Weeping Prophet.” The title is no doubt inexact and incorrect; for, while these Hebrew seers are all “Weeping Prophets,” just this man it is who often tells us, He would that he could weep, but he cannot. He knows how hard-hearted he...