Jeremiah 39: 1 – 18
Justice Delayed is Justice Denied
1 In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and all his army came against Jerusalem and besieged it. 2 In the eleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, on the ninth day of the month, the city was penetrated. 3 Then all the princes of the king of Babylon came in and sat in the Middle Gate: Nergal-Sharezer, Samgar-Nebo, Sarsechim, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sarezer, Rabmag, with the rest of the princes of the king of Babylon. 4 So it was, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, that they fled and went out of the city by night, by way of the king’s garden, by the gate between the two walls. And he went out by way of the plain. 5 But the Chaldean army pursued them and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. And when they had captured him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, to Riblah in the land of Hamath, where he pronounced judgment on him. 6 Then the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes in Riblah; the king of Babylon also killed all the nobles of Judah. 7 Moreover he put out Zedekiah’s eyes, and bound him with bronze fetters to carry him off to Babylon. 8 And the Chaldeans burned the king’s house and the houses of the people with fire and broke down the walls of Jerusalem. 9 Then Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive to Babylon the remnant of the people who remained in the city and those who defected to him, with the rest of the people who remained. 10 But Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left in the land of Judah the poor people, who had nothing, and gave them vineyards and fields at the same time. 11 Now Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon gave charge concerning Jeremiah to Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard, saying, 12 “Take him and look after him, and do him no harm; but do to him just as he says to you.” 13 So Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard sent Nebushasban, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sharezer, Rabmag, and all the king of Babylon’s chief officers; 14 then they sent someone to take Jeremiah from the court of the prison, and committed him to Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, that he should take him home. So he dwelt among the people. 15 Meanwhile the word of the LORD had come to Jeremiah while he was shut up in the court of the prison, saying, 16 “Go and speak to Ebed-Melech the Ethiopian, saying, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: “Behold, I will bring My words upon this city for adversity and not for good, and they shall be performed in that day before you. 17 But I will deliver you in that day,” says the LORD, “and you shall not be given into the hand of the men of whom you are afraid. 18 For I will surely deliver you, and you shall not fall by the sword; but your life shall be as a prize to you, because you have put your trust in Me,” says the LORD.”
When an earthly judge reserves his or her decision, that means that they can take it and take time to consider what the correct judgment should be.
Meanwhile, the litigants and their families or associates suffer as time goes on without hearing of a ruling.
Delay in issuing reasons for judgment has been recognized in the common law since time immemorial by the expression justice delayed is justice denied.
Delay in issuing reasons for judgment is also a matter of judicial ethics. You can hardly find a judge's handbook that does not state the obvious: "Judges should endeavor to perform all judicial duties, including the delivery of reserved judgments, with reasonable promptness."
"A judge shall dispose of all judicial matters promptly...."
When a judge takes a case under advisement, a controversial matter - a live dispute between real people - remains undecided and in a no-man's land.
Worse is that: "Time is memory's thief. Details of the case will be forgotten." Have you ever watched the news and you have no idea of what the news reporter is talking about with a case that is years old?
In the interim, there is no tool or process to prod the judge. In fact, any attempt to do so may well backfire and tip a procrastinating judge to the other side.
"The public has a right to expect of a judge decisiveness...."Litigants expect, and rightfully expect, that the judge will soon relieve then from the agony of uncertainty that prevails until judgment is delivered.
"That is not to say that it is better to be quick than right.... The aim is to be both quick and right."
When one judge suffers from judicial indecisiveness, the reputation of his or her court is tarnished, and that includes that of his or her diligent colleagues, however unfair that may be. And anything which for no good reason, brings the justice system into disrepute is a bad thing.
Between a rock and a hard place best describes the unfortunate situation of a litigant waiting, waiting, waiting ... for a judge's decision, as judicial councils fear treading on the independence of their members in refusing to accept responsibility for the conduct of their judges in this regard.
But we do lose the baby with the bath water when there is no accountability for the rare yet devastating effect of an incompetent judges who expresses her or his inabilities by inordinate delays in judgment.
Of course, this reality of judicial politics is of no solace whatsoever to the citizen-litigant caught in the judicial process.
In the book of Numbers chapter 14 verse 8 we learn, “The LORD Is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, and by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.”
Many individuals over the years have asked me who didn’t our Holy God just wipe out the Jews for all their obnoxious rebellion against Him. My response is, ‘For the same reason He did not wipe me off the face of the earth and you also. It is because He Is a Great Loving God Who Is Longsuffering. He recognizes that we are just puffed up dirt.’
But there comes a time after so many warnings that He must act. Judgment must happen. Today, we are going to sadly investigate the judgement on God’s people.
The kings of the Kingdom of Israel practiced idolatry, but so did many of the kings of the Kingdom of Judah. Our Holy Father Yahweh sent prophets repeatedly to admonish the Jews, but they refused to change their ways, choosing instead to deride these prophets as false messengers coming to discourage them with predictions of destruction.
Beginning in 463 BC, Jeremiah prophesized about the Babylonian threat and warned the Jews of the terrible devastation they would incur if they did not stop worshipping idols and mistreating each other. But his melancholic prophecies, recorded in the Book of Jeremiah, went largely unheeded by the Jews, who mocked and persecuted him.
Some eighteen years before the destruction of the Temple, Jeremiah was imprisoned by King Jehoiakim (due to his persistent prophecies foretelling the fall of Jerusalem).
Jeremiah described the words of the Lord written down in a scroll the devastation that Yahweh God would wreak upon Jerusalem and the Holy Land: children starving; cannibalism on the part of hunger-crazed mothers, the city abandoned.
Baruch ben Neriah the assistant to Jeremiah followed his instructions. He publicly read the scroll in the Holy Temple. When the king was informed of this event, he asked that the scroll be read to him. After hearing but a few verses, the king ordered just after a few verses were read the portion of the scroll to be cut off and instructed that they be thrown into the fireplace.
When Jeremiah was informed of the king's actions, he rewrote what was in the original scroll and composed another chapter that he added to the book.
The Assyrians had long dominated the Middle East, but their power was waning. Even with the help of the Egyptians, who were getting stronger, they were not able to fight off the Babylonians. These three empires were engaged in a power struggle, and the Kingdom of Judah was caught in the middle.
In 434 BC, the Kingdom of Judah tried to form an alliance with Egypt. The Jews thought, despite Jeremiah's prophecies, that this would keep them safe. But instead, the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, marched on Judah. He pillaged Jerusalem and deported tens of thousands of Jews to his capital in Babylon; all the deportees were drawn from the upper classes, the wealthy, and craftsmen. Ordinary people were allowed to stay in Judah, and Nebuchadnezzar appointed a puppet king over Judah, Zedekiah.
But Zedekiah, despite Jeremiah's repeated admonitions not to try to break free from the Babylonians. So, Nebuchadnezzar marched on Jerusalem again. This time he would not be content with making Judah into a vassal state. On the tenth of Tevet, 425 BC, Nebuchadnezzar began the siege of Jerusalem.
1 In the ninth year of Zedekiah king of Judah, in the tenth month, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and all his army came against Jerusalem and besieged it. 2 In the eleventh year of Zedekiah, in the fourth month, on the ninth day of the month, the city was penetrated.
In the month of Tammuz, after a long siege during which hunger and epidemics ravaged the city, the city walls were breached. On the seventh day of Av, the chief of Nebuchadnezzar's army, Nebuzaradan, began the destruction of Jerusalem. The walls of the city were torn down, and the royal palace and other structures in the city were set on fire.
On the ninth day of Av, toward evening, the Holy Temple was set on fire and destroyed. The fire burned for 24 hours.
3 Then all the princes of the king of Babylon came in and sat in the Middle Gate: Nergal-Sharezer, Samgar-Nebo, Sarsechim, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sarezer, Rabmag, with the rest of the princes of the king of Babylon. 4 So it was, when Zedekiah the king of Judah and all the men of war saw them, that they fled and went out of the city by night, by way of the king’s garden, by the gate between the two walls. And he went out by way of the plain. 5 But the Chaldean army pursued them and overtook Zedekiah in the plains of Jericho. And when they had captured him, they brought him up to Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, to Riblah in the land of Hamath, where he pronounced judgment on him.
A breach being made in the wall by the enemy a desperate attempt was made to escape by night by using a small gate (the main gates would be closely guarded) which would have been identifiable at the time, and all the men of war fled from Jerusalem, along with the king who was making for the Jordan Rift Valley.
However, the movement of such many men could hardly fail to be detected so when the Chaldeans realized that there had been an escape they pursued after the king, whose troops had scattered to find refuge where they could. It is possible that the hope was that this would aid the king’s escape as the Chaldeans would not know who to follow, but it failed, and he was captured in the plains of Jericho in the Arabah.
He was then taken to Riblah in the region of Hamath where Nebuchadnezzar was stationed, and there given a trial. But the result could hardly have been in doubt. He had broken his oath of allegiance and was worthy of death.
6 Then the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes in Riblah; the king of Babylon also killed all the nobles of Judah. 7 Moreover he put out Zedekiah’s eyes, and bound him with bronze fetters to carry him off to Babylon.
Nebuchadnezzar’s penalty was severe. All his sons were slain before his eyes and he was then blinded, leaving the last sight that he had experienced before becoming blind as that of his sons being killed. Then he was bound in fetters and carried off to Babylon. His rebellion, into which humanly speaking he had been forced by the anti-Assyrian party in Jerusalem, had cost him dear. From the divine point of view his evil behavior had brought its own reward.
After Zedekiah was forced to watch his sons be executed before his eyes were gouged out. He was given bronze fetters and led 700 miles to Babylon, the land of idolatry where he would die in prison.
Jerusalem was burned, and the walls of the city were torn down. All military, civil and religious leaders were either executed or carried away into captivity. Only the poorest of the peasants of Judah could remain in the land which was by now a place of complete desolation.
The Jewish survivors were hauled across the Syrian Desert to Babylon, many of them perishing along the way. The Southern Kingdom of Judah had ceased to exist, the monarchy had ended, and this marked the end of the First Temple Period.
8 And the Chaldeans burned the king’s house and the houses of the people with fire and broke down the walls of Jerusalem. 9 Then Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard carried away captive to Babylon the remnant of the people who remained in the city and those who defected to him, with the rest of the people who remained. 10 But Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard left in the land of Judah the poor people, who had nothing, and gave them vineyards and fields at the same time.
Everything of gold and silver that remained was carried off as loot by the Babylonian soldiers. All the beautiful works of art with which King Solomon had once decorated and ornamented the holy edifice were destroyed or taken away. The holy vessels of the Temple that could be found were brought to Babylon. The high priest Seraiah and many other high officials and priests were executed, millions more were killed inside and outside of the city. Many thousands of the people that had escaped the sword were taken prisoner and led into captivity in Babylon, where some of their best had already preceded them. Only the poorest of the residents of Jerusalem were permitted to stay on to plant the vineyards and work in the fields.
The land was not, however, to be left totally deserted and the common and unimportant folk (and there would be many of them) were left in the land to maintain its agriculture. Thus, while Jerusalem itself was now almost deserted and in ruins, the land around remained populated and was tended, although hardly initially in good condition. What was left of Judah still survived in the land, and they would no doubt be supplemented by those who came out of hiding in the mountains once the Babylonian forces had withdrawn. Furthermore, Lachish, and possibly other cities, had not been taken, and if so their inhabitants may have been treated more leniently. Gedaliah the new governor would come from Lachish.
11 Now Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon gave charge concerning Jeremiah to Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard, saying, 12 “Take him and look after him, and do him no harm; but do to him just as he says to you.” 13 So Nebuzaradan the captain of the guard sent Nebushasban, Rabsaris, Nergal-Sharezer, Rabmag, and all the king of Babylon’s chief officers; 14 then they sent someone to take Jeremiah from the court of the prison, and committed him to Gedaliah the son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, that he should take him home. So, he dwelt among the people.
A good number of poorer people could remain in the land and over them Nebuchadnezzar set a governor. Judah was now a Babylonian province. The governor’s name was Gedaliah. He was the son of the Ahikam who had served Josiah (22.12) and had sought to protect Jeremiah (Jeremiah 26.24), and thus in good standing in the Jewish community.
15 Meanwhile the word of the LORD had come to Jeremiah while he was shut up in the court of the prison, saying, 16 “Go and speak to Ebed-Melech the Ethiopian, saying, ‘Thus says the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel: “Behold, I will bring My words upon this city for adversity and not for good, and they shall be performed in that day before you. 17 But I will deliver you in that day,” says the LORD, “and you shall not be given into the hand of the men of whom you are afraid. 18 For I will surely deliver you, and you shall not fall by the sword; but your life shall be as a prize to you, because you have put your trust in Me,” says the LORD.”
Our watches and observes what we all do. In our last study a man stood up for the right justice and was willing to risk his life to make it happen. His name was Ebed-Melech. Let us just take a quick look at what he did.
“7 Now Ebed-Melech the Ethiopian, one of the eunuchs, who was in the king’s house, heard that they had put Jeremiah in the dungeon. When the king was sitting at the Gate of Benjamin, 8 Ebed-Melech went out of the king’s house and spoke to the king, saying: 9 “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 dungeon, and he is likely to die from hunger in the place where he is. For there is no more bread in the city.” 10 Then the king commanded Ebed-Melech the Ethiopian, saying, “Take from here thirty men with you, and lift Jeremiah the prophet out of the dungeon before he dies.” 11 So Ebed-Melech took the men with him and went into the house of the king under the treasury, and took from there old clothes and old rags, and let them down by ropes into the dungeon to Jeremiah. 12 Then Ebed-Melech the Ethiopian said to Jeremiah, “Please put these old clothes and rags under your armpits, under the ropes.” And Jeremiah did so. 13 So they pulled Jeremiah up with ropes and lifted him out of the dungeon. And Jeremiah remained in the court of the prison.”
Because of his act of bravery our Holy Father God specifically instructed Jeremiah to inform Ebed-Melech that God would watch over him and spare his life from any harm in the subsequent atrocities by the Babylonian military.
