Jeremiah 23:23-29 Commentary

Dreams and Discernment

Taken on its own, this text would leave us thinking dreams are a terrible way of knowing the truth. But then consider a couple experiences in the book of Genesis — I’m thinking of both Jacob and Joseph — and the prophet Joel who promises that one day God’s people will “see visions” and “dream dreams.” Indeed, compare this prohibition against the list of saints in Hebrews 11, the Lectionary Epistle reading for this Sunday. Now we have to conclude that the Bible attests to a complex view of dreams and visions, which means we would do well to get more specific about what this text is ruling out of bounds.

Jeremiah was an unlikely and unlikable prophet, in large part because most of his so-called colleagues in the prophet business were eager to tell people what they wanted to hear.  In a way, it is commendable. Judah spends most of the book of Jeremiah either anticipating exile or straight-up in it. They are an afflicted people in search of comfort.  Wouldn’t it be the charitable thing, then, to cast vision and draw images of good things to come?

Certainly. But only if those dreams and visions are true. Otherwise, the disillusionment of false home and the disappointment of hopes deferred are likely to take their toll on fragile faith. Robert Alter observes that “dream interpretation would have been a common vehicle for these popular prophets.”

Hebrew Scripture tends to judge the merit of a prophecy less on whether it makes me feel better in the moment and more on whether it is, well, true. The CEB Study Bible commentary suggests “the community isn’t to be taken in by prophets who promise national well-being and security,” even though those are the very things a nation in exile and under threat of war most want.  “Their vision of the future is attractive but it doesn’t derive from God.” Notice how many times in this text, God says “I didn’t tell them” or “I didn’t send them.”  When their prophecies don’t come to fruition, God is saying, “Don’t look at me. They were never speaking for me!”

This isn’t to say these prophet aren’t sincere or that they aren’t trying to encourage God’s people. At first, the critique offered by Jeremiah, “doesn’t consider the motivation or intentions of these prophets. Nor does it comment on their sincerity or morality. It only says that God hasn’t sent them, so their words and visions lack divine authority.”  But in the Lectionary selection, we see Jeremiah getting very specific about the motivations of these prophets. “They are accused of scheming and are said to be treacherous.

On the other hand, consider Jeremiah. Yes, he offers hope at times, peaceful images and, ultimately, an end to their oppression and degradation but that is far from he central message God has given him for the people.  “His oracles of hope are an outgrowth of a radical program of destabilizing Judah’s entire social and theological value system.”

In Biblical interpretation—especially when we have two manuscripts of roughly the same era—when we find a discrepancy, we are taught to use the principle of privileging the more complicated reading. The thinking goes: a well-meaning scribe comes across a strange sentence or a word that doesn’t exactly make sense.  That scribe thinks he is “helping” by replacing that word with a similar word that makes more sense in the context.  No one would try to “help” the text along by changing it to make it more obscure. In a way, we want to read Jeremiah against his fellow prophets in the same way.  His credibility is boosted by the fact that he doesn’t just say what everyone wants him to say. As a result, not just Jeremiah but Jeremiah’s *God* become that much more complicated.

Great and Near

Jeremiah’s God is both great and near. This promise, in verse 23, could be seen as good news.  If you are about to fight the neighborhood bully and your big brother shows up, you are very relieved that the big guy who just showed up is on your side.  But if your dad told you not to fight and catches you in a brawl, the nearness and greatness of your father is scant comfort in that moment.  You are busted!  And that is a better interpretation of the promise in this verse.  God is not impotent.  And God is not uninvolved. God is powerful. God is watching.  As Alter puts it, “In the present context, this designation is ominous rather than reassuring: God follows the people up close; they have no way of hiding from Him, as the next verse spells out.”

It is important for us to come to know God as both great (all-knowing, all-powerful, all-the-alls) and near (close as our breath, in our hearts, etc.) because without this tension, our theology is likely to go wonky.  God who is great and far off is like a watch-maker in the sky, a benevolent and affable deity wishing us good things that may or may not happen. Even if God is angry and vengeful, at least we are outside of arm’s reach and, so, relatively safe. If God is near but not great, then we have a buddy but nothing outside ourselves worth stretching, growing and changing for. Life is this present moment and we might as well try to be happy in it.

Illustration:

The philosopher Charles Taylor levels a critique against The Secular Age in which we have all learned to live within the immanent frame.  The universe is explained by science. Healing comes through medicine. Our sense of the spiritual world is replaced by the state of our mental health.  While I would argue that science, medicine and concern for mental health are incredibly valuable contributions of the last several centuries, it is also the case that most of us live like life is a road trip.  Our vision is constrained to the windshield, the rearview and side mirrors.  Taylor’s argument is that we’re, in fact, driving a convertible and we lose so much of the experience because we’re keeping the lid on. We settle for quick fixes, promises of the good life — the sort of thing offered by the false prophet of Jeremiah 23. Taylor’s solution for this is what he calls “reenchantment,” which is a wonderful word for a biblical way of seeing the world. For contending, alongside Jeremiah that God is near. God is far beyond our imagining. We cannot hide from God and this whole creation is God’s handiwork. Any accounting of reality that doesn’t bubble with ineffability isn’t an accounting worth listening to.

the CEP website has several commentaries on Isaiah 5:1-7:

from 2022 by Scott Hoezee: https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2022-08-08/isaiah-51-7-3/

from 2019 by Stan Mast: https://cepreaching.org/commentary/2019-08-12/isaiah-51-7-2/