siastical town of Anathoth, about
three miles from Jerusalem, and was the son of a priest. We do not know
the exact year of his birth, but he was a very young man when he
received his divine commission as a prophet, about six hundred and
twenty-seven years before Christ. Josiah had then been on the throne of
Judah twelve years. The kingdom was apparently prosperous, and was
unmolested by external enemies. For seventy-five years Assyria had given
but little trouble, and Egypt was occupied with the siege of Ashdod,
which had been going on for twenty-nine years, so strong was that
Philistine city. But in the absence of external dangers corruption,
following wealth, was making fearful strides among the people, and
impiety was nearly universal. Every one was bent on pleasure or gain,
and prophet and priest were worldly and deceitful. From the time when
Jeremiah was first called to the prophetic office until the fall of
Jerusalem there was an unbroken series of national misfortunes,
gradually darkening into utter ruin and exile. He may have shrunk from
the perils and mortifications which attended him for forty years, as his
nature was sensitive and tender; but during this long ministry he was
incessant in his labors, lifting up his voice in the courts of the
Temple, in the palace of the king, in prison, in private houses, in the
country around Jerusalem. The burden of his utterances was a
denunciation of idolatry, and a lamentation over its consequences. "My
people, saith Jehovah, have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters,
and hewn out for themselves underground cisterns, full of rents, that
can hold no water.... Behold, O Judah! thou shalt be brought to shame by
thy new alliance with Egypt, as thou wast in the past by thy old
alliance with Assyria."

In this denunciation by the prophet we see that he mingled in political
affairs, and opposed the alliance which Judah made with Egypt, which
ever proved a broken reed. Egypt was a vain support against the new
power that was rising on the Euphrates, carrying all before it, even to
the destruction of Nineveh, and was threatening Damascus and Tyre as
well as Jerusalem. The power which Judah had now to fear was Babylon,
not Assyria. If any alliance was to be formed, it was better to
conciliate Babylon than Egypt.

Roused by the earnest eloquence of Jeremiah, and of those of the group
of earnest followers of Jehovah who stood with him,--Huldah the
prophetess, Shallum her husb