{"id":69559,"date":"2018-07-09T17:46:38","date_gmt":"2018-07-09T14:46:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wall\/wall-410\/"},"modified":"2023-09-04T17:12:19","modified_gmt":"2023-09-04T14:12:19","slug":"wall-410","status":"publish","type":"wall","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wall\/wall-410\/","title":{"rendered":"chapter-Prophets-Jeremiah-10"},"parent":0,"template":"","acf":{"type":"chapter","wall_id":"410","date":"20270325","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","books_group":"Prophets","posts":[{"order":1,"id":"68980","color":"#f8ebe3","size":"1","name":"JPS Audio Bible - Jeremiah Chapter 10 ","post_title":"JPS Audio Bible - Jeremiah Chapter 10","slug":"jps-audio-bible-jeremiah-chapter-10","old_id":"68980","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34686,"post_title":"Soundcloud","slug":"soundcloud","old_id":"34686","first_name":"","last_name":"","description":"","short_description":"","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34656,"alt":"","title":"491","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","width":300,"height":300,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","medium_large-width":300,"medium_large-height":300,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","large-width":300,"large-height":300,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","1536x1536-width":300,"1536x1536-height":300,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","2048x2048-width":300,"2048x2048-height":300,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","post_full_size-width":300,"post_full_size-height":300,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/491-2.jpg","home_baner-width":300,"home_baner-height":300}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"4","show_author_image":true,"old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"","post_main_content_content":"","post_main_content_image":"","post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"JPS Audio Bible","tile_main_caption":"Jeremiah Chapter 10","tile_main_caption_size":"2","tile_sub_caption":"Hear the daily chapter","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":"","tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"https:\/\/soundcloud.com\/user-753876298\/jps_audio_bible_jeremiah_chapter_10","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","old_create_date":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":false},{"order":2,"id":"117391","color":"#f6edf6","size":"1","name":"God vs The Idols ","post_title":"God vs The Idols","slug":"god-vs-the-idols","old_id":"117391","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":33877,"post_title":"Marc Bregman","slug":"marc-bregman","old_id":"33877","first_name":"Marc","last_name":"Bregman","description":"Marc Bregman received his Ph.D. from The Hebrew University in Jerusalem in 1991. 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In our<\/span> chapter<\/span><\/a>, Jeremiah prophesies repeatedly to the \u201cHouse of Israel\u201d about the greatness of God as compared to the weakness of idols, which he describes in sarcastic terms. For example:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

They are like a scarecrow in a cucumber patch. They cannot speak. They have to be carried, for they cannot walk. Be not afraid of them, for they can do no harm; nor is it in them to do any good. O Lord, there is none like You! You are great and Your name is great in power (<\/span>Jeremiah 10:5-6<\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Midrash Tanhuma<\/span><\/a> extends Jeremiah\u2019s comparison of God and the idols to the relation of a king to his ministers. A human king may be extremely wise, and yet among his ministers there may be others who are no less wise. But of the Holy One, blessed be He, it is said: \u201cThere is none like You! You are great and Your name is great in power. Who would not revere You, O King of the nations? For that is Your due, since among all the wise of the nations and among all their royalty there is none like You\u201d (<\/span>Jeremiah 10:6-7<\/span><\/a>).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

In a modern-sounding compositional analysis of<\/span> Jeremiah 10:1-16<\/span><\/a>,<\/span> Midrash Exodus Rabbah<\/span><\/a> explicates that \u201cfour times on one page\u201d (i.e. four times in our chapter) you find that Jeremiah defamed the idols and then praised God:<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Scripture says of the idols: \u201c<\/span>They are like a scarecrow in a cucumber patch<\/span><\/a>\u2026\u201d. And after defaming the idols, you now immediately hear the praise of God: \u201c\u2026<\/span>You are great and Your name is great in might<\/span><\/a>\u2026\u201d. Now that you have heard the praise of God, you hear again the defamation of the idols. For Jeremiah goes on to say of the idols: \u201c<\/span>They are both stupid and foolish...<\/span><\/a>\u201d. And yet again, after you have heard the defamation of the idols, right away Jeremiah says, Come and I will tell you the praise of God: \u201c<\/span>But the Lord is the true God. He is the living God and the everlasting King<\/span><\/a>\u201d. And yet again! Now that you have heard the praise of God, come and hear again the defamation of foreign gods. For it says: \u201c<\/span>The gods who did not make the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from under heaven<\/span><\/a>\u201d. But, immediately following, of God it says: \u201c<\/span>It is He who made the earth by His power, who established the world by His wisdom<\/span><\/a>\u201d. And once more. Now that you have heard the praise of God, come again and hear the defamation of the idols, for it says:<\/span> For their molten images are a deceit. Their is no breath in them. They are a delusion, a work of mockery<\/span><\/a>. Finally, come now and listen to the praises of God -- and now also Israel, His people:<\/span> Not like these is the Portion of Jacob, for it is He who formed all things. And Israel is His very own tribe. Lord of Hosts is His name<\/span><\/a>\u201d.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

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He and his daughter studied the Tanach again for her bat mitzvah. Josh has taught many classes on Tanach throughout the years and currently in the New Rochelle 929 group. When not studying for 929, Josh works as an in-house lawyer in New Jersey.","short_description":"Josh has taught many classes on Tanach throughout the years and currently in the New Rochelle 929 group, and is an in-house attorney in New Jersey. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":78134,"alt":"","title":"josh blechner","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","width":276,"height":351,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner-236x300.jpg","medium-width":236,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","medium_large-width":276,"medium_large-height":351,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","large-width":276,"large-height":351,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","1536x1536-width":276,"1536x1536-height":351,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","2048x2048-width":276,"2048x2048-height":351,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","post_full_size-width":276,"post_full_size-height":351,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/josh-blechner.jpg","home_baner-width":276,"home_baner-height":351}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"A startlingly odd verse with an intriguing backstory\r\n\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

The book of Jeremiah is unique in that it is not chronological. The chapters seem to be garbled up. An early example of this is chapter 10. The tip off of the timing of this chapter is in verse 11:<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Thus shall you say to them: Let the gods, who did not make heaven and earth, perish from the earth and from under these heavens\u201d (verse 11).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

This verse seems pretty straight forward. It is a continuation of the message against idolatry that appears in the first part of the chapter. However, there is something different about it. The verse is in Aramaic. Why would Jeremiah drop in an Aramaic verse in the middle of the chapter?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Rashi explains that this chapter takes place after the exile of Joachin in the initial exile from Jerusalem. God is warning the people not to fall prey to the idol worship around them, even while in exile. The verse is added as a sort of script that the people should read when approached by the local Babylonian population. It is in Aramaic because that was the native tongue of the Babylonians.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

The use of Aramaic here is also a testament to the assimilation of the people. Back at the time of Hezekiah and Isaiah, the agents of Rabshakeh, the Assyrian king, came to Jerusalem to scare the people (<\/span>see Isaiah 36<\/span><\/a>). The agents made their announcement in Hebrew and Hezekiah\u2019s ministers entreated them to speak in Aramaic so that the people would not understand. Now, with part of the nation in exile, the prophet must resort to using the native tongue of the Babylonians to reach the people. They have lost their Hebrew heritage and are vulnerable to the influences of their Aramaic surroundings.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":75672,"alt":"","title":"ez46-time tunnel","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","width":1920,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-300x300.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-768x768.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":768,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-1024x1024.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-1200x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-420x420.jpg","home_baner-width":420,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Jeremiah Jumble","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"A startlingly odd verse with an intriguing backstory","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":75672,"alt":"","title":"ez46-time tunnel","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","width":1920,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-300x300.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-768x768.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":768,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-1024x1024.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-1200x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/ez46-time-tunnel-420x420.jpg","home_baner-width":420,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_link_for_pay":"0","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"493","name":"Aramaic","old_id":"893"},{"term_id":"720","name":"Chronology","old_id":"1120"},{"term_id":"798","name":"language","old_id":"1198"}]},{"order":4,"id":"69738","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Pouring Out Wrath And Love In An Age Of Anti-Semitism ","post_title":"Pouring Out Wrath And Love In An Age Of Anti-Semitism","slug":"pouring-out-wrath-and-love-in-an-age-of-anti-semitism","old_id":"69738","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":60755,"post_title":"Katja Vehlow","slug":"katja-vehlow","old_id":"60755","first_name":"Katja ","last_name":"Vehlow ","description":"Dr. Katja Vehlow is a rabbinical student at JTS in New York City. She taught as an Associate Professor of Religious and Jewish studies at the University of South Carolina. ","short_description":"Dr. Katja Vehlow is a rabbinical student at JTS in New York City. She taught as an Associate Professor of Religious and Jewish studies at the University of South Carolina. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":60757,"alt":"","title":"Katja Vehlow","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","width":454,"height":580,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow-235x300.jpg","medium-width":235,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","medium_large-width":454,"medium_large-height":580,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","large-width":454,"large-height":580,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","1536x1536-width":454,"1536x1536-height":580,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","2048x2048-width":454,"2048x2048-height":580,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow.jpg","post_full_size-width":454,"post_full_size-height":580,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/08\/Katja-Vehlow-329x420.jpg","home_baner-width":329,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"It is up to us to decide which...\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

What a roller coaster chapter this is! There are images of utter desolation: <\/span><\/p>\r\n

My tents are ravaged, all my tent cords are broken. My children have gone forth from me and are no more, no one is left to stretch out my tents and hang my tent cloths. <\/span><\/p>\r\n

Amidst this immense loss, Jeremiah pleads urgently with the Holy One to keep these horrors away from us. And then we arrive at: \u201cPour out your wrath on the nations who do not heed you!\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

This thunderous verse is perhaps better known in Hebrew: <\/span>Shefokh khamatkha al hagoyim<\/span><\/em>\u2026 <\/span><\/i>from traditional Passover haggadahs. On our way to redemption during the seder, the text calls down divine revenge on Israel\u2019s enemies, God\u2019s opponents. This is a dramatic, and to many, uncomfortable low point during the seder. Do we really want to conjure up divine ire on people who do not believe in the God of Israel? Perhaps those are people sitting right here with us. What is this quote doing here? In fact, some people reject the very idea and omit the text. And some haggadot offer thoughtful alternatives. One work amends to: \u201cPour out your love on the nations who know You and on kingdoms who call Your name\u2026.\u201d Similarly, the haggadah long associated with the Maharal of Prague (1525-1609) introduces an Elijah who will \u201creconcile parents with children and children with parents.\u201d In the end of times, this love will prevent the destruction of the land. Beautiful, especially when we consider how much angst and social anxiety is often associated with big family gatherings!<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Though both texts claim to be many centuries old, they are, we now know, products of the twentieth century. Does it matter? Only to historical purists. It is perhaps significant that modern Jews felt the need to change these lines, while pre-modern Jews for the most part seem to have been content to engage in revenge fantasies during one of the most dramatic moments of the seder.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

And yet, some people choose to quote Jeremiah proudly, perhaps even defiantly, while others spiritualize the vengeance and point out that the avenger is God alone. So will Jeremiah\u2019s <\/span>shefokh khamatekha<\/span><\/em> experience a renaissance in today\u2019s age of growing antisemitism? I hope not, but in the end, this is up to each and one of us when we open our Haggadah this Passover.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Image: \u201cShefoch Ahavatacha<\/em> - Pour Out Your Love Upon The Nations,\u201d photo by zeeveez of graffiti in the Katamonim neighborhood of Jerusalem, 2010 \/ flickr<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69741,"alt":"","title":"","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","width":2048,"height":1536,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-300x225.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":225,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-768x576.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":576,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-1024x768.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":768,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1152,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","2048x2048-width":2048,"2048x2048-height":1536,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-1200x900.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":900,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-560x420.jpg","home_baner-width":560,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Pouring Out Wrath And Love In An Age Of Anti-Semitism","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"It is up to us to decide which...","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69741,"alt":"","title":"","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","width":2048,"height":1536,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-300x225.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":225,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-768x576.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":576,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-1024x768.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":768,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1152,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch.jpg","2048x2048-width":2048,"2048x2048-height":1536,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-1200x900.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":900,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-shfoch-560x420.jpg","home_baner-width":560,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"381","name":"love","old_id":"781"},{"term_id":"458","name":"Nations","old_id":"858"},{"term_id":"597","name":"Pesach","old_id":"997"},{"term_id":"858","name":"Elijah","old_id":"1258"},{"term_id":"915","name":"Hate","old_id":"1315"}]},{"order":5,"id":"69734","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"PR, Parody and Prayer Purge Paganism ","post_title":"PR, Parody and Prayer Purge Paganism","slug":"pr-parody-and-prayer-purge-paganism","old_id":"69734","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":38552,"post_title":"Benny Lau","slug":"benny-lau","old_id":"38552","first_name":"Benny","last_name":"Lau ","description":"Rav Benny Lau is the founder and co-head of the Israeli initiative 929 along with Gal Gabbai. In addition, he is the rabbi of the Ramban synagogue in Jerusalem and is a community leader, activist, author, and public speaker.","short_description":"Rav Benny Lau is the founder and co-head of the Israeli initiative 929 along with Gal Gabbai.","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":1708,"alt":"","title":"","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","width":150,"height":150,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","medium-width":150,"medium-height":150,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","medium_large-width":150,"medium_large-height":150,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","large-width":150,"large-height":150,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","1536x1536-width":150,"1536x1536-height":150,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","2048x2048-width":150,"2048x2048-height":150,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","post_full_size-width":150,"post_full_size-height":150,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/8-1.jpg","home_baner-width":150,"home_baner-height":150}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Three strategies to cleanse the country\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

In chapter 10, Jeremiah uses three rhetorical strategies to help purge the land of idolatry: public relations, parody, and prayer.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Jeremiah turns to the \"House of Israel,\" a collective name for the kingdoms of Judah and Ephraim, and appeals to them to abandon the ways of foreign nations. He contends with those who plan their every move based on the constellations. Astrology was well-developed in Babylonian religion, and his plea not to fear the heavens may be the first indication that the people are beginning to absorb a new and increasingly prevalent pagan culture. Jeremiah's call to Israel not to fear heavenly signs is echoed in a later, well-known rabbinic saying: \"Israel is not subject to constellations.\"\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

A midrash based on our chapter depicts the human experience of divination based on the stars:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

\u201cR. Eliezer says: A solar eclipse is an ominous sign for the nations of the world, and a lunar eclipse is an ominous sign for the enemies of Israel [a euphemism for Israel itself], for Israel is likened to the moon, and the nations of the world to the sun.... If [the eclipse] is in the west, it bodes ill for those in the west; if it occurs at the zenith, it bodes ill for the whole world. If its face looks like blood, the sword is coming to the world; if it looks like sackcloth, famine is coming to the world.... When Israel carries out the will of God, [it] shall not fear, as it says, \"Thus said the Lord: Learn not the way of the nations, and fear not signs in the heavens, though the nations fear them\" \u2014 the nations will fear, but [Israel] will not\u201d (Tanna DeVei Eliyahu Zuta 16).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

After addressing those who place their faith in horoscopes, Jeremiah turns to those who worship idols of wood and stone. A similar style of mockery can be found in Isaiah 44 as well as other prophetic works. Jeremiah describes the absurdity of idol worship: The worshippers themselves cut down trees, carve statues out of the wood, decorate them with gold and silver, hammer them full of nails, and finally, worship their own creations. Israel's faith in the God of heaven and earth contrasts with prostration before replaceable, man-made statues:\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

But the Lord, God, is true, the living God and King of the world; at His wrath the earth shakes, and the nations cannot withstand His fury. (Jer. 10:10)\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Lau, Binyamin. <\/span>Jeremiah: The Fate of a Prophet<\/span><\/i>. Maggid Books, 2013. \u201cA Confrontation with Idolaters and a Prayer.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69252,"alt":"","title":"jer-lau2","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","width":884,"height":635,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-300x215.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":215,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-768x552.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":552,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","large-width":884,"large-height":635,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","1536x1536-width":884,"1536x1536-height":635,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","2048x2048-width":884,"2048x2048-height":635,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","post_full_size-width":884,"post_full_size-height":635,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-585x420.jpg","home_baner-width":585,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"PR, Parody and Prayer Purge Paganism","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Three strategies to cleanse the country","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69252,"alt":"","title":"jer-lau2","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","width":884,"height":635,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-300x215.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":215,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-768x552.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":552,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","large-width":884,"large-height":635,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","1536x1536-width":884,"1536x1536-height":635,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","2048x2048-width":884,"2048x2048-height":635,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2.jpg","post_full_size-width":884,"post_full_size-height":635,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/jer-lau2-585x420.jpg","home_baner-width":585,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"429","name":"Idolatry","old_id":"829"},{"term_id":"437","name":"Prayer","old_id":"837"},{"term_id":"622","name":"Criticism","old_id":"1022"}]},{"order":6,"id":"69758","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Jeremiah v. Maimonides ","post_title":"Jeremiah v. Maimonides","slug":"jeremiah-v-maimonides","old_id":"69758","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":64460,"post_title":"Vincent Calabrese","slug":"vincent-calabrese","old_id":"64460","first_name":"Vincent ","last_name":"Calabrese ","description":"Vincent Calabrese is a doctoral student in Jewish thought at the University of Toronto and a rabbinical student at the Hadar Institute","short_description":"Vincent Calabrese is a doctoral student in Jewish thought at the University of Toronto and a rabbinical student at the Hadar Institute","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":64461,"alt":"","title":"vincent calabrese","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese.jpg","width":2117,"height":2504,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-254x300.jpg","medium-width":254,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-768x908.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":908,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-866x1024.jpg","large-width":866,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese.jpg","1536x1536-width":1299,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese.jpg","2048x2048-width":1731,"2048x2048-height":2048,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-1015x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":1015,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/vincent-calabrese-355x420.jpg","home_baner-width":355,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Do idolaters really believe that their idols are gods?\u00a0\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

The tenth chapter of Jeremiah begins with a polemic against the idolatry of \u201cthe nations.\u201d The prophet revels in the ridiculousness of foreign worship; why, he asks, would anyone bow down before \u201cthe work of a craftsman\u2019s hands\u201d? He catalogues the laborious process by which the idol is produced \u2014 the felling of a tree, the smelting of precious metals, the careful carpentry to combine the two. But the result of all this work, Jeremiah states, is useless: <\/span><\/p>\r\n

They cannot speak. They have to be carried, for they cannot walk. Be not afraid of them, for they can do no harm; nor is it in them to do any good.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

There could be no greater contrast to the God of Israel, of whom Jeremiah proclaims <\/span><\/p>\r\n

the LORD is truly God: he is a living God, the everlasting King. At His wrath, the earth quakes, and nations cannot endure His rage.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

It is not necessary to be a historian of religion to feel that something is a little off in Jeremiah\u2019s description of \u2018idolatry.\u2019 Could it really be the case that the foreign worshiper believes his handiwork itself to be a god? Maimonides thought this impossible. In his <\/span>Guide of the Perplexed<\/em> <\/span>he writes that:<\/span><\/p>\r\n

No human being of the past has ever imagined on any day, and no human being of the future will ever imagine, that the form he fashions either from cast metal or from stone and wood has created and governs the heavens and the earth.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

According to Maimonides, idolaters are not even disbelievers in the true God \u2014 rather, the statues they fashion are of intermediaries between humanity and YHWH. While their actions still infringe on the sovereignty of God and are thus condemnable, for Maimonides the issue is at bottom one of cognitive error.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Jeremiah and Maimonides offer two very different approaches to the problem with which religious diversity presents monotheism. Do we react emotionally, or intellectually, to the distressing fact that so many deny what seems to us to be the most important of truths? Jeremiah\u2019s satire does not really take idolatry seriously; indeed, his words seem to have less to do with real idolatry than with an imaginary idolatry against which his monotheism defines itself. Maimonides, on the other hand, assumes that idolaters are not stupid, and that though their practices may be deviant they are ultimately comprehensible.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

In the end, neither of these texts provide a very promising basis for the kind of dialogue we expect between members of different faith traditions today. What they do make clear, however, is just how difficult it can be to take the other seriously on their own terms \u2014 we always face the danger of explaining the inner lives others as merely deviations from or modifications of our own perspective. What is even more difficult is to interpret the other charitably without letting go of one\u2019s own perspective. In the final estimation, it may be that Maimonides\u2019 approach, flawed as it is, approximates this latter goal more closely than Jeremiah\u2019s.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Image: Making of an idol, 2015, photo by: Debnathsonu \/ wikipedia<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69759,"alt":"","title":"jer10-idol maker","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","width":707,"height":599,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-300x254.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":254,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","medium_large-width":707,"medium_large-height":599,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","large-width":707,"large-height":599,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","1536x1536-width":707,"1536x1536-height":599,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","2048x2048-width":707,"2048x2048-height":599,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","post_full_size-width":707,"post_full_size-height":599,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-496x420.jpg","home_baner-width":496,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Jeremiah v. Maimonides","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Do idolaters really believe that their idols are gods?\u00a0","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69759,"alt":"","title":"jer10-idol maker","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","width":707,"height":599,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-300x254.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":254,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","medium_large-width":707,"medium_large-height":599,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","large-width":707,"large-height":599,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","1536x1536-width":707,"1536x1536-height":599,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","2048x2048-width":707,"2048x2048-height":599,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker.jpg","post_full_size-width":707,"post_full_size-height":599,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol-maker-496x420.jpg","home_baner-width":496,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"429","name":"Idolatry","old_id":"829"},{"term_id":"449","name":"Religion","old_id":"849"},{"term_id":"458","name":"Nations","old_id":"858"},{"term_id":"868","name":"Maimonides","old_id":"1268"}]},{"order":7,"id":"69748","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"2","name":"Astrology And The Jews ","post_title":"Astrology And The Jews","slug":"astrology-and-the-jews","old_id":"69748","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":42746,"post_title":"Michal Kohane","slug":"michal-kohane","old_id":"42746","first_name":"Michal ","last_name":"Kohane ","description":"Currently based in Israel, Rabbanit Michal Kohane is a graduate of Yeshivat Maharat, a writer, community leader and teacher of Talmud & Torah. She holds degrees in Israel studies , education and psychology, and has been a leader and educator in Northern California for over 25 years. Her first novel, Hachug (\"Extracurricular\") was published in Israel in 2016 and her weekly blog can be found at http:\/\/www.miko284.com\r\n\r\n\r\n","short_description":"Currently based in Israel, Rabbanit Michal Kohane is a graduate of Yeshivat Maharat, a writer, community leader and teacher of Talmud & Torah. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":42747,"alt":"","title":"michal kohane","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","width":214,"height":226,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","medium-width":214,"medium-height":226,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","medium_large-width":214,"medium_large-height":226,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","large-width":214,"large-height":226,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","1536x1536-width":214,"1536x1536-height":226,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","2048x2048-width":214,"2048x2048-height":226,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","post_full_size-width":214,"post_full_size-height":226,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/michal-kohane-e1540448078529.jpg","home_baner-width":214,"home_baner-height":226}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Be not dismayed by portents in the sky\r\n\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

One of my favorite questions to ask people is, \u201cwhat sign are you??\" Of course, I don\u2019t believe in \u201cit\u201d and yet\u2026 I find it fascinating and I\u2019m curious. The response is often, \u201cyou can\u2019t possibly be serious! This is a bunch of nonsense! Jews don\u2019t believe in astrology, do they\u201d?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Jews believe in many things, as is evident already from Jeremiah who says: <\/span><\/p>\r\n

Thus said God: Do not turn to the way of the nations, And do not be dismayed by portents in the sky; Let the nations be dismayed by them!\u00a0(10:2).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

He echoes what God said to Moses back in Deuteronomy (4:15-19):<\/span><\/p>\r\n

for your own sake, therefore be most careful\u2026 lest you look up to the sky and behold the sun and the moon and the stars, the whole heavenly host\u2026 these your God allotted to other Peoples everywhere under heavens...<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Which means: it\u2019s not that there is no truth in the \u201cheavenly host\u201d; it\u2019s just that it\u2019s not for us.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

The conversation continues towards the end of Tractate Shabbat (156), when the sages debate whether there is \u201cmazal\u201d, translated here as \u201cconstellation\u201d, in Israel, or not?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

It was stated that Rabbi \u1e24anina says: A constellation makes one wise and a constellation makes one wealthy, and there is a constellation for the Jewish people that influences them. Rabbi Yo\u1e25anan said: There is no constellation for the Jewish people and they are not subject to the influence of astrology.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Rabbi Yo\u1e25anan follows his own reasoning by quoting Jeremiah\u2019s verse implying that the nations will be affected by the heavenly host, but not the Jewish people. Rav too tells us about the moment when God took Abraham \u201cout\u201d to tell him an heir will be born to him. Why the need to take Abraham \u201cout\u201d? Answers the Talmud:<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Abraham said before Him: Master of the Universe, I looked at my astrological map, and according to my constellations I am not fit to have a son. The Holy One, Blessed be He, said to him: \u201cGet out\u201d from your astrology, as there is no constellation (mazal) for Israel.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

We\u2019d think that\u2019s a pretty good \u201cproof\u201d, but the discussion doesn\u2019t quite end there. A few lines later, we\u2019re told that:<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Rabbi Akiva had a daughter, and Chaldean astrologers told him that on the same day that she enters the wedding canopy, a snake will bite her and she will die.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

What to do? Is there anything to do? Rabbi Akiva worries. But, how can the righteous Rabbi Akiva, of all people, even consider that there\u2019s truth to the Chaldeans\u2019 astrologers know what they\u2019re talking about? Perhaps he does know that words and \u201cmazal\u201d have power. What he learns, and we are reminded of with him, is that through sincere action and heartfelt kindness, it can be changed; that while there may be truth to it, there\u2019s Something stronger.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69749,"alt":"","title":"jer10-astrology","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","width":1280,"height":977,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-300x229.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":229,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-768x586.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":586,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-1024x782.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":782,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":977,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":977,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-1200x916.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":916,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-550x420.png","home_baner-width":550,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Astrology And The Jews","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Be not dismayed by portents in the sky","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69749,"alt":"","title":"jer10-astrology","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","width":1280,"height":977,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-300x229.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":229,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-768x586.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":586,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-1024x782.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":782,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":977,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":977,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-1200x916.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":916,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-astrology-550x420.png","home_baner-width":550,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"384","name":"God","old_id":"784"},{"term_id":"783","name":"Destiny","old_id":"1183"},{"term_id":"999","name":"Astrology","old_id":"1399"}]},{"order":8,"id":"117434","color":"#f6edf6","size":"1","name":"The Tanakh Podcast-Jeremiah10 ","post_title":"The Tanakh Podcast-Jeremiah10","slug":"the-tanakh-podcast-jeremiah10","old_id":"117434","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":33692,"post_title":"Alex Israel","slug":"33692-2","old_id":"33692","first_name":"Alex","last_name":"Israel","description":"Alex Israel teaches Tanakh at the Pardes Institute, Yeshivat Eretz Hatzvi and Matan, Jerusalem. His first book \"I Kings - Torn in Two\" was published in 2013. See his website www.alexisrael.org, and his podcasts at https:\/\/elmad.pardes.org\/ and https:\/\/tanachstudy.com\/ \r\n","credit":"","image_url":"","short_description":"Alex Israel teaches Tanakh at the Pardes Institute, Yeshivat Eretz Hatzvi and Matan, Jerusalem.","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":33693,"alt":"","title":"alex israel","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel.jpg","width":1657,"height":2500,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-199x300.jpg","medium-width":199,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-679x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":679,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-679x1024.jpg","large-width":679,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel.jpg","1536x1536-width":1018,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel.jpg","2048x2048-width":1357,"2048x2048-height":2048,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-795x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":795,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/alex-israel-278x420.jpg","home_baner-width":278,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"4","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"","post_main_content_content":"","post_main_content_image":"","post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"The Tanakh Podcast","tile_main_caption":"Jeremiah 10: Mocking Idolatry","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"This chapter intersperses depictions of God's greatness with statements belittling the idols that the nations serve, encouraging Israel to remain true to their faith.","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":108885,"alt":"","title":"-635baf915f04f--635baf915f050tanakh podcast - 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","post_title":"Whence Aramaic?","slug":"whence-aramaic","old_id":"69833","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":34243,"post_title":"Moshe Sokolow","slug":"moshe-sokolow","old_id":"34243","first_name":"Moshe","last_name":"Sokolow","description":"Dr. Moshe Sokolow is Associate Dean of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, Yeshiva University, and teaches a weekly class in parashat hashavu`a at Lincoln Square Synagogue. He is the author of TANAKH: An Owner\u2019s Manual (Jerusalem: Urim\/Ktav, 2015).\r\n\r\n","short_description":"Dr. Moshe Sokolow is Associate Dean of the Azrieli Graduate School of Jewish Education and Administration, Yeshiva University","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":34244,"alt":"","title":"sokolow","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","width":302,"height":300,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow-300x298.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":298,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","medium_large-width":302,"medium_large-height":300,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","large-width":302,"large-height":300,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","1536x1536-width":302,"1536x1536-height":300,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","2048x2048-width":302,"2048x2048-height":300,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","post_full_size-width":302,"post_full_size-height":300,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/sokolow.jpg","home_baner-width":302,"home_baner-height":300}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Which distant population is addressed here?\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

Thus shall you say to them: Let the gods, who did not make heaven and earth, perish from the earth and from under these heavens (11).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

This verse is unique in one significant respect: It is in Aramaic, while the rest of the Book of Jeremiah is in Hebrew. Whom Jeremiah was addressing here, and why he did so in Aramaic, naturally intrigued the exegetes.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Rashi wrote, \u201cThis is a letter that Jeremiah sent to [King] Jehoiachin and the [Jews] in exile to respond to the Chaldeans, in Aramaic, if they were to tell them to worship idols.\u201d Rashi assumed, correctly, that Aramaic was a language understood in Babylonia, although we know that it was not the everyday spoken language (which was Babylonian), but was generally reserved for official use.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

We may recall from Isaiah 36 that when the Assyrian Rabshakeh addressed the emissaries of King Hezekiah at the outskirts of Jerusalem, they asked him not to speak in \u201cJudean\u201d (<\/span>Yehudit<\/span><\/em>), which everyone within earshot could understand, but in Aramaic, which was understood by courtiers as it was the \u201clingua franca\u201d of the ancient Near East. Radak concurred, observing that Jeremiah issued a warning against idolatry to the Jews as well, but that Scripture kept it all in Aramaic so as not to have a bilingual verse.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Shadal*, however, had reservations about their interpretation.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Rashi and Radak thought that this verse was written in Aramaic because it was a letter Jeremiah sent to the people in exile with Jehoiachin. This would be quite a stretch if he were to incite the people to insult their captors. He told them the opposite: \u201cSeek the peace of the city to which I have exiled you; if it is at peace, so will you be at peace\u201d (29:7). How could he tell them to belittle them with these words, and how could that bring them peace?<\/span><\/p>\r\n

It appears to me that after saying \u201cnations cannot endure His rage\u201d (10:10), he said that those who served the true God would have no fear of the anger of idols and their worshippers. These [devout] deserved to be addressed forthrightly and in their own language in order to understand that those deities deserved to perish from the earth. In order not to appear afraid of idolaters, he added these words in Aramaic, \u201cThus shall you say to them\u2026\u201d, so that if among the people there were some of these idolaters they would hear him addressing all the people [and not only their Babylonian captors].<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Shadal also cited and rejected the opinion of a Christian scholar named Hubigant who suggested that the Aramaic was originally part of a Targum that was inadvertently reinserted into the biblical text by a careless copyist, calling that supposition \u201ca dream.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

*For an explanation of our objectives in studying Shadal\u2019s commentary, <\/span>see our introduction<\/span><\/a> in Jeremiah chapter 1.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Image: Aramaic - selection from the Syriac Peshitta.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69834,"alt":"","title":"jer10-aramaic","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","width":408,"height":272,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","medium_large-width":408,"medium_large-height":272,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","large-width":408,"large-height":272,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","1536x1536-width":408,"1536x1536-height":272,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","2048x2048-width":408,"2048x2048-height":272,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","post_full_size-width":408,"post_full_size-height":272,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","home_baner-width":408,"home_baner-height":272}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Whence Aramaic?","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Which distant population is addressed here?","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69834,"alt":"","title":"jer10-aramaic","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","width":408,"height":272,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","medium_large-width":408,"medium_large-height":272,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","large-width":408,"large-height":272,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","1536x1536-width":408,"1536x1536-height":272,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","2048x2048-width":408,"2048x2048-height":272,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","post_full_size-width":408,"post_full_size-height":272,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-aramaic.jpg","home_baner-width":408,"home_baner-height":272}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"493","name":"Aramaic","old_id":"893"},{"term_id":"948","name":"Babylonians","old_id":"1348"}]},{"order":10,"id":"69751","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"God Is Truth ","post_title":"God Is Truth","slug":"god-is-truth","old_id":"69751","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":36277,"post_title":"Yedidya Sinclair","slug":"yedidya-sinclair","old_id":"36277","first_name":"Yedidya","last_name":"Sinclair","description":"Rabbi Yedidya Sinclair serves as Senior Rabbinic Scholar at Hazon, the leading US Jewish environmental organization. From 2011-16 he was Vice President for Research and Senior Economist at Energiya Global, a Jerusalem-based solar energy company focused on the developing world and he continues to consult on renewable energy and climate change preparedness. In 2014 he published together with Hazon, a translation of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook's great work on shmitta, the Sabbatical year, \"Introduction to Shabbat Ha'aretz.\" Yedidya holds a BA from Oxford University, an MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard and lives with his family in Jerusalem.","short_description":"Yedidya Sinclair is a Jerusalem-based rabbi and economist, and is Senior Rabbinic Scholar at Hazon. ","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":36278,"alt":"","title":"yedidya sinclair","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","width":200,"height":200,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","medium-width":200,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","medium_large-width":200,"medium_large-height":200,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","large-width":200,"large-height":200,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","1536x1536-width":200,"1536x1536-height":200,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","2048x2048-width":200,"2048x2048-height":200,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","post_full_size-width":200,"post_full_size-height":200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/yedidya-sinclair.jpg","home_baner-width":200,"home_baner-height":200}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Unlike those wooden idols...\r\n\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

\"The Lord God is Truth (10:10) is probably the second most famous line of today's chapter (after the door-opening Seder night moment in verse 25 of \"pour out your wrath...). Our recital of the Shema runs on into the next chapter to include the word truth, so that we can declare Jeremiah's affirmation that God is truth (Talmud Berachot 14b).<\/span><\/p>\r\n

But what does it mean? The context helps us understand. The God of truth is contrasted with the blocks of wood that surrounding peoples worshipped. Jeremiah denounces the ways of neighboring nations as \"dull and foolish; \"following a doctrine that is but delusion\" (Jer 8:10). Serving something that's fixed and finite, like a piece of wood, makes even smart people stupid, the prophet implies.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

As opposed to this stultifying error, \"The Lord God is Truth.\" (10:10) Rashi picks up on the context commenting, <\/span><\/p>\r\n

Why? Because He is the Living God and King forever and therefore can stand behind His words; unlike people, who say they will do something, then they die, or become weak or lose their money and they cannot do it.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Since God is not limited as human beings are, God's words and commitments are backed by reliable truth, whereas people's promises even if they mean them sincerely, are subject to human contingency and failure.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

The Talmud grasps the depths of Jeremiah's meaning in a beautiful passage from Taanit 5a that urges us to open our minds to the possibility that \"there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy,\u201d as Hamlet said. Quoting our verse, \"with one thing they are made foolish their doctrine is delusion, a piece of wood,\" the Talmud interprets the \"one thing\" that makes you foolish as idol worship. But, citing an early verse in Jeremiah, this one thing was really two things: \"they have abandoned Me, a source of living waters and hewn out broken cisterns that can hold no water,\" the prophet accuses (Jeremiah 2:13.). Not merely did the people abandon God, a source of ever renewing life, but they also quarried for themselves Gods who, like broken water pits, leached away the very life that was poured into them.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

Unlike the wooden idols whose fixed nature cramps and limits the worldview of those who believe in them, the God whom Jeremiah affirms as true is alive, infinite and the grounds of endless\u00a0 possibility.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69752,"alt":"","title":"jer10-idol1","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","width":1079,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-169x300.jpg","medium-width":169,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-575x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":575,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-575x1024.jpg","large-width":575,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","1536x1536-width":863,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","2048x2048-width":1079,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-674x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":674,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-236x420.jpg","home_baner-width":236,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"God Is Truth","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Unlike those wooden idols...","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69752,"alt":"","title":"jer10-idol1","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","width":1079,"height":1920,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-169x300.jpg","medium-width":169,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-575x1024.jpg","medium_large-width":575,"medium_large-height":1024,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-575x1024.jpg","large-width":575,"large-height":1024,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","1536x1536-width":863,"1536x1536-height":1536,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1.jpg","2048x2048-width":1079,"2048x2048-height":1920,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-674x1200.jpg","post_full_size-width":674,"post_full_size-height":1200,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-idol1-236x420.jpg","home_baner-width":236,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"384","name":"God","old_id":"784"},{"term_id":"429","name":"Idolatry","old_id":"829"},{"term_id":"463","name":"Truth","old_id":"863"}]},{"order":11,"id":"69754","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Jeremiah: Prophet Or Prop Guy? ","post_title":"Jeremiah: Prophet Or Prop Guy?","slug":"jeremiah-prophet-or-prop-guy","old_id":"69754","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":69743,"post_title":"Jonathan Hodson","slug":"jonathan-hodson","old_id":"69743","first_name":"Jonathan ","last_name":"Hodson ","description":"Rabbi Jonathan Hodson is the assistant rabbi at Temple Beth Sholom, in Las Vegas Nevada. He was ordained by the Ziegler School of Rabbinic studies and is a graduate of Texas State University.","short_description":"Rabbi Jonathan Hodson is the assistant rabbi at Temple Beth Sholom, in Las Vegas Nevada.","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":69744,"alt":"","title":"jonathan hodson","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","width":293,"height":364,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson-241x300.jpg","medium-width":241,"medium-height":300,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","medium_large-width":293,"medium_large-height":364,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","large-width":293,"large-height":364,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","1536x1536-width":293,"1536x1536-height":364,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","2048x2048-width":293,"2048x2048-height":364,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","post_full_size-width":293,"post_full_size-height":364,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jonathan-hodson.jpg","home_baner-width":293,"home_baner-height":364}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"Warning against assimilation using trees...\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

Jeremiah is my favorite prophet, because of his use of props during his illustrative condemnations. This is a guy who could keep any congregation awake on a Saturday morning, because the items he uses to aid in his talks vary from the ordinary to the strange. Throughout his time as a prophet, Jeremiah\u2019s metaphors and analogies include, but are not limited to: an almond branch, a boiling pot, a decrepit girdle (that he is to hide in the rocks), a smashed pot, two baskets of figs, a cup of poison, and a yoke of exile. He uses these items to paint one overarching idea: the nation of Israel is headed for immediate trouble unless change happens.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

My favorite image that Jeremiah employs, is here in chapter 10. He describes the practices of the other nations as delusional, noting <\/span><\/p>\r\n

They cut a tree out of the forest, and a craftsman shapes it with his chisel. They adorn it with silver and gold; they fasten it with hammer and nails so it will not totter.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

What Jeremiah is describing here sounds remarkably similar to a modern Christmas tree. Obviously, the practice of using evergreen and fir trees as a Christmas ritual wouldn\u2019t happen for a long time after the prophet lived (historians suggest this custom began in Germany in the 16<\/span>th<\/span> century), but Jeremiah would have certainly been familiar with other ancient pagan practices involving trees.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

For instance, Ancient Egyptians were said to have celebrated the winter solstice by decorating their homes with the green leaves of date palms. In Rome, to celebrate the feast of Saturnalia, Romans decorated their homes with evergreen branches and candles. Both of these holidays are the roots (pun intended) of what would eventually evolve into the modern Christmas holiday.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

By no means am I the first to notice the connection between Jeremiah\u2019s prophecy and the modern day Tannenbaum, and there certainly have been debates as to what exactly the prophet is describing in this chapter. What is clear, however, is that Jeremiah is yet again warning the people of assimilation through the alluring practices of other nations. This theme is likewise abundant in the Torah as well, when God tells the Jewish people to avoid the ways of the Canaanites.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

So, is Jeremiah cautioning the reader against yuletide traditions, or is this just another visual in his arsenal of images? Is Jeremiah the prophet, or the prop guy? I\u2019ll let you decide. Either way, he\u2019s fit for \u201ctinsel\u201d town.<\/span><\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":69756,"alt":"","title":"jer10-tree","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","width":1280,"height":1078,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-300x253.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":253,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-768x647.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":647,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-1024x862.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":862,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":1078,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":1078,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-1200x1011.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1011,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-499x420.png","home_baner-width":499,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"","tile_main_caption":"Jeremiah: Prophet Or Prop Guy?","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Warning against assimilation using trees...","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":69756,"alt":"","title":"jer10-tree","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","width":1280,"height":1078,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-300x253.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":253,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-768x647.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":647,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-1024x862.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":862,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","1536x1536-width":1280,"1536x1536-height":1078,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree.png","2048x2048-width":1280,"2048x2048-height":1078,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-1200x1011.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":1011,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/02\/jer10-tree-499x420.png","home_baner-width":499,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"478","name":"Christianity","old_id":"878"},{"term_id":"553","name":"Trees","old_id":"953"},{"term_id":"840","name":"Jeremiah","old_id":"1240"},{"term_id":"854","name":"Metaphor","old_id":"1254"}]},{"order":12,"id":"69732","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Isaiah Speaks In Tongues ","post_title":"Isaiah Speaks In Tongues","slug":"isaiah-speaks-in-tongues","old_id":"69732","type":"event","iframe":"","writer":{"id":54356,"post_title":"Robert Alter","slug":"robert-alter","old_id":"54356","first_name":"Robert ","last_name":"Alter","description":"Robert Alter is the Class of 1937 Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at the University of California at Berkeley, where he has taught since 1967. He has written over twenty books, focusing on such topics as the European novel from the 18th century to the present, contemporary American fiction, and modern Hebrew literature. He has also written extensively on the literary aspects of the Bible. His most recent work is his monumental three volume translation of the entire Hebrew Bible - The Hebrew Bible, W. W. Norton & Co., 2019 - from which the selections in 929 are taken. ","short_description":"Robert Alter is the Class of 1937 Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature at the University of California at Berkeley, and author of the three-volume translation of the entire Hebrew Bible - The Hebrew Bible, W. W. Norton & Co., 2019.","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":54357,"alt":"","title":"robert alter","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","width":184,"height":275,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","medium-width":184,"medium-height":275,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","medium_large-width":184,"medium_large-height":275,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","large-width":184,"large-height":275,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","1536x1536-width":184,"1536x1536-height":275,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","2048x2048-width":184,"2048x2048-height":275,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","post_full_size-width":184,"post_full_size-height":275,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/robert-alter.jpg","home_baner-width":184,"home_baner-height":275}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"To address the Aramaic-speaking Judahite exiles\r\n","post_main_content_content":"

10:11 \u201cThus shall you say to them: gods that have not made the heavens and the earth shall perish from the earth and from beneath these heavens.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\r\n

This entire verse is in Aramaic, being the only complete sentence in Aramaic in the Hebrew Bible apart from the Aramaic sections of Nehemiah and Daniel. There have been suggestions from Late Antiquity onward that Jeremiah is addressing the group of Judahites exiled to Babylonia in 597 B.C.E, who would have been constrained to speak in Aramaic to their pagan captors.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n

From: Robert Alter, The Hebrew Bible<\/em>, vol. 2: Prophets, W. W. Norton & Co., 2019, ad loc. By permission of the author.<\/span><\/p>\r\n

 <\/p>","post_main_content_image":{"id":54890,"alt":"","title":"Alter-Cover","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","width":1200,"height":693,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-300x173.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":173,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-768x444.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":444,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-1024x591.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":591,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","1536x1536-width":1200,"1536x1536-height":693,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","2048x2048-width":1200,"2048x2048-height":693,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-1200x693.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":693,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-727x420.jpg","home_baner-width":727,"home_baner-height":420}},"post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"From Robert Alter's Bible Translation and Commentary","tile_main_caption":"Isaiah Speaks In Tongues","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"To address the Aramaic-speaking Judahite exiles","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":54890,"alt":"","title":"Alter-Cover","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","width":1200,"height":693,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-300x173.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":173,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-768x444.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":444,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-1024x591.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":591,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","1536x1536-width":1200,"1536x1536-height":693,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover.jpg","2048x2048-width":1200,"2048x2048-height":693,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-1200x693.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":693,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Alter-Cover-727x420.jpg","home_baner-width":727,"home_baner-height":420}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","links":false,"tile_link_for_pay":"0","send_noty":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":[{"term_id":"493","name":"Aramaic","old_id":"893"}]},{"order":13,"id":"69018","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"A Lesson on the Daily Chapter- Jeremiah 10 ","post_title":"A Lesson on the Daily Chapter- Jeremiah 10","slug":"a-lesson-on-the-daily-chapter-jeremiah-10","old_id":"69018","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":40936,"post_title":"David Silber","slug":"david-silber-2","old_id":"40936","first_name":"David ","last_name":"Silber ","description":"Rabbi David Silber is the Founder and Dean of Drisha Institute for Jewish Education. 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\u201cPain, Disability, and Suffering\u201d<\/a> by Aron Wander: What do Jewish texts say about our physical struggles?<\/p>\r\n

\u201cA Survey of Chosenness\u201d<\/a> by Rabbi Alex Kress: Explore what it could mean for a people to be chosen.\u00a0<\/p>","post_main_content_image":"","post_main_content_embedded_video":"","post_main_content_video_duration":"","post_main_content_show_fb_comments":"1","post_main_content_credit_media":"","tile_top_caption":"Go deeper into the chapter....","tile_main_caption":"Source Sheets - Jeremiah 10","tile_main_caption_size":"1","tile_sub_caption":"Links to learning resources","tile_preview_embedded":"","tile_preview_image":{"id":42232,"alt":"","title":"sefaria-words-sunburst","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","width":608,"height":395,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst-300x195.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":195,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","medium_large-width":608,"medium_large-height":395,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","large-width":608,"large-height":395,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","1536x1536-width":608,"1536x1536-height":395,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","2048x2048-width":608,"2048x2048-height":395,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","post_full_size-width":608,"post_full_size-height":395,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/sefaria-words-sunburst.png","home_baner-width":608,"home_baner-height":395}},"tile_preview_video":"","tile_external_link":"","tile_tile_gallery_items":"","tile_credits":"Sefaria word sunburst visualization","alternate_tile_top_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption":"","alternate_tile_main_caption_size":"1","alternate_tile_sub_caption":"","alternate_tile_hide_media":"0","tile_group_preview_image_url":"","tile_group_main_caption":"","tile_group_sub_caption":"","tile_group_popup_package_extra_content":"","tile_group_read_time":"","home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo_seo_title":"","seo_seo_description":"","seo_seo_default_title":"","seo_seo_default_description":"","old_create_date":"","links":false,"chapter_info":{"books_group":"Prophets","book":"Jeremiah","chapter":"10","chapter_main_number":"410","date":"20270325","wall_id":"410"},"link_for_pay":false,"tags":false},{"order":15,"id":"69730","color":"#e2f4fa","size":"1","name":"Points to Ponder - Jeremiah 10 ","post_title":"Points to Ponder - Jeremiah 10","slug":"points-to-ponder-jeremiah-10","old_id":"69730","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":{"id":38102,"post_title":"929-English","slug":"929-english","old_id":"38102","first_name":"","last_name":"929-English","description":"","short_description":"","credit":"","image_url":"","hide_writer":false,"link_for_pay":false,"image":{"id":38333,"alt":"","title":"\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5","caption":"","description":"","mime_type":"image\/png","url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","width":1513,"height":860,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-150x150.png","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-300x171.png","medium-width":300,"medium-height":171,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-768x437.png","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":437,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-1024x582.png","large-width":1024,"large-height":582,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","1536x1536-width":1513,"1536x1536-height":860,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5.png","2048x2048-width":1513,"2048x2048-height":860,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-1200x682.png","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":682,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/\u05dc\u05d5\u05d2\u05d5-739x420.png","home_baner-width":739,"home_baner-height":420}},"tags":false},"related_cahpter":"410","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content_description":"","post_main_content_content":"

    \r\n\t
  1. Aramaic?.<\/em> What is a sentence in Aramaic doing in a Hebrew prophecy? A riddle with more than one answer. See traditional commentaries and academic literature.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t
  2. Regards from Isaiah<\/em>. The prophecy in verses 1-16 about the worthlessness of idols, is exceptional in Jeremiah, but is very reminiscent of the prophecies from the second part of Isaiah. Remeber? Isaiah chapters <\/span>40<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>41<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>44<\/span><\/a>, <\/span>45 <\/span><\/a>and <\/span>46<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t
  3. And regards too from the haggadah of seder Pesach<\/em>. The prayer to punish the oppressive nations in verse 25 - \u201cShefoch Chamatcha<\/em> - Pour out Your wrath on the nations who have not heeded You, Upon the clans that have not invoked Your name. For they have devoured Jacob, Have devoured and consumed him, And have laid desolate his homesteads\u201d - found its way into the Haggada, apparently because \u201cin every generation there are those who work for our destruction.\u201d<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t
  4. Reaching closure<\/em>. It\u2019s hard to find a connection between the two halves of the chapter, but let\u2019s try. The closing verse seeks to punish the \u201cnations who have not heeded You,\u201d and the \u201cclans who have not invoked Your name.\u201d This is similar to earlier in the chapter: there are those who believe in \u201ca work of mockery\u201d (verse 15), as opposed to those for whom God is their Lord, \u201cNot like these is the Portion of Jacob; For it is He who formed all things, And Israel is His very own tribe: LORD of Hosts is His name\u201d (verse 16).<\/span><\/li>\r\n<\/ol>","post_main_content_image":{"id":86314,"alt":"","title":"Points to 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