Why does King Zedekiah send a delegation to inquire of Jeremiah if the Lord “will deal with us according to all his wonderful deeds”?

This next section of the book (Jeremiah 21:1–23:8) deals with what the Lord has to say about the kings who ruled in Judah during the time of Jeremiah’s ministry. In the first passage (Jeremiah 21:1–10) the assessment of the kings of Judah begins at the end. The historical setting for the passage is the reign of King Zedekiah who was the last king in Judah from 597-587 BC. It was under his rule that the Babylonian invasion took place. In the following passages Jeremiah 21:11–23:8 there is a look back at all the kings who reigned before Zedekiah, during Jeremiah’s ministry, describing the role they all played in bringing Judah to the situation described in Jeremiah 21:1–10, where judgment was inevitable. In the final passage (Jeremiah 23:1–8) there is a return to the rule of Zedekiah but only to draw a contrast with the righteous Branch that the Lord will raise up to finally be the king that Judah has always needed.

There is a clear change in the message of the book from the start of Jeremiah 21:1–14. Up until this point Jeremiah has delivered a clear message of judgment but there was also always the offer of escaping judgment if Judah turned to the Lord in repentance, even if the reality of this happening was said to be minimal. From Jeremiah 21:1–14 onwards, Jeremiah’s message becomes one of inescapable judgment in the form of the Babylonian invasion. The only sliver of hope is that the consequences of the judgment could be reduced if the people of Judah surrendered to the Babylonians.¹

 As mentioned above, the historical setting for the current passage (Jeremiah 21:1–10) is the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem in 588/589 BC. King Zedekiah of Judah had resisted the Babylonian empire because he believed that the Egyptians would come to his aid against the Babylonians. Late in 589 BC, the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar, responded to this rebellion by moving his forces south against Judah and, in January of 589 BC, placed Jerusalem under siege (2 Kings 25:1). King Zedekiah’s faith in the Egyptians proved to be misplaced and by the middle of the year the besieged city was in a desperate situation. He therefore sends a delegation to Jeremiah to inquire of the Lord.

The high-ranking delegation consisted of Pashhur, the son of Malchiah, and Zephaniah the priest, the son of Maaseiah. This is not the same Pashhur who arrested Jeremiah in Jeremiah 20:1–6. However, this Pashhur was also very opposed to Jeremiah and later tried to have him executed for treason (Jeremiah 38:1–13). Zephaniah the priest had replaced the Pashhur mentioned in Jeremiah 20:1 as the overseer of the temple and he seems to have been more sympathetic to Jeremiah. He was in fact later accused of not disciplining the prophet (Jeremiah 29:25–26).²

The Hebrew word daras, translated as inquire is often used in the Old Testament when people want to know what the Lord has to say about a particular situation (Genesis 25:22; Exodus 18:15; Deuteronomy 4:29; Deuteronomy 12:5; 1 Samuel 9:9; 1 Kings 22:5, 1 Kings 22:7–8; 2 Kings 3:11; 2 Kings 8:8; 2 Kings 22:13; Isaiah 31:1; Isaiah 55:6; Isaiah 65:10; Hosea 10:12; Amos 5:4–6 etc.).³ It was also not unusual for the kings of Israel to turn to the prophets to inquire of the Lord. In fact, the kings of Israel were supposed to wait to hear from the Lord as they ruled the Lord’s people. However, Zedekiah’s request for Jeremiah to inquire of the Lord is deeply ironic since he had done everything in his power to oppose the prophet and his message.⁴

It would seem that the desperate situation in Jerusalem has forced the king to ask Jeremiah if perhaps the Lord will deal with us according to all his wonderful deeds and will make him (Nebuchadnezzar) withdraw from us. Zedekiah is probably recalling the time when Jerusalem was besieged by the Assyrian king, Sennacherib, in 701 BC and the Lord caused him to withdraw (2 Kings 19:35–36).⁵ There is absolutely no indication in the request to Jeremiah that Zedekiah sees the need to repent before the Lord or that Judah’s sin is the reason they find themselves in this situation. Clearly, the message of judgment that Jeremiah has been preaching for 49 years has had absolutely no impact. The assumption is that the Lord will act again to save his covenant people despite their stubborn unfaithfulness.⁶