The Bible

 

Jeremiah 45

Study

   

1 The word that Jeremiah the prophet spake unto Baruch the son of Neriah, when he wrote these word in a book at the mouth of Jeremiah, in the fourth year of Jehoiakim the son of Josiah, king of Judah, saying,

2 Thus saith Jehovah, the God of Israel, unto thee, O Baruch:

3 Thou didst say, Woe is me now! for Jehovah hath added sorrow to my pain; I am weary with my groaning, and I find no rest.

4 Thus shalt thou say unto him, Thus saith Jehovah: Behold, that which I have built will I break down, and that which I have planted I will pluck up; and this in the whole land.

5 And seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not; for, behold, I will bring evil upon all flesh, saith Jehovah; but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey in all places whither thou goest.

   

Commentary

 

Weary

  

On the surface, it appears that Swedenborg gives two different representations for “weariness.” In discussing Genesis - where Esau and later Jacob are described as “weary” - he says it represents a state of temptation, an interior spiritual conflict. In discussing passages from several other places, however, he says “weariness” represents a lack of truth, having no concept of how to be good. But these two ideas are not as disconnected as they seem. Temptation arises when the interior, rational parts of our minds - which can be elevated to grasp deeper truths about life and the Lord - come into conflict with the exterior, natural parts of our minds, where we are driven by bodily desires and cling to false ideas that support those desires. Part of the process is clearing those falsities out of the lower parts of our minds so that the deeper truths can enter in. In that in-between stage, when the falsities are being driven away but we have not embraced the deeper truth yet, we can feel pretty empty. people who have been through serious temptations will likely relate to this - at some point along the way you feel like you have no idea what is right and what is wrong. If at those moments we can give up trying to figure it out and trust in the Lord, we'll be OK - but we will likely be pretty tired, too.