3 That Yahweh thy Elohim may shew us the way wherein we may walk, and the thing that we may do.

A member of the royal family, who had fled to a neighbouring country, hearing of a Jewish governor having been placed over Judah, evidently thought he might open the way for his own elevation by getting rid of the said governor.

So Ishmael, son of Nethaniah, slew Gedaliah, son of Ahikam. On this, a panic naturally seized the people. They imagined that Nebuchadnezzar, on hearing of the murder of his lieutenant, would be sure to return and wreak vengeance on the miserable remnant of the people that had been left in his charge.

Their plan, therefore, was to get away and go down to Egypt, which had shown friendship to them, and which they reckoned would be sure to give them a friendly welcome and a safe asylum from the distractions of war. But before carrying out their plan, they thought they would consult Jeremiah whose words had so signally come to pass. They therefore applied to him, telling him of their ideas, but professing their willingness to be guided entirely by what commands he might receive from the Lord.

12 And I will shew mercies unto you, that he may have mercy upon you, and cause you to return to your own land.

Jeremiah submitted the matter to God, and in ten days he received an answer, whereupon arose a controversy in which was exemplified that curious perversity which, with the most surface show of reason, contends for an outrageous conclusion.

The message was that they were not to go down to Egypt, but to stay where they were. To this, the whole assembly demurred. They were bent on going down to Egypt.

"There," said they,

"we shall see no war nor hear the sound of the trumpet nor have hunger of bread."

It was natural for them to take this view. But then there was this plain other side: they had the divine assurance:

It was a case of natural fear against divine assurance: a case of faith versus unbelief, in which, as usual with Israel, the scale went heavily down in favour of unbelief, alias worldly wisdom. The whole congregation marched to Egypt, taking Jeremiah with them.

17 So shall it be with all the men that set their faces to go into Egypt to sojourn there; they shall die by the sword, by the famine, and by the pestilence: and none of them shall remain or escape from the evil that I will bring upon them.

When they came to the Egyptian frontier, at Tahpanhes, there was another message from the Lord of the most interesting character. Jeremiah was commanded to take large stones and bury them in the presence of the Jews under the brick-work at the entrance of Pharaoh's palace at Tahpanhes: and to say,

"Behold I will send and take Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon my servant, and I will set his throne upon these stones that I have hid, and he shall spread his royal pavilion over them." [43: 10]

Tahpanhes has lately been recovered through the excavations of Mr. Petrie. Pharaoh's palace has been found, and under the paved work about the entrance has been found stones which there seems every reason to believe are the very stones that were buried there by Jeremiah. What Jeremiah said, duly came to pass. Nebuchadnezzar invaded Egypt, encamping at Tahpanhes, and no doubt fixing headquarters on the very spot where the hidden stones lay under the ground.

Seasons 2. 60