We must not completely disregard the viewpoint that Jeremiah, along with Job, attacked. For the "correct" view makes some sense when nations are involved, even though it may look absurd when related to individuals. We saw (in Chapter 6) that the prophets believed in a kind of "rough justice" in the long sweep of history. They believed that if a nation consistently went against the will of the righteous God, that nation would ultimately perish. The nation couldn't "get away with it" forever.
Fine, you say, so long as you are top dog and not getting trampled on.
But a nation being trampled on would hardly talk like that. . . .
And the whole spectacular point of the prophets is that their country got trampled on and they did talk like that. Just like that. This was the way they interpreted their own suffering, not somebody else's. Micah, for example, speaks to his own people, and says:
Your rich men are full of violence; your inhabitants speak lies, and their tongue is deceitful in their mouth.
Therefore I have begun to smite you, making you desolate because of your sins.
( Micah 6: 12, 13)
The nation is smitten, the lands are despoiled -- almost everybody gets carried off into exile. And perhaps the most amazing fact of Old Testament history is that instead of interpreting their national disaster as a proof of the fact that God had deserted them, they could see it as an example of the fact that God did care for them, and was using these means to "bring them to their senses," so that they would give up their evil ways and return to him. A lesson was taught to them as an entire nation.
As an entire nation, yes. But if you try to say that good individuals are always rewarded, and bad individuals are always punished, then you are saddled with the vigorous protests of Job and Jeremiah.
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