People make a lot of promises when crises happen - then renege on them as soon as things calm down.
This is what seems to have happened in Jerusalem in the years leading up to the final conquest by Babylon: But the bigger victims here were the slaves.
Slavery was common in Judea as it was all over in those days. People owned slaved, some of the Judean and some from other cultures. Despite the Torah law to free Judean/Hebrew slaves every seven years, it seems that this was one more moral law that the Jerusalem elites preferred to ignore.
But then something happens - unclear why and when, mid siege, King Zedekiah orders all the people to emancipate their slaves.
Historians suggest that this was during the worse moment of the siege, when it was clear that slaves would not be needed to work the fields - those were out of town and not accessible, but human power was needed to fight and build more walls. Another plausible reason is that it was the S’hmita year - the sabbatical year of release.
Filled with remorse and hopes of pleasing the deity, the king resorts to the ancient laws and demands the slaves go free. At first the people obey but then they change their minds:
“Everyone, officials and people, who had entered into the covenant agreed to set their male and female slaves free and not keep them enslaved any longer; they complied and let them go.
But afterward they turned about and brought back the men and women they had set free, and forced them into slavery again.”
Jeremiah was furious. His tirade, lasting many verses, blamed the people for betraying the covenant and warned them their due punishment -- those who enslave shall be slaves themselves, preyed upon by every beast, vulture, plague and war.
But what happened here? Why did Jerusalem’s slave owners change their minds and how long did it take? What is this story all about?
Robert Alter writes, making sense of this moment historically: “This may have been during the early months of 587 B.C.E, when the Babylonians temporarily lifted the siege, an event alluded to in verse 21. This act of reclaiming the slaves reflects not only the bad faith of the Judahites but also their previous inclination to ignore the injunction (Exodus 21:2, Deuteronomy 15:1-2) that a Hebrew slave had to be set free at the end of seven years.”
It’s possible, as other scholars suggest, that the king tried to do the right thing, bring the people back into a more moral high ground, even as the ground was burning - but the court, as always more interested in power than justice - got in his way. The freed slaves had no work as the siege was on and were not able to feed themselves, and their previous owners used this to their own advantage - but not for long.
This was what brought about Jeremiah’s rage: None will survive.
There is one more historical curious fact regarding this brief attempt at emancipation. A similar story, with more successful outcomes, happened around the same time - not too far away.
In Athens, Solon, a local aristocrat, statesman and poet considered one of the fathers of democracy, became the Archeon, or leader, in 594 BCE. One of the first laws he managed to pass was the return of privately owned proprietary to farmers who had become serfs and indentured slaves to local lords. He managed to prevent a civil war and plant the seeds for what will one day become the early Greek models of democracy.
Was Zedekiah inspired or influenced by similar ideas? Was there some sort of communication between these different cultures and the ideas emanating to improve people’s lives? We’ll never know. Solon went on to pave the way to Western democracy. Zedekiah, despite Jeremiah’s promises to him earlier in this chapter that he will end in peace and be buried with his ancestors in Jerusalem, with all the respect due a king - will not. Jerusalem could have been there with Athens leading the world towards more justice, but instead succumbed to a futile mutiny that will eliminate its power -- but not our lasting aspirational hopes for a legacy of justice - for all.
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