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To live in the nuclear age is to liVe with a mental and emotional «burden heaviqrixmuqh hegVier fihan Efiy‘previofis generafiionfi has had_tb ‘
‘bear in the whoie Of human higéory; ’It ié‘fo livé with the awru1%thpught that we may possibly be the last generétipnj not ofilf that our own liférk» “ and the lifé of our childrén may be cut short by a fiherho~nuclear “
explosibn, but thai everything that mankind has achiévefl and hofied 'for thousands of years
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may come to a sudQen éndr
know that this Qiil happen; it ié only a possibility; but it is
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pdsSibi1ity;.énd as each series or nugiear tésts is foiipfied by anbfihef,:v“ siniéter inevifability, so fhe chances that sooner or with Séemihgly " dgily ‘7"‘ ‘Iater the worgt will happen appéaf to be growing/in magnitude. ‘
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If we'want fio keep our sanity in sfiEh a situationg there afé
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Vapparently two gqurses openifo‘us, and both of them are illustrated bi an incident in the life of Jeremiéh which ialpe1atefl in the Haftarah ';
traditionally appointed for this Safibath. :It happened in the year"587h B,C.E. when Jérfiéalem; alreaayibnnnueréd a few yfars nreviously by the‘ ‘
Babylonians,'waé once again besigged by the enemy; ,It was,obvious that 1the city could not hoid Sub much lopget; that the end was very fiear. u
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But what was only now realised by everybody had been foreseen by Jeremiah‘ 'long befone, éhd-becausé he had predicted it.pub1ic1y hé had been “
imprisoned for unpatriotic.condugt;_ Nov, when his prophecies seemed' ‘abbufi to cpmég%rue, Jeéemiah was visited ip‘firiéoh by a relative indmiil‘
his native viliage of Anathoth, by the name 6f Hafiamel, who wished £0;
dispose q: a piede of lénd. Jerémiah immediately agreeq 60 buy it f§¥r Sefenteep Shekels of silver.» That is %he simple gfiory, but its inéérest & lies in the’atfiitudes of mind of the two men. " ‘
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Hanamel had decided that there was no hope for the future.
What
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value to him was there in a piece of land which would soon be devastated by the invadiqg army? ‘On the other hand, With seventeen Shekels’in hisl pocket he could at least enjoy himselfT have a good time, during whatever‘ perfod of life and liberty remained before the final doom. His attitude;f
in_other wordsm was "Let us eat and drink, far tomorrow we die," Quite aifije'rent was themati‘ti‘tude
Jerusalem would sewn be destroyed,
‘r‘blf‘Jeremiahw
He too
that
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But he did not believe that it would‘
'be the end 03 everything.‘ Something; he Was convificed; would be saved
out of the wreckage.
Life would go 6n.
Judaism would survive, Jerusalem
wgqld be rebuiik, the Kingdom of GOGVWOgld yet be established. This was with him a matter of religioué conviction, based on the divine promises rece;ved, as he believed, by himself and previous prophets. ‘
And it is this implicit faith whiéh, unfortgnately, many of us cannot”" share. The destruction of Jerusalem is, arter_a11, one thing; the destEJCLion of fine world, with which we must reckon; quite another: But perhaps Jeremiah tob had hié moments of doubt; and at such moments,
we may surmise, he argued as follows: "We do not know for certain that
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Jewish life will survive; but at leaét we have grounds for hoping so} and in the present mood of despondency and degpair it ;s this hope fibich needs to be emphasised; far when men live without hope they lose tfieir
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We must thérefbpe work on the assumption that life will qontinue, even if wé cannot be sure that the assumption is correct." ~it was in order to express this sense of:Values and abandon their moral principles.
philnéophyy gnd in order to stimulate this hope, that Jeremiah purchaged f the family eétatg at Anathoth, even though he knéw that it might sdon
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be seized and trampled uphn by the army of occupation. And it was from the game motivéflthafi he had written to thg Jewish exiles in Babylonié é few years éariier: "Build houéés and dwell in them; pl nt gardgns and eat their‘produceq Take wives and bear sons and fiamghters.“€
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“By fill this Jerefiiah did not méén that the people should‘biind'y mg: ‘xithémgelvgé to the reaiiéigs of tfie wdfid in which bhey'livéd, that ‘
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to happen,
behave as ii nbthing had happenéd and nothing was goinér Jeremiah fias the last person in the fiérld to ad§ocate a'r
Vfiheadeinffihe—eands éttitfideg
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on thq cofitrary; hé was for ever obndemningi
7the false
prophefis who said "peace, peace, when theré is no peacé", who 7,1u11ed the pedyle into a false sense pf securityr He comforted the
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"people with the hope fhgy in the end a1; fiodld be wail. "For I know" iibé fiianS-I have for ybuw sgysithé Ldrd, pians for wélfafie and.notk ‘.
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for ev;1, to give yog a future and a h9pe."‘ But he emphasised through; '
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prophgci§Sc
out all his
t phere
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was nothing autnmaiié in the fulfilg
.ment of finisjhope, that the people must deserve it by the Sihcefity of their repentance.
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The prééicament of the world today is inéampafébl& more serious A‘rhan.tha% hf the Judeané in Jeremiap‘s timés ‘
‘But fihé préper
attitmfie
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'to‘addpémis~the'same;
flq'must"nbt=eurrehéér fio Somfilete déépé;r,,and‘lf3 ‘fhen compefiaate for it by an irreeppnsyble punsfiit 6f Sensual pleaéfires§} But neither must we shut buf éyeg £0 the prdblems apd perils of_theg‘
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wfirld in which we live.
our proper course is to cultiVéie the hope, "~ V
and to work on the assumfiyion, that the filtimaté disaster will b?
averted; to bhild hoqses, £0 plant gardens anq to rear children;
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fbufi at the gdmfi time to fedoyble bur effort; t6 establish in ourg
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own lives, and in the life of enciety;mthose sténdards of righteousnessv
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" dnd justice, of brothérhood andrpeaéé, on which thétsurtival pf humanfty‘
must ultimateli aepend; in the knoyéedfie that God‘s intcntion is £0 give“, lt
,us a future and a hope, and that it is_up to us,
with him,"tzo realise that int‘entiém;
by our Co~9peration
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