A Ruler’s Requirements (3)
This is what the Lord says: Do what is just and right. Rescue from the hand of the oppressor the one who has been robbed. Do no wrong or violence to the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place. Jeremiah 22:3 NIV
No wrong or violence – Do not mistreat (yānâ). Do not do violence (ḥāmas). Before we look at the implications of these two verbs, notice the categories of people who are involved. First, the gēr, that is, the stranger, the foreigner, the one who is temporarily in your land, the outsider. Second, the fatherless or orphan (yātôm). “The quality of one’s devotion is measured by how one treats the widow and the orphan. Justice is especially due them (Deut 24:17); if not, the curse of God comes on the congregation (Deut 24:19).”[1] “Do no wrong” entails considerably more than passive acknowledgement, as we shall discover. It’s not enough to make a contribution to an orphanage. Something else is required. And last, but not least, the widow (ʾalmānâ), a particularly vulnerable class of women in the ancient patriarchal world. Now that we have these socially at-risk people in mind, what does “do no wrong” and “do no violence” mean?
“Do no wrong” uses the participle of yānâ and the conditional negative ʾal. This seems a bit strange. Using the participle is understandable because this is not a one-time act. It is continuous attitude with subsequent actions for the well-being of those without social power. But the conditional negative seems weak. Shouldn’t this be an unconditional command with the same force as “honor your father and mother”? Gilchrist offers the answer, or at least a hint of the answer.
The prophets of the Babylonian crisis use the participle of yānâ in referring to Jerusalem the “oppressing city,” because her civil rulers have turned from the Lord, behave as “roaring lions,” profaning the sacred and doing violence to the law. Jeremiah 46:16 speaks of the oppressing sword (cf. 50:16).
The prophets considered these oppressive activities to be nothing less than sin against God. Hence political oppression and private affliction of slaves or aliens were denounced as contrary to God’s will for the covenantal people of the Lord.[2]
“Do no wrong,” rather “Do not mistreat” depends on the situation. The general principal of šālôm toward others is applied according to the circumstances. Each case of those oppressed will be a little different, and will therefore require some specific application of the principal, but there cannot be a hard and fast universal directive. What is required is the implementation of “love your neighbor” to the exact circumstances of the neighbor, no matter who the neighbor happens to be. Mistreatment is nothing more than the refusal to love.
What about “no violence”? The Hebrew term is easily recognized: ḥāmas. The radical Islamic organization intent on exterminating all Jews is known by the very word that encapsulates the horror, brutality, and sheer inhumanity of its members. Animals have more moral sense than these. When Jeremiah tells the rulers not to use violence against the helpless, he condemns most of human history. Violence has been the oil in the machine of subjugation and power for centuries.
Some clarification is necessary to properly understand this Hebrew word.
. . . the word ḥāmās in the ot is used almost always in connection with sinful violence. It does not refer to the violence of natural catastrophes or to violence as pictured in a police chase on modern television. It is often a name for extreme wickedness. It was a cause of the flood (Gen 6:11, 13, parallel to “corrupt”). Other usages are: a “malicious” witness (Ex 23:1; Deut 19:16 NIV); “cruel” hatred (Ps 25:19); oppression and violence (Ps 72:14 NIV); violence is risen up into a rod of wickedness (Ezk 7:11, a rod to punish wickedness, NIV). The aspect of sinfulness is illustrated also by the verb which twice refers to “transgression” of God’s law (Ezk 22:26; Zeph 3:4).[3]
In other words, punishment—even painful retribution—is not always violence in the biblical sense. A society that treats punishment of its criminals as if it were forbidden violence has lost the ability to practice righteousness because righteousness requires that the wicked be punished. ḥāmās is different. It is savage brutality against others for the sake of domination. It is the ultimate affront to equality of humanity in the image of God in Man for it operates on the belief that one person or group is manifestly superior to other people, so much so that maniacal force is justified. As Polybius wrote about Rome:
When Scipio thought that a sufficient number of troops had entered, he sent most of them, as is the Roman custom, against the inhabitants of the city with orders to kill all they encountered, sparing no one, and not to start pillaging until the signal was given. The Romans do this, I think, to inspire terror, so that when they take towns one may often see not only the corpses of human beings, but dogs cut in half and the dismembered limbs of other animals, and on this occasion such scenes were very many owing to the numbers of those in the place [emphasis added].[4]
ḥāmās is terror and its physical outcome.
Consider the three groups designated in this verse. If any of the people in these groups experience ḥāmās, then God holds the rulers responsible. Judgment will be inevitably exercised. Just wait. You’ll see. And hope you’re not in any leadership role when that happens.
Topical Index: yānâ, mistreat, ḥāmās, violence, terror, Jeremiah 22:3
[1] Hartley, J. E. (1999). 934 יתם. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 419). Moody Press.
[2] Gilchrist, P. R. (1999). 873 יָנָה. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 383). Moody Press.
[3] Harris, R. L. (1999). 678 חָמַס. In R. L. Harris, G. L. Archer Jr., & B. K. Waltke (Eds.), Theological Wordbook of the Old Testament (electronic ed., p. 297). Moody Press.
[4] https://newcriterion.com/article/the-roman-custom/
