This paper brings up a long standing question in the study of Ezekiel and his (or, the book’s) relationship to Jeremiah. A hypothetical scenario: if Jeremiah had arrived in Babylon after 586 B.C. E., would he be included among those whom Ezekiel had designated as the הטלפ , those survivors taken out of Jerusalem after its final destruction: those who were to serve as object lessons to the Jehoiachin Exiles, those whose very appearance and “ways” would show why God had had to destroy Jerusalem, and so cause them to be consoled (Ezek 14:21–23)? Ezekiel and Jeremiah are the two major prophets of the years before and after Judah’s destruction and at the beginning of the Babylonian exile. Yet neither refers to the other, either by name or obliquely, through explicit responses to the other’s claims.
I. Specifying the Problem
The date formulae in Haggai and Zechariah clarify that the prophets were active in Yehud within approximately the same months of the second year of Darius (520 B.C.E.), though in their extant writings they never refer to each other (See E. Assis, “The Temple in the Book of Haggai,” The Journal of Hebrew Scriptures 8 (2008): 5 n. 9). There is another way in which looking at Haggai and Zechariah may shed light on Jeremiah and Ezekiel. Haggai, and even more so Zechariah, have long been acknowledged as relying on “the former prophets” (Zech 1:4; 7:12). Although they do not name those to whom they refer, they each allude to specific prophecies (mainly those of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Deutero-Isaiah), or utilize in their own prophecies prophetic patterns and genres found in these predecessors/ Furthermore, this allusive character of both Haggai’s and Zechariah’s prophetic writing is not restricted to isolated prophetic traditions; they also appear to bring together multiple texts from diverse sources within biblical literature (See M.R. Stead (The Intertextuality of Zechariah 1–8 [LHB/OTS 506; New York: T & T Clark, 2009]). This allusive usage of biblical literature formulates theological and ideological deliberations between each of the prophets and their contemporaries.
The expectation that some kind of contact existed between Ezekiel and Jeremiah is based on the following indications:
A. Each of them recognizes their time as a period of intensive prophetic activity, marked by fierce polemics over both status and message (Jer 14:13–16; 23:9–40; 27–29; Ezek 13). Jeremiah mentions by name some prophets who were active in Babylon (Jer 29:21, 24) yet says nothing about that one prophet, Ezekiel. Is it reading too much into the text to wonder whether, when he quotes the Jehoiachin Exiles’ saying: םיאבנהוהיונלםיקה הלבב” The LORD has raised up prophets for us in Babylon” (Jer 29:15), Jeremiah is referring obliquely to (and putting down) Ezekiel? For the polemic tone of this quotation, see (W.L. Holladay, Jeremiah 2 (Hermeneia; Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 143; J.R. Lundbom, Jeremiah 21–37 (AB 21B; New York: Doubleday, 2004), 355). Indeed, according to Ezekiel’s own call narrative, he was called to his prophetic mission on the Kebar River in Babylon (Ezek 1:1).
B. Jeremiah and Ezekiel have quite similar personal backgrounds, as members of priestly families commissioned to prophesy (Ezek 1:3; Jer 1:1). Scholars have noted the differences in their descent, and even claimed a rivalry between their priestly families, since Ezekiel was of Jerusalemite, perhaps even of Zadokite, origin and Jeremiah was of the priests of Anatoth (Jer 1:1), who are said to have descended from Abiathar (J. Scharbert, “Wu¨rdigung der Prophetie Jeremias und Ezechiels,” in Die Propheten Israels um 600 v. Chr (Ko¨ln: J. P. Bachem, 1967), 459–478, esp. 466–469). Whatever the relations between their clans, we may assume some basic resemblance in their education and in their intellectual and spiritual formation (R. Kasher, Ezekiel 1–24 (Mikra LeIsrael; Tel Aviv: Am Oved; Jerusalem: The Hebrew University Magnes Press, 2004), 47).
C. The likelihood of connection between the prophets may also stem from the socio-political situation of the Judean communities from the early sixth century B.C.E. and onwards. Both Jeremiah and Ezekiel express in their individual prophecies the highly tense and even hostile relationship between the two Judean communities, the community left behind in Jerusalem and the Jehoiachin Exiles in Babylon (Jer 22:24–30; 32:6–15; Ezek 11:1–13, 14–21; 33:23–29). Both this personal data and the antagonism between the communities in Babylon and Jerusalem suggest the strong possibility that Jeremiah and Ezekiel would not only have known of each other by name, but also would have been aware of each other’s prophetic activity. If so, what are we to make of the silence of each in relation to the other? I want to propose that we investigate this silence itself as another datum in the struggle between the two Judean communities, in Babylon and in Judah, a conflict that we can trace back to the prophets themselves and follow on through the editorial strands of their books. On Ezekiel’s central role in this struggle see my earlier discussions:
- D. Rom-Shiloni, “Ezekiel as the Voice of the Exiles and Constructor of Exilic Ideology,” HUCA 76 (2005): 1– 45; idem, “Exiles and Those Who Remained: Strategies of Exclusivity in the Early Sixth Century BCE,” in Shai le-Sara Japhet: Studies in the Bible, its Exegesis and its Language (ed. M. Bar Asher, D. Rom-Shiloni, E. Tov, N. Wazana; Jerusalem: Bialik, 2007), 119–138 (in Hebrew). I have addressed the complicated picture in Jeremiah in idem, “GroupIdentities in Jeremiah: Is It the Persian Period Conflict?” in A Palimpsest: Rhetoric, Stylistics, and Language in Biblical Texts from the Persian and Hellenistic Periods (ed. E. BenZvi, D. Edelman and F. Polak; PHSC 5; Piscataway, N.J.: Gorgias, 2009), 11–46
D. Finally, in the literary sphere, questions arise that take into consideration the multiple layers of composition within each of the books. Thus, did Ezekiel know a written form of the prophecies of Jeremiah? If so, what might it have contained? Or since each of the prophetic books had gone through procedures of compilation and editorial stages, is Ezekiel only aware of an edited form of Jeremiah, already containing some editorial layers? Alternatively, or in addition, could there be a later connection between the editorial level(s) of Jeremiah and those of the book of Ezekiel? And are the seeming connections between the historical prophets in fact purely literary ones crafted by the circles of their followers and tradents?
- II. Ezekiel and Jeremiah: Scholarly Observations
Scholars of both Jeremiah and Ezekiel have attended to this issue, drawing implicit connections between the prophets and their books through verbal similarities, resemblances in imagery, and shared themes and conceptions. For the sake of this study, the full list of suggestions raised by R. Smend (1880), G. Fohrer (1952), J.W. Miller (1955), W. Zimmerli (1979), W.L. Holladay (1989), and R. Kasher (2004) (R. Smend, Der Prophet Ezechiel (2d ed.; Leipzig: Hirzel, 1880), xxiv; G. Fohrer, Die Hauptprobleme des Buches Ezechiel (BZAW 72; Berlin: de Gruyter, 1952), 135–140; J.W. Miller, Das Verha¨ltnis Jeremias und Hesekiels Sprachlich und Theologisch Untersucht, mit besonderer Beru¨cksichtigung der Prosareden Jeremias (Assen: Buchhandlung des Erziehungsvereiens Neukirchen Kreis Moers, 1955); W. Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1 (trans. R.E. Clements; Hermeneia; Philadelphia: Fortress, 1979; German original, 1969), 44; Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 81–84; Kasher, Ezekiel 1–24, 47–54). In his commentary on Ezekiel, Smend (1880) pointed out the great influence of “other prophetic scriptures” (Amos, Hosea, Isaiah and Zephaniah) on Ezekiel, but he considered that the greatest influence of all comes from Jeremiah. Thus, Smend presented a long list of over sixty parallel passages in Ezekiel and in Jeremiah.
Fohrer (1952), addressing the major problems of the book of Ezekiel, discussed the relationships between the two prophets, arguing that Ezekiel is clearly influenced by, and mostly dependent upon, Jeremiah. But when it came to discussing specific passages, Fohrer put forward thirty cases divided into three groups: in eighteen cases he found no connection whatsoever between the Ezekiel passage and the Jeremian parallel (see Die Hauptprobleme, 135–137); in six cases Fohrer accepted the possibility that Ezekiel knew some ideas similar to those of Jeremiah, though the verbal similarities were few; in an additional six cases Fohrer found a literal dependence of Ezekiel upon Jeremiah, and thus assumed that Ezekiel must have had these passages in writing. Based on this data, Fohrer concluded that Ezekiel had heard Jeremiah’s prophecy back in Jerusalem prior to 598 B.C.E., and was highly influenced by his thought. He knew some of Jeremiah’s prophecy by memory, but in other cases, according to Fohrer, Ezekiel must have had a written form of Jeremian prophecies. His literary dependence on Jeremiah was thus restricted to this early stage in Jeremiah’s prophetic career.
Miller addressed Smend’s sixty-two examples, rejecting forty-one of them as unacceptable for different reasons (Miller, Das Verha¨ltnis, 1 and n. 2–5) and leaving only twenty-one examples, some of which he still regarded as doubtful. In fifteen cases, Miller did find examples of common themes (pp. 86– 12): in prophecies against the false prophets (Jer 14:11–16; Ezek 13); in the prophets’ calls (Jer 1; Ezek 1–3); in historical passages (Jer 3:6–11; Ezek 16, 23); in parallel legal speeches (compare Jer 15:1–4; 16:1–18; 13:1–14 with Ezek 14:12–23; 24:15–27; 15); in Jeremiah’s deliberation over the current religious state of affairs (7:16–28), which is echoed in Ezekiel’s great vision of the abominations in Jerusalem (Ezekiel 8); in the words of consolation in Jeremiah 30–31, which accord with the consolations of Ezekiel in chapter 33 onward; and in the reversal of Jeremian judgment prophecies into words of salvation in Ezekiel (compare Jer 8:1–3 and Ezek 37:1–14). Miller also established connections between Ezekiel and specific segments of the book of Jeremiah. He argued that Ezekiel must have had a Jeremian text in front of him, which Miller assumed contained prose speeches from the scroll of Baruch in the form it had prior to 597 B.C.E.; the consolation prophecies of Jeremiah 30–31; and possibly also Jer 23:1–2; 23:23–40 (p. 119). Regarding other verbal similarities, shared images and word groups, Miller found examples which testify that Ezekiel was greatly influenced by Jeremiah. Yet he repeatedly classified these resemblances as stemming from common usage of that period, and thus as validating the contemporaneousness of the two prophets (in his words, “Jeremia und Hesekiel Zeitgenossen waren,” p. 117); he did not find those passages to indicate the clear literary dependence of one upon the other (pp. 116, 119, and passim).
Similarly, he assumed that Ezekiel was aware of Jeremiah’s letter to the Exiles (Jer 29:1–7, and see below), presumably via his priestly connections or through the discussions held within the exilic community (pp. 95–96). On the theological level, Miller found that common points of view unite these great prophets. For instance, he identified commonalities in their conceptions of the past (pp. 140–145), their ethical perspectives on the present (pp. 147–155), and their concepts of individual retribution (pp. 168–172). Miller highlighted the areas in which Ezekiel carried on his predecessor’s ideas and further adapted them to create his own proclamation. In his concluding remarks on the theological resemblances between the two prophetic books, Miller said that they reflect Ezekiel’s conviction that the message of his Jerusalemite predecessor (like those of other earlier prophets) should continue to be proclaimed in the Golah (p. 184). Zimmerli (1979) responsibly articulated the methodological procedure to be followed, saying “it is best to deal with the purely literary-critical question of the dependence of the prophet on written documents after the tradition-historical question” (Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1, 41). Zimmerli mentioned Ezekiel’s familiarity with Amos (cf. Ezek 7:1–9 and Amos 8:1f); Hosea (cf. Ezek 16 and Hosea 1:2; 2:4–15); Isaiah (cf. Ezek 5:1–4 and Isa 7:20; Ezek 1–2 and Isa 6; Ezek 22:17–22 and Isa 1:22–26); and Zephaniah (Zeph 3:3–8 and Ezek 22:23– 31). Only then did he raise the question of whether Ezekiel was familiar with Jeremiah’s preaching, a question he categorized as “a special problem.” Zimmerli enumerated major common themes and phraseological resemblances, recognizing both the similarities and Ezekiel’s own contributions and developments. Zimmerli concluded that Jeremiah’s preaching was known to Ezekiel.
In his commentary on Jeremiah, Holladay (1989) gave a list of the parallels under the rubric of “Jeremiah’s impact on Ezekiel.” He found Smend’s list useful, but in his own study brought only twenty-five examples. Twenty of them refer to materials in Jeremiah that Holladay dated to before 600, thirteen of which are materials he considered to belong to prophecies postdating Jehoiakim’s burning of the first scroll. This schema allowed enough time for Ezekiel to “have gained his knowledge of Jeremiah’s material through a copy of the latter’s scroll either in Jerusalem before 598, in Babylon after 598, or both” (Holladay, Jeremiah 2, 82–84). Holladay preferred the possibility that Ezekiel had heard Jeremiah personally in Jerusalem. Ezekiel’s familiarity with Jeremiah’s confessions brought Holladay even to suggest a personal acquaintance with the latter, a connection maintained while in Babylon through the priests Jeremiah mentions as active in the area (Jer 19:1–20:6; 29:24–32; 37:3) (Idem, “Had Ezekiel Known Jeremiah Personally” (see n. 9), 31–3).
In a fairly recent commentary, Kasher (2004) presented in great detail similarities in language and style (phraseology and imagery), shared motifs, and the two prophets’ attitudes in relation to several theological and political issues: retribution, the future relationship of God and Israel, David’s kingship, the future of the Northern Kingdom, the borders of Jerusalem, the city’s new name, the attitude towards the remnant in Jerusalem and Judah (Kasher (Ezekiel 1–24, 52)), the struggle with false prophets, the similar attitude toward Babylon (which goes hand in hand with their mutual objections to any pro-Egyptian policy), and finally the future of Judah’s neighbors. Kasher concluded his list by pointing out the relations between the imagery and its tangible meaning (Jer 15:16 and Ezek 2:9–3:2), and the prophets’ parallel utilization of lists (as in Jer 46:9 and Ezek 30:5, etc.). Kasher argued that this wealth of resemblances shows clear linkages between the prophets, despite their presumed rivalry based on their distinct priestly backgrounds. Therefore, he accepted as reasonable the previous suggestions that Ezekiel had learned Jeremiah’s prophecies either orally, prior to his deportation, or in writing, while in Babylon. As a general observation, Kasher found those profound and numerous similarities to reflect the two prophets’ similar intellectual education.
A different point of view was suggested by D. Vieweger (1993) (D. Vieweger, Die literarischen Beziehungen zwischen den Bu¨chen Jeremia und Ezechiel). Realizing that the similarities between the two books cannot be explained solely as a result of Ezekiel’s personal experience of hearing Jeremiah in Jerusalem before 598/7, Vieweger addressed the complex literary evolution both books had gone through, arguing that the relationships between them had continued over a period much longer than the prophets’ careers. He thus suggested that Jeremianic traditions in the book of Ezekiel are only in a minor degree the result of Ezekiel’s own activity. Rather, Ezekiel’s school and disciples of Jeremiah were responsible for introducing Jeremianic traditions into the Ezekiel corpus. While Vieweger recognized that there were many more references to Jeremiah in Ezekiel than vice versa, he suggested that the opposite direction of influence obtained as well; i.e., Ezekiel materials in the book of Jeremiah were also introduced by Jeremiah’s disciples (as in Jer 24:6 and Ezek 11:19; 36:26–28). Vieweger traced the mutual motivation of the two circles of disciples to the desire not only to establish their own master’s legacy, but also to cooperate in bringing the two prophetic collections into closer ideological accord.
III. Literary Relationships: Echo, Influence, and Allusion
Verbal similarities, resemblances in imagery, and shared themes and conceptions have brought scholars to notice parallels between the two books. Closer examination of the texts, however, shows among them a great diversity that permeates the entire spectrum of textual relationships from influence, to echo, to literary allusion. For the differences accepted here between intertextuality and influence or allusion, see:
- B.D. Sommer in his monograph, A Prophet Reads Scripture: Allusion in Isaiah 40–66 (Contraversions; Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998), 6–31, esp. 6–10; M.A. Lyons, From Law to Prophecy: Ezekiel’s Use of the Holiness Code (LHB/OTS 507; New York: T & T Clark, 2009), 48–50.
The first two are very fluid concepts, and indeed seem to require an assumption of Ezekiel’s acquaintance with Jeremiah’s words (heard or written). But literary allusion is much more restricted in its definition, and thus may be of importance for the present investigation. Defining literary allusion:
The bulk of the parallels between Ezekiel and Jeremiah does not qualify as true literary allusions. Most of the Ezekiel passages that indeed show similarity of expression to Jeremiah, such that they could have been markers for an evoked text, do not signal a true literary connection. These passages do not activate the Jeremian passage(s) in any allusive, interpretive, way; rather, they might be said to indicate “echo” or “influence”. B.D. Sommer defines literary “echo” as follows: “The echo alters nothing in the interpretation of the sign itself, though the presence of a familiar phrase makes the text more interesting” (Sommer, A Prophet Reads Scripture (see n. 37), 14). “Influence,” however, shows the viewpoint or reflection of, or ideological dependence on, an earlier text, but it does not depend on specific verbal connections between the texts, and in this respect it is even more remote from a literary allusion. Influence may thus entail “less word-for-word reliance on the source as the new text restates the older material largely in its own words” (Lyons, From Law to Prophecy (see n. 37), 50–51). Indeed, this level of resemblance may be discerned in the many examples of shared imagery and common conceptions that draw Ezekiel close to Jeremiah yet do not show any deliberate action of accommodating one text to the other.
Three different types of textual relationships obtain between passages in Ezekiel and in Jeremiah:
A. Verbal or idiomatic resemblances show a lack of allusion or literary dependence. Two idioms that are peculiar to Jeremiah and Ezekiel may suffice:
- (1) The designation of the land of Israel as יבצ”) most desirable”) is used by both prophets as epithet for the promised land God had given to his people (Ezek 20:6, 15 and Jer 3:19).44 But beyond the quite similar superlative descriptive pattern, Ezekiel does not reflect the particular Jeremian context of the term, but adds this attribute to the more common description of “the land flowing with milk and honey”
- (2) The phrase העקנ לעמשפנ”) His/her soul recoils from,” i.e., “rejects in disgust”) is repeated four times in Ezekiel 23 (vv. 17, 18, 22, 28).45 Thrice the agent of the disgust is Oholibah reacting against the many lovers by whom she had defiled herself, and in v. 18 it is God who turns away from her in disgust, as He had before from her sister Oholah.46 This idiom is otherwise known only from Jer 6:8 ( ךממישפנעקתןפםילשוריירסוה ( where the prophet rebukes Jerusalem for social sins committed in its midst and threatens it with divine desertion and desolation (vv. 6, 7). These two examples (among others) illustrate the broader phenomenon.47 While there is clearly a shared vocabulary that brings Ezekiel close to Jeremiah and that may be the result of their contemporaneousness (as argued by Miller and others), there is no literary dependence between the passages. Therefore, the relation between these passages should be described as one of echo or influence rather than literary allusion.
B. Literary allusions. By way of comparison, there are indeed a few prophecies in Ezekiel that I would classify as literary allusions—that is, passages where Ezekiel seems to carry forward, develop, and transform phrases or themes found in Jeremiah. Such may be (1) the reference to eating the scroll (Ezek 2:8–3:2), where Ezekiel develops and concretizes the Jeremianic notion of God putting his words into the prophet’s mouth (Jer 1:7; 15:16); but all these passages refer back to Deut 18:18.48 (2) Along the same lines, but with implicit polemical intentions, Ezekiel’s conception of restoration, which includes internal transformation prior to the reinstitution of the covenant between God and the Exiles (11:18–20; 36:26–28), expands and transforms Jeremiah’s conception of the new covenant (Jer 31:33).
C. Utilizations of the same pentateuchal traditions. Some resemblances between Ezekiel and Jeremiah actually cover up quite independent allusions to and interpretations of pentateuchal legal traditions. There are six such quasi-similarities that appear to connect Ezekiel with Jeremiah, but in fact present independent inner-biblical interpretations of pentateuchal legal traditions, mostly from Deuteronomy:
- (1) The phrase תומיונועב is found in Ezek 3:18, 19 and Jer 31:30, though each of the prophetic passages suggests a separate and independent utilization of Deut 24:16 ( ואטחבשיאתובאלעותמויאלםינבוםינבלעתובאותמויאל ותמוי” Parents shall not be put to death for children, nor children be put to death for parents: a person shall be put to death only for his own crime.”).
- (2) םכישעמוחמנו) in Ezek 6:6) caused D. Block to suggest that םכישעמ is an ellipsis of םכידיישעמ , as repeatedly used in Jer 1:16; 25:6–7; 44:8 (all prose, except for once in poetry: דצעמבשרחידיהשעמ , Jer 10:3).
A similar phenomenon seems to stand behind the other similarities as well: (3) Ezek 6:13 and Jer 2:20 allude to Deuteronomy (e.g., Deut 12:2; and see Hos 4:13) and generally to the Deuteronomistic literature (as in 2 Kgs 16:4; 17:10); (4) Ezek 12:2 and Jer 5:21 allude independently to Deut 29:3 (rather than the references to idols in Ps 115:5; 135:16); (5) The curse formula of Deut 28:26 serves a distinctive role in Ezekiel’s prophecy against Pharaoh king of Egypt (Ezek 29:5)55 on the one hand, and in its several occurrences in Jeremiah (8:2; 9:21) on the other.56 (6) The Deuteronomic conception of exile to an unknown land (Deut 28:36) occurs in another prophecy against Egypt (Ezek 32:9). This idea occurs twice in Jer 17:4 (|| 15:14) and in 22:28, but there it refers to the Jehoiachin exile. This line of references to Deuteronomy shows itself also in the literary allusions mentioned above; see the clear reference of Jer 1:9; 15:16, and likewise Ezek 2:8–3:3, to Deut 18:18.
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