Message to Baruch
Jer 45:1 When Baruch son of Neriah wrote on a scroll the words Jeremiah the prophet dictated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, Jeremiah said this to Baruch:
Jer 45:2 “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says to you, Baruch:
Jer 45:3 You said, ‘Woe to me! The LORD has added sorrow to my pain; I am worn out with groaning and find no rest.’
Jer 45:4 But the LORD has told me to say to you, ‘This is what the LORD says: I will overthrow what I have built and uproot what I have planted, throughout the earth.
Jer 45:5 Should you then seek great things for yourself? Do not seek them. For I will bring disaster on all people, declares the LORD, but wherever you go I will let you escape with your life.'”
1 Baruch being dismayed, 4 Jeremiah instructed and comforted him.
Message to Baruch
Jer 45:1 When Baruch son of Neriah wrote on a scroll the words Jeremiah the prophet dictated in the fourth year of Jehoiakim son of Josiah king of Judah, Jeremiah said this to Baruch:
An insight into the character of Jeremiah’s faithful scribe is given in this chapter.
Fourth year of Jehoiakim. According to this date, ch. 45 follows ch. 36 (see ch. 36:4; see on ch. 36:1)
Jer 45:2 “This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says to you, Baruch:
Jer 45:3 You said, ‘Woe to me! The LORD has added sorrow to my pain; I am worn out with groaning and find no rest.’ .
Woe to me! With Jeremiah in prison, and the king and his counsellors giving no heed to the prophet’s messages, Baruch became despondent. His ambition to hold a position of importance in a revived Jewish state (v. 5) seemed dashed in view of the apparent failure of Jeremiah’s endeavours. The prophet could enter into a sympathetic understanding of his secretary’s feelings and so help him, for he, too, had experienced bitter disappointments (chs. 15:10–21; 20:7–18). Baruch, like all men, needed to learn to expect the bitter along with the sweet, failure as well as prosperity (see Job 2:10).
Jer 45:4 But the LORD has told me to say to you, ‘This is what the LORD says: I will overthrow what I have built and uproot what I have planted, throughout the earth.
Jer 45:5 Should you then seek great things for yourself? Do not seek them. For I will bring disaster on all people, declares the LORD, but wherever you go I will let you escape with your life.'”
No earthly success could be as important to Baruch as the work God desired him to do. Each one has a place in God’s great plan which only he can fill.
God comforts Baruch, the scribe, with the promise that He will be merciful to him. In marked contrast with the divine vengeance and retribution that would descend upon the earth (v. 4) and the evil that would come to “all people” by reason of the Babylonian invasion (2 Kings 25),
Baruch’s life would be protected by God. Most of those whose success and position Baruch envied would have no such assurance but would perish miserably in the destruction of Jerusalem.
Baruch’s future would be one of wandering and exile. We do know that he went down to Egypt (see ch. 43:5–7). Tradition has it that he died either in Egypt or in Babylon.