Jeremiah 20:3

And it came to pass on the morrow,.... After the prophet was put into the stocks; so that he was there all night: that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks; either to bring him before the

And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah unto him, The LORD hath not called thy name Pashur, but Magormissabib.

Possibly by this time the mad-brained priest thought he had done more than he could justify by law, for if he were a false prophet, the judgment of him belonged not to him, but to the sanhedrim; he had nothing to do to smite him. Possibly he brought him forth in order to his bringing him before the sanhedrim; but it doth not appear that he did so, though Jeremiah’ s following words to him might reasonably be thought provocative enough, if he had designed any formal charge against him. He had it seemeth no more to say to Jeremiah, but Jeremiah (to whom God had appeared in the prison that night, while he was separated from communion with men, and revealed to him what end this hot-headed priest should come to) had something to say to him. God’ s meaning was, not that he should by men be no longer called Pashur, (for doubtless after this he was called by the same name he had before,) but his state and condition should not answer the name Pashur, which signifies, as some say, a noble, flourishing priest; or, as others, one who by his authority maketh others to tremble; but Magor-missabib, that is, fear and terror on all sides.

Jeremiah 20:3 And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah unto him, The LORD hath not called thy name Pashur, but Magormissabib.Ver. 3. Pashur brought forth Jeremiah.] To be judged, say some; but why then did he first smite him? An officer should retain the majesty of the law, and not do anything passionately. To set him at liberty, say others; as perceiving that the "word of God could not be bound," nor a prophet’ s mouth stopped by a prison, as Pashur also shall well perceive ere Jeremiah hath done with him. Bonner said to Hawkes the martyr, A faggot will make you believe the sacrament of the altar. He answered, No, no, a point for your faggot; God will meet with you one day. So true is that of the poet, “ Pressa sub ingenti ceu pondere palms virescit, Sub cruce sic florent debita corda Deo. ” The Lord hath not called thy name Pashur.] That is, black mouth, as some derive it; or diffusing paleness, as others; but on the contrary. Magormissabib,] i.e., Terror round about, or, Fear on every side; a proverbial form of speech, denoting extreme consternation of spirit and greatest distress. Such as befell Tullus Hostilius, King of Rome, who had for his gods Payor and Pallor. Dignissimus sane qui deos suos semper haberet praesentes, saith Lactantius wittily; i.e., great pity but this man should ever have had his gods at hand, since he was so fond of them. Our Richard III and Charles IX of France, a pair of bloody princes, were Magormissabibs in their generations, as terrible at length to themselves as they had been formerly to others; and therefore could never endure to be awakened in the night without music or some like diversion. Acts and Mon. Junius. q.d., Non Augustus, sed augustus; non nobilis, sed mobilis futurus es. Non tumor sed timer. Daniel; Thuan.

(3) Magor-missabib.—The words are a quotation from Psalms 31:13, and are rightly rendered, “Fear is round about;” they had already been used by the prophet in Jeremiah 6:25. We may venture to think that the Psalm had been his comfort in those night-watches of suffering, and that he now uttered the words which described the bitterness of the Psalmist’s sorrow, as at last feeling sure that they belonged to his persecutor rather than to himself. It is scarcely necessary to seek a special significance in the name of Pashur as contrasted with this new nomen et omen; but Hebrew scholars, according to various, and it must be owned, conjectural etymologies, have found in it the ideas of wide-spread joy, “joy round about,” or else of freedom and deliverance. The prophet repeats the combination in Jeremiah 46:5; Jeremiah 49:29; Lamentations 2:22, and it had evidently become a kind of “burden” in both senses of the word, weighing on the prophet’s thoughts and finding frequent utterance. The word that stands for “fear” is a rare one, and outside the passages now referred to is found only in Isaiah 31:9.

Verse 3. The Lord hath not called thy name Pashur] Security on all sides. This name thou hast had, but not by Divine appointment. But Magor-missabib - Fear on every side. This name hath God given thee; because, in the course of his providence, thou shalt be placed in the circumstances signified by it: thou shalt be a terror to thyself.

3. Magor-missabib] meaning, terror on every side. The LXX wrongly render, foreigner, obtaining this sense from the fact that the Hebrew roots for terror and sojourn in a foreign country are identical in form. The name is to be significant of his fate, which doubtless was to go into exile with Jehoiachin, as well as of the consternation of himself and his friends at the failure of their policy of reliance on Egypt against Chaldaea. For the expression cp. Jeremiah 20:10, Jeremiah 6:25, Jeremiah 46:5, Jeremiah 49:29; Lamentations 2:22, and for the protest on the part of the prophet cp. Isaiah 22:15 ff.; Amos 7:10 ff; Acts 16:37.

Magor-missabib - See Jeremiah 6:25 note. Jeremiah uses it no less than five times, having probably adopted it as his watchword from Psalms 31:13.

3. Pashur — All is uncertain as to the etymology, and so the meaning, of this name. As it is set over against the one which follows, it is probably opposite to it in sense, but just how we do not know.