Jeremiah 44:15

JUDAH'S NEW GOD; THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN

"Then all the men who knew that their wives burned incense to other gods, and all the women that stood by, a great assembly, even all the people that dwelt in the land of Egypt, in Pathros, and answered Jeremiah, saying, As for the word that thou hast spoken unto us in the name of Jehovah, we will not hearken unto thee. But we will certainly perform every word that is gone forth out of our mouth, to burn incense unto the QUEEN OF HEAVEN, and to pour out drink-offerings unto her, as we have done, we and our fathers, our kings and our princes, in the cities of Judah, and in the streets of Jerusalem; for then had we plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil. But since we left off burning incense to the QUEEN OF HEAVEN, and pouring out drink-offerings unto her, we have wanted all things, and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine. And when we burned incense to the QUEEN OF HEAVEN, and poured out drink-offerings unto her, did we make her cakes to worship her, and pour out drink-offerings unto her, without our husbands?"

The capital letters for QUEEN OF HEAVEN in the above paragraph are a variation from our text. This is to emphasize the adoption of a new god by the Jewish sojourners in Egypt.

THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN

There was nothing either honorable or innocent in the worship of this ancient sex-goddess by God's people. Who was the Queen of Heaven? She is identified primarily with Ashteroth, Astarte, Ishtar, Venus, Aphrodite and other female goddesses of antiquity. She was worshipped as the goddess of fertility and was the female equivalent of Baal.

"The immoral rites of the worship of this deity entered Canaan from Babylon, long before God sent the children down into Canaan to extirpate it and replace it with the knowledge of the true God."[4]

The type of sexual orgies that went along with such worship is clearly visible in Numbers 25, in which event Israel demonstrated their preference for that kind of worship over that which God had commanded, a preference which they maintained down to the events of this chapter.

"The Israelites turned to the worship of the Queen of Heaven as Ashteroth soon after their arrival in Canaan; it was depraved in the extreme; it was rife in the times of Samuel (1 Samuel 7:3-4); after Saul's death, his armour was placed in the temple of Ashteroth at Beth-shan (1 Samuel 21:10); and Solomon gave it royal sanction (2 Kings 23:13)."[5] "In the times of Jeremiah, prior to the exile, the Chosen People had given themselves over to the worst and vilest forms of heathen worship in their worship of the Queen of Heaven."[6] Furthermore, it appears from the events in these last two chapters that it was Israel's desire to continue uninterruptedly their worship of this vile goddess that sparked their willingness to go back to Egypt.

"All the women that stood by ..." (Jeremiah 44:15). "This was probably an idolatrous festival (to the Queen of Heaven) in which the women were taking a leading part."[7] With regard to the part which the women played in such a festival, Numbers 25 gives the daughters of Moab as examples! Cheyne agreed that, "This special mention of the women suggests that the occasion of the gathering was a festival in honor of the Queen of Heaven."[8]

"Since we left off burning incense to the Queen of Heaven ..." (Jeremiah 44:18). This appears to be a reference to that period in the days of Josiah the king, whose widespread reforms had, for a season, suppressed the shameful paganism which had taken the land. "They senselessly attributed the disasters to Judah to Josiah's reforms, claiming that idolatry had done more for them than had the Lord."[9] Not once did the people connect their disasters with their sins! Nothing is more blinding than infidelity; and the type of theological acrobat that can suppose sin to be a better benefactor than the righteousness of God is here revealed to have been a very ancient specimen, the prototype of many such theological gymnasts in our own day."

Like the harlot in Hosea, Israel "Did shamefully, and said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink" (Hosea 2:5); and she did not know that it was her God who gave all those things she desired.

As the women concluded this shocking reply to Jeremiah, that said, in effect, "And don't think for a minute that we do all this without our husbands consent!"

"Did we (do all this) ... without our husbands ..." (Jeremiah 44:19)? "Vows taken by women, in order to be valid, were required by the Law of Moses to be with their husband's consent (Numbers 30:7-16)";[10] and it is certainly amazing that these women here seem to have been boasting that they had engaged in this shameful worship "according to law." Indeed, indeed! This is the key to the error in their thinking that they could do all of those sinful things and yet keep on worshipping God! The result was a kind of syncretism, much like that which Jezebel attempted to set up between Christianity and paganism in Thyatira (Revelation 2:20-14).

"Did we make cakes to worship her ...?" (Jeremiah 44:19) "The cakes were made in the form of a crescent, representing the moon,"[11] believed to have been especially sacred to the Queen of Heaven.

This worship of the Queen of Heaven had all kinds of astrological connotations, similar to that of practically all of the mythological gods and goddesses of antiquity. They were severally identified with the sun, the moon, and the stars, and with certain planets in particular. When Stephen referred to the Israelites having worshipped "the host of heaven" (Acts 7:42), the reference was precisely to these ancient deities.