This post starts with an observation about one word in Jeremiah 23:15, it makes a connection to the New Testament, and draws conclusions about (a) the nature of sanctification and (b) what it means to read Jeremiah as a Christian.

The Word

The word in Jeremiah 23:15 is חנף:

From the prophets of Jerusalem has gone out חֲנֻפָּה into all the land.

It is not a super common word, only 26 times in the Hebrew Bible, only twice in the Pentateuch. The LXX renders it μολυσμός, which is super rare in the LXX (Esdras A 8:80; 2 Maccabees 5:27; here) and only once in the NT (the verb form is more frequent but not really “common”).

The NT Connection

Take a look at the one NT instance of μολυσμός in 2 Corinthians 7:1:

UBS6: Ταύτας οὖν ἔχοντες τὰς ἐπαγγελίας, ἀγαπητοί, καθαρίσωμεν ἑαυτοὺς ἀπὸ παντὸς μολυσμοῦ σαρκὸς καὶ πνεύματος, ἐπιτελοῦντες ἁγιωσύνην ἐν φόβῳ θεοῦ.

ESV: Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.

Sanctification

Some people want to emphasize that sanctification is a process. Others would say that sanctification is punctiliar: We are sanctified and glorified, past tense, with Christ (cf. Romans 6–8, especially 8:30). I’m sympathetic with the emphasis of the latter. Those united to Christ by faith are truly united to him.

2 Corinthians 7:1 makes clear, however, that one can be truly united to Christ, sanctified even, and yet Paul is good with using sanctification vocabulary (note the noun form, ἁγιωσύνη) to talk about the work yet to be brought to completion in a Christian, work we participate in now, work which will ultimately be brought to completion when we are ultimately raised.

Reading Jeremiah

What does this rabbit hole have to do with reading Jeremiah? Christians can read Jeremiah and see in themselves some of the awful things Jeremiah denounces. They can hear the scary pronouncements of judgment and not run away or close the book. They can keep reading Jeremiah’s words and hear Jeremiah’s call and respond in accord with the purpose for which this book was written and placed in Christian Scripture: It’s a prophetic warning to turn (שׁוּב), not to be without fault.

That’s the call of both Jeremiah and Jesus.

(For Jeremiah, see the surrounding verses, Jeremiah 23:14 and 23:22, and see the summary of Jesus’s preaching in Matthew 4:17).