Jeremiah’s language of trauma emblematizes modern descriptions of Moral Injury. While neither Jeremiah nor the people may know from what they suffer, they know that they are suffering from feelings of external or internal betrayal. Given the newness of knowledge and terminology about Moral Injury, many persons who suffer from this pain also do not know from what they suffer. Moral Injury, therefore, is a silent suffering that needs a voice. It deserves substantive conversation about coping mechanisms and healing practices. Jeremiah does just this. I do not intend to retroactively diagnose the prophet Jeremiah or the Israelites. Rather, by looking at these characters, I will demonstrate how their language resembles language used by and for persons with Moral Injury. The text then unearths possible healing strategies through the journey of these people. Embodied grief and public displays of lament suggest the importance of giving voice to emotion. Jeremiah’s sign acts emphasize a need to confront sources of trauma. Ultimately, however, Jeremiah suggests that healing comes from an active faith in the omnipresent God.
Jeremiah’s Suffering: Moral Injury from Betrayal of Trust Though Moral Injury is modern terminology, the concept of a transgressed soul transcends time, space, and vocabulary. Today, leaders in psychology, theology, and medicine provide a two-fold explanation of Moral Injury. First, external inputs may cause Moral Injury. This occurs in the form of betrayal by “someone who holds legitimate authority in a high-stakes situation.”[1] Theologians Rita Nakashima Brock and Gabriella Lettini add to this first explanation of Moral Injury. Their research on military veterans concludes that “seeing someone else violate core moral values” can transgress a soul in addition to betrayal.[2] Thus, Moral Injury can occur as a result of the environment or situation in which one finds one’s self. It may emerge after witnessing or living trauma. The prophet Jeremiah personifies Moral Injury caused by betrayal from a trusted leader. In Jeremiah’s case, that authority figure is God. Jeremiah 15:15-18 captures Jeremiah’s sense of betrayal. In these verses, Jeremiah calls to God to remember him and to be close (Jer 15:15 NRSV). He then recounts his obedience to the LORD when he states that “Your words were found, and I ate them” (Jer 15:16). Jeremiah makes it known that even he suffered in societal isolation for God (Jer 15:17). As biblical scholar Pauline Viviano explains, Jeremiah “embraced his role as messenger of God, but because of his vocation, he has borne insult and was set apart from his people and their celebrations…”[3] Therefore, tangible repercussions accompanied Jeremiah’s obedience. The isolation was likely painful, lonesome, and challenging. Yet, Jeremiah did as his legitimate authority asked. In verse 18, Jeremiah expresses the language that resembles Moral Injury. He asks the question that turns this prayer into lament. Jeremiah asks, “Why is my pain unceasing, my wound incurable, refusing to be healed?” (Jer 15:18). He is likely distraught that he did everything God asked and received nothing in return. As a result, he expresses his betrayal. The prophet says to God, “Truly, you are to me like a deceitful brook, like waters that fail” (Jer 15:18). This verse expresses that Jeremiah’s trust in God disappeared because, though Jeremiah did everything God commanded, Jeremiah feels God failed him. Jeremiah expresses his betrayal during the traumatic exile of his people. He also undergoes personal trauma by being ostracized from his society. This reality explains Jeremiah’s pained language. Old Testament scholar Kathleen O’Connor explains that distrust of God and the world can emerge after trauma[4] This distrust can manifest in many ways. For example, in a letter describing his invisible war wounds, one Soldier wrote, “I felt betrayed by the government, the military leadership…and my faith community.”[5] This Soldier was supposed to be able to trust these “legitimate” authority figures. Like Jeremiah’s God, they gave the Soldier commands. He followed them faithfully and obediently. Yet, in the wake of trauma, the Soldier felt abandoned and the leaders became “like waters that fail” (Jer 15:18). Though the Soldier’s trauma and Jeremiah’s trauma differ, the two both experienced events that made them feel betrayed by leadership. Today, we know that this is one cause of Moral Injury. Jeremiah, therefore, provides us a lens into what a morally transgressed person may sound like. Jeremiah’s community also carried the weight of a burdened soul. The People’s Suffering: Moral Injury from Aggrieving Moral Compasses Modern scholarship provides a second explanation for Moral Injury. This strain occurs from personal action amid trauma. Researchers at Syracuse University explain that Moral Injury can be caused by the suffering person through personally perpetrating, witnessing, or not preventing “acts that transgress [one’s] own moral and ethical values or codes of conduct.”[6] Brock and Lettini further this definition. They add that when one violates their morals, the person may “feel they no longer live in a reliable, meaningful world.”[7] This sentiment could cause feelings of displacement, dispel faith, or manifest as anger, shame, or grief. Alternatively, it may force emotional numbness because the transgressed person does not know how to react or to cope. This is the form of Moral Injury expressed by the Israelite people. The Israelites suffered the trauma of exile as a result of their destruction, idol worship, and disobedience to their God.[8] In these acts, they betrayed not only God, but also their own morals and values. Language such as Jeremiah 9:19 expresses their pain. The Israelites profess, “How we are ruined! We are utterly shamed, because we have left the land, because they have cast down our dwellings.” (Jer 9:19). These words suggest that the Israelites knew their wrongdoing and were pained by the consequences, even if they did not yet repent of their sins. Dr. David Blumenthal explains how this is possible. He offers that “Jewish tradition teaches that humans have been taught what to do, by God and by society, and if we deviate from that knowingly, we sin.”[9] As people raised in the tradition and familiar with God’s laws, it is hard to believe the Israelites would have been unaware of committing actions against the LORD. Thus, the distress, guilt, and shame which underscore Jeremiah 9:19 likely come from having violated personal codes of conduct. Brock and Lettini speak to the shame in this text. They quote a U.S. Army Chaplain who worked with fellow Soldiers in Iraq. He documented that he was “amazed at [Soldier’s] personal shame…profound, searing shame. Many felt that they had committed a personal affront against God…what they were confronting is what many experience as sin.”[10] Blumenthal then speaks to the guilt. He explains that “Serious guilt runs very deep; it touches our soul and colors our being.”[11] Thus, the shame and guilt felt by the Israelites are the same feelings felt by many today who would receive the unofficial diagnosis of Moral Injury. The “affront against God” cuts the soul and causes wounds. Wounds that, often, may have no reprieve. Given the complexity of an ailment that transgresses a person’s soul, there is no “cure” for the pain. Another testimony from a Soldier expresses this reality. He confesses, “I strive each day to forgive and absolve myself of guilt, and to live with the wounds of war that will never heal.”[12] Again, this language is seen in the book of Jeremiah. In Jeremiah 30:15, God declares to the suffering people, “Your pain is incurable. Because your guilt is great” (Jer 30:15). For the pained Prophet and the people Israel, there is no reprieve until they make their souls right with God and with one another. Scholar Amy Kalmanofsky succinctly summarizes the status of Israel’s relationship with God. She writes that “the sore testifies that Israel is at God’s mercy.”[13] Whether acknowledged or not, Israel needs God to heal their transgressed souls. Turning to God or a divine being is also often the most recommended course of action for people who seem to be carrying the burden of Moral Injury. Though there may be no official cure for either the Israelites or today’s transgressed souls, Jeremiah offers examples of ways to express grief, confront personal sins, and turn back to God. Each of these actions may help heal from Moral Injury. Soul Healing in the Book of Jeremiah Embodied Grief: The Catharsis of Emotional Release Returning to Jeremiah 15:15-18, we experience the prophet expressing his grief, even if that expression is only to God. His second “confession,” as commentator Viviano calls it, begins with “O Lord, you know; remember me and visit me…” (Jer 15:15). Jeremiah longingly cries out to God with these words. One does not ask someone to “remember” or “visit” them if they do not miss that person or long for their presence. Thus, we can assume that Jeremiah felt anguish when he uttered this confession. Jeremiah’s entire confession continues in this distressed tone as do his other confessions. It is because of these confessions that Jeremiah receives the epithet of the “weeping prophet.” Jeremiah teaches readers through his confessions the importance of voicing hurt. His tears tell us that our tears signal something to us about our innermost states. As Old Testament scholar David Bosworth explains, “weeping is a particularly powerful bodily manifestation of emotional disturbance that many Western cultures regard as unmasculine.”[14] In this “unmasculine” behavior, however, Jeremiah releases the grief bottled within. Not only this, but the weeping connects Jeremiah to God – the very authority by whom Jeremiah felt aggrieved.[15] Lastly, weeping serves both individual and communal purposes.[16] Individually, this outlet enables the suffering person to release their emotions. Communally, the weeping speaks for those who may not. Jeremiah’s direct access to God meant that he occupied a position of privilege. As the Oxford Bible Commentary suggests, Jeremiah “embodie[d] the questions of the exiles,” their concern, and their fear through his own tears.[17] O’Connor, too, interprets Jeremiah’s confessions in this light. She believes them to be the dramatization of disaster victims’ failed trust in a public setting.[18] When tears are seen by others, it is as if they give others permission to feel and to question. The weeping prophet cries to God not only on behalf of his community, but also as an example for the community. Biblical scholar Louis Stulman calls this “a kind of ‘street theater.’” [19] The weeping is a performative measure for the actor and the audience. Jeremiah was not the only person to do this. Rather, the book of Jeremiah contains another example of public display of emotion. This further suggests the importance of voicing emotions around trauma as part of the healing process. Public Lament: Invitation to Feel God urges the Israelites to “consider” calling professional mourners to mourn for and with Israel in Jeremiah 9:17-20. This call occurs before the verse substantiating the Israelites’ morally injurious language (Jer 9:19). God calls the mourners to come in the middle of a period of death and destruction. Specifically, the mourning women are to “raise a dirge over us, so that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids flow with water” (Jer 9:18). As Viviano translates, a “dirge” is a funeral song that expresses grief’s depth.[20] In giving voice to the grief, the women model to the people how to address their pain and suffering, even if that suffering resulted from their own sin. The mourning women create space for the Israelites to emote when they may otherwise feel numb.[21] O’Connor construes the purpose of their presence to “awaken the grief of the bereaved.”[22] These ideas of sleeping numbness stem from trauma theory. Often persons who experience trauma become emotionally numb or experience the “exclusion of feeling.”[23] This means they may need help to mourn. They may need someone else to testify to their trauma for them because they, as trauma theorist David Garber recounts, may “never possess adequate language” to testify themselves.[24] The mourning women of Jeremiah 9 do just this. The women embrace and enliven the community’s pain.[25] In doing so, they give the Israelites agency to name their feelings of guilt and shame that are so characteristic of Moral Injury (Jer 9:19). Like Jeremiah, the women enabled the Israelites to feel. As Claassens explains, they also forced the people to explore, or confront, their injury.[26] This second ramification occurs elsewhere in Jeremiah, too. Rethinking Sign Acts: Confronting the Complicity and the Pain Confronting the source of Moral Injury is an imperative part of the healing process. Jeremiah’s sign acts are normally used as symbols to convey a message from the LORD to the people. Yet, they could also be creatively interpreted as visible acts that enable people to grapple with their wrongdoings. Take, for example, Jeremiah breaking the pottery in chapter 19. This is a public act conducted in front of “some of the elders of the peoples and some of the senior priests” in the public “entry of the potsherd gate” (Jer 19:1-2). The act would have intentionally been a public demonstration. The scholar Johanna Erzberger emphasizes that sign acts would have occurred in public settings to force an audience.[27] This forced people to confront the topic at hand. The public sign act represents God breaking “this people and this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended” (Jer 19:11). Thus, it is a public demonstration of God’s rage over the disobedience of God’s people. For the Israelites to watch this symbolism, the exact people who violated their covenant with God, would be to confront the failures that transgressed their souls. Understanding sign acts as avenues for confronting complicity may appear a stretch. However, Stulman offers a similar argument. He writes that “Prophetic sign-acts, often embodied in the prophetic persona, bring to light haunting memories of community pain that cannot be subsumed under the heading of speech.”[28] An action, therefore, is needed where speech fails. Language may not be strong or accurate enough to depict the “haunting memories” of pain because real fear, shame, or guilt may prevent the traumatized from being able to recount what occurred. Helping a suffering person confront the “haunting” past is a technique often used when working with people with Moral Injury.[29] Trusted professionals may discuss the past with the injured person, make it tangible via conversation or images, and then find ways to reframe it. In doing so, the parties paint a new image of a once “horrifying” event. While sign acts may not directly transfer to this concept, the philosophy behind them does. Jeremiah’s public sign acts force the Israelites to confront their complicity in the disaster. They make the Israelites address their complicity in their injured souls. This is a painful process. Yet, the book of Jeremiah would be incomplete without the prophet’s sign acts to the community. Facing trauma may be a necessary part of healing from Moral Injury. Though weeping, observing public lament, and confronting the past are all important steps in the healing journey, Jeremiah points to a final component imperative for restoration. God in Grief: Confession, Repentance, and Forgiveness Jeremiah ultimately demonstrates that without God, there would be no healing from Moral Injury. That God is with us in our grief is strewn throughout Jeremiah. However, Jeremiah also points to the importance of confession and repentance for complete healing. Jeremiah 31 verses 7 and 9 express this. God says to God’s people, “Save, O Lord, your people…With weeping they shall come, and with consolations I will lead them back…for I have become a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my firstborn” (Jer 31:7, 9). In these verses, we read God’s promise that the LORD will restore God’s familial covenant with the people and safely welcome them back. The Oxford Bible Commentary explains that “Ephraim symbolizes the generation of exiles, the faithless children who have repented and returned.”[30] Thus, by stating that God is the parent to Israel, the LORD implies that the Israelites are regaining their faith and striving to fix their relationship with their God. Within these verses, we also read that restoration with God requires effort on the peoples’ parts. They must weep or lament for the transgressions and offer prayers and confession to God. This is because one must acknowledge his or her sins before repenting in order to be ready to receive the fullness of God’s forgiveness. As Blumenthal explains, “Guilt is not enough. One must rejoin life…” and repair their relationship with God. Blumenthal also lists steps for repentance which include “recognition of one’s wrongdoings as sins, remorse, desisting from sin, restitution where possible, and confession.”[31] These steps depict actionable faith. Though God never abandons God’s children, we cannot faithfully live into our covenant with God if we are not transparent with the LORD or if we do not repent. Else, we restore the relationship under false pretenses. As Brock and Lettini offer, “To reenter the Garden, humanity must face that fierce angel. Unless the struggle is attempted, there is no way back and no way to know what remains in the garden behind the gate. The attempt to regain entry requires accepting responsibility for what we have done…”[32] Then, and only then, can we find God weeping alongside us in our grief as we live life’s trauma. With no “cure” for Moral Injury, one must find creative methods to cope with the distrust, shame, grief, anger, and isolation. The book of Jeremiah gives examples of these subversive healing methods considering personal and communal trauma. Conclusion Read through the lens of trauma, the book of Jeremiah exemplifies common language used for Moral Injury. It also offers possible courses of action for healing. The character of Jeremiah resembles someone suffering from betrayal by a legitimate authority. Conversely, the Israelites suffer from their actions that transgressed their own moral codes. Jeremiah’s weeping, the mourning women, public sign acts, and an omnipresent God all provide examples of possible healing methods. Left to explore are the developments around Jeremiah’s queerness. Does his effeminate or gender-defying demeanor enable a more substantive healing than would someone with hypermasculine traits? Regardless, Jeremiah draws no conclusion on how to fully heal from a transgressed soul. The book does conclude, however, that Jeremiah can be read as a tool for restoration by both those who help people who suffer from Moral Injury and those who suffer themselves. As a silent pain, texts like Jeremiah give Moral Injury a necessary voice. It adds to the short list of literature available about Moral Injury. It enables those who suffer to identify with the characters and, possibly, even find God in their despair. Thus, Jeremiah is an imperative read for anyone susceptible to transgression and conditioned to ignore one’s emotions. [1] William Nash, Teresa Marino Carper, Mary Alice Mills, et al, “Psychometric Evaluation of the Moral Injury Events Scale,” Military Medicine, Volume 178, Issue 6 (2013), https://doi.org/10.7205/MILMED-D-13-00017. [2] Rita Nakashima Brock and Gabriella Lettini, Soul Repair: Recovering from Moral Injury after War (Boston: Beacon Press, 2012), xv. [3] Pauline A. Viviano, “The Book of Jeremiah,” New Collegeville Bible Commentary: Old Testament, ed. Daniel Durken (Minnesota: Liturgical Press, 2015), 1102. [4] Kathleen O’Connor, Jeremiah: Pain and Promise (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2012), 25. [5] Brock and Lettini, 79. [6] “What is Moral Injury,” The Moral Injury Project, Syracuse University, accessed 05 February 2019, http://moralinjuryproject.syr.edu/about-moral-injury/. [7] Brock and Lettini, xv. [8] Viviano, 1076. [9] David Blumenthal, “Soul Repair: A Jewish View,” Exploring Moral Injury in Sacred Texts, ed. Joseph Brock (Boston: Beacon Press, 2012), 32. [10] Brock and Lettini, 26. [11] Blumenthal, 31-2. [12] Brock and Lettini, 75. [13] Amy Kalmanofsky, “Israel’s Open Sore in the Book of Jeremiah,” JBL 135, No. 2 (New York: The Jewish Theological Seminary, 2016), 263. [14] David Bosworth, "The Tears of God in the Book of Jeremiah," Biblica 94,1 (DC: The Catholic University of America, 2013), 45. [15] Ibid., 25. [16] Juliana Claassens, “Calling the Kneelers: The Image of the Wailing Woman as Symbol of Survival in a Traumatized World,” Journal of Feminist Studies in Religion, Vol. 26, No. 1 (Indiana: Indiana University Press, 2010), 68. [17] "Commentary on Jeremiah," The Oxford Bible Commentary, Oxford Biblical Studies Online, http://www.oxfordbiblicalstudies.com/article/book/obso-9780198755005/obso-9780198755005-div1-670, accessed 26-Apr-2019. [18] O’Connor, 84. [19] Louis Stulman, “Prophetic Words and Acts as Survival Literature,” The Oxford Handbook of the Prophets, ed. Carolyn Sharp (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016), 326. [20] Viviano, 1097. [21] Claassens, 68. [22] O’Connor, 60. [23] Ibid., 59. [24] David Garber, “Trauma Theory and Biblical Studies,” Currents in Biblical Research, Vol. 14(1) 24-44 (2015), 27. [25] Claassens, 77. [26] Claassens, 69. [27] Johanna Erzberger, “Poetic Sign Acts as Performances,” Jeremiah Invented: Constructions and Deconstructions of Jeremiah, ed. Carolyn Sharp and Else Holt (London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2015), 112. [28] Stulman, 329. [29] This is also true of persons with PTSD. [30] “Commentary on Jeremiah.” [31] Blumenthal, 37-38. [32] Brock and Lettini, 125. |