Yirmiyahu 20
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Jeremiah is Thoroughly Depressed
A man named Pashchur, who was in charge of the Kohanim (priests) in the Temple, didn't care for Jeremiah's prophecies, so he tossed him in a jail cell. Pashchur released him the next day and Jeremiah said, "G-d doesn't call you 'Pashchur,' He calls you 'Magor Misaviv'," which means "terror all around." Why did Jeremiah say that this was G-d's name for Pashchur? Because G-d curses Pashchur. He will witness his friends falling to the enemy's sword. The nation will be exiled to Babylonia and the treasures will be plundered. Pashchur will go into captivity and die in exile because he was a false prophet.
Because Pashchur oppressed him, Jeremiah cried out to G-d, Who pressed Jeremiah into his mission, making him the object of verbal and physical attacks. Every time he addresses the people, Jeremiah ends up crying out because he must foretell destruction. This, of course, does not endear him to the people. But what else can Jeremiah do? If he would refuse to carry out G-d's mission, G-d's word would burn inside him like a fire that he is unable to contain. Jeremiah heard the slander of the people against him, plotting to frame him. Those he thought were his friends wait for him to fall. They try to lure him over to their side, to worship idols, but G-d is with him. Jeremiah's enemies will fail and be eternally ashamed.
G-d tests the righteous, looking inside them to see their true intentions. Jeremiah prays to see G-d punish his antagonists. Jeremiah tells the righteous to praise G-d for revealing the plot of the poisoners to him. Jeremiah was feeling so low, he lamented his own conception and birth, going so far as to curse whoever informed his father that he was born, making him think it was a good thing. Jeremiah mourns that he did not die before birth; why did he have to be born to such a miserable existence?
Author: Rabbi Jack Abramowitz