A member
of a family of priests, Jeremiah was called to serve as a prophet when he was a
teenager. His prophetic activity spans the years from about 627 to 586 BC. The
biblical book of Jeremiah, which took final form sometime around 530 BC,
is a composite of Jeremiah's actual words, as well as the writings of "an
inspired Jeremiah tradition," made up of various authors and editors. The book
is not arranged in chronological order and appears somewhat disjointed and
includes various literary forms: poetic oracles and first person accounts;
biographical accounts about the prophet; and prophecies. Jeremiah's scribe
Baruch is the probable source of much material. Jeremiah's purposes were not
only to proclaim a terrible judgment on the covenant people for their
idolatries by an instrument (a foreign ruler) God would raise up, but also to
declare the compassionate, prayerful hope that there would come a (messianic)
day of redemption following the disaster.