Jeremiah-Hananiah, the Prophet Who Lied to Make People Feel Good

By Mary Vee
Jeremiah 28

From Jeremiah's Journal

Photo Courtesy - Jeremiah wearing a yoke

Being a prophet of God is sometimes a very difficult job. My name is Jeremiah.

Sometimes other men will claim to be a prophet. They gather the people around them and say God gave them a message.

I'm not the only prophet God has spoken to.

But if a man claims to be a prophet and lies to the people, I get pretty cranky. 

Take for example Hananiah. He stood in the temple and told the priests and all the people there that within two years all the prisoners would come back from Babylon, including Jehoiachin. He also said Nebuchadnezzar would no long rule our land and all the things taken from the temple would be brought back at that time.

"Well," I said. "This would be wonderful if it were true." But I knew it was not the truth because God said the time would be seventy years.

I turned to the people in the temple and said, "From the early times, prophets have told us war, disaster, and plague would come to many countries and great kingdoms. But, the prophet who said peace would come would prove to be a real prophet if and only if his words came true. I say in two years Hananiah's words will not come true because God, himself said Nebuchadnezzar would rule over us for seventy years."

Hananiah walked over to me, in front of all the people, took the yoke off of me and broke it. He stood and said to all the people, "The Lord says, 'In the same way, I will break the yoke of Nebuchadnezzar off of all the nations, including Judah within two years."

I walked away. Unwilling to listen to his lies any more. Not long after, the Lord spoke to me again. He said, "Go to the Hananiah and tell him Nebuchadnezzar will rule for seventy years. And because you lied to the people you will die."

Seven months later, Hananiah died.


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1. Hananiah was a __________ prophet (good or bad)
2. What lie did Hananiah tell the people?
3. What did Hananiah do in front of the people to convince them he was not lying?
4. What was the truth?
5. Who told the truth?
6. What happened to Hananiah?