The next poem, Ch. V. 1-13, says little of the Scythians, possibly only in verse 6, but details the moral reasons for the doom with which they threatened the people. It describes the Prophet's search through Jerusalem for an honest, God-fearing man and his failure to find one. Hence the fresh utterance of judgment. Perjury and whoredom are rife, with a callousness to chastisement already inflicted. Some have relegated Jeremiah's visit to the capital to a year after 621-20 when the deuteronomic reforms had begun and Josiah had removed the rural priests to the Temple.[220] But, as we have seen, Anathoth lay so near to Jerusalem, and intercourse between them was naturally so constant, that Jeremiah may well have gained the following experience before he left his village for residence in the city. The position of the poem among the Scythian Songs, along with the possible allusion to the Scythians [pg 119] in verse 6, suggests a date before 620. There is no introduction.
Range ye the streets of Jerusalem, V. 1
Look now and know,
And search her broad places,
If a man ye can find—
If there be that does justice,
Aiming at honesty.
[That I may forgive them[221]]
Though they say, “As God liveth,” 2
Falsely[222] they swear