Jeremiah

Jeremiah, from a priestly family of Anathoth, prophesied in Judah from about 626 BCE through the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem in 587/586 BCE. His book records warnings of judgment, his clashes with kings and priests, and his own complaints to God. His scribe Baruch wrote down his words. After the city fell he was taken to Egypt.

Later Jewish writings built legends around him. 2 Maccabees 2 says that before the destruction Jeremiah hid the tent, the Ark of the Covenant and the altar of incense in a cave on the mountain Moses had climbed, sealing the entrance until God gathers his people again. The Paralipomena of Jeremiah, also called 4 Baruch, tells of his servant Abimelech sleeping for sixty-six years. Some Muslim commentators named Jeremiah as the man in Quran 2:259 who passes a ruined town and sleeps for a hundred years, though others name Uzair.

On this site his book is also cited for Jeremiah 4:23, where the words tohu and bohu, "without form and void," describe a land ruined by judgment.