{{Short description|Type of literary work}} {{Use dmy dates|date=May 2022}} [[Image:123.The Prophet Jeremiah (retusche).jpg|thumb|The prophet Jeremiah lamenting the fall of Jerusalem, engraving by Gustave Doré, 1866]] A '''jeremiad''' is a long literary work, usually in prose, but sometimes in verse, in which the author bitterly laments the state of society and its morals in a serious tone of sustained invective, and always contains a prophecy of society's imminent downfall.
Generally, the term ''jeremiad'' is applied to moralistic texts that denounce a society for its wickedness, and prophesies its downfall. Over time, the impact of the term has faded and has become a general expression for lament. It is often perceived with derogatory overtones.
The jeremiad has a unique presence in American culture and in the history of the United States, having roots in Colonial-era settlers in New England. In American culture, jeremiads are closely associated with historical American Puritans and the concept of American exceptionalism{{Not in body|date=May 2026}}.<ref name="Sacvan Bercovitch 2012">Sacvan Bercovitch, "The American Jeremiad (Studies in American Thought and Culture)". 19 April 2012. University of Wisconsin Press; 1st edition (19 April 2012). ISBN 0299288641</ref>{{page needed|date=November 2021}}<ref>Van Engen, Abram C. City on a Hill: A History of American Exceptionalism. Yale University Press; Illustrated edition. 25 February 2020 edition. ISBN 0300229755</ref>{{page needed|date=November 2021}}
==Origins and usage== The word is named after the biblical prophet Jeremiah, and comes from biblical works attributed to him, the Book of Jeremiah and the Book of Lamentations. The Book of Jeremiah chronicles the downfall of the Kingdom of Judah, and asserts that this is because its rulers have broken the covenant with the Lord.
The ''Lamentations'', similarly, lament the fall of the kingdom of Judah after the conquest prophesied by Jeremiah has occurred:
{{Poem quote|text=How lonely sits the city that once was full of people! How like a widow she has become, she that was great among the nations! She that was a princess among the provinces has become subject to forced labor.
She weeps bitterly in the night, with tears on her cheeks; among all her lovers, she has no one to comfort her; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her; they have become her enemies.
Judah has gone into exile with suffering and hard servitude; she lives now among the nations; she finds no resting place; her pursuers have all overtaken her in the midst of her distress.
The roads to Zion mourn, for no one comes to the festivals; all her gates are desolate; her priests groan; her young girls grieve, and her lot is bitter.<ref>Lamentations 1:1–4 (NRSVue)</ref>}}
''The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language'' defines Jeremiad as: "a literary work or speech expressing a bitter lament or a righteous prophecy of doom", as well as being form of lamentation; an utterance of grief or sorrow; a complaining tirade: used with a spice of ridicule or mockery, implying either that the grief itself is unnecessarily great, or that the utterance of it is tediously drawn out and attended with a certain satisfaction to the utterer. Its third definition is "a tale of sorrow, disappointment, or complaint; a doleful story; a dolorous tirade; – generally used satirically".<ref>{{cite book |title=The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language |edition=5th indexed |publisher=Mariner Books |date=16 October 2018 |ISBN=1328841693}}</ref> Merriam-Webster dictionary defines Jeremiad as "a prolonged lamentation or complaint; also: a cautionary or angry harangue".<ref>{{Cite dictionary|url=https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/jeremiad|title=jeremiad |dictionary=Merriam-Webster|access-date=9 April 2026}}</ref>
== Use in American culture ==
The jeremiad was a favorite literary device of the Puritans, and was used in prominent early evangelical sermons like "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God" by Jonathan Edwards.<ref>Daniels, Bruce C. Puritans at Play. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005. {{ISBN|978-1-4039-7212-5}} {{Page needed|date=August 2011}}</ref> Besides Jonathan Edwards, such jeremiads can be found in every era of American history, including John Adams, Thomas Jefferson and James Fenimore Cooper.<ref name="Reinartz, Gabriele 1993">Reinartz, Gabriele. Die amerikanische "Jeremiade" als rhetorische Strategie im öffentlichen Diskurs: disillusionment in Eden. Frankfurt am Main: P. Lang, 1993. ISBN 9783631464687</ref>{{page needed|date=November 2021}}
The term has also found use in American literature. Works by Norman Mailer (''The Armies of the Night''), Thomas Pynchon (''The Crying of Lot 49''), Nathanael West (''The Day of the Locust'') and Hubert Selby (''Last Exit to Brooklyn'') were interpreted as jeremiads, as were older works of American literature such as Herman Melville's ''The Confidence-Man'' or William Faulkner's Southern literature.{{according to whom|date=November 2021}}
The work of Robert Bork has also been described as a jeremiad. Extending that tradition in a reflective vein is the autobiographical work of freed American slave Frederick Douglass, who lamented the moral corruption that slavery wrought on America – from both a Jeffersonian and Christian tradition.{{according to whom|date=November 2021}}
===Role in American politics===
According to the Canadian literary scholar Sacvan Bercovitch, in a typical American jeremiad, the biblical promise of a perfect society contradicts the actual mistakes of American society. The jeremiad thus has the function of a social corrective in that it links salvation to the righteous behavior of Americans. Bercovitch found this pattern in many political speeches.<ref name="Sacvan Bercovitch 2012"/>{{page needed|date=November 2021}}
The role of America as a myth and concept of salvation is an important part of the political rhetoric of the United States and is described, among other things, in inaugural speeches.<ref name=nzz>[http://www.nzz.ch/aktuell/feuilleton/uebersicht/amerika-als-mythos-und-heilsvorstellung-1.1734528 Amerika als Mythos und Heilsvorstellung, Die Kunst der Jeremiade – über die Rhetorik der Inaugurationsrede] Götz-Dietrich Opitz, NZZ 20. Januar 2009</ref> America is described as a world and salvation history experiment with a role model character, as a vision and also cited self-accusatory and apocalyptic tones. It corresponds to a civil religious tradition of rhetorical millennialism.
==See also== * Philippic (tirade, orations) * African-American jeremiad
==References== {{reflist}}
==Further reading== *{{cite journal |doi=10.1086/644761 |title=Consumer Identity Work as Moral Protagonism: How Myth and Ideology Animate a Brand-Mediated Moral Conflict |year=2010 |last1=Luedicke |first1=Marius K. |last2=Thompson |first2=Craig J. |last3=Giesler |first3=Markus |journal=Journal of Consumer Research |volume=36 |issue=6 |pages=1016–32|s2cid=144993089 |url=http://openaccess.city.ac.uk/4674/5/644761.pdf }} * {{cite book|last1=Murphy|first1=Andrew R.|title=Prodigal Nation: Moral Decline and Divine Punishment from New England to 9/11|date=2008|publisher=Oxford University Press|location=New York|isbn=978-0-19-532128-9}}
==External links== *[http://www.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/jeremiad.htm Forms of American Puritan Rhetoric: The Jeremiad]
Category:Rhetoric Category:Genres of poetry Category:Jeremiah