Context No. 2362 of 4322 · Baruch

Baruch 1:15-22: in context

15You shall say: To the Lord our God belongs righteousness, but to us confusion of face, as at this day—to the men of Judah, to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, 16to our kings, to our princes, to our priests, to our prophets, and to our fathers, 17because we have sinned before the Lord. 18We have disobeyed him and have not listened to the voice of the Lord our God, to walk in the commandments of the Lord that he has set before us. 19Since the day that the Lord brought our fathers out of the land of Egypt to this present day, we have been disobedient to the Lord our God, and we have been negligent in not listening to his voice. 20Therefore the plagues have clung to us, along with the curse which the Lord declared through Moses his servant in the day that he brought our fathers out of the land of Egypt to give us a land that flows with milk and honey, as at this day. 21Nevertheless we didn’t listen to the voice of the Lord our God, according to all the words of the prophets whom he sent to us, 22but we each walked in the imagination of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods and to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord our God.

Baruch records a prayer of confession sent back toward Jerusalem by exiles. It begins by putting the two sides in their place: to the Lord our God belongs righteousness, but to us belongs shame of face, as on this day. Then it lays out the long record. Kings, princes, priests, prophets, and fathers alike have sinned, disobedient from the day of the exodus down to now.

The confession does not hunt for someone else to blame. It gathers the whole community, leaders and ancestors and the present generation together, under one honest verdict, and traces the root to a repeated choice: we each walked in the imagination of our own heart. There is no plea of ignorance; the prophets were sent and not heeded. To say that the fault is ours and the righteousness is God's is the first true thing this prayer can say, and it says it before asking for anything.

Can I name my part in what has gone wrong without immediately reaching for who else is to blame?

Sources

Baruch 1:15: To the Lord our God belongs righteousness, but to us confusion of face, as at this day.
Baruch 1:22: we each walked in the imagination of his own wicked heart, to serve strange gods and to do what is evil in the sight of the Lord our God.
Daniel 9:7: Lord, righteousness belongs to you, but to us confusion of face, as it is today.