ירמיהו, פרק ל״ו, פסוק ב׳

After years of delivering divine messages, a critical moment arrives for the prophet's words to be gathered and preserved. God commands Jeremiah to collect his many prophecies and document them into a single, unified record. To do this, he is instructed to take a rolled parchment [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. Although the parchment is completely blank when he first takes it, it is already referred to as a book. This anticipates its future purpose, reflecting the certainty that it will soon be filled with divine words and transformed into a completed text [מצודת דוד].

The scope of what Jeremiah must record spans his entire prophetic career, starting from his earliest days during the reign of Josiah up to the present moment. On a straightforward level, this involves compiling a comprehensive record of his mission [רד״ק, ביאור שטיינזלץ]. He is to write down all the tragedies he previously foretold concerning Israel and Judah that have already come to pass, alongside the prophecies and destinies that are still waiting to unfold [מצודת דוד].

Alongside this general explanation, commentators broadly agree with an ancient tradition identifying this specific scroll as the Book of Lamentations [מצודת דוד, רד״ק, חומת אנך]. According to this history, the original document written under this divine command contained only three laments, structured alphabetically. However, this first scroll met a tragic end when it was burned by the king of Judah. Forced to rewrite the text, Jeremiah recreated the original laments and added a new, expanded section. This addition, which now forms the third chapter of Lamentations beginning with the words "I am the man," features a more complex, triple-alphabetic structure [חומת אנך].