Irijah

Irijah appears once, in the gate of Benjamin, the man who arrests Jeremiah on a charge of desertion as the prophet leaves Jerusalem during the Babylonian siege.

Arrest at the Gate of Benjamin

The encounter is brief and named with full lineage. "And when he was in the gate of Benjamin, a captain of the ward was there, whose name was Irijah, the son of Shelemiah, the son of Hananiah; and he laid hold on Jeremiah the prophet, saying, You are falling away to the Chaldeans" (Jer 37:13). The accusation is desertion — slipping over to the besieging Chaldeans — and the seizure is immediate.

Jeremiah's denial is direct and the captain's response is a refusal to hear it: "Then said Jeremiah, It is false; I am not falling away to the Chaldeans. But he didn't listen to him; so Irijah laid hold on Jeremiah, and brought him to the princes" (Jer 37:14). Irijah's role ends at the handoff. The princes' beating of the prophet and his confinement in Jonathan's house follow in the verses after, but Irijah himself drops out of the narrative once the prisoner has been delivered.