Jeremiah Arkham is a fictional character in DC Comics' Batman comic books, in which he serves as the current head of Arkham Asylum, an institution for the criminally insane. He debuted in 1992 in Shadow of the Bat #1 during the four-part story arc, Batman: The Last Arkham, that kicked off the new series. Since the original Black Mask was killed by Catwoman, he became an insane supervillain taking the name of Black Mask.

In Batman: The Last Arkham, Jeremiah is portrayed as the somewhat sadistic administrator of Arkham Asylum who has delusions that the criminals he houses could one day be housed in society. The Asylum had come into Jeremiah's possession after his uncle Amadeus Arkham died after going mad. Jeremiah proceeded to demolish the asylum before rebuilding it with state-of-the-art systems to keep Arkham's criminals, such as The Joker, The Scarecrow and Cornelius Stirk, contained.

Jeremiah's background was touched upon briefly. Although not much is known about his prior history, the issue states that when he was a teenager he walked into a corner store being held up at gun point by an escaped inmate of the nearby Arkham Asylum, which was coincidentally run by his uncle. The gunman had already killed the storeowners, but when he went to shoot him, Jeremiah seemed to know all about the gunman's past and talked the gunman out of shooting him. The gunman then proceeded to commit suicide and Jeremiah knew he would be destined to succeed his uncle as the head of Arkham Asylum.

Jeremiah ( /dʒɛrɨˈmaɪ.ə/;Hebrew：יִרְמְיָה, Modern Hebrew:Yirməyāhū, IPA: jirməˈjaːhu, Tiberian:Yirmĭyahu, Greek:Ἰερεμίας), meaning "Yah exalts", also called the "Weeping prophet" was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. Jeremiah is traditionally credited with authoring the Book of Jeremiah, 1 Kings, 2 Kings and the Book of Lamentations with the assistance and under the editorship of Baruch ben Neriah, his scribe and disciple.

Judaism considers the Book of Jeremiah part of its canon, and regards Jeremiah as the second of the major prophets. Islam also considers Jeremiah a prophet, and he is listed as a prophet in all the collections of Stories of the Prophets.^{[citation needed]}Christianity also regards Jeremiah as a prophet and he is quoted in the New Testament. It has been interpreted that Jeremiah “spiritualized and individualized religion and insisted upon the primacy of the individual’s relationship with God.”

According to the Book of Jeremiah, Jeremiah was a kohen (Jewish priest), from a landowning family. It is mentioned that he had a joyful early life, however, the difficulties in Jeremiah and the Book of Lamentations have prompted scholars to refer to him as "the weeping prophet". Jeremiah was called to prophetic ministry in c. 626 BC, about a year after King Josiah of Judah had turned the nation toward repentance from the widespread idolatrous practices of his father and grandfather. Jeremiah’s job was to reveal the sins of the people and explain the reason for the impending disaster (destruction by the Babylonian army and captivity), “And when your people say, 'Why has the LORD our God done all these things to us?' you shall say to them, 'As you have forsaken me and served foreign gods in your land, so you shall serve foreigners in a land that is not yours.'"