Jeremiah 18-19

Common English Bible

God the potter

18 Jeremiah received the Lord’s word: ²Go down to the potter’s house, and I’ll give you instructions about what to do there. ³So I went down to the potter’s house; he was working on the potter’s wheel. ⁴But the piece he was making was flawed while still in his hands, so the potter started on another, as seemed best to him. ⁵Then the Lord’s word came to me: ⁶House of Israel, can’t I deal with you like this potter, declares the Lord? Like clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in mine, house of Israel! ⁷At any time I may announce that I will dig up, pull down, and destroy a nation or kingdom; ⁸but if that nation I warned turns from its evil, then I’ll relent and not carry out the harm I intended for it. ⁹At the same time, I may announce that I will build and plant a nation or kingdom; ¹⁰but if that nation displeases and disobeys me, then I’ll relent and not carry out the good I intended for it. ¹¹Now say to the people of Judah and those living in Jerusalem: This is what the Lord says: I am a potter preparing a disaster for you; I’m working out a plan against you. So each one of you, turn from your evil ways; reform your ways and your actions. ¹²But they said, “What’s the use! We will follow our own plans and act according to our own willful, evil hearts.”

¹³Therefore, the Lord proclaims:
Ask among the nations:
    Have you ever heard anything like this?
        Virgin Israel has done
        the most horrible thing.
¹⁴Does the snow on the mountains of Lebanon ever melt entirely
        off their rocky cliffs?
    Do the cool mountain streams ever dry up?^[a]
¹⁵Yet my people have forgotten me;
    they have offered sacrifices to a lie.
And so they have stumbled along the way,
    even along the ancient paths.
They have taken side roads,
    not the main roads.^[b]
¹⁶They have ruined their country
    and brought utter shame on it.
All who pass by are shocked
    and shake their heads.
¹⁷Like a strong east wind,
    I will scatter them before their enemy.
When disaster strikes them,
    I will show them my back,
        not my face.

¹⁸Then they said, “Come, let’s unite against Jeremiah, for the priest’s instruction won’t fail, nor will the sage’s counsel, nor the prophet’s word. Come, let’s silence him and pay no attention to his words.”

¹⁹Pay attention to me, Lord;
    listen to what my enemies are saying.
²⁰Should evil be returned for good?
    Yet they have set traps for me.
Remember that I stood before you,
    begging you to be merciful
        and not to punish them.
²¹Enough! Let their children starve;
    let them die by the sword.
    Let their wives be barren widows;
    let their men be slaughtered
    and their youth struck down in battle.
²²    Let screams be heard from their homes
    when you suddenly bring armies against them.
They have dug a pit to capture me,
    set traps for my feet.
²³But you, Lord, you know
    all their sinister plots to kill me.
Don’t overlook their wrongdoing;
    don’t cleanse their sin from before you.
May they stumble before you;
    when you become angry, do something about them.

Broken beyond repair

19 The Lord proclaims: Go buy a clay jar from a potter in the presence of the elders of the people and the priests. ²Then go out to the Ben-hinnom Valley at the entrance of the gate called Broken Pots and proclaim there the words I will tell you. ³Listen to the Lord’s word, you kings of Judah and those of you living in Jerusalem: This is what the Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel, says: I’m going to bring such disaster upon this place that it will shock all who hear of it. ⁴They have deserted me and degraded this place into a shrine for other gods, which neither they nor their ancestors nor Judah’s kings have ever known. And they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent. ⁵Yes, they have built shrines to Baal, to burn their sons and daughters in the fire, although I never commanded or ordered such a thing, nor did it ever cross my mind.

⁶So now the time is coming, declares the Lord, when people will no longer call this place Topheth or Ben-hinnom Valley but Carnage Valley. ⁷I will foil the plans of Judah and Jerusalem in this place and will have them fall in battle before their enemies, before those who seek their lives. I will give their corpses as food to the birds and the wild animals. ⁸I will make this city something that sounds horrible; all who pass by it will be shocked at its pain. ⁹And when their enemies lay siege to the city, seeking their lives, they will resort in desperation to eating the flesh of their sons and daughters, and to devouring the flesh of their neighbors.

¹⁰Then you should shatter the clay jar in the sight of the people who are with you, ¹¹and you should say to them: This is what the Lord of heavenly forces says: Just as one smashes the potter’s piece beyond repair, so I will smash this people and this city. And they will bury the dead in Topheth until there’s no room left. ¹²That is what I will do to this place and its residents, declares the Lord: I will make this city like Topheth. ¹³The houses of Jerusalem and those of Judah’s kings will become as foul as Topheth—all the houses on whose roofs they made offerings to the heavenly force and poured out drink offerings to other gods.

¹⁴When Jeremiah returned from Topheth where the Lord had sent him to prophesy, he stood in the court of the Lord’s temple and said to all the people: ¹⁵The Lord of heavenly forces, the God of Israel, proclaims: I am about to bring upon this city and its surrounding towns every disaster that I have pronounced against them, because they have been stubborn and wouldn’t obey my words.