✝
← Bible
ARCBLIVREKJVVBL

Jeremiah 18

KJV · Chapter 18/52

1The word which came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,

2Arise, and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause thee to hear my words.

3Then I went down to the potter’s house, and, behold, he wrought a work on the wheels.

4And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hand of the potter: so he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.

5Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying,

6O house of Israel, cannot I do with you as this potter? saith the Lord. Behold, as the clay is in the potter’s hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel.

7At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it;

8If that nation, against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them.

9And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it;

10If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, wherewith I said I would benefit them.

11Now therefore go to, speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the Lord; Behold, I frame evil against you, and devise a device against you: return ye now every one from his evil way, and make your ways and your doings good.

12And they said, There is no hope: but we will walk after our own devices, and we will every one do the imagination of his evil heart.

13Therefore thus saith the Lord; Ask ye now among the heathen, who hath heard such things: the virgin of Israel hath done a very horrible thing.

14Will a man leave the snow of Lebanon which cometh from the rock of the field? or shall the cold flowing waters that come from another place be forsaken?

15Because my people hath forgotten me, they have burned incense to vanity, and they have caused them to stumble in their ways from the ancient paths, to walk in paths, in a way not cast up;

16To make their land desolate, and a perpetual hissing; every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished, and wag his head.

17I will scatter them as with an east wind before the enemy; I will shew them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity.

18Then said they, Come, and let us devise devices against Jeremiah; for the law shall not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, and let us smite him with the tongue, and let us not give heed to any of his words.

19Give heed to me, O Lord, and hearken to the voice of them that contend with me.

20Shall evil be recompensed for good? for they have digged a pit for my soul. Remember that I stood before thee to speak good for them, and to turn away thy wrath from them.

21Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and pour out their blood by the force of the sword; and let their wives be bereaved of their children, and be widows; and let their men be put to death; let their young men be slain by the sword in battle.

22Let a cry be heard from their houses, when thou shalt bring a troop suddenly upon them: for they have digged a pit to take me, and hid snares for my feet.

23Yet, Lord, thou knowest all their counsel against me to slay me: forgive not their iniquity, neither blot out their sin from thy sight, but let them be overthrown before thee; deal thus with them in the time of thine anger.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

God has Jeremiah watch a potter reworking a spoiled vessel, illustrating that He can change His plans for a nation depending on its repentance or rebellion.

Explanation

The potter's workshop was a common, everyday sight in Israelite life, which made the lesson extremely accessible: just as the potter reshapes flawed clay into something new, God has sovereign freedom to adjust a nation's destiny according to its response. The general principle presented (if a nation repents, judgment can be averted; if a blessed people become corrupt, the blessing can be withdrawn) shows that the relationship with God is dynamic, not a fixed, impersonal script. Sadly, the people respond with outright refusal, saying they will follow their own plans — and even conspire against Jeremiah's life for announcing this.

Fun facts

  • The potter's workshop described here was a real and common technology in ancient Israel, with rotating stone wheels uncovered in archaeological excavations of Jerusalem and other cities of the period.
  • This passage about the potter and the clay is echoed by Paul in Romans 9:20-21, using the same image to speak of God's sovereignty over humanity.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Jeremiah 18:1In the potter’s workshop, Jeremiah watches a vessel that comes out wrong get remade into another shape, not discarded but reshaped. It is the central image for explaining how God deals with nations: He is free to change what He does depending on the people’s response, not locked into a fixed sentence.
  2. Jeremiah 18:2God tells Jeremiah to visit a common pottery workshop of the time, to use the potter’s work as a new prophetic enactment.
  3. Jeremiah 18:3Jeremiah obeys and watches the potter working at the wheel, an everyday scene that will become the basis for the message that follows.
  4. Jeremiah 18:4The vessel the potter was shaping comes out wrong, but instead of discarding the clay, he reshapes it into another form — the central image for God’s explanation that follows.
  5. Jeremiah 18:5A transition formula introducing the divine explanation for the scene of the potter that Jeremiah has just watched.
  6. Jeremiah 18:6God applies the scene directly: just as the potter has total control over the clay, He has control over Israel’s fate — shaping it according to the people’s response.
  7. Jeremiah 18:7God explains that His decisions of judgment are not fixed and unchangeable — they depend on the response of the nation involved, as becomes clear in the next verse.
  8. Jeremiah 18:8These verses make explicit that prophecies of judgment, and of blessing, were conditional: if the nation turned back, God would change His mind about the disaster announced, and the reverse holds true too. This is the logic behind Jeremiah’s constant insistence on calling for repentance.
  9. Jeremiah 18:9In the same way, promises of blessing and rebuilding can also change — God explains the principle symmetrical to the one in the previous verses.
  10. Jeremiah 18:10Completes the principle: even a nation destined for blessing can lose it if it goes back to doing evil — the relationship with God is always conditional on the human response.
  11. Jeremiah 18:11God applies this principle of flexibility directly to Judah: there is still a chance to change course before the announced judgment becomes final.
  12. Jeremiah 18:12The people’s response is a direct, cynical refusal: they prefer to follow their own plans, even knowing this means turning down the chance for change offered by God.
  13. Jeremiah 18:13God reacts with shock: not even among the pagan nations would something this strange be seen — a chosen people deliberately refusing the chance to correct itself.
  14. Jeremiah 18:14Uses reliable natural phenomena, like the constant snow of Mount Lebanon and the cool waters of fresh rivers, as a comparison: even nature is more constant than Israel.
  15. Jeremiah 18:15Unlike the constancy of nature, the people abandoned the known, safe path to follow risky shortcuts after empty idols.
  16. Jeremiah 18:16Describes the shock foreigners will feel at seeing the destruction of Judah’s land — astonishment that turns even into hissing and gestures of scorn.
  17. Jeremiah 18:17Compares the scattering of the people to leaves carried off by a strong east wind — and God warns that, at the moment of destruction, He will turn His back instead of helping.
  18. Jeremiah 18:18The idea that the priest’s law, the counsel of the wise, and the word of the prophet would never fail shows the mindset of Jeremiah’s opponents: to them, each of these three religious authorities would always have a ready answer. That’s why they preferred to silence Jeremiah with violence instead of arguing with him.
  19. Jeremiah 18:19Begins another of Jeremiah’s confessions: he asks God to pay attention to him personally, after discovering yet another conspiracy against his life.
  20. Jeremiah 18:20Jeremiah laments the cruel irony: he had even interceded on behalf of these very people before, and now receives conspiracy and malice in return.
  21. Jeremiah 18:21In one of the harshest moments of his confessions, Jeremiah explicitly asks for vengeance against his persecutors — a raw human outpouring of pain, not a virtue to be imitated.
  22. Jeremiah 18:22Continues the plea for retribution, justifying the intensity of the request by the fact that his persecutors literally set a trap to capture him.
  23. Jeremiah 18:23Closes the confession by asking God not to forgive those who plotted his death — ending this raw outpouring with a direct appeal for justice, with no middle ground.

Chapters

12345678910111213141516171819202122232425262728293031323334353637383940414243444546474849505152

Our apps

Our apps →

Bible in Stories

The Bible told as a story, with audio and videos.

📱 Get the app

World in Stories

True stories of humanity that sound made up.

App StoreGoogle Play

Feito! Pequenas Vitórias

A light daily routine for people who lose track of the day.

App StoreGoogle Play