Jeremiah 18:1

_THE WORD WHICH CAME TO JEREMIAH FROM THE LORD, SAYING,_ No JFB commentary on this verse....

The sum of what is here taught is, that as the Jews gloried in God’s singular favor, which yet had been conferred on them for a different purpose, even that they might be his sacred heritage, it was necessary to take from them a confidence of this kind; for they at the same time heedlessly despised God and the whole of his law. We indeed know that in God’s covenant there was a mutual stipulation — that the race of Abraham were faithfully to serve God, as God was prepared to perform whatever he had promised; for it was the perpetual law of the covenant, “Walk before me and be perfect,” which was once for all imposed on Abraham, and extended to all his posterity. (Genesis 17:1.) As then the Jews thought that God was by an inviolable compact bound to them, while they yet proudly rejected all his prophets, and polluted, and even as far as they could, abolished, his true favorship, it was ne...

1-10 While Jeremiah looks upon the potter's work, God darts into his mind two great truths. God has authority, and power, to form and fashion kingdoms and nations as he pleases. He may dispose of us as he thinks fit; and it would be as absurd for us to dispute this, as for the clay to quarrel with the potter. But he always goes by fixed rules of justice and goodness. When God is coming against us in judgments, we may be sure it is for our sins; but sincere conversion from the evil of sin will prevent the evil of punishment, as to persons, and to families, and nations....

CHAPTER XVIII _The type of the potter's vessel, and its signification_, 1-10. _The inhabitants of Judah and Jerusalem exhorted to repentance_, 11; _but on their refusal, (which is represented to be as unnatural_ _as if a man should prefer the snowy Lebanon or barren rock to a_ _fruitful plain, or other waters to the cool stream of the_ _fountain,) their destruction is predicted_, 12-17. _In consequence of these plain reproofs and warnings of_ _Jeremiah, a conspiracy is formed against him_, 18. This leads him to appeal to God for his

In the first prophecy of the series Jeremiah 18, the fate of Jerusalem was still undetermined; a long line of kings might yet reign there in splendor, and the city be inhabited forever. This was possible only so long as it was still undecided whether Josiah’s efforts would end in a national reformation or not, and before Jehoiakim threw the weight of the kingly office into the opposite balance. In the present prophecy mercy is still offered to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, but they reject it Jeremiah 18:11. They have made their final choice: and thereupon follows the third prophecy of “the broken vessel” Jeremiah 19:1 in which the utter overthrow of city and kingdom is foretold. We should thus

EXPOSITION This chapter is the introduction of a group of prophecies (extending to Jeremiah 25:1.) of various dates; their sequence has evidently not been determined by chronological considerations. The prophet's first object is, perhaps, to refute the scoffing inquiry (Jeremiah 17:15), "What has become of the [threatening] word of Jehovah?" and to justify the glorious premise given at the conclusion of the last chapter. The fulfillment of threatenings and promises alike is conditioned by the moral attitude of the people (comp. Ezekiel 33:11). God, as it were, holds them in either hand, and there is still time (contrast...

THE WORD WHICH CAME TO JEREMIAH FROM THE LORD, SAYING. The word of prophecy, as the Targum: this is a distinct prophecy from the former, though it may be connected with it; it referring to the destruction threatened in the latter part of the preceding chapter....

THE WORD Israel (the whole nation) a vessel marred in the Potter's hand, is the key to this prophetic strain. But Jehovah will make "it again another vessel" (Jeremiah 18:4)....

CHAPTER 18 The Potter and the Clay _ 1. In the potter's house and the message (Jeremiah 18:1) _ 2. The plot against the prophet and his prayer (Jeremiah 18:18) Jeremiah 18:1. He was commanded to go to the house of a potter and watch his work. The vessel Jeremiah sees fashioned out of clay is marred; it did not turn out well. Then the clay was taken up again and made in another vessel as it seemed good to the potter to make it. Then came the message: “O 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 my hand, O house of Israel.” If the creature of the dust can do as he pleases with the clay, how much

THE POTTER AND THE CLAY. The potter (Jeremiah 18:1) moulding his clay on the upper stone, which he makes revolve by his feet resting on the connected lower stone, is compared with Yahweh in His control of Israel (Jeremiah 18:5). The point of the comparison, as worked out in Jeremiah 18:7 ff_.,_ is not predestination (contrast Romans 9-11), but the conditionality of Yahweh's treatment of a nation, according as it turns to good or to evil (_cf._ the story of Jonah and Nineveh, also Ezekiel's individualism, Jeremiah 18:20 ff.). Judah, however, will not repent (with...