The Potter and the Clay
Jeremiah 18The word which came to Jeremiah from YHWH, saying, “Get up and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will cause you to hear my words.”
Then I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was making something on the wheels. When the vessel that he made of the clay was marred in the hand of the potter, he made it again another vessel, as seemed good to the potter to make it.
Then the word of YHWH came to me, saying, “As a potter does, can I not do with y’all, house of Israel?” declares YHWH. “Like clay in a potter’s hand, so are y’all in my hand, house of Israel. At the instant I speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up and to break down and to destroy it, if that nation, concerning which I have spoken, turns from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do to them. At the instant I speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if they do that which is evil in my sight, that they not obey my voice, then I will repent of the good with which I said I would benefit them.
“Now therefore, you are to speak to the men of Judah, and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, ‘YHWH says: “Look! I will form a disaster for y’all, and devise a plan against y’all. Every one of y’all should return from your evil way now, and reform your* ways and actions.”’ But they say, ‘It’s hopeless! We will follow our own plans, and each of us will each follow the stubbornness of our evil heart.’”
Therefore YHWH says:
“Y’all should ask among the nations, ‘Who has heard such things?’ The virgin of Israel has done a very horrible thing. Will the snow of Lebanon fail from the rock of the field? Will the cold waters that flow down from afar be dried up? For my people have forgotten me. They have burned incense to false gods. They have been made to stumble in their ways in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up, to make their land an astonishment, and a perpetual hissing. Everyone who passes by it will be astonished, and shake their head. I will scatter them as with an east wind before the enemy. I will show them the back, and not the face, in the day of their calamity.Then they said, “Come, y’all! Let’s devise plans against Jeremiah, for the law won’t be lost from the priest, nor counsel from the wise, nor the word from the prophet. Come, y’all, and let’s strike him with the tongue, and let’s not give heed to any of his words.”
Pay attention to me, YHWH, and listen to the voice my opponents. Should evil be repaid for good? For they have dug a pit for my soul. Remember how I stood before you to speak good for them, to turn away your wrath from them. Therefore deliver up their children to the famine, and give them over to the power of the sword. Let their wives become childless and widows. Let their men be killed and their young men struck by the sword in battle. Let a cry be heard from their houses when you bring a troop suddenly on them; for they have dug a pit to take me and hidden snares for my feet. Yet, YHWH, you know all their plots to kill me. Don’t forgive their iniquity. Don’t blot out their sin from your sight, Let them be overthrown before you. Deal with them in the time of your anger.