Jeremiah 18

Berean Standard Bible · Compare translations · 609 BC – 598 BC · Judah alone · Tap a verse to copy, share or highlight ·

23 verses · 609 words · ~3 min read · ~4 min listen

The Potter and the Clay

¹This is the word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord: ²“Go down at once to the potterʼs house, and there I will give you My message to you.”

³So I went down to the potterʼs house and saw him working at the wheel. ⁴But the vessel that he was shaping from the clay became flawed in his hand; so he formed it into another vessel, as it seemed best for him to do.

⁵Then the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ⁶“O house of Israel, declares the Lord, can I not treat you as this potter treats his clay? Just like clay in the potterʼs hand, so are you in My hand, O house of Israel.

⁷At any time I might announce that a nation or kingdom will be uprooted, torn down, and destroyed. ⁸But if that nation I warned turns from its evil, then I will relent of the disaster I had planned to bring.

⁹And if at another time I announce that I will build up and establish a nation or kingdom, ¹⁰and if it does evil in My sight and does not listen to My voice, then I will relent of the good I had intended for it.

¹¹Now therefore, tell the men of Judah and the residents of Jerusalem that this is what the Lord says: ‘Behold, I am planning a disaster for you and devising a plan against you. Turn now, each of you, from your evil ways, and correct your ways and deeds.’

¹²But they will reply, ‘It is hopeless. We will follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.’”

¹³Therefore this is what the Lord says:

“Inquire among the nations:

Who has ever heard things like these?

Virgin Israel has done a most terrible thing.

¹⁴Does the snow of Lebanon

ever leave its rocky slopes?

Or do its cool waters flowing from a distance

ever run dry?

¹⁵Yet My people have forgotten Me.

They burn incense to worthless idols

that make them stumble in their ways,

leaving the ancient roads

to walk on rutted bypaths

instead of on the highway.

¹⁶They have made their land a desolation,

a perpetual object of scorn;

all who pass by will be appalled

and shake their heads.

¹⁷I will scatter them before the enemy

like the east wind.

I will show them My back and not My face

in the day of their calamity.”

Another Plot against Jeremiah

Jeremiah 11:18–23

¹⁸Then some said, “Come, let us make plans against Jeremiah, for the law will never be lost to the priest, nor counsel to the wise, nor an oracle to the prophet. Come, let us denounce him and pay no heed to any of his words.”

¹⁹Attend to me, O Lord.

Hear what my accusers are saying!

²⁰Should good be repaid with evil?

Yet they have dug a pit for me.

Remember how I stood before You

to speak good on their behalf,

to turn Your wrath from them.

²¹Therefore, hand their children over to famine;

pour out the power of the sword upon them.

Let their wives become childless and widowed;

let their husbands be slain by disease,

their young men struck down by the sword in battle.

²²Let a cry be heard from their houses

when You suddenly bring raiders against them,

for they have dug a pit to capture me

and have hidden snares for my feet.

²³But You, O Lord, know all their deadly plots against me.

Do not wipe out their guilt

or blot out their sin from Your sight.

Let them be overthrown before You;

deal with them in the time of Your anger.

Study notes on this chapter · 1

BackgroundWidely held reading

Conditional prophecy: Nineveh and Jeremiah's principle

Jonah announced that Nineveh would be overturned in forty days, but when the city repented God relented. Jeremiah states the principle: if a nation God has warned turns from evil, he will change his mind about the disaster, and if a nation he has promised to build does evil, he will change his mind about the good. Prophecy in the Bible can be conditional.

When: Jonah, c. 780–750 BC; Jeremiah's potter's house, c. 605–597 BC.

Original passageJonah 3:4–10Jeremiah 18:7–10

Echoed inNahum 1:1–3

Ways people read this (3)

Many prophecies have implied conditions, which explains why some warnings were not carried out as stated.
The principle shows how God's freedom and human response interact; traditions describe this differently (open theism, compatibilism, and others).
Nahum later announces Nineveh's destruction, after the repentance was forgotten.

Editorial note by BibleWay. Interpretations vary; dates are approximate scholarly estimates.

See all prophecy & fulfillment notes →

Jeremiah 18

The Potter and the Clayⓘ

Another Plot against Jeremiahⓘ

Study notes on this chapter · 1

Conditional prophecy: Nineveh and Jeremiah's principle

The Potter and the Clay

Another Plot against Jeremiah