In this case his first efforts did not succeed, and he forthwith massed the same material and made a second effort, assuming of course his right, and showing his power to do any thing with his clay that he chose. Using this case as an illustration, the Lord proceeds to assert his analogous right and power to determine and shape the destiny of nations at his pleasure.- -Let it be noted that this illustration is not used here to show that God makes and molds the free moral activities of men, even the free action of their will, according to his absolute pleasure, allowing to them no more responsibility or activity than the clay has in the potter's hand. This is neither asserted nor implied here. This is not by any means the point of the comparison; but the point is, as we shall soon see, that God can speak concerning a nation to pull it down and destroy it, or to build it up, and instantly the agencies of his providence prove themselves perfectly adequate for this result. With infinite ease he can say this and do it. The reader will specially note the bearing of this case upon the theory of interpretation held by some which assumes that where inspired prophets were commanded to go and to do, it was going and doing in vision only, and not in actual fact. Was not this most obviously a fact? Was not this man at the wheel a living, working potter, and the whole thing a scene in the outward living world? How can this be rationally doubted? 5. Then the word of the LORD came to me, saying, 6. O house of Israel, can not 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. 7. At what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to pluck up, and to pull down, and to destroy it: 8. If that nation against whom I have pronounced, turn from their evil, I will repent of the evil that I thought to do unto them. 9. And at what instant I shall speak concerning a nation, and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it; 10. If 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. As the clay is in the potter's hand to destroy the incipient form of one vessel and to mold it into a new and better one, so are the nations of men in God's hand, to mar and destroy, or to build up and bless at his pleasure. This is the point of the comparison. -There is no occasion to deny that this involves various agencies of divine providence upon the free moral activities of men. Such agencies God is every day exerting, yet with no infringement upon the freedom of the human will. The phrase, "at what instant" (v. 7); and again (v. 9) might well be rendered, "once I speak to destroy; ""again I speak to save. -The word "evil" appears (v. 8) in its twofold sense. If that nation turn from its moral evil, sin, I will repent of the physical evil, ruin, that I thought to bring upon them.-Note that God does not represent his power as in such a sense arbitrary and sovereign that it has no respect to the moral state of his creatures. The very opposite of this is true. God shows that he exercises his agency so as to meet their moral state precisely, sparing the penitent and destroying the incorrigibly wicked. 11. Now 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. In applying the doctrine of this discourse, the Lord through his prophet apprises the people that he is laying his plans to bring sore calamity upon them, and therefore exhorts them to repent that they may escape its infliction and receive blessings instead. 12. And 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. This subtle resort to the plea of no hope indicates a deep-seated love of sin, and a willingness to cheat one's own soul out of the blessings that God proffers, rather than be disturbed in the ways and pleasures of sin. (See notes on 2: 25.)- Some interpreters give it this turn: "There is no hope in your effort to change us; you may as well desist, for we have no thought of returning to God." I prefer the former as the primary sense. The latter, will of course follow as a result.The last clauses of the verse, "We will walk after the stubborness of our evil heart," etc., are to be taken as words supplied for the people by the prophet or by the Lord, as truly representing their hearts; not as words quoted from their lips, for wicked men are not wont in speaking of themselves to call things thus by their right names. (See notes on the phrase "imagination of his evil heart" in chap. 3: 17.) 13. Therefore 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. 14. Will 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? The thought in these verses appears essentially in 2: 10-13. Nothing so strange, so unreasonable, so horrible, has ever been seen among the heathen. "The virgin of Israel" (specially expressive here because the word virgin indicates purity of character) has yet done this horrible thing. She has forsaken God, the fountain of living, snow-cold water, for filthy failing waters of her own broken cisterns.- -V. 14 may be better translated without introducing the italic words of our received version, thus: "Will the snow of Lebanon fail from the rocks of my field? Or shall the waters from that distant region, cold and flowing, dry up? The implication is, No; neither will the blessings that come from God upon those who obey him. These waters are called foreign [from another place"], as coming from a mountain beyond the bounds of Palestine. The idea is, that Lebanon, lifting its crest into the regions of perpetual snow, supplies to the fields within its range the purest, cool, luscious water all the year, even as God supplies good for his trusting people; and it is therefore sheer folly for men to forsake God, or fear that he will fail to supply their need. 15. Because 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; 16. To make their land desolate, and a perpetual hissing; every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished, and wag his head. Strange as it is, the Lord says, "My people have forgotten me," etc. "To stumble and fall out of the ancient paths," is to leave the old ways of obedience to God. "A way not cast up," is one not raised, not turnpiked and smoothed for dry and easy traveling. The result of this is to make their land a desolation and a perpetual object of scorn. 17. 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. The east wind is specially violent in Judea-a figure, therefore, of fierce and fearful scattering.- -The verb rendered "I will show," is the common verb to see, but not in the causative form, as our translators seem to have supposed. It should therefore be read, "I shall see their back, and not their face," i. e., as they fly in confusion from my land. Literally, See them as to their back, and not their face, i. e., shall see this part of their persons. Here is a tacit, but keen allusion to what is said chap. 2: 27: "My people gave me the back, and not the face," while at peace in their homes. Now, in judgment for that very sin, I shall see their back and not their face, as they are driven from their country to a long captivity. 18. Then 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. The people turn against Jeremiah to counteract his mission, and to accuse him before the civil authorities, "smiting him with the tongue." They will not believe his affirmation that their priests, wise men, and prophets, were deceiving them, and really had no word from the Lord. It is plain that the people were mainly strengthened to harden themselves against the messages and influences of Jeremiah by their confidence in their own religious system and teachers—their priests, wise men, and prophets. 19. Give heed to me, O LORD, and hearken to the voice of them that contend with me. 20. Shall 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. Most appropriately the prophet looks to his God for help in this emergency. He implores the Lord to hear what they say against him. He bears his case to God with confidence, because conscious of having sought to do right, faithfully and benevolently as toward both God and the people. He had done them good; shall they be allowed to requite him with evil?- -"Digged a pit for my soul," means that they laid plots against his life. 21. Therefore 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. 22. Let 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. 23. Yet, 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. The clause rendered "Pour out their blood by the force of the sword," is literally, "Give them over to the hand of the sword." The spirit of this prayer is due to the prophet's deep sympathy with truth and righteousness; to his sense of what the cause and honor of God demand; and to his consciousness that he had honestly and with much benevolent self-sacrifice labored to reclaim and save the people, albeit they were proving themselves hopelessly and madly incorrigible. Hence what else could he do? Shall he succumb and make up his mind to let wickedness rule in rampant defiance of God and of all righteousness? Nay, verily, there are sometimes imperative reasons why guilty men should be given up to exterminating judgments. Justice demands it, and even Mercy has no more to say in bar or even delay of retribution. CHAPTER XIX. This chapter and the next are closely connected in time and occasion, the former being the prophetic message and the latter a history of some of its results in the persecution of Jeremiah and his consequent mental conflicts. The date can be determined by the points made in the prophecy. The horrid forms of the exist ing idolatry, as well as the persecution of the prophet, must locate it in time after Josiah's death, and indeed down very near to the end of the kingdom. The siege described (v. 9) must have been the final one in the time of Zedekiah. Probably this message did not precede the final siege by any long interval.- -The occasion is one: its circumstances are solemnly impressive and significant. The prophet is directed to purchase an earthen bottle; to take some of the elders of the people and of the priests with him to Tophet in the valley of the son of Hinnom, and there deliver his message, predicting the utter ruin of the city, fearful slaughter, terrible famine, burying in Tophet till there shall be no more room for graves; and then to break the bottle before their eyes as a symbol of the complete though temporary destruction of the city and nation. He then returns from Tophet to the city; goes into the temple, and there repeats before all the people the substance of this fearful threatening. 1. Thus saith the LORD, Go and get a potter's earthen bottle, and take of the ancients of the people, and of the ancients of the priests; 2. And go forth unto the valley of the son of Hinnom, which is by the entry of the east gate, and proclaim there the words that I shall tell thee: We may suppose that the elders were selected as being the class most susceptible to good impressions. They would be men who were living under Josiah's great reformation, and who hopefully were not utterly hardened against all moral influence. The phrase, "the east gate," should be "the potter's gate"-his shop |