Charles Ellicott Commentary Jeremiah 18

The word which came to Jeremiah. —The message that follows comes in close sequence upon that of the preceding chapter, i.e., probably before the fourth year of the reign of Jehoiakim. It has the character of a last warning to king and people, and its rejection is followed in its turn by the more decisive use of the same symbol in Jeremiah 19:0.

The potter’s house. —The place was probably identical with the potter’s field of Zechariah 11:13, the well-known spot where the workers in that craft carried on their business. The traditional Aceldama, the potter’s field of Matthew 27:7, is on the southern face of the valley of Hinnom, south of Jerusalem. The soil is still a kind of clay suitable and used for the same purpose (Ritter, Palestine, iv. 165, English Translation). The purchase of the field to bury strangers in (Matthew 27:7) implies, however, that it was looked upon as a piece of waste ground, and that its use had been exhausted.

He wrought a work on the wheels. —Literally, the two wheels. The nature of the work is described more graphically in Ecclesiasticus 38:29-30. The potter sat moving one horizontal wheel with his feet, while a smaller one was used, as it revolved, to fashion the shape of the vessel he was making with his hands. The image had been already used of God’s creative work in Isaiah 29:16; Isaiah 45:9; Isaiah 64:8.

Of clay. —The reading in the margin, which gives “as clay,” must be regarded as a clerical error, originating, probably, in the desire to bring the text into conformity with Jeremiah 18:6, while the reading in the text of the Authorised Version is confirmed by many manuscripts and Versions.

He made it again. —Literally, and more vividly, he returned and made. As we read, we have to remember that what is narrated in a few words implied a long train of thoughts. The prophet went by the impulse which he knew to be from God to the “field” in the valley of Hinnom; he stood and gazed, and then as he watched he was led to see in the potter’s work a parable of the world’s history: God as the great artificer, men and nations as the vessels which He makes for honourable or dishonourable uses (2 Timothy 2:20; Romans 9:21).

Cannot I do with you as this potter? —The question implies a theory of the universe, which is neither (as some have thought) one of absolute fatalism, crushing man’s freedom, nor, on the other hand, one which merges God’s sovereignty in man’s power of choice. The clay can resist the potter, or can yield itself willingly to his hands to be shaped as he wills.

Its being “marred” is through no fault of the potter, but—in the framework of the parable—through the defect of the material, and, in its application, through the resistance of the human agents whom God is fashioning. And when it is so marred, one of two courses is open to the potter. He can again re-mould and fashion it to his purpose, to a new work which may be less honourable than that for which it was originally designed; or, if it is hopelessly marred, he can break it and cast it away, and with fresh clay mould a fresh vessel.

The history of nations, churches, and individuals offers many examples of both processes. They frustrate God’s gracious purpose by their self-will, but His long-suffering leads them to repentance and gives them, to speak after the manner of men, yet another chance of being moulded by His hands.

Here the prophet invites the people, as the clay, to accept the former alternative. St. Paul, taking the same analogy, looks forward to the time when the marred vessel of Israel shall be restored to the Master’s house and be honoured in His service (Romans 9:21; Romans 11:26). The closing verses of Browning’s poem, “Rabbi Ben-Ezra,” in Men and Women, may be referred to as embodying the same thought:

“But I need Thee, as then,
Thee, God, who mouldest men;

And since, not even while the whirl was worst,
Did I—to the wheel of life,
With shapes and colours rife,
Bound dizzily—mistake my end, to slake Thy thirst,

So take and use Thy work!
Amend what flaws may lurk,
What strain o’ the stuff, what warpings past the aim!
My times be in Thy hand;
Perfect the cup as planned!
Let age approve of youth, and death complete the same.”