Jeremiah 18

Jeremiah 18:1-23 . GOD, AS THE SOLE SOVEREIGN, HAS AN ABSOLUTE RIGHT TO DEAL WITH NATIONS ACCORDING TO THEIR CONDUCT TOWARDS HIM; ILLUSTRATED IN A TANGIBLE FORM BY THE POTTER'S MOULDING OF VESSELS FROM CLAY.

2. go down--namely, from the high ground on which the temple stood, near which Jeremiah exercised his prophetic office, to the low ground, where some well-known (this is the force of "the") potter had his workshop.

3. wheels--literally, "on both stones." The potter's horizontal lathe consisted of two round plates, the lower one larger, the upper smaller; of stone originally, but afterwards of wood. On the upper the potter moulded the clay into what shapes he pleased. They are found represented in Egyptian remains. In Exodus 1:16 alone is the Hebrew word found elsewhere, but in a different sense.

4. marred--spoiled. "Of clay" is the true reading, which was corrupted into "as clay" (Margin), through the similarity of the two Hebrew letters, and from Jeremiah 18:6 , "as the clay."

6. Refuting the Jews' reliance on their external privileges as God's elect people, as if God could never cast them off. But if the potter, a mere creature, has power to throw away a marred vessel and raise up other clay from the ground, a fortiori God, the Creator, can east away the people who prove unfaithful to His election and can raise others in their stead (compare Isaiah 45:9 , 64:8 , Romans 9:20 Romans 9:21 ). It is curious that the potter's field should have been the purchase made with the price of Judas' treachery ( Matthew 27:9 Matthew 27:10 : a potter's vessel dashed to pieces, compare Psalms 2:8 Psalms 2:9 , Revelation 2:27 ), because of its failing to answer the maker's design, being the very image to depict God's sovereign power to give reprobates to destruction, not by caprice, but in the exercise of His righteous judgment. Matthew quotes Zechariah's words ( Zechariah 11:12 Zechariah 11:13 ) as Jeremiah's because the latter (Jeremiah 18:1-19:15') was the source from which the former derived his summary in Zechariah 11:12 Zechariah 11:13 [HENGSTENBERG].

7. At what instant--in a moment, when the nation least expects it. Hereby he reminds the Jews how marvellously God had delivered them from their original degradation, that is, In one and the same day ye were the most wretched, and then the most favored of all people [CALVIN].

8. their evil--in antithesis to, "the evil that I thought to do."
repent--God herein adapts Himself to human conceptions. The change is not in God, but in the circumstances which regulate God's dealings: just as we say the land recedes from us when we sail forth, whereas it is we who recede from the land ( Ezekiel 18:21 , 33:11 ). God's unchangeable principle is to do the best that can be done under all circumstances; if then He did not take into account the moral change in His people (their prayers, &c.), He would not be acting according to His own unchanging principle ( Jeremiah 18:9 Jeremiah 18:10 ). This is applied practically to the Jews' case ( Jeremiah 18:11 ; see Jeremiah 26:3 , Jonah 3:10 ).

11. frame evil--alluding to the preceding image of "the potter," that is, I, Jehovah, am now as it were the potter framing evil against you; but in the event of your repenting, it is in My power to frame anew My course of dealing towards you.
return, &c.--( 2 Kings 17:13 ).