Jeremiah 19:1-6

1 This is what the LORD says: Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take along some of the leaders of the people and some of the leaders of the priests.

2 Go to the valley of Ben Hinnom at the entrance to Potsherd Gate. Announce there the things I plan to do.

3 Say, "Listen to the word of the LORD, you kings of Judah and those who live in Jerusalem. This is what the LORD of Armies, the God of Israel, says: I'm going to bring such a disaster on this place that the ears of everyone who hears about it will ring.

4 "The people, their ancestors, and the kings of Judah have abandoned me. They have made this place unrecognizable by burning incense as an offering to other gods that they hadn't heard of. They have filled this place with the blood of innocent people.

5 They have built worship sites to burn their children as sacrifices to Baal. I didn't ask them or command them to do this. It never entered my mind.

6 "That is why the days are coming, declares the LORD, when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the valley of Ben Hinnom. Instead, it will be called Slaughter Valley.

Jeremiah 19:1-6 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JEREMIAH 19

In this chapter is foreshadowed, represented, and confirmed, the destruction of Jerusalem, by the breaking of a potter's vessel the prophet had in his hand; and by the place where he was bid to do this, and did it. The order for it, and the witnesses of it, and the place where it was done, are declared in Jer 19:1,2; the proclamation there of Jerusalem's ruin is made, Jer 19:3; the cause of it, their apostasy, idolatry, and shedding of innocent blood, Jer 19:4,5; the great slaughter of them by the sword and famine, Jer 19:6-9; and how easy, and irresistible, and irrecoverable, their destruction would be, are signified by the breaking of the bottle, Jer 19:10,11, when Jerusalem for its idolatry would become as defiled a place as Tophet, where the prophet was, Jer 19:12,13; from whence he came to the temple, and there repeated the proclamation of the evil that should come upon that city, and all the towns around it, Jer 19:14,15.