Jeremiah 19, Broken Pot Judah

The term for “jar” used here is baqbuq, which helps in identifying the kind of jar or earthenware jug referred to here. Most scholars agree that the jug Jeremiah buys is an expensive, ring-burnished decanter that functions as a carafe. It is from four to ten inches high and has a heavy body with a narrow neck. The handle is attached to the neck and rim. It is used for storing liquids, and its distinctive narrow neck emits a gurgling sound. The term baqbuq sounds much like that gurgling sound of liquid coming out of the jug. (Zondervan Illustrated Bible Backgrounds Commentary)

^19:1 This is what Yahweh says: “Go and buy a clay jar from a potter. Take along some of the elders of the people and of the priests ² and go out to the Valley of Ben Hinnom, near the entrance of the Potsherd Gate. There proclaim the words I tell you, ³ and say, ‘Hear the word of Yahweh, you kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem. This is what Yahweh Almighty, the God of Israel, says: Listen! I am going to bring a disaster on this place that will make the ears of everyone who hears of it tingle. ⁴ For they have forsaken me and made this a place of foreign gods; they have burned incense in it to gods that neither they nor their ancestors nor the kings of Judah ever knew, and they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent. ⁵ They have built the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire as offerings to Baal—something I did not command or mention, nor did it enter my mind. ⁶ So beware, the days are coming, declares Yahweh, when people will no longer call this place Topheth or the Valley of Ben Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter.

Jeremiah leads a delegation of elders (leaders) and priests out the south gate of Jerusalem where refuse like shards of pottery and human waste are taken to be disposed in the valley of Ben Hinnom. Ironically, this is where the people have been sacrificing to an array of foreign gods, slaughtering not only animals in sacrifice, but children. Molech and Baal have been the recipient gods for these children. So here Jeremiah announces the coming invasion by Babylon and the slaughter of these wicked idolaters.

⁷ “‘In this place I will ruin the plans of Judah and Jerusalem. I will make them fall by the sword before their enemies, at the hands of those who want to kill them, and I will give their carcasses as food to the birds and the wild animals. ⁸ I will devastate this city and make it an object of horror and scorn; all who pass by will be appalled and will scoff because of all its wounds. ⁹ I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and they will eat one another’s flesh because their enemies will press the siege so hard against them to destroy them.’

The invasion will be a siege, where the city of Jerusalem is shut up from access and starved out. Yahweh tells His people that they will become cannibals of their own children when the famine becomes great. Lamentations 2:20, likely written by Jeremiah, laments the very thing he here predicted coming true.

¹⁰ “Then break the jar while those who go with you are watching, ¹¹ and say to them, ‘This is what Yahweh Almighty says: I will smash this nation and this city just as this potter’s jar is smashed and cannot be repaired. They will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room. ¹² This is what I will do to this place and to those who live here, declares Yahweh. I will make this city like Topheth. ¹³ The houses in Jerusalem and those of the kings of Judah will be defiled like this place, Topheth—all the houses where they burned incense on the roofs to all the starry hosts and poured out drink offerings to other gods.’”

Jeremiah dramatically crashes the baqbuq to the ground, a symbol of what God will do to His people. This valley has been called Topheth, a place of burning, because of the waste that is constantly on fire, and later will be called Gehinnom or Gehenna (a synonym for hell), and is a place that has been defiled by both being the trash dump and the place of idolatrous sacrifices. Jerusalem will become Topheth at the hands of the invaders. The houses where inhabitants would go up on the roof to burn incense to the starry hosts will be smashed and destroyed, a fitting end.

¹⁴ Jeremiah then returned from Topheth, where Yahweh had sent him to prophesy, and stood in the court of Yahweh’s temple and said to all the people, ¹⁵ “This is what Yahweh Almighty, the God of Israel, says: ‘Listen! I am going to bring on this city and all the villages around it every disaster I pronounced against them, because they were stiff-necked and would not listen to my words.’” (Jeremiah 19)

Jeremiah leads the delegation back inside the city walls to the Temple court and repeats the message he gave outside. Yahweh is bringing disaster on Jerusalem and all the surrounding communities. Why? Because they will not bow their heads and obey Yahweh.

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Discussion Questions:

1. What valuable thing have you broken so that it cannot be repaired?
2. What do you think would possess someone to sacrifice their own babies to gods?
3. What is the appeal of going up on the roof to offer incense to the gods of the heavens?
4. What have you stiffened your neck to?