Jeremiah 18

1The word that came to Yirmeyahu from Yahweh, saying,

2Arise and go down to the potter’s house, and there I will let you hear my words.

3So I went down to the potter’s house, and there he was, doing work on the wheel.

4And the vessel that he was making from the clay was spoiled in the potter’s hand, and he turned and made it into another vessel, as seemed right in the potter’s eyes to make.

5Then the word of Yahweh came to me, saying,

6Can I not do with you, house of Israel, as this potter does? declares Yahweh. Look, like clay in the hand of the potter, so are you in my hand, house of Israel.

7At one moment I may speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to uproot and to tear down and to destroy.

8And if that nation turns from its evil, against which I spoke, then I will relent concerning the disaster that I planned to do to it.

9And at another moment I may speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant.

10but if it does what is evil in my sight, not listening to my voice, then I will relent concerning the good that I said I would do to it.

11Now therefore, say to the men of Judah and to the inhabitants of Jerusalem, saying, ‘Thus says Yahweh: Behold, I am shaping disaster against you and devising a plan against you. Turn back, please, each man from his evil way, and make your ways and your deeds good.’

12But they will say, ‘It is hopeless, for we will follow our own plans, and each of us will act according to the stubbornness of his evil heart.’

13Therefore thus says Yahweh: Ask now among the nations, who has heard such things? Virgin Israel has done a very horrible thing.

14Does the snow of Lebanon leave the rock of the open country? Or are cold, flowing foreign waters ever uprooted?

15For my people have forgotten me; they burn incense to emptiness. They have stumbled in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk on side roads, on a road not built up.

16making their land a desolation, an object of perpetual hissing; everyone who passes by it will be appalled and shake his head.

17Like an east wind I will scatter them before the enemy; I will show them the back and not the face in the day of their disaster.

18Then they said, “Come, let us devise plans against Jeremiah, for instruction will not perish from the priest, nor counsel from the wise man, nor word from the prophet. Come, let us strike him with the tongue, and let us not pay attention to any of his words.”

19Pay attention to me, O Yahweh, and hear the voice of my adversaries.

20Should evil be repaid for good? For they have dug a pit for my life. Remember that I stood before you to speak good on their behalf, to turn your wrath away from them.

21Therefore give their children over to famine, and hand them over to the power of the sword. Let their wives become bereaved and widowed, and let their men be slain by death, their young men struck down by the sword in battle.

22Let a cry be heard from their houses when you suddenly bring a raiding band upon them, for they have dug a pit to capture me and hidden traps for my feet.

23But you, O Yahweh, know all their counsel against me for death. Do not cover over their iniquity, and do not blot out their sin from before you. Let them be made to stumble before you; in the time of your anger, act against them.