Year of the Bible
Jeremiah 19
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Commentary on the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, Chapter 19:
This chapter relates Jeremiah’s second prophetic action involving pottery. This time, instead of watching a potter work the clay (see 18:1-11), Jeremiah purchases a finished pottery flask. He takes the flask to Hinnom valley where the garbage dump for the city was located. At this time, it had also become a place of idol worship, the murder of innocents, and some type of dedication, perhaps even sacrifice, of children to a pagan god. Jeremiah is to break the pottery flask to represent how God will break the people for these offences. The chapter wraps up with Jeremiah reminding the people that they are not like malleable clay but instead have stiffened their necks, that is, they have become hard like the flask, and they refuse to hear God’s words.
The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, Chapter 19:
The Broken Earthen Flask
1 Thus said the Lord, “Go, buy a potter’s earthen flask, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the senior priests, 2 and go out to the valley of the son of Hinnom at the entry of the Potsherd Gate, and proclaim there the words that I tell you. 3 You shall say, ‘Hear the word of the Lord, O kings of Judah and inhabitants of Jerusalem. Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Behold, I am bringing such evil upon this place that the ears of everyone who hears of it will tingle. 4 Because the people have forsaken me, and have profaned this place by burning incense in it to other gods whom neither they nor their fathers nor the kings of Judah have known; and because they have filled this place with the blood of innocents, 5 and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or decree, nor did it come into my mind; 6 therefore, behold, days are coming, says the Lord, when this place shall no more be called Topheth, or the valley of the son of Hinnom, but the valley of Slaughter. 7 And in this place I will make void the plans of Judah and Jerusalem, and will cause their people to fall by the sword before their enemies, and by the hand of those who seek their life. I will give their dead bodies for food to the birds of the air and to the beasts of the earth. 8 And I will make this city a horror, a thing to be hissed at; every one who passes by it will be horrified and will hiss because of all its disasters. 9 And I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and their daughters, and every one shall eat the flesh of his neighbor in the siege and in the distress, with which their enemies and those who seek their life afflict them.’
10 “Then you shall break the flask in the sight of the men who go with you, 11 and shall say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord of hosts: So will I break this people and this city, as one breaks a potter’s vessel, so that it can never be mended. Men shall bury in Topheth because there will be no place else to bury. 12 Thus will I do to this place, says the Lord, and to its inhabitants, making this city like Topheth. 13 The houses of Jerusalem and the houses of the kings of Judah — all the houses upon whose roofs incense has been burned to all the host of heaven, and drink offerings have been poured out to other gods — shall be defiled like the place of Topheth.’ ”
14 Then Jeremiah came from Topheth, where the Lord had sent him to prophesy, and he stood in the court of the Lord’s house, and said to all the people: 15 “Thus says the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Behold, I am bringing upon this city and upon all its towns all the evil that I have pronounced against it, because they have stiffened their neck, refusing to hear my words.”
*Daily Lectio Divina Question:
"Quite frequently in both the Old and in the New Testament, we find sin described as a refusal to hear the word, as a breaking of the covenant and thus as being closed to God who calls us to communion with himself" (Benedict XVI, Verbum Domini 26). What words of the Lord do I refuse to hear (v. 15) or avoid spending too much time with?
Biblical Commentary provided by the Catholic Biblical School of Michigan, an adult faith formation apostolate. cbsmich.org/join
Revised Standard Version; Second Catholic Edition. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2006).
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Jeremías 19
19 1 Esto dice el Señor: –Anda a
comprar un cántaro de barro cocido.
Toma algunos ancianos del pueblo
y algunos sacerdotes, 2 y sal hacia el valle
de Ben-Hinom, frente a la Puerta de
los Cascotes, y pregona allí las palabras
que Yo te diga. 3 Habrás de decir: «Escuchad
la palabra del Señor, reyes de Judá
y habitantes de Jerusalén. Esto dice el
Señor, Dios de Israel: “Mirad que voy a
traer tal desgracia sobre este lugar, que
a cualquiera que la oiga le zumbarán los
oídos. 4 La causa es que me abandonaron
a Mí, y enajenaron este lugar, quemando
incienso en él a otros dioses, que
ni ellos ni sus padres ni los reyes de Judá
conocían, y llenaron de sangre inocente
este lugar. 5 Y edificaron lugares altos a
Baal, para quemar a sus hijos en el fuego,
como holocausto a Baal, cosas que
Yo no había ordenado, ni dicho, ni se
me habían pasado jamás por la cabeza.
6 Por eso, mirad que vienen días –oráculo
del Señor–, en que ya no se llamará a
este lugar Tófet ni valle de Ben-Hinom,
sino valle de la Matanza. 7 Yo vaciaré en
este lugar los designios de Judá y de Jerusalén,
y los haré caer a espada ante
sus enemigos, a manos de los que atentan
contra su vida, y daré sus cadáveres
en pasto a las aves del cielo y a las
bestias de la tierra. 8 Convertiré esta ciudad
en desolación y escarnio; cualquiera
que pase junto a ella se pasmará y silbará
a la vista de tantas plagas. 9 Les haré
comer la carne de sus hijos y de sus hijas,
se comerán unos a otros durante el
asedio y la angustia con que los oprimirán
sus enemigos que atentarán contra
sus vidas”».
10 »Entonces romperás el cántaro a la
vista de los hombres que vayan contigo.
11 Y les dirás: «Esto dice el Señor de los
ejércitos: “Así romperé Yo a este pueblo
y esta ciudad, como se rompe una vasija
de alfarero, que no se puede recomponer.
Y los sepultarán en el Tófet, porque
no habrá sitio para enterrar. 12 Así haré
Yo con este lugar –oráculo del Señor–,
y con sus habitantes, convirtiendo esta
ciudad en un Tófet. 13 Las casas de Jerusalén
y las casas de los reyes de Judá serán
impuras como el recinto del Tófet,
todas las casas en cuyos terrados quemaron
incienso a cualquier ejército del
cielo e hicieron libaciones a otros dioses”
».
14 Jeremías volvió del Tófet, adonde
lo había enviado el Señor a profetizar, y
se detuvo en el atrio del Templo del Señor,
y dijo a todo el pueblo:
15 –Esto dice el Señor de los ejércitos,
Dios de Israel: «He aquí que Yo voy a
traer sobre esta ciudad y todos sus aledaños
todos los males que le he anunciado,
por haber endurecido su cerviz, y
no haber escuchado mis palabras».
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