The Father Shatters the Flask
At our Father's word Jeremiah takes elders out to the valley where children had been burned, renames it the Valley of Slaughter, and smashes a clay jar in front of them. Unlike the potter's pot, this one cannot be reworked. He carries it back to the temple court.
19 1This is what our Father said: Go and buy a potter's clay flask, and take some of the elders of the people and some of the elders of the priests, 2and go out to the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, which is at the entrance of the Potsherd Gate, and proclaim there the words that I speak to you. a a v2 A potsherd is a shard of broken clay pottery; the gate was named for the potsherds discarded nearby.
3Say: Hear the word of our Father, kings of Judah and people of Jerusalem. This is what the Father of heaven's armies, the Father of Israel, says: Look, I am bringing such disaster on this place that the ears of all who hear will tingle. 4Because they abandoned me and made this place foreign, burning incense here to other gods unknown to them, their ancestors, and Judah's kings, and because they filled this place with innocent blood. 5They built Baal's high places to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal—which I never commanded or decreed, nor entered my mind. 6So look, the days are coming, declares our Father, when this place will no longer be called Topheth or the Valley of Ben-Hinnom, but the Valley of Slaughter. 7In this place I will pour out Judah and Jerusalem's plans, make them fall by the sword before their enemies, by the hand of those seeking their lives. I will give their corpses as food to the birds of the sky and beasts of the earth. b b v7 The word for "pour out" here sounds like the word for the clay flask Jeremiah carried — the emptied flask pictures the emptied plans of Judah. 8I will make this city a horror, a thing hissed at; all who pass by will be appalled and hiss at all its wounds. 9I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, each eating his neighbor's flesh during the siege and distress their enemies and those seeking their lives press on them.
10Then you are to break the flask in front of the men who go with you,
11and say to them: This is what the Father of heaven's armies says: In the same way I will break this people and this city, just as one breaks a potter's vessel so that it can never be mended again. And they will bury in Topheth because there is no other place to bury. 12This is what I will do to this place and its residents, declares our Father—making this city like Topheth. 13Jerusalem's houses and the houses of Judah's kings will be made unclean like Topheth—every house on whose roof they burned incense to the whole army of heaven and poured out drink offerings to other gods.
14Jeremiah came from Topheth, where our Father sent him to prophesy, and stood in the court of our Father's house and told all the people:
15This is what the Father of heaven's armies, our Father of Israel, says: I am bringing on this city and all its towns every disaster I pronounced against it, because they stiffened their neck and refused to hear my words.
