You turn things around! Shall the potter be considered as equal with the clay, That what is made would say to its maker, “He did not make me”; Or what is formed say to him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?

“I have put one from the north into motion, and he has come; From the rising of the sun he will call on My name; And he will come upon rulers as upon mortar, As the potter treads on clay.”

“Woe to the one who quarrels with his Maker— A piece of pottery among the other earthenware pottery pieces! Will the clay say to the potter, ‘What are you doing?’ Or the thing you are making say, ‘He has no hands’?

But now, Lord, You are our Father; We are the clay, and You our potter, And all of us are the work of Your hand.

The Potter and the Clay

The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying,

But the vessel that he was making of clay was spoiled in the hand of the potter; so he remade it into another vessel, as it pleased the potter to make.

“Am I not able, house of Israel, to deal with you as this potter does?” declares the Lord. “Behold, like the clay in the potter’s hand, so are you in My hand, house of Israel.

And in that you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter’s clay and partly of iron, it will be a divided kingdom; but it will have within it some of the toughness of iron, since you saw the iron mixed with common clay.

In that you saw the iron mixed with common clay, they will combine with one another in their descendants; but they will not adhere to one another, just as iron does not combine with pottery.

Or does the potter not have a right over the clay, to make from the same lump one object for honorable use, and another for common use?