◀ All Reading Plans / Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary) / Psalm 119:161-168 (Loving God’s law); Jeremiah 18:1-11 (Jeremiah at the potter’s wheel); Matthew 11:20-24 (Jesus prophesies against the cities) (New English Translation)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

Daily Bible readings that follow the church liturgical year, with thematically matched Old and New Testament readings.

Duration: 1245 days

Psalm 119:161-168

שׂ/שׁ (Sin/Shin)

¹⁶¹Rulers pursue me for no reason,
yet I am more afraid of disobeying your instructions.^[a]
¹⁶²I rejoice in your instructions,
like one who finds much plunder.^[b]
¹⁶³I hate and despise deceit;
I love your law.
¹⁶⁴Seven times^[c] a day I praise you
because of your just regulations.
¹⁶⁵Those who love your law are completely secure;^[d]
nothing causes them to stumble.^[e]
¹⁶⁶I hope for your deliverance, O Lord,
and I obey^[f] your commands.
¹⁶⁷I keep your rules;
I love them greatly.
¹⁶⁸I keep your precepts and rules,
for you are aware of everything I do.^[g]

Jeremiah 18:1-11

An Object Lesson from the Making of Pottery

18 The Lord said to Jeremiah:^[a] ²“Go down at once^[b] to the potter’s house. I will speak to you further there.”^[c] ³So I went down to the potter’s house and found him working^[d] at his wheel.^[e] ⁴Now and then^[f] there would be something wrong^[g] with the pot he was molding from the clay^[h] with his hands. So he would rework^[i] the clay into another kind of pot as he saw fit.^[j]

⁵Then the Lord’s message came to me, ⁶“I, the Lord, say:^[k] ‘O nation of Israel, can I not deal with you as this potter deals with the clay?^[l] In my hands, you, O nation of Israel, are just like the clay in this potter’s hand.’ ⁷There are times, Jeremiah,^[m] when I threaten to uproot, tear down, and destroy a nation or kingdom.^[n] ⁸But if that nation I threatened stops doing wrong,^[o] I will cancel the destruction^[p] I intended to do to it. ⁹And there are times when I promise to build up and establish^[q] a nation or kingdom. ¹⁰But if that nation does what displeases me and does not obey me, then I will cancel the good I promised to do to it. ¹¹So now, tell the people of Judah and the citizens of Jerusalem this: The Lord says, ‘I am preparing to bring disaster on you! I am making plans to punish you.^[r] So, every one of you, stop the evil things you have been doing.^[s] Correct the way you have been living and do what is right.’^[t]

Footnotes

Jeremiah 18:1 tn Heb “The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying:” This same formula occurs ten other times in Jeremiah. It has already occurred at 7:1 and 11:1.
Jeremiah 18:2 tn Heb “Get up and go down.” The first verb is not literal but is idiomatic for the initiation of an action. See 13:4, 6 for other occurrences of this idiom.
Jeremiah 18:2 tn Heb “And I will cause you to hear my word there.”
Jeremiah 18:3 tn Heb “And behold he was working.”
Jeremiah 18:3 sn At his wheel (Heb “at the two stones”). The Hebrew expression is very descriptive of the construction of a potter’s wheel, which consisted of two stones joined by a horizontal shaft. The potter rotated the wheel with his feet on the lower wheel and worked the clay with his hands on the upper. For a picture of a potter working at his wheel, see I. Ben-Dor, “Potter’s Wheel,” IDB 3:846. See also the discussion regarding the making of pottery in J. L. Kelso, “Pottery,” IDB 3:846-53.
Jeremiah 18:4 tn The verbs here denote repeated action. They are the Hebrew perfect with the vav (ו) consecutive. The text then reads somewhat literally, “Whenever the vessel he was molding…was ruined, he would remold…” For this construction see Joüon 2:393-94 §118.n and 2:628-29 §167.b, and compare the usage in Amos 4:7-8.
Jeremiah 18:4 sn Something was wrong with the clay—either there was a lump in it, or it was too moist or not moist enough, or it had some other imperfection. In any case the vessel was “ruined” or “spoiled,” or defective in the eyes of the potter. This same verb has been used of the linen shorts that were “ruined” and hence “good for nothing” (Jer 13:7). The nature of the clay and how it responded to the potter’s hand determined the kind of vessel that he made of it. He did not throw the clay away. This is the basis for the application in vv. 7-10 to any nation and to the nation of Israel in particular (vv. 11-17).
Jeremiah 18:4 tn The usage of the preposition בּ (bet) to introduce the material from which something is made in Exod 38:8 and 1 Kgs 15:22 should lay to rest the rather forced construction that some (like J. Bright, Jeremiah [AB], 121) put on the variant כַּחֹמֶר (kakhomer) found in a few Hebrew mss. Bright renders that phrase as an elliptical “as clay sometimes will.” The phrase is missing from the Greek version.
Jeremiah 18:4 tn Heb “he would turn and work.” This is an example of hendiadys where one of the two verbs joined by “and” becomes the adverbial modifier of the other. The verb “turn” is very common in this construction (see BDB 998 s.v. שׁוּב Qal.8 for references).
Jeremiah 18:4 tn Heb “as it was right in his eyes to do [or work it].” For this idiom see Judg 14:3, 7; 1 Sam 18:20, 26; 2 Sam 17:4.
Jeremiah 18:6 tn This phrase (literally “Oracle of the Lord”) has been handled this way on several occasions when it occurs within first person addresses where the Lord is the speaker. See, e.g., 16:16 and 17:24.
Jeremiah 18:6 tn The words “deals with the clay” are not in the text. They are part of an elliptical comparison and are supplied in the translation here for clarity.
Jeremiah 18:7 tn The word “Jeremiah” is not in the text, but it is implicit from the introduction in v. 5 that he is being addressed. It is important to see how the rhetoric of this passage is structured. The words of vv. 7-10 lead up to the conclusion “So now” in v. 11, which in turn leads to the conclusion “Therefore” in v. 13. The tense of the verb in v. 12 is very important. It is a vav consecutive perfect indicating the future (cf. GKC 333 §112.p, r); their response is predictable. The words of vv. 7-10 are addressed to Jeremiah (v. 5) in fulfillment of the Lord’s promise to speak to him (v. 2). They furnish the basis for the Lord’s words of conditional threat to a people who show no promise of responding positively (vv. 11-12). Verse 6 then must be seen as another example of the figure of apostrophe (the turning aside from description about someone to addressing them directly; cf., e.g., Ps 6:8-9 (6:9-10 HT). Earlier examples of this figure have been seen in 6:20; 9:4; 11:13; 12:13; and 15:6.
Jeremiah 18:7 tn Heb “One moment I may speak about a nation or kingdom to…” So also in v. 9. The translation is structured this way to avoid an awkward English construction and to reflect the difference in disposition. The constructions are, however, the same.
Jeremiah 18:8 tn Heb “turns from its wickedness.”
Jeremiah 18:8 tn There is a good deal of debate about how the word translated here “revoke” should be translated. There is a good deal of reluctance to translate it “change my mind” because some see that as contradicting Num 23:19 and thus prefer “relent.” However, the English word “relent” suggests the softening of an attitude but not necessarily the change of course. It is clear that in many cases (including here) an actual change of course is in view (see, e.g., Amos 7:3, 6; Jonah 3:9; Jer 26:19; Exod 13:17; 32:14). Several of these passages deal with “conditional” prophecies, where a change in behavior of the people or the mediation of a prophet involves the change in course of the threatened punishment (or the promised benefit). “Revoke” or “forgo” may be the best way to render this in contemporary English idiom.sn There is a wordplay here involving the word “evil” (רָעָה, raʿah), which refers to both the crime and the punishment. This same play is carried further in Jonah 3:10-4:1, where Jonah becomes very displeased (Heb “it was very evil to Jonah with great evil”) when God forgoes bringing disaster (evil) on Nineveh because they have repented of their wickedness (evil).
Jeremiah 18:9 sn Heb “plant.” The terms “uproot,” “tear down,” “destroy,” “build,” and “plant” are the two sides of the ministry Jeremiah was called to fulfill (cf. Jer 1:10).
Jeremiah 18:11 sn Heb “I am forming disaster and making plans against you.” The word translated “forming” is the same as that for “potter,” so there is a wordplay taking the reader back to v. 5. They are in his hands like the clay in the hands of the potter. Since they have not been pliable he forms new plans. He still offers them opportunity to repent, but their response is predictable.
Jeremiah 18:11 tn Heb “Turn, each one from his wicked way.” See v. 8.
Jeremiah 18:11 tn Or “Make good your ways and your actions.” See the same expression in 7:3, 5.

Matthew 11:20-24

Woes on Unrepentant Cities

²⁰Then Jesus began to criticize openly the cities^[a] in which he had done many of his miracles, because they did not repent. ²¹“Woe to you, Chorazin!^[b] Woe to you, Bethsaida! If^[c] the miracles^[d] done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon,^[e] they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes.^[f] ²²But I tell you, it will be more bearable for Tyre and Sidon^[g] on the day of judgment than for you! ²³And you, Capernaum,^[h] will you be exalted to heaven?^[i] No, you will be thrown down to Hades!^[j] For if the miracles done among you had been done in Sodom,^[k] it would have continued to this day.^[l] ²⁴But I tell you, it will be more bearable for the region of Sodom^[m] on the day of judgment than for you!”

Footnotes

Matthew 11:20 tn The Greek word here is πόλις (polis) which can be translated “city” or “town.” “Cities” was chosen here to emphasize the size of the places mentioned by Jesus in the following verses, since these localities tended to be relatively larger and more important by the standards of the time.
Matthew 11:21 sn Chorazin was a town of Galilee that was probably fairly small in contrast to Bethsaida and is otherwise unattested. Bethsaida was more significant; it was declared a polis (“city”) by the tetrarch Herod Philip, sometime after a.d. 30.
Matthew 11:21 tn This introduces a second class (contrary to fact) condition in the Greek text.
Matthew 11:21 tn Or “powerful deeds.”
Matthew 11:21 sn Tyre and Sidon are two other notorious OT cities (Isa 23; Jer 25:22; 47:4). The remark is a severe rebuke, in effect: “Even the hardened sinners of the old era would have responded to the proclamation of the kingdom and repented, unlike you!”
Matthew 11:21 sn To clothe oneself in sackcloth and ashes was a public sign of mourning or lament, in this case for past behavior and associated with repentance.
Matthew 11:22 sn Jesus’ general point is that in the day of judgment the Gentile cities will come off better than the cities of Galilee. This is not to indicate toleration for the sins of the Gentile cities, but to show how badly the judgment will go for the Galilean ones. In the OT prophetic oracles were pronounced repeatedly against Tyre and Sidon: Isa 23:1-18; Ezek 26:1-28:26; Joel 4:4; Zech 9:2-4.
Matthew 11:23 sn Capernaum was a town located on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, 680 ft (204 m) below sea level. It existed since Hasmonean times and was a major trade and economic center in the North Galilean region. The population in the first century is estimated to be around 1,500. Capernaum became the hub of operations for Jesus’ Galilean ministry (Matt 4:13; Mark 2:1). In modern times the site was discovered in 1838 by the American explorer E. Robinson, and major excavations began in 1905 by German archaeologists H. Kohl and C. Watzinger. Not until 1968, however, were remains from the time of Jesus visible; in that year V. Corbo and S. Loffreda began a series of annual archaeological campaigns that lasted until 1985. This work uncovered what is thought to be the house of Simon Peter as well as ruins of the first century synagogue beneath the later synagogue from the fourth or fifth century A.D. Today gently rolling hills and date palms frame the first century site, a favorite tourist destination of visitors to the Galilee.
Matthew 11:23 tn The interrogative particle introducing this question expects a negative reply.
Matthew 11:23 sn In the OT, Hades was known as Sheol. It is the place where the unrighteous will reside (Luke 10:15; 16:23; Rev 20:13-14).
Matthew 11:23 sn See the note on Sodom and Gomorrah in Matt 10:15.
Matthew 11:23 sn The implication is that such miracles would have brought about the repentance of the inhabitants of Sodom, and so it would not have been destroyed, but would have continued to this day.
Matthew 11:24 sn The allusion to Sodom, the most wicked of OT cities (Gen 19:1-29), shows that to reject the current message brought by Jesus is even more serious (and will result in more severe punishment) than the worst sins of the old era. The phrase region of Sodom is in emphatic position in the Greek text and refers not only to the city itself but to the surrounding area.

New English Translation (NET)

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Revised Common Lectionary (Complementary)

שׂ/שׁ (Sin/Shin)

Footnotes

An Object Lesson from the Making of Pottery

Footnotes

Woes on Unrepentant Cities

Footnotes