Jeremiah 19:10

Then shalt thou break the bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee,

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(10) Then shalt thou break the bottle . . .—Those who heard the prophet and saw his act were not unfamiliar with the imagery. The words of Psalm 2:9 had portrayed the Messianic king as ruling over the nations, even as “breaking them in pieces like a potter’s vessel.” But it was a new and strange thing to hear these words applied to themselves, to see their own nation treated, not as the potter’s clay that could be remodelled, as in Jeremiah 18:1-6, either for a nobler, or, at least, for some serviceable use, but as the vessel which once broken could never be restored. Happily for Israel, there was a depth of Divine compassion which the parable failed to represent. The after-history showed that though, as far as that generation went, the punishment was final, and their existing polity could never be made whole again, there was yet hope for the nation. The things that were “impossible with man” were “possible with God.” The fragments of the broken vessel might be gathered from the heap of rubbish on which the prophet had flung them, and brought into a new shape, for uses less glorious indeed than that for which it had been originally designed, but far other than those of a mere vessel of dishonour.

Benson Commentary

Jeremiah 19:10-13. Then shalt thou break the bottle, &c. — This was intended to be a symbolical representation of the ruin threatened against them, used in order to strike the beholders more powerfully than mere words could do. Of such symbolical actions as these there are several instances in the Scriptures. Thus saith the Lord, Even so will I break this people — That is, as Jeremiah breaketh the bottle: That cannot be made whole again — That is, the ruin of Jerusalem shall be an utter ruin: no hand can repair it but his that broke it; and if they return to him, though he has torn, he will heal. In fact, Jerusalem was so utterly destroyed by the Chaldeans that there was little left standing of it. So that after their captivity they were obliged to build a new city in the place of the former. And they shall bury them in Tophet — These words are omitted by the LXX.; till there be no place to bury — Till there is no room to bury more; for the meaning is, that the whole valley of Tophet should be so filled with dead bodies, that there should be no room to lay any more there; by which is expressed the greatness of the slaughter. And even make this city as Tophet — A place of slaughter. And the houses of Jerusalem shall be defiled as Tophet — Namely, polluted with dead bodies. Because of the houses upon whose roofs they have burned incense — The houses of the Jews were built with flat roofs, Deuteronomy 22:8, and there they dedicated altars to the host of heaven, where they could have a full view of them.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

19:10-15 The potter's vessel, after it is hardened, can never be pieced again when it is broken. And as the bottle was broken, so shall Judah and Jerusalem be broken by the Chaldeans. No human hand can repair it; but if they return to the Lord he will heal. As they filled Tophet with the slain sacrificed to their idols, so will God fill the whole city with the slain that shall fall as sacrifices to his justice. Whatever men may think, God will appear as terrible against sin and sinners as the Scriptures state; nor shall the unbelief of men make his promise or his threatenings of no effect. The obstinacy of sinners in sinful ways, is their own fault; if they are deaf to the word of God, it is because they have stopped their ears. We have need to pray that God, by his grace, would deliver us from hardness of heart, and contempt of his word and commandments.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Make void - The verb used here is that from which "bottle" Jeremiah 19:1 is derived, and as it represents the sound made by the water running out, it would be better translated, "pour out." Jeremiah perhaps carried the bottle to Tophet full of water, the symbol in the East of life Isaiah 35:6; Isaiah 41:18, and at these words emptied it before the assembled elders.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

10. break … bottle—a symbolical action, explained in Jer 19:11.

the men—the elders of the people and of the priests (Jer 19:1; compare Jer 51:63, 64).

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The earthen bottle, which, Jeremiah 19:1, he was commanded to carry with him into the valley of the son of Hinnom, (where he now was,) in the sight of the ancients of the priests, and of the people, the men who there were appointed to go with the prophet. This symbolical or sacramental teaching by signs was much in use by the prophets.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Then shall thou break the bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee. The earthen bottle he was bid to get of the potter, Jeremiah 19:1; this he is ordered to break in pieces before the eyes of the ancients of and of the priests that went with him out Jerusalem to Tophet, as an emblem of the easy, sure, and utter destruction of Jerusalem; for nothing is more easily broken than an earthen vessel; and so easily was Jerusalem destroyed by the Chaldean army; nor can an earthen pot resist any force that is used against it; nor could the inhabitants of Jerusalem withstand the force of Nebuchadnezzar's army; and an earthen vessel once broken cannot be put together again; a new one must be made; which was the case both of the city and temple; and which, upon the return from the captivity, were not repaired, but rebuilt.

Geneva Study Bible

Then shalt thou break the bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee,

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

10–13. See introd. summary to section. Jeremiah 19:10 links on to Jeremiah 19:2. This and the next sub-section (Jeremiah 19:14 to Jeremiah 20:6) are thought to be taken from the memoirs of Jeremiah by Baruch (see Intr. pp. xli. f.), as in them the prophet is spoken of in the third person.

“The people … have the same custom of breaking a jar, when they wish to express their utmost detestation of any one. They come behind or near him, and smash the jar to atoms, thus imprecating upon him and his a like hopeless ruin.” Thomson, The Land and the Book, p. 641.

Jeremiah 19:10

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

In Jeremiah 19:6-13 the threatened punishment is given again at large, and that in two strophes or series of ideas, which explain the emblematical act with the pitcher. The first series, Jeremiah 19:6-9, is introduced by בּקּותי, which intimates the meaning of the pitcher; and the other, Jeremiah 19:10-13, is bound up with the breaking of the pitcher. But both series are, Jeremiah 19:6, opened by the mention of the locality of the act. As Jeremiah 19:5 was but an expansion of Jeremiah 7:31, so Jeremiah 19:6 is a literal repetition of Jeremiah 7:32. The valley of Benhinnom, with its places for abominable sacrifices (תּפת, see on Jeremiah 7:32), shall in the future be called Valley of Slaughter; i.e., at the judgment on Jerusalem it will be the place where the inhabitants of Jerusalem and Judah will be slain by the enemy. There God will make void (בּקּותי, playing on בּקבּק), i.e., bring to nothing; for what is poured out comes to nothing; cf. Isaiah 19:3. There they shall fall by the sword in such numbers that their corpses shall be food for the beasts of prey (cf. Jeremiah 7:33), and the city of Jerusalem shall be frightfully ravaged (Jeremiah 19:8, cf. Jeremiah 18:16; Jeremiah 25:9, etc.). מכּתה (plural form of suffix without Jod; cf. Ew. 258, a), the wounds she has received. - In Jeremiah 19:9 is added yet another item to complete the awful picture, the terrible famine during the siege, partly taken from the words of Deuteronomy 28:53. and Leviticus 26:29. That this appalling misery did actually come about during the last siege by the Chaldeans, we learn from Lamentations 4:10. - The second series, Jeremiah 19:10-13, is introduced by the act of breaking the pitcher. This happens before the eyes of the elders who have accompanied Jeremiah thither: to them the explanatory word of the Lord is addressed. As the earthen pitcher, so shall Jerusalem - people and city - be broken to pieces; and that irremediably. This is implied in: as one breaks a potter's vessel, etc. (הרפה for הרפא). The next clause: and in Tophet they shall bury, etc., is omitted by the lxx as a repetition from Jeremiah 7:32, and is object to by Ew., Hitz., and Graf, as not being in keeping with its context. Ew. proposes to insert it before "as one breaketh;" but this transposition only obscures the meaning of the clause. It connects very suitably with the idea of the incurable breaking in sunder. Because the breaking up of Jerusalem and its inhabitants shall be incurable, shall be like the breaking of a pitcher dashed into countless fragments, therefore there will be lack of room in Jerusalem to bury the dead, and the unclean places of Tophet will need to be used for that purpose. With this the further thought of Jeremiah 19:12 and Jeremiah 19:13 connects simply and suitably. Thus (as had been said at Jeremiah 19:11) will I do unto this place and its inhabitants, ולתת, and that to make the city as Tophet, i.e., not "a mass of sherds and rubbish, as Tophet now is" (Graf); for neither was Tophet then a rubbish-heap, nor did it so become by the breaking of the pitcher. But Josiah had turned all the place of Tophet in the valley of Benhinnom into an unclean region (2 Kings 23:10). All Jerusalem shall become an unclean place like Tophet. This is put in so many words in Jeremiah 19:13 : The houses of Jerusalem shall become unclean like the place Tophet, namely, all houses on whose roofs idolatry has been practised. The construction of הטּמאים causes some difficulty. The position of the word at the end disfavours our connecting it with the subject בּתּי, and so does the article, which does not countenance its being taken as predicate. To get rid of the article, J. D. Mich. and Ew. sought to change the reading into תּפתּה טמאים, after Isaiah 30:33. But תּפתּה means a Tophet-like place, not Tophet itself, and so gives no meaning to the purpose. No other course is open than to join the word with "the place Tophet:" like the place Tophet, which is unclean. The plural would then be explained less from the collective force of מקום than from regard to the plural subject. "All the houses" opens a supplementary definition of the subject: as concerning all houses; cf. Ew. 310, a. On the worship of the stars by sacrifice on the housetops, transplanted by Manasseh to Jerusalem, see the expos. of Zephaniah 1:5 and 2 Kings 21:3. 'והסּך, coinciding literally with Jeremiah 7:18; the inf. absol. being attached to the verb. finit. of the former clause (Ew. 351, c.). - Thus far the word of the Lord to Jeremiah, which he was to proclaim in the valley of Benhinnom. - The execution of the divine commission is, as being a matter of course, not expressly recounted, but is implied in Jeremiah 19:14 as having taken place.