What Does Jeremiah 18:10 Mean?
If it does harm before my eyes, not hearing and responding to my voice, then I will relent of the good I had said I would do for them.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
If it do evil in my sight, that it obey not my voice, then I will repent of the good, wherewith I said I would benefit them.THE KEY
The verse’s word for “repent” means relent: when a people refuses to hear and respond, the good already spoken can change course.
THE MEANING
The good God declares for a people is real, yet responsive to how that people meets his voice. When a people persists in evil and refuses to hear and respond, God relents from the good he has spoken. The promise and its withdrawal are both held in the open.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
God’s announced good is an unconditional guarantee, no matter how a people responds.
THE ROOT
נִחַמְתִּי
niḥamtî
GROWS FROM
נ־ח־ם
n-ḥ-m
To be moved or relent; in another Hebrew verb form, to comfort.
“relent of” in this verse is niḥamtî. Here, the form means “I will relent,” a change in the course previously announced. The same root also yields “comfort,” keeping responsiveness within the word-family without making this verse a confession of wrongdoing.
ALSO GROWS
niḥam: He relented or was moved.
נִחַם
This is the verb form behind the verse’s change from declared good to withdrawal.
niḥēm: He comforted.
נִחֵם
This other form from the same root reveals a word-family that holds both comfort and relenting.
שְׁמֹעַ
shəmoaʿ
GROWS FROM
ש־מ־ע
sh-m-ʿ
To hear, listen, and heed.
“not hearing and responding” in this verse is shəmoaʿ. The Hebrew says the people do not “hear” God’s voice, where English says they do not “obey” it. The word carries listening into response: the failure is not merely missing information but refusing to answer what is heard.
ALSO GROWS
shāmaʿ: To hear or listen.
שָׁמַע
This is the root verb whose sense can extend from hearing to heeding.
shemuʿah: A report or something heard.
שְׁמוּעָה
This branch keeps the root’s connection to what reaches the ear and calls for a response.
לְהֵיטִיב
leheytiv
GROWS FROM
י־ט־ב
y-ṭ-b
To be good or go well; to do good.
“Benefit” here is expressed as “to do good,” not as an abstract reward. The word makes the promised good an action toward the people, an action that the verse says can be withdrawn.
ALSO GROWS
ṭov: Good.
טוֹב
This is the basic “good” in the same word-family as the promised benefit.
heṭiv: To do good or benefit.
הֵיטִיב
This verb names good as something enacted, clarifying what God had said he would do for the people.
THE PATTERN
God’s spoken course meets the people’s response: hearing, turning, and doing shape what follows.
And God saw their deeds, because they turned back from their harmful way; and God relented from the harm he had spoken to do to them, and he did not do it.So now make good your ways and your doings, and hear and respond to the voice of the LORD your God, and the LORD will relent of the harm he has spoken against you.But be makers of the word, and not hearers only, miscounting yourselves.THE THREAD
And God saw their deeds, because they turned back from their harmful way; and God relented from the harm he had spoken to do to them, and he did not do it.Jonah uses the same Hebrew root, נ־ח־ם (n-ḥ-m), for God’s relenting after the people turn from their evil way. Jeremiah shows the other side of that responsiveness: when a people refuses to hear and respond, the good already spoken can be withdrawn.
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