But they are together brutish and foolish, instructed by idols! It is just wood.
Parallel translations
- KJV But they are altogether brutish and foolish: the stock is a doctrine of vanities.
- BSB But they are altogether senseless and foolish, instructed by worthless idols made of wood!
- NKJV But they are altogether dull-hearted and foolish; A wooden idol is a worthless doctrine.
- NASB But they are altogether stupid and foolish; The instruction from idols is nothing but wood!
- NLT People who worship idols are stupid and foolish. The things they worship are made of wood!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Idol-worshipers are dull and foolish, instructed by gods that are nothing but wood. Trusting idols makes people as senseless as the idols themselves.
Overview
Yahweh declares that those taught by idols are 'brutish and foolish,' for their teacher 'is just wood.' Worshipers come to resemble the empty things they trust. The verse warns that idolatry corrupts the worshiper's own understanding, while pointing by contrast to the wisdom and life that come from knowing the true and living God.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 12
- Jer 10:14Every man has become brutish and without knowledge; every goldsmith is disappointed by his engraved image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.
- Zech 10:2For the teraphim have spoken vanity, and the diviners have seen a lie; and they have told false dreams. They comfort in vain. Therefore they go their way like sheep. They are oppressed, because there is no shepherd.
- Ps 135:18Those who make them will be like them; yes, everyone who trusts in them.
- Hab 2:18“What value does the engraved image have, that its maker has engraved it; the molten image, even the teacher of lies, that he who fashions its form trusts in it, to make mute idols?
- Ps 115:8Those who make them will be like them; yes, everyone who trusts in them.
- Rom 1:21–22Because, knowing God, they didn’t glorify him as God, neither gave thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened.
- Jer 51:17–18“Every man has become brutish without knowledge. Every goldsmith is disappointed by his image; for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.
- Isa 41:29Behold, all of them, their deeds are vanity and nothing. Their molten images are wind and confusion.
- Jer 2:27who tell wood, ‘You are my father;’ and a stone, ‘You have given birth to me:’ for they have turned their back to me, and not their face; but in the time of their trouble they will say, ‘Arise, and save us.’
- Jer 4:22“For my people are foolish, they don’t know me. They are foolish children, and they have no understanding. They are skillful in doing evil, but to do good they have no knowledge.”
- Isa 44:19No one thinks, neither is there knowledge nor understanding to say, “I have burned part of it in the fire. Yes, I have also baked bread on its coals. I have roasted meat and eaten it. Shall I make the rest of it into an abomination? Shall I bow down to a tree trunk?”
- Hos 4:12My people consult with their wooden idol, and answer to a stick of wood. Indeed the spirit of prostitution has led them astray, and they have been unfaithful to their God.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Against the failure of false shepherds Jeremiah promises the Righteous Branch, 'The LORD our righteousness,' and the new covenant written on the heart and sealed in the blood of Christ.
How Jeremiah 10:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.