How the precious sons of Zion, once worth their weight in pure gold, are now esteemed as jars of clay, the work of a potter’s hands!
Parallel translations
- WEB The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!
- KJV The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!
- NKJV The precious sons of Zion, Valuable as fine gold, How they are regarded as clay pots, The work of the hands of the potter!
- NASB The precious sons of Zion, Weighed against pure gold, How they are regarded as earthenware jars, The work of a potter’s hands!
- NLT See how the precious children of Jerusalem, worth their weight in fine gold, are now treated like pots of clay made by a common potter.
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
Zion's precious people, once worth their weight in gold, are now treated as cheap clay pots.
Overview
The 'precious sons of Zion' have been devalued, esteemed as common, breakable earthenware. The contrast between fine gold and clay pitchers dramatizes their fall from honor to ruin. It reflects how sin debases what God made glorious, and points to the gospel's reversal in which God restores worth to broken vessels (2 Cor. 4:7).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Isa 30:14It will break in pieces like a potter’s jar, shattered so that no fragment can be found. Not a shard will be found in the dust large enough to scoop the coals from a hearth or to skim the water from a cistern.”
- Rom 9:21–23Does not the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay one vessel for special occasions and another for common use?
- Jer 19:11and you are to proclaim to them that this is what the LORD of Hosts says: I will shatter this nation and this city, like one shatters a potter’s jar that can never again be repaired. They will bury the dead in Topheth until there is no more room to bury them.
- 2 Tim 2:20A large house contains not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and clay. Some indeed are for honorable use, but others are for common use.
- 2 Cor 4:7Now we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this surpassingly great power is from God and not from us.
- Lam 5:12Princes have been hung up by their hands; elders receive no respect.
- Isa 51:18Among all the sons she bore, there is no one to guide her; among all the sons she brought up, there is no one to take her hand.
- Zech 9:13For I will bend Judah as My bow and fit it with Ephraim. I will rouse your sons, O Zion, against the sons of Greece. I will make you like the sword of a mighty man.
- Lam 2:21Both young and old lie together in the dust of the streets. My young men and maidens have fallen by the sword. You have slain them in the day of Your anger; You have slaughtered them without compassion.
- Jer 22:28Is this man Coniah a despised and shattered pot, a jar that no one wants? Why are he and his descendants hurled out and cast into a land they do not know?
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Christ at the center
The weeping over a ruined city and the steadfast mercies that are new every morning point to the man of sorrows who wept over Jerusalem and whose mercy rises new from the grave.
How Lamentations 4:2 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
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