Jeremiah 10:1-16 The message is that God is the only God...Why is this new to the people?

Question

Also, Jeremiah 19:1-6,10-11;20:1-18.......What is Jeremiah going through?

Jeremiah 19:1-6,10-11;20:1-18
What is Jeremiah going through?

In the Bible

Answer 1

A Satire on Idolatry (10:1-18)
10:1-5 This chapter alternates between the vanity of idols and the greatness of God. God's people should not learn the way of the Gentiles and their lifeless idols.
Yates comments about the satire on idols:
Jeremiah is cruel in his treatment of the poor, defenseless idols that men use as substitutes for God. They are unresponsive sticks that have to be decorated so as to conceal the fact that they are only dead wood. Instead of carrying they must be carried. They must be fashioned; God fashions. No speech, no power, no breath, no intelligence, no worth, no influence, and no permanence can be attributed to them. In contrast Yahweh is eternal, living, active, powerful.
10:6-9 God is the great . . . King of the nations, worthy of fear. Those who worship idols are dull-hearted and foolish, bowing to the work of men's hands.
10:10-16 The LORD is the true and living God. Manufactured gods will perish. Jehovah is the God of creation and providence. Idol-makers are dull-hearted, and their images futile. The God (Portion) of Jacob is the Maker, the LORD of hosts.
10:17, 18 The inhabitants of the land are told to gather up what they can carry because the Lord is sending them into exile.

Answer 2

The prophet Jeremiah showed the great contrast between Jehovah, the living God, and lifeless man-made idols. That contrast is well expressed in Jeremiah chapter 10. Among other things, Jeremiah wrote: “Jehovah is in truth God. He is the living God and the King to time indefinite.” (Jeremiah 10:10.) The living and true God, Jehovah, created all things. He delivered the Israelites languishing in Egyptian bondage. Nothing is impossible for him. Well, let us just think of the widespread disregard for his laws, the contempt for his name, the crime, the love of pleasures rather than the love of God, the immorality, the religious hypocrisy, the persecution upon those who form a modern-day Jeremiah class, the refusal of the nations to submit to Jehovah’s kingdom by Christ. Certainly, in the face of all these things, there is every good reason for Jehovah God the Great Potter to have indignation.

Under his expressed denunciation “no nations will hold up.” Their “gods,” the things that they have deified and idolized, will prove helpless and perish. Their worshipers will perish with them. Their hearts are rent because a “breakdown” like that described by Jeremiah impends over all the nations due to the fact that their rulers have not searched for Jehovah as our only help. (Jer. 10:19-22) All human schemes for directing the course of history and for warding off destruction at the hands of the Great Potter will prove futile.

18 After we examine the warning examples of history, we have to agree with Jeremiah when he said: “I well know, O Jehovah, that to earthling man his way does not belong. It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step.”—Jer. 10:23.

There is much more to learn about Jehovah and his purposes. We thus will be privileged to enjoy eternal life in an earthly paradise under Kingdom rule. We will live there when sorrow, pain, and even death have passed away and the knowledge of Jehovah fills the earth. (Isaiah 11:9; Revelation 21:1-4) That can be your blessings if you seek and find, and act in harmony with the Bible-based answers to the question, “Who is Jehovah.”

If you would like further answers to this question which will be beneficial, please contact Jehovah's Witnesses at the local Kingdom Hall. Or visit http://www.watchtower.org

Answer 3

In Jeremiah's day, idolatry was a very powerful force. Even with the Prophets, open miracles and the Temple in operation, many Jews still drifted into idolatrous practices.