Text: Jeremiah 4:23
OT Text Referred to: Genesis 1:3
Subject: anti-creation
Source: Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Reference Type: Allusion
Connection Method(s): Longitudinal Theme
Significance: Jeremiah 4:23 deliberately inverts Genesis 1:3's creation sequence by describing the earth as תֹּהוּ וָבֹהוּ (tohu vavohu, "formless and void") — the same rare phrase from Genesis 1:2 — with "no light" where Genesis had God creating light. This anti-creation vision systematically reverses Genesis 1's ordering: where God brought light from darkness (Gen 1:3), Jeremiah sees the lights extinguished; where God established mountains and fruitful land, Jeremiah sees them quaking and the fruitful land become wilderness. The prophet envisions divine judgment as cosmic de-creation, a return to primordial chaos. The shared vocabulary signals that Judah's sin has provoked a reversal of creation itself — God is undoing the work of Genesis 1, returning the land to its pre-creation state.