Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but they don’t speak. They have eyes, but they don’t see. They have ears, but they don’t hear. They have noses, but they don’t smell. They have hands, but they don’t feel. They have feet, but they don’t walk, neither do they speak through their throat.
⛓ Read Psalm 115 forward — the whole chapter and its afterlife →Where this passage surfaces again, sorted by the strength of the link. Each kind of reuse — formal quotation, deliberate allusion, faint echo, figural pattern — carries its own mark. Follow any reference to read it in place.
Allusion2
A deliberate verbal borrowing without a citation formula.
Paul recalls the Corinthians being led to 'mute idols' (eidola aphona), echoing the psalm's taunt that the nations' idols are silver and gold, the work of human hands, with mouths that cannot speak. The motif of the idol's speechlessness contrasted with the living God is a fixed OT polemic, and the verbal link (mouths/speech) gives this strong volume.
High confidenceThe catalogue of idols 'of silver and gold, the work of human hands' that cannot see, hear, or walk (Ps 115:4-7) is the template for 9:20 — 'the works of their hands... idols of gold, and of silver, and of brass, and of stone, and of wood... which can neither see, nor hear, nor walk' (so 9:20 per the WEB fuller form; cf. parallel). Strong verbal correspondence on the materials-list and 'works of their hands.'
High confidence