8:11 They offer only superficial help
for the hurt my dear people 1 have suffered. 2
They say, “Everything will be all right!”
But everything is not all right! 3
8:21 My heart is crushed because my dear people 4 are being crushed. 5
I go about crying and grieving. I am overwhelmed with dismay. 6
8:22 There is still medicinal ointment 7 available in Gilead!
There is still a physician there! 8
Why then have my dear people 9
not been restored to health? 10
46:19 Pack your bags for exile,
you inhabitants of poor dear Egypt. 11
For Memphis will be laid waste.
It will lie in ruins 12 and be uninhabited.
31:21 I will say, 13 ‘My dear children of Israel, 14 keep in mind
the road you took when you were carried off. 15
Mark off in your minds the landmarks.
Make a mental note of telltale signs marking the way back.
Return, my dear children of Israel.
Return to these cities of yours.
1 tn Heb “daughter of my people.” For the translation given here see 4:11 and the note on the phrase “dear people” there.
2 tn Heb “They heal the wound of my people lightly.”
3 tn Heb “They say, ‘Peace! Peace!’ and there is no peace!”
4 tn Heb “daughter of my people.” For the translation given here see 4:11 and the note on the phrase “dear people” there.
5 tn Heb “Because of the crushing of the daughter of my people I am crushed.”
6 tn Heb “I go about in black [i.e., mourning clothes]. Dismay has seized me.”
7 tn Heb “balm.” The more familiar “ointment” has been used in the translation, supplemented with the adjective “medicinal.”
sn This medicinal ointment (Heb “balm”) consisted of the gum or resin from a tree that grows in Egypt and Palestine and was thought to have medicinal value (see also Jer 46:11).
8 tn Heb “Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there?” In this context the questions are rhetorical and expect a positive answer, which is made explicit in the translation.
sn The prophet means by this metaphor that there are still means available for healing the spiritual ills of his people, mainly repentance, obedience to the law, and sole allegiance to God, and still people available who will apply this medicine to them, namely prophets like himself.
9 tn Heb “daughter of my people.” For the translation given here see 4:11 and the note on the phrase “dear people” there.
10 tn Or more clearly, “restored to spiritual health”; Heb “Why then has healing not come to my dear people?”
sn Jeremiah is lamenting that though there is a remedy available for the recovery of his people they have not availed themselves of it.
11 tn Heb “inhabitants of daughter Egypt.” Like the phrase “daughter Zion,” “daughter Egypt” is a poetic personification of the land, here perhaps to stress the idea of defenselessness.
12 tn For the verb here see HALOT 675 s.v. II נָצָה Nif and compare the usage in Jer 4:7; 9:11 and 2 Kgs 19:25. BDB derives the verb from יָצַת (so BDB 428 s.v. יָצַת Niph meaning “kindle, burn”) but still give it the meaning “desolate” here and in 2:15 and 9:11.
13 tn The words “I will say” are not in the text. They are supplied in the translation to mark the transition from the address about Israel in a response to Rachel’s weeping (vv. 15-20) to a direct address to Israel which is essentially the answer to Israel’s prayer of penitence (cf. G. L. Keown, P. J. Scalise, T. G. Smothers, Jeremiah 26-52 [WBC], 121.)
sn The
14 tn Heb “Virgin Israel.” For the significance see the study note on 31:3.
15 tn Heb “Set your mind to the highway, the way which you went.” The phrase “the way you went” has been translated “the road you took when you were carried off” to help the reader see the reference to the exile implicit in the context. The verb “which you went” is another example of the old second feminine singular which the Masoretes typically revocalize (Kethib הָלָכְתִּי [halakhti]; Qere הָלָכְתְּ [halakht]). The vocative has been supplied in the translation at the beginning to help make the transition from third person reference to Ephraim/Israel in the preceding to second person in the following and to identify the referent of the imperatives. Likewise, this line has been moved to the front to show that the reference to setting up sign posts and landmarks is not literal but figurative, referring to making a mental note of the way they took when carried off so that they can easily find their way back. Lines three and four in the Hebrew text read, “Set up sign posts for yourself; set up guideposts/landmarks for yourself.” The word translated “telltale signs marking the way” occurs only here. Though its etymology and precise meaning are unknown, all the lexicons agree in translating it as “sign post” or something similar based on the parallelism.