Discovery BoxJeremiah 46:11 
Context46:11 Go up to Gilead and get medicinal ointment, 1
you dear poor people of Egypt. 2
But it will prove useless no matter how much medicine you use; 3
there will be no healing for you.
Jeremiah 46:19
Context46:19 Pack your bags for exile,
you inhabitants of poor dear Egypt. 4
For Memphis will be laid waste.
It will lie in ruins 5 and be uninhabited.
1 tn Heb “balm.” See 8:22 and the notes on this phrase there.
2 sn Heb “Virgin Daughter of Egypt.” See the study note on Jer 14:17 for the significance of the use of this figure. The use of the figure here perhaps refers to the fact that Egypt’s geographical isolation allowed her safety and protection that a virgin living at home would enjoy under her father’s protection (so F. B. Huey, Jeremiah, Lamentations [NAC], 379). By her involvement in the politics of Palestine she had forfeited that safety and protection and was now suffering for it.
3 tn Heb “In vain you multiply [= make use of many] medicines.”
4 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.
5 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.
