Skip to content
mannafest.faith
Read

Subject

Grief

Sorrow carried honestly before God, given its time and its words in the laments.

Part of Topics & Trials

Also called: mourning, sorrow, lament, weeping, brokenhearted, bereavement

What Grief covers, and where it stops

This subject covers sorrow carried honestly before God, and the shape Scripture gives it in lament. What was taken belongs to Loss. Pain that has no death in it belongs to Suffering.

On this page, 7 sections

The one drawing

Across the canon

Old Testament

New Testament

The other 14 books of the canon carry none.

503 verses across 52 of the 66 books, Genesis to Revelation. A column is taller and brighter where the King James text returns to it. Each book with a verse in it opens that book.

12 passages

Where Scripture speaks

The passages this subject stands on, in canon order.

And Sarah died in Kirjath–arba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan: and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her.
Genesis 23:2KJVAbraham takes time to mourn and weep for Sarah before he does anything else
And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him; but he refused to be comforted; and he said, For I will go down into the grave unto my son mourning. Thus his father wept for him.
Genesis 37:35KJVJacob's grief for Joseph refuses every attempt at comfort
Then Job arose, and rent his mantle, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped,
Job 1:20KJVJob's first response to catastrophe is grief expressed in the body, then worship
So they sat down with him upon the ground seven days and seven nights, and none spake a word unto him: for they saw that his grief was very great.
Job 2:13KJVJob's friends sit with him in silence — their first and best gift
The Lord is nigh unto them that are of a broken heart; and saveth such as be of a contrite spirit.
Psalms 34:18KJVGod stays near the brokenhearted rather than removing what broke them
A time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
Ecclesiastes 3:4KJVA time to mourn given its place in the shape of a life
He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not.
Isaiah 53:3KJVThe coming Messiah described in advance as a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief
To appoint unto them that mourn in Zion, to give unto them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness; that they might be called trees of righteousness, the planting of the Lord, that he might be glorified.
Isaiah 61:3KJVThe promise on the other side of mourning: beauty for ashes
Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people!
Jeremiah 9:1KJVJeremiah wishes his eyes were a fountain, wanting tears enough for his people's loss
Jesus wept.
John 11:35KJVJesus weeps at Lazarus's tomb, minutes before raising him
Rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.
Romans 12:15KJVPaul makes grief shared a command, not just a kindness
And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.
Revelation 21:4KJVThe last promise: every tear wiped away, and no more death
David weeping over his rebellious son Absalom — 'O my son Absalom, my son, my son!' — grief that victory could not erase.
David weeping over his rebellious son Absalom — 'O my son Absalom, my son, my son!' — grief that victory could not erase.Gustave Doré, Doré's English Bible (1866), public domain

Grief in Scripture, in full

Grief is the experience of loss and mourning described throughout Scripture as torn clothes, weeping, ashes, and the absence of comfort. The Bible does not treat grief as weakness: the psalms of lament, the book of Lamentations, and Jesus' own weeping at Lazarus's tomb name it as part of the life of faith. Every biblical response to grief holds sorrow and hope together without collapsing one into the other.

5 voices

What teachers have said

“Herein he was a type of Christ,--who was intimately acquainted with grief and often in tears.”

Matthew Henry · Commentary on the Whole Bible, 1710

“No words can express their sorrows: small griefs are eloquent, great ones dumb.”

Adam Clarke · Commentary on the Bible

Written before 1832.

“When you return to Zion and dwell in Jerusalem, you will not weep as you wept before, but your mourning will turn into joy”

Jerome · Commentary on Isaiah

Written before 420.

“And the Lord weeps, seeing the man made in His own image marred by corruption, that He may put an end to our tears.”

Cyril of Alexandria · Commentary on the Gospel of John, Book 7

Written before 444.

“For the 'mouth' of the righteous will then be 'filled with laughing' when the tears of their pilgrimage being done, their hearts shall be filled to the full with exulting in eternal joy.”

Gregory the Dialogist · Morals on the Book of Job, Book VIII

Written before 604.

The words underneath

Each card is one Hebrew or Greek word behind grief. It gives the sense, the count across the canon, and the number in Strong's 1890 concordance.

bakah: to weep

Hebrew · H1058
בָּכָה

Strong's entry: to weep; generally to bemoan

the Bible's plain, most common word for crying

114 times in the Old Testament · bakah, in full →

chalah: be weak: weak

Hebrew · H2470
חָלָה

Strong's entry: properly, to be rubbed or worn; hence (figuratively) to be weak, sick, afflicted; or (causatively) to grieve, make sick; also to stroke (in flattering), entreat

figuratively, to grieve or be sick with sorrow

76 times in the Old Testament · chalah, in full →

klaio: to weep

Greek · G2799
κλαίω

Strong's entry: to sob, i.e. wail aloud (whereas 1145 is rather to cry silently)

the loud, visible weeping of mourners in grief

39 times in the New Testament · klaio, in full →

abal: to mourn

Hebrew · H56
אָבַל

Strong's entry: to bewail

grief expressed openly, not hidden

39 times in the Old Testament · abal, in full →

493 verses

The complete list

The King James text uses the language of grief in 503 verses. 10 of them are quoted above and the other 493 stand here, book by book. 2 more verses above show grief without using one of its words, so they are outside that count. Open a book to read the references with a clause of each verse.

Genesis33
Exodus10
Leviticus1
Numbers9
Deuteronomy5
Judges8
Ruth3
1 Samuel23
2 Samuel21
1 Kings6
2 Kings5
1 Chronicles3
2 Chronicles5
Ezra4
Nehemiah6
Esther4
Job23
Psalms39
Proverbs12
Ecclesiastes9
Isaiah41
Jeremiah49
Lamentations13
Ezekiel21
Daniel5
Hosea6
Joel7
Amos7
Jonah1
Micah4
Nahum1
Habakkuk1
Zephaniah1
Zechariah6
Malachi2
Matthew18
Mark9
Luke16
John10
Acts9
Romans2
1 Corinthians2
2 Corinthians9
Ephesians1
Philippians4
1 Thessalonians1
1 Timothy1
Hebrews4
James2
1 Peter1
1 John1
Revelation9

Topics & Trials

The subjects beside it