Jeremiah 8:18
in Jeremiah 8My sorrow is beyond healing; my heart is faint within me.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Oh that I could comfort myself against sorrow! my heart is faint within me.
KJV
When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me.
⋯
This verse in Jeremiah 8
Commentary
7 notes on this verse(Verse 18) My sorrow is upon sorrow, my heart is mourning within me. As we have said before, the previous seventy sentences, which were said, were connected in order to establish: 'And they will bite you,' says the Lord, 'incurably: with the pain of your heart, you will faint.' However, in Hebrew, the word for pain, which is translated into Greek as ὀδύνη, is not so much a physical pain as it is a grimace of the mouth, contracted and resembling a laugh.
This site's exposition
my heart is faint within me
on Jeremiah 8:18-22
The words “My sorrow is beyond healing; my heart is faint within me” turn the chapter from indictment to the prophet's own grief. The unit closes on the book's best-known line of grief, the question of balm in Gilead, left with no answer in the text.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening3 voices
When I would comfort myself against terror,.... Either naturally, by eating and drinking, the necessary and lawful means of refreshment; or spiritually, by reading the word of God, and looking over the promises in it: my heart is faint in me; at the consideration of the calamities which were coming upon his people, and which were made known to him by a spirit of prophecy, of which he had no room to doubt. So the Targum takes them to be the words of the prophet, paraphrasing them, "for them, saith the prophet, my heart grieves.''
Death shall not now be, as it always used to be--the repose of the dead. When Job makes his court to the grave it is in hope of this, that there he shall rest with kings and counsellors of the earth; but now the ashes of the dead, even of kings and princes, shall be disturbed, and their bones scattered at the grave's mouth, Ps. cxli.
When I would comfort myself against my sorrow, I do but labour in vain; nay, every attempt to alleviate the grief does but aggravate it." It is our wisdom and duty, under mournful events, to do what we can to comfort ourselves against our sorrow, by suggesting to ourselves such considerations as are proper to allay the grief and balance the grievance.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — odd-straight-quotes
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Rather, “O my comfort in sorrow: my heart faints for me.” The word translated “comfort” is by some supposed to be corrupt. With these mournful ejaculations a new strophe begins, ending with Jer 9:1, in which the prophet mourns over the miserable fate of his countrymen, among whom he had been earnestly laboring, but all in vain.
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
The lamentation of the prophet for the impending calamity of his country. against sorrow--or, with respect to sorrow. MAURER translates, "Oh, my exhilaration as to sorrow!" that is, "Oh, that exhilaration ('comfort', from an Arabic root, to shine as the rising sun) would shine upon me as to my sorrow!" in me--within me.
The words behind it
6 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| מַבְלִ֥יגִיתִ֖י | mavligiti | cheerfulness my | H4010 → | |
| עֲלֵ֣י | ʾalei | on | H5921 → | 5755 times |
| יָג֑וֹן | yagon | sorrow | H3015 → | 14 times |
| עָלַ֖י | ʾalai | on me | H5921 → | 5755 times |
| לִבִּ֥י | libi | heart my | H3820 → | 595 times |
| דַוָּֽי׃ | davai | [is] faint | H1742 → |
מַבְלִ֥יגִיתִ֖יcheerfulness my
mavligitiH4010 →
עֲלֵ֣יon
ʾaleiH5921 →5755 times
יָג֑וֹןsorrow
yagonH3015 →14 times
עָלַ֖יon me
ʾalaiH5921 →5755 times
לִבִּ֥יheart my
libiH3820 →595 times
דַוָּֽי׃[is] faint
davaiH1742 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Lamentations 5:17Because of this, our hearts are faint; because of these, our eyes grow dim—
it leads to
- Psalms 6:7
My eyes fail from grief; they grow dim because of all my foes.
- Isaiah 1:5
Why do you want more beatings? Why do you keep rebelling? Your head has a massive wound, and your whole heart is afflicted.
- Job 17:7
My eyes have grown dim with grief, and my whole body is but a shadow.
- Lamentations 2:11
My eyes fail from weeping; I am churning within. My heart is poured out in grief over the destruction of the daughter of my people, because children and infants faint in the streets of…
- Psalms 6:7
Through
Isaiah 22:4Therefore I said, “Turn away from me, let me weep bitterly! Do not try to console me over the destruction of the daughter of my people.”
it leads to
- Jeremiah 9:1
Oh, that my head were a spring of water, and my eyes a fountain of tears! I would weep day and night over the slain daughter of my people.
- Jeremiah 9:1
Through
Jeremiah 6:24We have heard the report; our hands hang limp. Anguish has gripped us, pain like that of a woman in labor.
it leads to
- Jeremiah 4:31
For I hear a cry like a woman in labor, a cry of anguish like one bearing her first child—the cry of the Daughter of Zion gasping for breath, stretching out her hands to…
- Jeremiah 49:24
Damascus has become feeble; she has turned to flee. Panic has gripped her; anguish and pain have seized her like a woman in labor.
- Jeremiah 50:43
The king of Babylon has heard the report, and his hands hang limp. Anguish has gripped him, pain like that of a woman in labor.
- Jeremiah 4:31
Where this verse is studied
On this page
Studies1
About Jeremiah
This page draws on Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; Jerome, Commentary on Jeremiah; John Calvin, Commentary on Jeremiah and Lamentations; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763) and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.