22 Is there no balm in Gilead? is there no physician there? Why then is there no dressing applied for the healing of the daughter of my people?
And they sat down to eat bread; and they lifted up their eyes and looked, and behold, a caravan of Ishmaelites came from Gilead; and their camels bore tragacanth, and balsam, and ladanum -- going to carry [it] down to Egypt.
Go up to Gilead, and fetch balm, O virgin-daughter of Egypt! In vain shalt thou multiply remedies: there is no healing for thee.
For thus saith Jehovah: Thy bruise is incurable, thy wound is grievous. There is none to plead thy cause, to bind up [thy wound]; thou hast no healing medicines. All thy lovers have forgotten thee; they seek thee not. For I have smitten thee with the stroke of an enemy, with the chastisement of a cruel one, for the greatness of thine iniquity: thy sins are manifold. Why criest thou because of thy bruise? thy sorrow is incurable; for the greatness of thine iniquity, [because] thy sins are manifold, I have done these things unto thee. Therefore all that devour thee shall be devoured, and all thine adversaries, every one of them, shall go into captivity; and they that spoil thee shall be for a spoil; and all they that prey upon thee will I give to be a prey. For I will apply a bandage unto thee, and I will heal thee of thy wounds, saith Jehovah; for they have called thee an outcast: This is Zion that no man seeketh after.
And their father Israel said to them, If it is then so, do this: take of the best fruits in the land in your vessels, and carry down the man a gift: a little balsam and a little honey, tragacanth and ladanum, pistacia-nuts and almonds.
Why should ye be smitten any more? ye will revolt more and more: the whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole of the foot even unto the head there is no soundness in him; wounds, and weals, and open sores: they have not been dressed, nor bound up, nor mollified with oil.
And the Pharisees seeing [it], said to his disciples, Why does your teacher eat with tax-gatherers and sinners? But [Jesus] hearing it, said, They that are strong have not need of a physician, but those that are ill.
And Jesus answering said to them, They that are in sound health have not need of a physician, but those that are ill. I am not come to call righteous [persons], but sinful [ones] to repentance.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Jeremiah 8
Commentary on Jeremiah 8 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 8
The prophet proceeds, in this chapter, both to magnify and to justify the destruction that God was bringing upon this people, to show how grievous it would be and yet how righteous.
Jer 8:1-3
These verses might fitly have been joined to the close of the foregoing chapter, as giving a further description of the dreadful desolation which the army of the Chaldeans should make in the land. It shall strangely alter the property of death itself, and for the worse too.
Jer 8:4-12
The prophet here is instructed to set before this people the folly of their impenitence, which was it that brought this ruin upon them. They are here represented as the most stupid senseless people in the world, that would not be made wise by all the methods that Infinite Wisdom took to bring them to themselves and their right mind, and so to prevent the ruin that was coming upon them.
Jer 8:13-22
In these verses we have,