Jeremiah 8:18

18 You who are my Comforter^[a] in sorrow, my heart is faint within me.

Jeremiah 8:18 in Other Translations

18 When I would comfort myself against sorrow, my heart is faint in me.

18 My joy is gone; grief is upon me; my heart is sick within me.

18 My grief is beyond healing; my heart is broken.

18 I drown in grief. I'm heartsick.

18 Oh that I could comfort myself against sorrow! my heart is faint within me.

18 Sorrow has overwhelmed me. I am sick at heart!

18 My joy has flown away; grief has settled on me. My heart is sick.

18 Lord, my heart is weak inside me. You comfort me when I'm sad.

Jeremiah 8:18 Meaning and Commentary

Jeremiah 8:18

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.''

Jeremiah 8:18 In-Context

16 The snorting of the enemy’s horses is heard from Dan; at the neighing of their stallions the whole land trembles. They have come to devour the land and everything in it, the city and all who live there.

17 “See, I will send venomous snakes among you, vipers that cannot be charmed, and they will bite you,” declares the LORD.

18 You who are my Comforter in sorrow, my heart is faint within me.

19 Listen to the cry of my people from a land far away: “Is the LORD not in Zion? Is her King no longer there?” “Why have they aroused my anger with their images, with their worthless foreign idols?”

20 “The harvest is past, the summer has ended, and we are not saved.”

Cross References

• 1. Lamentations 5:17

Footnotes

• [a]. The meaning of the Hebrew for this word is uncertain.