Yeremia 30:13

30:13 There is no one to plead your cause.

There are no remedies for your wounds. ¹ 

There is no healing for you.

Yeremia 46:11

46:11 Go up to Gilead and get medicinal ointment, ² 

you dear poor people of Egypt. ³ 

But it will prove useless no matter how much medicine you use; ⁴ 

there will be no healing for you.

[30:13]  ¹ tc The translation of these first two lines follows the redivision of the lines suggested in NIV and NRSV rather than that of the Masoretes who read, “There is no one who pleads your cause with reference to [your] wound.”

[30:13]  sn This verse exhibits a mixed metaphor of an advocate pleading someone’s case (cf., Jer 5:28; 22:18) and of a physician applying medicine to wounds and sores resulting from them (see, e.g., Jer 8:18 for the latter metaphor). Zion’s sins are beyond defense and the wounds inflicted upon her beyond healing. However, God, himself, in his own time will forgive her sins (Jer 31:34; 33:8) and heal her wounds (Jer 30:17).

[46:11]  ² tn Heb “balm.” See 8:22 and the notes on this phrase there.

[46:11]  ³ 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.

[46:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “In vain you multiply [= make use of many] medicines.”