Bible Strands
Jeremiah 9:18
Let them come quickly and take up a lament over us, that our eyes may overflow with tears, and our eyelids may gush with water.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Jeremiah instructs the community to summon professional wailing women to mourn the impending national catastrophe. The directive occurs between a divine warning of devastation and the reported sound of lament rising from Zion.
The words — The Hebrew תְמַהֵרְנָה (temaherenah) commands the mourners to "hasten," while נֶהִי (nehi) specifies a formal "wailing." עַפְעַפֵּינוּ ('af'apeinu) identifies the "eyelids" that will physically gush with water.
The thread — The image of eyes overflowing with tears appears in Jeremiah 9:1, Isaiah 22:4, and Jeremiah 14:17 as a recurring scriptural marker for unceasing grief over destruction.
Why it lands — The text records a concrete command to ritualize mourning before describing the physical overflow of tears. It requires the reader to acknowledge the scale of the coming collapse through the unvarnished mechanics of professional lament.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters.
Cross-references
- 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.
- Isaiah 22:4 Therefore 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.”
- Jeremiah 14:17 You are to speak this word to them: ‘My eyes overflow with tears; day and night they do not cease, for the virgin daughter of my people has been shattered by a crushing blow, a severely grievous wound.
- Jeremiah 9:20 Now, O women, hear the word of the LORD. Open your ears to the word of His mouth. Teach your daughters to wail, and one another to lament.
- Jeremiah 6:26 O daughter of my people, dress yourselves in sackcloth and roll in ashes. Mourn with bitter wailing, as you would for an only son, for suddenly the destroyer will come upon us.
- Jeremiah 9:10 I will take up a weeping and wailing for the mountains, a dirge over the wilderness pasture, for they have been scorched so no one passes through, and the lowing of cattle is not heard. Both the birds of the air and the beasts have fled; they have gone away.
- Jeremiah 13:17 But if you do not listen, I will weep in secret because of your pride. My eyes will overflow with tears, because the LORD’s flock has been taken captive.
- Lamentations 1:2 She weeps aloud in the night, with tears upon her cheeks. Among all her lovers there is no one to comfort her. All her friends have betrayed her; they have become her enemies.
- 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 the city.
- Lamentations 2:18 The hearts of the people cry out to the Lord. O wall of the Daughter of Zion, let your tears run down like a river day and night. Give yourself no relief, and your eyes no rest.