Jeremiah 8:14 - Exposition

Why do we sit still? The prophet transports us by a stroke of his pea into the midst of the fulfillment of his prophecy. The people of the country districts are represented as urging each other to flight. True, it is the resource of despair. No defensed cities can defend them against the judgment of Jehovah. Let us be silent ; rather, let us perish ; literally, let us be put to silence . Hath put us to silence ; rather, hath caused us to perish ; i . e . hath decreed our destruction. Water of gall ; a phrase characteristic of our prophet (see Jeremiah 9:14 ; Jeremiah 23:15 ). It is a little difficult to find a rendering which shall suit all the passages in which rosh (gall) is mentioned. In Deuteronomy 32:33 (and so Job 20:16 ) it is clearly used for "venom" in general; and yet in Deuteronomy 32:32 of the same chapter it obviously means a plant. Another general application of the term seems to have been to bitterness in general, the ideas of bitterness and poisonousness being taken as interchangeable. The Authorized Version may therefore stand.