What Does Jeremiah 31:16 Mean?
Thus says the LORD, Hold back your voice from weeping, and your eyes from tears, for there are wages for your work, says the LORD, and they will turn back from the land of the enemy.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Thus saith the LORD; Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded, saith the LORD; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy.THE KEY
The tears loosen as the LORD names both the labor beneath them and the return from the place holding what is loved.
THE MEANING
The LORD meets you in grief without calling your tears a failure: your labor is seen, and its recompense is named. What seems held in an enemy’s land is not beyond the reach of return.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The lie is that grieving means your labor has gone unseen and nothing can return. This verse holds recognition and return together.
THE ROOT
וְשָׁבוּ
ve-shavu
GROWS FROM
שוב
to turn back, return
“turn back” in this verse is ve-shavu. The word translated “come again” carries the motion of turning back. Return here is a change of direction out of enemy-held territory, not merely the reappearance of what was lost.
ALSO GROWS
teshuvah: returning, turning back
תְּשׁוּבָה
This noun keeps the root’s movement visible: the promise holds a way back within the word for return.
yeshovev: restores, turns back
יְשׁוֹבֵב
Psalm 23:3 uses this form for the LORD restoring the living soul; here, the same root gives return its restorative force.
שָׂכָר
sakar
GROWS FROM
שכר
wages, hire, compensation
“there are wages for your work” in this verse is sakar. The word translated “reward” has the concrete sense of wages or compensation. The verse places grief and labor together, making clear that the work carried through loss is counted rather than erased.
ALSO GROWS
sakhir: hired worker
שָׂכִיר
The root names the worker as well as the wages, keeping the person’s labor in view.
maskoret: wages, hire
מַשְׂכֹּרֶת
This related form preserves the material sense behind “reward”: compensation given for work.
THE PATTERN
Grief is answered with recognition of the labor beneath loss and a promise of return.
Those who sow in tears reap in a ringing cry. Going, he goes and weeps, carrying the bag of seed; coming, he comes in a ringing cry, carrying his sheaves.Therefore the ransomed of the LORD will turn back, and come to Zion with ringing cries and joy of the ages upon their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and groaning will flee away.Truly, truly, I say to you, that you will weep and wail, but the world will rejoice; you will be pained, but your pain will become joy.THE THREAD
And there is hope for your end, declares the LORD, that your children will turn back to their own border.“Shall come again” repeats the root שׁוּב (shuv, “return”) from this verse. The next line makes the direction explicit: the children return from the enemy’s land to their own border.
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