For those of us saturated in the rich folk traditions of American Christianity, the phrase “balm in Gilead” likely conjures up warm feelings of comfort and hope, of softly perceptive Marilynne Robinson novels, of slow-sung spirituals.  There is a balm in Gilead, we remember, to make the wounded whole.  There is a balm in Gilead that heals the sin-sick soul.

We are in for a surprise, therefore, when we turn to Jeremiah 8:18-9:1.  The prophet Jeremiah lived in the turbulent and dark last days of the independent kingdom of Judah, a society at the brink of what philosopher Jonathan Lear would call “cultural devastation.”  The Assyrian empire had largely dismantled the northern kingdom of Israel, and Judah, the last survivor of the Davidic kingdom, was under threat from the growing empire of Babylon which would sack Jerusalem three times between 598 BCE and 581 BCE and ultimately carry its leaders into exile. 

Jeremiah saw his culture collapsing both from without and from within.  In Jeremiah’s view Judah had acted faithlessly toward God (cf. 8:4-7), and he interpreted Judah’s destruction as divine judgment.  The God of Israel, the One who “[acts] with steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth” (9:24), had, in Jeremiah’s view, “doomed us to perish, . . . given us poisoned water to drink . . . We look for a time of healing, but there is terror instead” (8:15).  There is debate among scholars whether the speaker in 8:18-9:1 is the prophet himself, the personified city of Jerusalem, or God, but it is clear that the prevailing spirit of the people was one of fear, despair, and perceived abandonment by God.  “Is there no balm in Gilead?” the prophet cries, and for those who asked, the answer seemed to be emphatically, not for you, not for your people.

The bleakness of the prophet’s lamentation here is startling, but it is important to remember that it is not the last word, even for Jeremiah.  The Babylonians, of course, did sack Jerusalem, destroy the temple, and carry many into exile under conditions of profound suffering (see, for example, Psalm 137).  But the book of Jeremiah contains a subsequent letter to those Babylonian exiles, those who “wept . . . by the rivers of Babylon” (Ps. 137:1), reporting that God enjoins them to “seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile” (29:7) and that after seventy years God would restore them to Jerusalem, “for surely you know the plans I have for you, says the Lord, plans for your welfare and not for harm, plans to give you a future with hope” (29:11).

It is good for us to remember that the spiritual “There is a Balm in Gilead” originated in a community which had experienced a very different, though no less horrific, exile – that of the American slave trade.  There is a balm in Gilead to make the wounded whole; there is a balm in Gilead to heal the sin-sick soul. These words were sung by those who, like Jeremiah, longed for that balm and did not find it present.  When we sing the hymn today, it is the legacy of their subversive and prophetic hope that even in the deepest darkness, “the Lord has ransomed Jacob, and has redeemed him from hands too strong for him” (31:11).

By Dr. Warren Kinghorn, Psychiatrist, Graduate Student, Duke Divinity School; member, Presbyterian Church (USA)