IX.
(1) Oh, that my head were waters...! — Literally, Who will give my head waters...? The form of a question was, in Hebrew idiom as in Latin, the natural utterance of desire. In the Hebrew text this verse comes as the last in Jeremiah 8. It is, of course, very closely connected with what precedes; but, on the other hand, it is even more closely connected with what follows. Strictly speaking, there ought to be no break at all, and the discourse should flow on continuously.
A fountain. — Here, as in Jeremiah 2:13; Jeremiah 17:13, and elsewhere, the Hebrew word makor is a tank or réservoir rather than a spring.