Lamentations 2:11 My eyes fail with tears. My heart is troubled. My liver is poured on the earth, because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, because the young children and the infants swoon in the streets of the city. (World English Bible, public domain)
Commentary by A. R. Fausset: "that is, as the liver was thought to be the seat of the passions, "all my feelings are poured out and prostrated for," &c. The "liver," is here put for the bile ("gall," Job 16:13; "bowels," Psa 22:14 ) in a bladder on the surface of the liver, copiously discharged when the passions are agitated." (source)
From Calvin's commentary: "But Jeremiah, in short, shews that all his faculties were so seized with grief, that no part was exempt. He then says that his liver was poured forth, but in the same sense in which he said that his bowels were disturbed. They are indeed hyperbolical expressions; but as to the meaning, Jeremiah simply expresses his feelings; for there is no doubt but that he was incredibly anxious and sorrowful on account of so great a calamity;" (source)
The author of Lamentations was not including the first verse quoted above as part of a discussion of liver anatomy and physiology. If he had been doing so, he would have been largely wrong, as can be seen by reading this solid source on how the liver was perceived in ancient times. The authors of that source, in fact, quote the verse at the beginning of this post, and say, commenting on it, that the liver "... was also the seat of all the emotions..." Or, as Fausset put it in his commentary, the passions.
Was Jeremiah (presumably the author of Lamentations) wrong about the liver? Well, yes, about its significance and function. Was the Bible wrong about the liver? Yes, in the same way. But Lamentations was not a physiology text. God knows the function of the liver, perhaps even knowing aspects of it that are yet to be discovered, here in 2023, and He knew them in Jeremiah's time. The Bible, nor God, is not in error worth mentioning, or defending, concerning this passage. Jeremiah spoke in accord with the beliefs of his day, and those beliefs were not such as to imperil anyone's salvation. These beliefs were incorporated into what he said about the liver. It would have been strange indeed for God to have tapped Jeremiah on the shoulder and said "excuse me, but the liver is not actually the seat of the emotions. Carry on with your prophecy," and, of course, He didn't do that. To expect every Biblical description of created things to match current scientific knowledge is unreasonable.
Thanks for reading. Take care of your liver.
September 15, 2023:
I have discovered that, in chapter six of his book, (Mis)interpreting Genesis: How the Creation Museum Misunderstands the Ancient Middle Eastern Context of the Bible, Ben Stanhope discusses the brain and the kidneys, in a fashion similar to my treatment of the liver, in this post. God willing, I'll post on these further organs soon.
October 6, 2023: Here is a post on the kidneys, and here is one on the size of mustard seeds. Both posts argue that the Bible was produced according to the beliefs about nature and humans that were prevalent at that time.
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