meaning of is there no balm in gilead
There Is a Balm in Gilead The “balm in Gilead” is a reference from the Old Testament, but the lyrics of this spiritual refer to the New Testament concept of salvation through Jesus Christ. The Balm of Gilead is interpreted as a spiritual medicine that is able to heal Israel (and sinners in general). In the Old Testament, the balm of Gilead is taken most directly from Jeremiah chapter 8 v. 22: "Is there no balm in Gilead? Is there no physician there? Why then is there no healing for the wounds of my [God's] people?" (Another allusion can also be found in Jeremiah chapter 46, v. 2 and 11: “This is the message (of the Lord) against the army of Pharaoh Neco … Go up to Gilead and get balm, O Virgin Daughter of Egypt, but you multiply remedies in vain; here is no healing for you” - see also Jeremiah chapter 22, v. 6.) [1]
The Handmaid's Tale (TV series) In the near future, fertility rates collapse as a result of sexually transmitted diseases and environmental pollution.[1] With this chaos in place, the totalitarian, Christian theonomic government of "Gilead" establishes rule in the former United States in the aftermath of a civil war.[2][3][4] Society is organized by power-hungry leaders along a new, militarized, hierarchical regime of fanaticism and newly created social classes, in which women are brutally subjugated, and by law are not allowed to work, own property, handle money, or read.[4] Worldwide infertility has resulted in the conscription of the few remaining fertile women in Gilead, called handmaids, according to an "extremist interpretation" of a Biblical account.[4] They are assigned to the homes of the ruling elite, where they must submit to ritualized rape with their male masters in order to become pregnant and bear children for those men and their wives.