Jeremiah 31:16

Thy work shall be rewarded, saith the Lord. — Literally, there-shall be a reward for thy work. The words are a reproduction of the old prophecy of Azariah, the son of Oded (2 Chronicles 15:7). Rachel, personifying the northern kingdom, perhaps even the collective unity of all Israel, is thought of as labouring in the work of repentance and reformation, as with a mother’s care, and is comforted with the thought that her labour shall not be in vain. This seems a more satisfactory interpretation than that which refers the “work” of the weeping Rachel to the travail of child-birth.