She that was a princess among the provinces
has become a vassal.
2She weeps bitterly in the night,
with tears on her cheeks;
among all her lovers
she has no one to comfort her;
all her friends have dealt treacherously with her,
they have become her enemies.
3Judah has gone into exile with suffering
and hard servitude;
she lives now among the nations,
and finds no resting place;
her pursuers have all overtaken her
in the midst of her distress.
4The roads to Zion mourn,
for no one comes to the festivals;
all her gates are desolate,
her priests groan;
her young girls grieve,a
and her lot is bitter.
5Her foes have become the masters,
her enemies prosper,
because the LORD has made her suffer
for the multitude of her transgressions;
her children have gone away,
captives before the foe.
6From daughter Zion has departed
all her majesty.
Her princes have become like stags
that find no pasture;
they fled without strength
before the pursuer.
7Jerusalem remembers,
in the days of her affliction and wandering,
all the precious things
that were hers in days of old.
When her people fell into the hand of the foe,
and there was no one to help her,
the foe looked on mocking
over her downfall.
8Jerusalem sinned grievously,
so she has become a mockery;
all who honored her despise her,
for they have seen her nakedness;
she herself groans,
and turns her face away.
9Her uncleanness was in her skirts;
she took no thought of her future;
her downfall was appalling,
with none to comfort her.
“O LORD, look at my affliction,
for the enemy has triumphed!”
10Enemies have stretched out their hands
over all her precious things;
she has even seen the nations
invade her sanctuary,
those whom you forbade
to enter your congregation.
11All her people groan
as they search for bread;
they trade their treasures for food
to revive their strength.
Look, O LORD, and see
how worthless I have become.
12Is it nothing to you,b all you who pass by?
Look and see
if there is any sorrow like my sorrow,
which was brought upon me,
which the LORD inflicted
on the day of his fierce anger.
13From on high he sent fire;
it went deep into my bones;
he spread a net for my feet;
he turned me back;
he has left me stunned,
faint all day long.
14My transgressions were boundc into a yoke;
by his hand they were fastened together;
they weigh on my neck,
sapping my strength;
the Lord handed me over
to those whom I cannot withstand.
15The LORD has rejected
all my warriors in the midst of me;
he proclaimed a time against me
to crush my young men;
the Lord has trodden as in a wine press
the virgin daughter Judah.
16For these things I weep;
my eyes flow with tears;
for a comforter is far from me,
one to revive my courage;
my children are desolate,
for the enemy has prevailed.
17Zion stretches out her hands,
but there is no one to comfort her;
the LORD has commanded against Jacob
that his neighbors should become his foes;
Jerusalem has become
a filthy thing among them.
18The LORD is in the right,
for I have rebelled against his word;
but hear, all you peoples,
and behold my suffering;
my young women and young men
have gone into captivity.
19I called to my lovers
but they deceived me;
my priests and elders
perished in the city
while seeking food
to revive their strength.
20See, O LORD, how distressed I am;
my stomach churns,
my heart is wrung within me,
because I have been very rebellious.
In the street the sword bereaves;
in the house it is like death.
21They heard how I was groaning,
with no one to comfort me.
All my enemies heard of my trouble;
they are glad that you have done it.
Bring on the day you have announced,
and let them be as I am.
22Let all their evil doing come before you;
and deal with them
as you have dealt with me
because of all my transgressions;
for my groans are many
and my heart is faint.
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a Meaning of Heb uncertain
b Meaning of Heb uncertain
c Meaning of Heb uncertain
1.1–22 A moving description of the plight of the city following its destruction. Two voices mark the main sections of the poem. The narrator speaks in vv. 1–11b, and Daughter Zion in vv. 11c–22. The former speaks as an observer, and the latter as the victim of violence and destruction. Together they portray a totality of pain. They both blame the city for the disaster.
1.1–11 The poet contrasts the present miserable condition of the city with its former glory.
1.1 How (Hebrew ’ekah) suggests a sharp intake of breath in astonishment and disbelief about the fall of the city. The term characteristically appears in funeral elegies (see 2 Sam 1.19, 25, 27; Isa 1.21; 14.4; Jer 48.17; Ezek 26.17).
1.2 Lovers, friends, nations with whom Judah had entered into political alliances, which were denounced by the prophets (see Isa 31.1–3; Jer 4.30; 27.1–7; 30.14; Ezek 16.33). Some of these former allies made common cause with the Babylonians when they attacked Jerusalem (see 2 Kings 24.2; Ezek 25.12–17). The speaker accuses the city of adulterous infidelity, but notes that she is alone and without a comforter (see 1.9, 16, 19; 2.13).
1.4 Roads…mourn, or “roads are dried up,” perhaps for lack of religious pilgrims. City gates were normally bustling with activity (see 5.14).
1.5 Foes…the masters (the masters, lit. “the heads”) alludes to the covenant blessing and curse in Deut 28.13, 44. God punished Jerusalem for breach of covenant, a theme more fully developed in ch.2.
1.6 Daughter Zion or the like (see 1.15; 2.1, 4, 8, 10, 13, 15; 4.21, 22; cf. 3.48; 4.3, 6, 10, where the Hebrew reads lit. “daughter of my people”) is a poetic expression of endearment personifying a city, land, or people.
1.8 Nakedness was considered shameful and humiliating (see Gen 9.22–23; Ex 20.26; Isa 47.3; Ezek 16.37–39). Ancient reliefs show prisoners being marched into captivity stark naked.
1.9 Uncleanness, a metaphor drawn from ritual purity laws and barring Zion from worship (see Lev 15.16–24).
1.10 Precious things, the temple treasures plundered by the Babylonians (2 Kings 25.13–17; Jer 28.1–3). Ironically, foreigners barred by law from entering the Lord’s congregation (Deut 23.3) had invaded God’s sanctuary.
1.11 Treasures, rendered precious things in v. 10, here
probably refers to humans rather than valuables (cf. Ezek 24.16; Hos 9.16).
1.12–22 Zion is speaking from within a world of pain.
1.12 On the day of his fierce anger, a reference to the prophetic concept of “the day of the LORD,” on which God comes to judge Israel or the nations (see Isa 10.3; 13.13; 22.5; Ezek 7.7–12; Joel 2.1–2; Am 5.18, 20; Ob 15–18). Here it is identified with the destruction of Jerusalem.
1.13 Traditional metaphors drawn from individual laments (see Job 30.30; Pss 10.9; 35.7–8; 57.6;102.3; Jer 20.9) and here suggesting physical abuse by a spouse.
1.14 The yoke, or heavy burden (see 1 Kings 12.3–14; Isa 9.4; Jer 27–28), has been brought on by Israel’s rebellious acts against the Lord (cf. Deut 28.47–48).
1.15 Virgin daughter Judah. See note on 1.6.
1.17 Filthy thing belongs to the same semantic realm as uncleanness in v. 9 (cf. Lev. 12.2; 15.19–32; 2 Chr 29.5; Ezra 9.11; Zech 13.1).
1.18 Zion concedes that God’s punishment is just because she had rebelled against his word (lit. “mouth”), i.e., disobeyed divine directives given through prophetic mediators (see Num 20.24; Deut 1.26, 43; 1 Sam 12.14–15; 1 Kings 13.21, 26).
1.19 Lovers. See note on 1.2.
1.21–22 Petitions for God to see Zion’s suffering and to intervene against her enemies.
LAMENTATIONS 2
God’s Warnings Fulfilled
1How the Lord in his anger
has humiliateda daughter Zion!
He has thrown down from heaven to earth
the splendor of Israel;
he has not remembered his footstool
in the day of his anger.
2The Lord has destroyed without mercy
all the dwellings of Jacob;
in his wrath he has broken down
the strongholds of daughter Judah;
he has brought down to the ground in dishonor
the kingdom and its rulers.
3He has cut down in fierce anger
all the might of Israel;
he has withdrawn his right hand from them
in the face of the enemy;
he has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob,
consuming all around.
4He has bent his bow like an enemy,
with his right hand set like a foe;
he has killed all in whom we took pride
in the tent of daughter Zion;
he has poured out his fury like fire.
5The Lord has become like an enemy;
he has destroyed Israel.
He has destroyed all its palaces,
laid in ruins its strongholds,
and multiplied in daughter Judah
mourning and lamentation.
6He has broken down his booth like a garden,
he has destroyed his tabernacle;
the LORD has abolished in Zion
festival and sabbath,
and in his fierce indignation has spurned
king and priest.
7The Lord has scorned his altar,
disowned his sanctuary;
he has delivered into the hand of the enemy
the walls of her palaces;
a clamor was raised in the house of the LORD
as on a day of festival.
8The LORD determined to lay in ruins
the wall of daughter Zion;
he stretched the line;
he did not withhold his hand from destroying;
he caused rampart and wall to lament;
they languish together.
9Her gates have sunk into the ground;
he has ruined and broken her bars;
her king and princes are among the nations;
guidance is no more,
and her prophets obtain
no vision from the LORD.
10The elders of daughter Zion
sit on the ground in silence;
they have thrown dust on their heads
and put on sackcloth;
the young girls of Jerusalem
have bowed their heads to the ground.
11My eyes are spent with weeping;
my stomach churns;
my bile is poured out on the ground
because of the destruction of my people,
because infants and babes faint
in the streets of the city.
12They cry to their mothers,
“Where is bread and wine?”
as they faint like the wounded
in the streets of the city,
as their life is poured out
on their mothers’ bosom.
13What can I say for you, to what compare you,
O daughter Jerusalem?
To what can I liken you, that I may comfort you,
O virgin daughter Zion?
For vast as the sea is your ruin;
who can heal you?
14Your prophets have seen for you
false and deceptive visions;
they have not exposed your iniquity
to restore your fortunes,
but have seen oracles for you
that are false and misleading.
15All who pass along the way
clap their hands at you;
they hiss and wag their heads
at daughter Jerusalem;
“Is this the city that was called
the perfection of beauty,
the joy of all the earth?”
16All your enemies
open their mouths against you;
they hiss, they gnash their teeth,
they cry: “We have devoured her!
Ah, this is the day we longed for;
at last we have seen it!”
17The LORD has done what he purposed,
he has carried out his threat;
as he ordained long ago,
he has demolished without pity;
he has made the enemy rejoice over you,
and exalted the might of your foes.
18Cry aloudb to the Lord!
O wall of daughter Zion!
Let tears stream down like a torrent
day and night!
Give yourself no rest,
your eyes no respite!
19Arise, cry out in the night,
at the beginning of the watches!
Pour out your heart like water
before the presence of the Lord!
Lift your hands to him
for the lives of your children,
who faint for hunger
at the head of every street.
20Look, O LORD, and consider!
To whom have you done this?
Should women eat their offspring,
the children they have borne?
Should priest and prophet be killed
in the sanctuary of the Lord?
21The young and the old are lying
on the ground in the streets;
my young women and my young men
have fallen by the sword;
in the day of your anger you have killed them,
slaughtering without mercy.
22You invited my enemies from all around
as if for a day of festival;
and on the day of the anger of the LORD
no one escaped or survived;
those whom I bore and reared
my enemy has destroyed.
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a Meaning of Heb uncertain
b Cn: Heb Their heart cried
2.1–22 The narrator describes the enormity of Zion’s suffering but now shows sympathy for her pain and accuses God of being merciless and cruel in punishing Zion. This poem suggests the narrator has changed and protests the divine treatment of Zion.
2.1 Daughter Zion. See note on 1.6. The splendor of Israel is a reference to the capital city (cf. Isa 13.19; Ezek 24.25) or its sanctuary (cf. Ps 78.61; Isa 64.11). God’s footstool, the ark of the Lord or the temple where it was housed (see 1 Chr 28.2; Pss 99
.5;132.7). In the day of his anger. See also vv. 3, 4, 6, 21, 22; note on 1.12.
2.2 Without mercy, i.e., unsparingly, but without exhausting divine capabilities for mercy (cf. 3.22–23, 32–33).
2.3–5 The Divine Warrior who used to fight Israel’s enemies (see Ex 15.3–10; Judg 5.10–11; Hab 3.1–16) has now withdrawn his right hand, or protective power, and become like an enemy to Israel (cf. Jer 30.14).
2.6 Booth, tabernacle, the temple (see v. 7). King and priest, the two pillars of the Jerusalemite ruling class. Temple and palace were both part of the building complex destroyed by the Babylonians (2 Kings 25.8–12, 18–21), and kings played an important role in the Israelite religion (2 Kings 23.1–25).
2.9 Guidance, or priestly “instruction.”
2.10 This verse describes traditional rites of mourning in the face of calamity (see Job 2.12–13; Jer 4.8; 6.26; Jon 3.6).
2.13 Daughter Jerusalem, virgin daughter Zion. See note on 1.6. The narrator offers comfort by recognizing the vastness of her suffering.
2.14 Deceptive visions. See Jer 14.13–16; 23.9–22; 28.1–17; 29.8–9.
2.15–16 Cf. 1 Kings 9.8–9; Ps 22.7; Jer 19.8; Zeph 2.15.
2.15 Is this…the joy of all the earth, a derisive question that mocks the exalted praise of the city found in the songs of Zion (Pss 46; 48).
2.17 The claims of her enemies notwithstanding (v. 16b), Jerusalem’s destruction was the Lord’s purposive doing (cf. 1.5, 12–15, 18).
2.18–19 Zion is encouraged to engage in weeping, shouting, and entreaty before God.
2.20–22 Zion’s plaintive prayer appeals to God’s mercy through a heartrending description of her misery. She asks again for God to see her suffering, to recognize her misery. Perhaps God will act.
2.20 Should women eat their offspring? The horrors of cannibalism during severe famine are mentioned in traditional treaty curses and prophetic threats (see Lev 26.29; Deut 28.53–57; Jer 19.9; Ezek 5.10) and reported on at least some occasions (Lam 4.10; 2 Kings 6.28–29).
2.21 Cf. Jer 9.21–22.
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