Lamentations chapter 1
Sadness of Zion the captive
1 How lonely is the populous city! She who was great among the nations has become like a widow; she who was mistress of the provinces has become a slave.
2 She weeps bitterly in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks. Of all her lovers, there is no one to comfort her; all her friends have deserted her and turned to be her enemies.
3 Judah has gone into exile because of affliction and harsh servitude; she dwelt among the nations and found no rest; all her pursuers overtook her in her distress.
4 The streets of Zion mourn, for there is no one to come to the appointed feasts; all her gates are desolate, her priests wail, her virgins grieve, and she is bitter in spirit.
5 Her enemies have become princes, her haters have prospered, for the Lord has afflicted her because of the multitude of her transgressions; her children have gone into captivity before the enemy.
6 All the splendor of the daughter of Zion has vanished; her princes are like deer that find no pasture, and they walk powerless before the pursuer.
7 Jerusalem, when her people fell into the hand of the enemy, and there was no one to help her, remembered the days of her affliction and her transgressions, and all the pleasant things she had from days of old. The enemies looked on and mocked her downfall.
8 Jerusalem committed sin, for which she has been removed; all who honored her despise her, because they saw her shame; so she sighs and turns away.
9 Her filthiness is in her skirts, and she does not remember her end; therefore she has come down unexpectedly, and there is no one to comfort her. Look, O Lord, on my affliction, for the enemy has triumphed.
10 The enemy has stretched out his hand over all her precious things; She has seen the nations enter her sanctuary, those whom you commanded not to enter your assembly.
11 All her people groaned for bread; they exchanged all their precious possessions for food, to sustain their lives. Look, O Lord, and see that I am brought low.
12 Are you not moved, all you who pass by? Look and see if there is any sorrow like my sorrow that has come upon me, for the Lord has afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.
13 From on high he sent fire that consumes my bones; he spread a net for my feet and turned me back; he left me desolate, and in pain all day long.
14 The yoke of my transgressions has been bound by his hand; shackles have been placed on my neck; he has weakened my strength; the Lord has delivered me into the hands of whom I cannot rise.
15 The Lord has trampled down all my mighty men within me; he has summoned an army against me to crush my young men; the Lord has trampled down the virgin daughter of Judah like a winepress.
16 For this reason I weep; my eyes, my eyes overflow with tears, because the comforter who should give rest to my soul is far from me; my children are destroyed, because the enemy has prevailed.
17 Zion stretches out her hands; she has no one to comfort her; the Lord has given a command against Jacob, that his neighbors should be his enemies; Jerusalem has become an abomination among them.
18 The Lord is righteous; I rebelled against his word. Hear now, all you peoples, and see my anguish; my virgins and my young men have been taken captive.
19 I cried out to my lovers, but they deceived me; my priests and my elders perished in the city, seeking food to sustain their lives.
20 See, O Lord, I am troubled; my bowels are in turmoil. My heart is turned upside down within me, for I have greatly rebelled. Outside, the sword has ravaged; within, death reigns.
21 They heard me groaning, but there was no one to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my suffering; they rejoice at what you have done. You will bring on the day you have announced, and they will be like me.
22 Let all their wickedness come before you, and do to them as you have done to me for all my transgressions. For my groaning is great, and my heart is in anguish.
Lamentations Chapter 2
The sorrows of Zion come from the Lord
1 How the Lord has darkened the daughter of Zion in his anger! He has cast down from heaven to earth the splendor of Israel, and has not remembered his footstool in the day of his wrath.
2 The Lord has destroyed without pity; in his anger he has destroyed all the tents of Jacob; he has cast down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah, he has humbled the kingdom and its princes.
3 In the heat of his anger he has cut off all the strength of Israel; he has withdrawn his right hand from him in the face of the enemy, and he has burned against Jacob like a flame of fire that devours all around.
4 He bends his bow like an enemy, he sets his right hand like an adversary, and he destroys all that was beautiful. On the tent of the daughter of Zion he has poured out his wrath like fire.
5 The Lord has become like an enemy; he has destroyed Israel; he has destroyed all its palaces, he has demolished its strongholds, and he has multiplied sorrow and wailing on the daughter of Judah.
6 He has removed his dwelling like a garden booth; he has destroyed the place of their gathering. The Lord has caused the appointed feasts and Sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion; in his fierce anger he has rejected king and priest.
7 The Lord has rejected his altar and despised his sanctuary; he has given the walls of her palaces into the hand of the enemy; they raise their voices in the house of the Lord as on a festival day.
8 The Lord determined to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; he stretched out the measuring line and did not hold back his hand from destruction. He made the rampart and the wall wail; they are laid waste together.
9 Her gates are thrown down to the ground; he has broken down and smashed her bars. Her king and her princes are among the nations where there is no law; her prophets also find no vision from the Lord.
10 The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence; they have put dust on their heads and girded themselves with sackcloth. The virgins of Jerusalem bowed their heads to the ground.
11 My eyes failed with tears, my heart was in anguish; my liver poured out on the ground because of the destruction of the daughter of my people, when infants and nursing babies fainted in the streets of the city.
12 They said to their mothers, “Where is the grain and the new wine?” They fainted like wounded men in the streets of the city, pouring out their lives into their mothers’ bosoms.
13 What witness shall I bring before you, or to whom shall I compare you, daughter of Jerusalem? To whom shall I liken you, that I may comfort you, virgin daughter of Zion? For your destruction is as vast as the sea; who can heal you?
14 Your prophets saw for you worthless and foolish; they did not expose your sin to prevent your captivity, but prophesied to you falsehood and delusions.
15All who passed by clapped their hands at you; they hissed and shook their heads in contempt at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, “Is this the city that was called perfect in beauty, the joy of all the earth?”
16 All your enemies have opened their mouths against you; they mock and gnash their teeth; they say, “Let’s devour her! Surely this is the day we have waited for; we have found it, we have seen it.”
17 The Lord has done what he determined; he has fulfilled his word, which he commanded long ago. He has destroyed and shown no mercy; he has made the enemy rejoice over you and exalted the power of your adversaries.
18 Their hearts cry out to the Lord: “O daughter of Zion, shed tears like a river day and night; do not rest, do not let the apple of your eye cease.
19 Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the watches; pour out your heart like water before the Lord; lift up your hands to him for the lives of your little ones, who faint from hunger at the entrances of all the streets.
20 Look, O Lord, and consider to whom you have done this. Must women eat the fruit of their wombs, the infants they have cared for? Must priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
21 Children and old men lay on the ground in the streets; my virgins and my young men fell by the sword; you killed in the day of your wrath; you slaughtered, you did not spare.
22 You summoned my terrors from all sides, as on a day of solemn assembly; and in the day of the Lord’s wrath there was no one who escaped or was left alive; those I nurtured and kept, my enemy destroyed.
Lamentations Chapter 3
Hope of liberation through God's mercy
1 I am the man who has seen affliction under the lash of his anger.
2 He led me and brought me in darkness, not in light.
3 Surely he turned against me and twisted his hand all day long.
4 He made my flesh and skin grow old; he broke my bones.
5 He built siege works against me and surrounded me with bitterness and trouble.
6 He made me dwell in darkness, like those long dead.
7 He hemmed me in on every side, so that I could not escape; he made my chains heavier.
8 Even when I cried out and aloud, he shut out my prayer.
9 He walled up my ways with hewn stone and made my paths crooked.
10 He was to me like a bear lying in wait, like a lion in hiding.
11 He turned my ways around and tore me to pieces; he made me desolate.
12 He bent his bow and made me a target for his arrow.
13 He thrust the arrows of his quiver into my inmost being.
14 I became a reproach to all my people, a scorn among them all day long.
15 He filled me with bitterness and made me drunk with wormwood.
16 He broke my teeth with gravel and covered me with ashes.
17 My soul is far from peace; I forget what is good.
18 I say, “My strength is gone, and so is my hope in the Lord.”
19 Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall;
20 I will yet remember them, for my soul is downcast within me.
21 These things I recall to my heart, therefore I will have hope.
22 Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail.
23 They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
24 “The Lord is my portion,” says my soul, “therefore I will hope in him.”
25 The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.
26 It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.
27 It is good for a man to bear the yoke in his youth.
28 Let him sit alone and be silent, for it is God who has laid it on him;
29 let him put his mouth in the dust, for there may still be hope;
30 let him offer his cheek to the one who strikes him, and be filled with insults.
31 For the Lord will not reject forever;
32 though he causes grief, he will have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love;
33 for he does not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men.
34 To crush underfoot all the prisoners of the earth,
35To pervert a person’s justice in the presence of the Most High,
36 to pervert a person in their cause, the Lord does not approve.
37 Who can say that something has happened that the Lord has not commanded?
38 Does not both good and evil come from the mouth of the Most High?
39 Why should a living person complain? Let a person complain about their sin.
40 Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord.
41 Let us lift up our hearts and hands to God in heaven.
42 We have rebelled and been faithless; you have not spared.
43 You unleashed your anger and pursued us; you killed and did not spare.
44 You covered yourself with a cloud so that our prayer could not pass away.
45 You made us a reproach and an abomination among the nations.
46 All our enemies opened their mouths against us.
47 They became terror and a snare to us, ruin and destruction.
48 My eyes overflow with tears for the destruction of the daughter of my people.
49 My eyes weep and do not cease, for there is no relief
50 until the Lord looks down and sees from heaven.
51 My soul grieves over all the daughters of my city.
52 My enemies hunted me down like a bird, though I had no reason to;
53 they bound my life in the pit, they laid a stone upon me;
54 the waters covered my head; I said, “I am dead.”
55 I called upon your name, O Lord, from the deep pit;
56 You heard my voice; do not hide your ear from the cry of my sighs.
57 You drew near on the day I called upon you; you said, “Do not fear.”
58 You pleaded, O Lord, the cause of my soul; you redeemed my life.
59 You have seen, O Lord, my wrongdoing; defend my cause.
60 You have seen all their vengeance, all their thoughts against me.
61 You have heard their reproach, O Lord, all their schemes against me;
62 The words of those who rose up against me, and their design against me all day long.
63 See their sitting and their rising; I am their song.
64 Repay them, O LORD, according to the work of their hands.
65 Give them over to hardness of heart; let your curse fall upon them.
66 Pursue them in your anger, and break them from under the heavens, O LORD.
Lamentations Chapter 4
The punishment of Zion completed
1 How the gold has been tarnished! How the fine gold has lost its luster! The stones of the sanctuary are scattered at the crossroads of every street.
2 The children of Zion, once precious and valued more than pure gold, how they are now considered as clay pots, the work of a potter’s hands!
3 Even jackals nurse and suckle their young; the daughter of my people is cruel like ostriches in the desert.
4 The tongue of the infant clings to the roof of its mouth for thirst; the children beg for bread, but there is no one to give it to them.
5 Those who ate the finest food are now ruined in the streets; those who were brought up in purple cling to the dung heaps.
6 For the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the sin of Sodom, which was destroyed in a moment, without armies encamping against it.
7 Her nobles were purer than snow, whiter than milk; their bodies were redder than coral, their figures more beautiful than sapphires.
8 Their appearance was darker than blackness; they were not recognized in the streets; their skin clung to their bones, as dry as a stick.
9 Those slain by the sword were better off than those who died of famine, for they died little by little for lack of the fruits of the land.
10 The hands of devout women boiled their children; their own children became food for them on the day of the destruction of the daughter of my people.
11 The Lord fulfilled his wrath, he poured out the heat of his anger; he kindled a fire in Zion that consumed its foundations.
12 Never did the kings of the earth, nor any of the inhabitants of the world, believe that the enemy and the adversary would enter through the gates of Jerusalem.
13 It is because of the sins of her prophets and the wickedness of her priests, who shed the blood of the righteous in her midst.
14 They staggered like the blind in the streets; they were defiled with blood, so that they could not touch their garments.
15 “Depart from me, you unclean ones!” they cried to them; “Depart from me, depart from me, do not touch me!” They fled and were scattered; it was said among the nations, “They shall never dwell here again.”
16 The anger of the Lord has driven them away; he will look upon them no more. They did not respect the presence of the priests, nor did they have compassion on the elderly.
17 Our eyes have grown dim while we wait in vain for help; in our hope we look for a nation that cannot save.
18 They hunted down our steps, so that we could not walk in our streets; our end drew near, our days were fulfilled, for our end had come.
19 Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the sky; they chased us on the mountains, they ambushed us in the wilderness.
20 The breath of our lives, the Lord’s anointed, of whom we said, “Under his shadow we shall live among the nations,” was caught in their snares.
21 Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Edom, you who dwell in the land of Uz; the cup will again reach you; you will be drunk and vomit.
22 Your punishment is completed, daughter of Zion; never again will he take you into captivity. He will punish your iniquity, daughter of Edom; he will reveal your sins.
Lamentations Chapter 5
Prayer of the afflicted people
1 Remember, O Lord, what has happened to us; look and see our disgrace.
2 Our inheritance has been given to strangers, our houses to foreigners.
3 We are fatherless orphans; our mothers are like widows.
4 We drink our water with money; we buy our wood at a price.
5 We suffer persecution; we are weary, and there is no rest for us.
6 We stretched out our hands to the Egyptian and the Assyrian, to be satisfied with bread.
7 Our fathers sinned, and they are dead; and we bear their punishment.
8 Slaves ruled over us; there was no one to deliver us from their hand.
9 At the risk of our lives we brought our bread before the sword of the wilderness.
10 Our skin is blackened like a furnace because of the heat of hunger.
11 They violated the women in Zion, the virgins in the cities of Judah.
12 They hung the princes by their hands; They did not respect the faces of the elderly.
13 They made the young men grind grain, and the boys fainted under the weight of the wood.
14 The old men are no longer seen at the gate; the young men have stopped singing.
15 The joy of our hearts has ceased; our dancing has turned to mourning.
16 The crown has fallen from our heads; woe to us now, for we have sinned!
17 For this reason our hearts are saddened, for this reason our eyes grow dim,
18 because Mount Zion lies desolate; foxes prowl over it.
19 But you, O Lord, remain forever; your throne endures from generation to generation.
20 Why do you forget us completely, and forsake us for so long?
21 Restore us to yourself, O Lord, that we may be restored; renew our days as of old.
22 For you have rejected us; you have been exceedingly angry with us.