THE LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH

 

Lamentations Chapter 2

1 ¶ How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger, and hurled the glory of Israel down from heaven to earth, and has not remembered his footstool in the day of his wrath!

2 The Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob, and has not shown pity: in his wrath he has torn down the fortresses of the daughter of Judah; he has brought them down to the ground: he has defiled the kingdom and its princes.

3 In his fierce anger he has cut off all the strength of Israel: he withdrew his right hand when they faced the enemy, and he burned like a raging fire in Jacob, consuming everything around.

4 He has bent his bow like an enemy: he positioned his right hand like an adversary, he poured out his fury like fire, and destroyed all that was beautiful in the dwelling place of the daughter of Zion.

5 The Lord became like an enemy: he has wiped out Israel, he has consumed all its palaces: he has destroyed its fortresses, and has increased sorrow and weeping in the daughter of Judah.

6 And he violently removed his temple, as if it were a garden booth: he has destroyed his place of meeting: the LORD has caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and in the indignation of his anger has scorned king and priest.

7 The Lord has discarded his altar, he has disowned his sanctuary, he has delivered the walls of her palaces into the hand of the enemy; who shouted in the house of the LORD, as if it were a festival day.

8 The LORD has determined to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he has stretched out a line, and has not restrained his hand from destroying: therefore he made rampart and wall mourn; they waste away together.

9 Her gates are sunk into the ground; he has broken and destroyed her bars: her king and officials are among the Gentiles: the law is gone; and her prophets receive no vision from the LORD.

10 ¶ The elders of Zion’s daughter sit on the ground, and remain silent: they have thrown dust on their heads; they have put on sackcloth: the virgins of Jerusalem bow down their heads to the ground.

11 My eyes cannot see because of tears, my bowels are churning, my heart is poured out in grief, because of the destruction of the daughter of my people; because the children and infants faint in the streets of the city.

12 They say to their mothers, Where is bread and wine? as they fall like the wounded in the streets of the city, as their lives fade away in the arms of their mothers.

13 What can I say on your behalf? to what can I compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem? what can I liken you to, that I may comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion? for your affliction is as wide as the sea: who can heal you?

14 Your false prophets have foreseen things that are lies and nonsense: and they have not exposed your sin, which would have prevented your captivity; but have seen for you false visions and causes of banishment.

15 All who pass by clap their hands at you; they hiss and shake their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, Is this the city that men called The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?

16 All your enemies have opened their mouths against you: they hiss and gnash their teeth: they say, We have destroyed her: surely this is the day that we waited for; we have lived to see it.

17 The LORD has done what he planned; he has carried out what he said he would do long ago: he has demolished without compassion: letting your enemy triumph over you, he has exalted the horn of your adversaries.

18 The hearts of the people cried out to the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night: give yourself no rest; do not let your eyes stop shedding tears.

19 Arise, cry out in the night: at the beginning of each watch pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord: lift up your hands to him for the life of your young children, who faint for hunger at the corner of every street.

20 Look, O LORD, and consider to whom you have done this. Should women eat what they gave birth to, the children they fondled? should the priest and the prophet be killed in the Lord’s holy place?

21 The young and the old lie on the ground in the streets: my virgins and my young men have fallen by the sword; you slew them in the day of your anger; you have killed, without pity.

22 You have summoned my attackers on every side as for a day of festivity, so that in the day of the LORD’S wrath no one escaped or was left: my enemy has destroyed those I nurtured and reared.