LAMENTATIONS 
Lament over the Sorrows of Jerusalem
Her Comfortless Doom 
 1Alas! How lonely the city
1Once crowded with people.
She that was great among nations
Is now as a widow.
She that was queen of the provinces
Now is a vassal.
 2Sore, sore she weeps in the night;
There are tears on her cheecks.
Now there is no one to comfort
Of all those that loved her.
All her friends have proved faithless,
And turned to be foes.
 3From sorrow and toil into exile
Hath Judah departed;
And now is her home with the hearthen,
And no rest she findeth.
In the midst of her straits her pursuers
Have all overtaken her.
 4The highways to Zion lie mourning,
For pilgrims are none.
All desolate now are her gates,
And her priest are in sorrow.
Her virgins are dragged away far;
She herself is in bitterness.
 5Supreme her foes are now,
And her enemies triumph.
The Lord hath afflicted her sore
For her manifold sins.
Gone are her little once captive
In front of the foe.
 6The glory is vanished clean
From the daughter of Zion.
Her princes are like unto harts
That can nowhere find pasture;
All feeble they move on their way
With pursuers behind them.
 7Jerusalem calleth to mind
The days of her travail,
When into the hands of the foemen
Her people fell helpless.
The mocking foe feasted his eyes
On her sore desolation.
 8Jerusalem hath grievously sinned,
And so she hath fallen.
All they that honoured despise her
At sight of her nakedness.
She meanwhile groaneth and moaneth
And turneth her backward.
 9Her filthiness clung to her skirts;
She became all abhorrent.
To the future she gave not a thought,
So her fall was appalling.
Behold, O Lord, what I suffer
From the insolent foe.
 10The foeman hath stretched out his hand
To secure all her treasures.
The hearthen she saw enter in
And her temple profane—
Even those Thou forbadest to mix
With Thine own congregation.
 11Her people all groan and moan
In their search after bread.
They have given away their treasures
For food to revive them.
Behold, O Jehovah, and see
How abject am I.
 12All ye that pass by, I appeal to you,
Look ye and see;
Has there ever been sorrow like mine,
Like that dealt out to me,
When the Lord, in His fierce indignation,
Did put me to grief?
 13He hurled down fire from on high;
It hath entered my bones.
A net He hath spread for my feet;
He hath turned me backward.
Faint He hath left me and desolate
All the day long.
 14A watch He hath kept on my sins;
And into a yoke
For my neck with His hands He hath twined them.
Then, crippling my strength,
He hath given me into the hands
Of a foe irresistible.
 15The Lord hath hurled to the ground
All the strong men within me.
He hath summoned a festal assembly
To crush my young (warriors).
The Lord in His wine-press hath trodden
The daughter of Judah.
 16For these things I weep without creasing;
Mine eyes stream with tears;
For none have I now by my side
To refresh me and comfort me.
My children are clean distraught,
For the foe hath prevailed.
 17Zion hath stretched forth her hands;
There is no one to comfort her.
On her neighbours the Lord laid a charge
To be hostile to Jacob;
And now is Jerusalem vile
And abhorrent among them.
 18As for the Lord, He is just;
For the rebel was I.
Ye peoples all, hear, I entreat you,
And look on my sorrow.
Together my maidens and youths
Are gone into captivity.
 19I called upon those that had loved me,
But they have deceived me.
In the city my priest and mine elders
Have perished of hunger.
For the bread they searched in their need,
But their search was in vain.
 20Look, Lord, for distress is upon me,
And ferment within me.
Within me my heart writhes with pain,
That, for playing the rebel,
The sword dealeth death in the streets,
In the houses the pestilence.
 21Listen to these my sighs;
There is no one to comfort me.
My foes have all heard with delight
Of the evil Thou wroughtest me,
Bringing the day Thou proclaimedst
For all of my sins.
 22Let their wickedness all come before Thee;
Let them fare like me;
And do even so unto them
As Thou didst unto me.
For my sighs are many and many,
And sore is my heart.
Lament over the Sorrows of Jerusalem
The Divine Judgment and the Inconsolable Sorrow 
 2Alas! How the Lord is beclouding
1The daughter of Zion!
From the heaven down to earth He hath hurled
The glory of Israel.
In the day of His wrath He remembers
His foot-stool no more.
 2Without pity the Lord hath engulfed
All the homesteads of Jacob.
In His wrath He hath torn clean down
All the strongholds of Judah,
Hath hurled to the ground in dishonour
Her king and her princes.
 3He hath hewn in the glow of His anger
All Israel's horn.
He hath drawn His right hand back
From the face of the foe.
Like a fire He is blazing in Jacob,
Devouring around.
 4His bow He hath bent like a foeman;
He stands as for siege.
All the lovely He slays in the tent
Of the daughter of Zion.
He hath poured forth His anger like fire.
 5The Lord hath become like a foe;
He hath swallowed up Israel,
Swallowed her palaces all—
He hath ruined her strongholds,
And heaped on the daughter of Zion
Lamenting and woe.
 6His booth like His vine He hath ravaged;
He hath ruined His trysting-place.
Jehovah hath blotted from Zion
The feast and the sabbath.
The king and the priest He hath spurned
In the heat of His anger.
 7The Lord hath rejected His altar
And cast off His holy place,
Given to the hands of the foemen
The walls of her palaces.
In the house of the Lord there were shouts
Like the shouts of a feast-day.
 8For the walls of the daughter of Zion
The Lord hath planned ruin.
He stretched out the line, and withdrew not
His ravaging hand.
Wall and rampart He plunged into mourning—
Together they languish.
 9Sunk in the dust are her gates,
And her bars He hath shivered.
Her king and her princes are exiles
And guidance is none.
Yea, and no vision hath come
From the Lord to His prophets.
 10Speechless they sit on the ground,
Even the elders of Zion—
With dust cast up on their heads,
And with girdles of sack-cloth.
The maids of Jerusalem bow
With their heads to the ground.
 11Mine eyes are wasted with weeping,
My bowels are troubled.
My heart is poured out on the ground
For the wreck of my people.
The babe and the suckling lie faint
On the streets of the city.
 12To their mothers they keep on saying,
"O where is our bread?"
Like the wounded they lie in a swoon
On the streets of the city,
As they pour out their lives (to the death)
On the breasts of their mothers.
 13With what shall I rank or compare thee,
O daughter of Jerusalem?
Where is thy like, that I comfort thee,
Virgin of Zion?
For vast as the sea is thy ruin;
(Alas!) who can heal thee?
 14The visions thy prophets have brought thee
Are false and dishonest.
They did not uncover thy guilt,
And so save thee from exile.
The visions they uttered for thee
Were deceptive and false.
 15They clapped their hand over thee—
All they that passed by.
They hissed and they wagged their heads
At Jerusalem's daughter.
" Is this the city men called
The Perfection of Beauty?"
 16Against thee thine enemies all
Opened wide their mouths,
They hissed and they wagged their heads
At Jerusalem's daughter.
"Is this the city men called
The Perfection of Beauty?"
 16Against thee thine enemies all
Opened wide their mouths.
They hissed and they gnashed their teeth:
"We have swallowed her up.
Yes, this is the day that we looked for:
We have it, we see it."
 17Jehovah hath done what He planned,
Hath accomplished His word:
As in days long ago He enjoined,
He hath wrecked without pity,
Hath made thee the sport of thy foes
And exalted thine enemies.
 18Cry thou aloud to the Lord,
O virgin of Zion.
Pour down thy tears like a torrent
By day and by night,
Give thyself no respite,
No rest to thine eyes.
 19Arise, pierce the night with thy cries,
As each night-watch beginneth.
Pour out like water thy heart
In the face of the Lord.
Lift up thy hands unto Him
For the life of thy littles ones,
 20Behold, O Lord, and consider
Whom thus Thou maltreatest.
Shall women devour their own offspring,
The babes that they dandled?
Shall the priest and the prophet be slain
In the Lord's holy place?
 21In the streets on the ground they are lying—
The young and the old.
My maidens and young men together
Are fallen by the sword.
In the day of Thy wrath Thou hast slaughtered
And slain without pity.
 22Thou didst summon, as though 'twere a feast-day,
The villages round.
But not one in the day of Thine anger
Escaped or was left;
The children I brought up and fondled
Were slain by the foe.
Lament and Prayer 
 3I am the man who was humbled
1By the rod of His anger.
 2The way that He guided and led me
Was dark and unlighted.
 3Against me alone was His hand
Ever turned all the day.
 4He hath shrivelled my flesh and my skin;
He hath broken my bones.
 5He hath built round bout me a wall
Of exhaustion and bitterness.
 6He hath made me to dwell in the darkness
As those long dead.
 7He hath shut me behind solid walls;
He hath loaded my chain.
 8When I cry and entreat Him for help,
He is deaf to my prayer.
 9He hath blocked up my path with hewn stone,
And my way He hath tangled.
 10He lurketh for me like a bear
Or a lion in ambush.
 11He chased me aside and He tore me
And left me forlorn.
 12His bow he bent, and He set me
As mark for His arrow.
 13Into my reins He hath driven
The shafts of His quiver.
 14A derision was I to all peoples,
Their song all the day.
 15To the full did He fill me with bitterness,
With wormwood He sated me.
 16He hath broken my teeth with gravel,
And heaped me with ashes.
 17He hath robbed me of peace; and of weal
I remember no more.
 18So I said, "My glory is gone
And my hope in Jehovah."
 19The thought of my woe and my wandering
Is wormwood and gall.
 20My soul doth for ever recall them,
And is bowed down within me.
 21Now this I will lay on my heart
And will therefore take hope—
 22That the love of the Lord is unceasing,
His pity unfailing.
 23Thy kindness is new every morning
And great is Thy faithfulness.
 24"The Lord is my portion," I said:
"I will hope then in Him."
 25Those that wait for the Lord find Him gracious—
The souls that do seek Him.
 26It is good, then, in silence to wait
For the help of the Lord.
 27It is good for a man that he carry
A yoke in his youth.
 28Let him sit all alone and keep silence,
When He hath imposed it.
 29Let him lay his lips low in the dust,
For perchance there is hope.
 30Let him offer his cheek to the smiter
And bear all the taunt.
 31For Jehovah will not cast away
The afflicted for ever.
 32Though He wound, He will yet have compassion—
His love is so great.
 33He is loth to give sorrow or pain
To the children of men.
 34When the men of a land, taken prisoner,
Are crushed under foot:
 35When a man is deprived of his right
In the face of the Highest:
 36When the cause of a man is subverted:
Doth not the Lord see?
 37Where is he that can bring things to pass,
That the Lord hath not ordered?
 38Do not evil and good come alike
From the mouth of the Highest?
 39Why then should a mortal complain
When chastised for his sins?
 40Let us search and examine our ways
And return to the Lord.
 41Let us lift up our hearts with our hands
Unto God in the heavens.
 42"We have transgressed and rebelled,
And Thou hast not pardoned.
 43Thou hast wrapped Thee in wrath and pursued us,
And slain without pity;
 44Has wrapped Thee around in a cloud
Which no prayer could pass through.
 45Thou hast made us off-scouring and refuse
In the midst of the nations.
 46Against us our enemies all
Open wide their mouths.
 47Fear and the pit are upon us,
Destruction and ruin."
 48Mine eye runs with rivers of water
For the wreck of my people.
 49Mine eye poureth down without rest
And without any respite,
 50Until that Jehovah in heaven
Look down and behold.
 51Mine eyes are vexed with grief
For the daughters of my city.
 52They have hunted me sore like a bird—
Those that groundlessly hate me—
 53Have ended my life in the dungeon
And cast stones upon me.
 54Waters flowed over my head,
And I said, "I am lost."
 55From the depths of the dungeon, O Lord,
Did I call on Thy name;
 56And my voice Thou didst hear: "O hide not
Thine ear from my cry."
 57Thou camest the day that I called Thee,
And badest me fear not.
 58Thou pleddest my cause, O Lord,
And didst ransom my life.
 59Thou hast seen, Lord, how I am wronged;
O secure for me justice:
 60For all the revenge Thou hast seen
That they plotted against me.
 61O Lord, Thou has heard all the insults
They plotted against me.
 62The threatenings and plots without ceasing
Of those that assail me.
 63See how, whether sitting or rising,
They mock me in taunt-songs.
 64Thou wilt requite them, O Lord,
For the deeds they have done.
 65Blindness of heart wilt Thou give them—
Thy curse be upon them!
 66Pursue them in wrath and destroy them
From under Thy heavens.
Lament over the Sorrows of Jerusalem
The Fate of the People and their Leaders 
 4Alas! How bedimmed is the gold,
1The most pure gold.
The jewels, so sacred, lie scattered
At every street corner.
 2The children of Zion, the precious,
Whose worth is as gold,
Count, alas! but as earthenware pitchers,
The work of the potter.
 3Even the monsters give breast
And they suckle their young;
But the daughters of my people are cruel
As ostriches wild.
 4The tongue of the sucking child cleaves
To his palate for thirst.
The children are craving for bread;
There is none to dispose it.
 5Those that had feasted on dainties
Now waste on the streets.
Those that were nurtured in scarlet
Lie huddled on ash-heaps.
 6The guilt of my people surpassed
The transgressions of Sodom,
Whose overthrow came in a flash
Ere a hand could be wrung.
 7Her princes were purer than snow,
They were whiter than milk,
With a skin more ruddy than coral
And veins like the sapphire.
 8Now blacker than darkness their form—
On the streets no one knows them:
Their skin is drawn tight on their bones;
It is dry as a stick.
 9Better they that are slain with the sword
Than that perish with hunger,
Pinning away for the lack
Of the fruits of the field.
 10The hands of compassionate women
Have sodden their children.
Yea, these have served them for food
In the wreck of my people.
 11The Lord hath accomplised His wrath,
Hath poured out His hot anger,
And kindled in Zion a fire
Which devoured her foundations.
 12No kings of the earth had believed,
And no folk in the world,
That assailant or foeman could enter
The gates of Jerusalem.
 13It was all for the sins of her prophets,
The crimes of her priests,
Who have shed in the midst of the city
The blood of the righteous.
 14With the blood-stains upon them they reel
Like the blind through the streets,
And they touch with their robes those whom erstwhile
They could not endure.
 15"Away, ye unclean!" — men adjure them—
"Away, touch us not!"
So they stagger and wander around
With no resting for ever.
 16Jehovah Himself hath dispersed them—
He careth no more.
For the priest Ha hath shown no regard,
For the prophets no pity.
 17How long did our weary eyes watch
For the help that was vain!
Yea, on our watch-tower we watched
For the nation that saved not.
 18They hunted our steps, that we dared not
Appear in out streets.
Our days were cut short and completed;
Our end was now come.
 19Swifter were they that pursued us
Than eagles of heaven.
Over the mountains they chased us;
They ambushed the desert.
 20The breath of our life, God's anointed,
Was trapped in their toils—
He of whom we had said, "'Neath his shade
We shall live as a nation."
 21Be glad and rejoice in thy home-land,
O daughter of Edom.
To thee, too, the cup shall come round;
Thou'lt be drunken and naked.
 22O Zion, thy guilt is now blotted:
Of exile no more!
But thy guilt He shall visit, O Edom;
Thy sins are laid bare.
Jerusalem's Sorrow and Prayer for Deliverance
Her Sorrows 
 5Bethink thee, O Lord, of our plight;
1Look and see how Thy folk are insulted.
 2Our home-land is turned unto strangers;
Our houses are passed unto aliens.
 3Fatherless orphans are we,
And our mothers are like unto widows.
 4The water we drink we must buy,
And our wood becomes our at a price.
 5The yoke presses hard on our necks;
We are weary and never find rest.
 6We have stretched out our hands unto Egypt;
To Assyria also, for bread.
 7Our fathers, who sinned are no more;
And their guilt has been borne by us.
 8Servants are now our lords;
From their hand there is no one to save us.
 9We win bread at the risk of our lives
From the murderous bands of the desert.
 10Like an oven our skin is aglow
With the fierce fever-heat of famine.
 11The matrons they ravished in Zion,
The maids in the cities of Judah:
 12Princes were hanged by their hands,
And the faces of elders dishonoured.
 13Young men had to carry the mill;
Youths fell beneath loads of wood.
 14The elders have from the gate
And the youths given over their music.
 15The joy of our heart is vanished;
Our dancing is turned into mourning.
 16The crown is fallen from our head;
Woe, woe unto us! We have sinned.
 17For this is our heart turned faint,
For these things our eyes are grown dim—
 18For the mountains of Zion, now waste,
Over which the jackals roam.
Prayer for Deliverance
 19But thou, Lord, art seated for ever,
From age to age, on Thy throne.
 20O why then forget us for ever,
And leave us for long, long days?
 21Bring us back to Thee, Lord, let us turn,
And renew our days as of old;
 22Unless Thou hast utterly spurned us
And Thine anger is all too sore.