Lamentations 3-5

Lamentations 3

¹I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

²He has led me and caused me to walk in darkness, and not in light.

³Surely he turns his hand against me again and again all day long.

⁴He has made my flesh and my skin old. He has broken my bones.

⁵He has built against me, and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship.

⁶He has made me dwell in dark places, as those who have been long dead.

⁷He has walled me about, so that I can’t go out. He has made my chain heavy.

⁸Yes, when I cry, and call for help, he shuts out my prayer.

⁹He has walled up my ways with cut stone. He has made my paths crooked.

¹⁰He is to me as a bear lying in wait, as a lion in hiding.

¹¹He has turned away my path, and pulled me in pieces. He has made me desolate.

¹²He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.

¹³He has caused the shafts of his quiver to enter into my kidneys.

¹⁴I have become a derision to all my people, and their song all day long.

¹⁵He has filled me with bitterness. He has stuffed me with wormwood.

¹⁶He has also broken my teeth with gravel. He has covered me with ashes.

¹⁷You have removed my soul far away from peace. I forgot prosperity.

¹⁸I said, “My strength has perished, along with my expectation from the LORD.”

¹⁹Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the bitterness.

²⁰My soul still remembers them, and is bowed down within me.

²¹This I recall to my mind; therefore I have hope.

²²It is because of the LORD’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his mercies don’t fail.

²³They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.

²⁴“The LORD is my portion,” says my soul. “Therefore I will hope in him.”

²⁵The LORD is good to those who wait for him, to the soul who seeks him.

²⁶It is good that a man should hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the LORD.

²⁷It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.

²⁸Let him sit alone and keep silence, because he has laid it on him.

²⁹Let him put his mouth in the dust, if it is so that there may be hope.

³⁰Let him give his cheek to him who strikes him. Let him be filled full of reproach.

³¹For the Lord will not cast off forever.

³²For though he causes grief, yet he will have compassion according to the multitude of his loving kindnesses.

³³For he does not afflict willingly, nor grieve the children of men.

³⁴To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,

³⁵to turn away the right of a man before the face of the Most High,

³⁶to subvert a man in his cause, the Lord doesn’t approve.

³⁷Who is he who says, and it comes to pass, when the Lord doesn’t command it?

³⁸Doesn’t evil and good come out of the mouth of the Most High?

³⁹Why should a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?

⁴⁰Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the LORD.

⁴¹Let’s lift up our heart with our hands to God in the heavens.

⁴²“We have transgressed and have rebelled. You have not pardoned.

⁴³“You have covered us with anger and pursued us. You have killed. You have not pitied.

⁴⁴You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through.

⁴⁵You have made us an off-scouring and refuse in the middle of the peoples.

⁴⁶“All our enemies have opened their mouth wide against us.

⁴⁷Terror and the pit have come on us, devastation and destruction.”

⁴⁸My eye runs down with streams of water, for the destruction of the daughter of my people.

⁴⁹My eye pours down and doesn’t cease, without any intermission,

⁵⁰until the LORD looks down, and sees from heaven.

⁵¹My eye affects my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.

⁵²They have chased me relentlessly like a bird, those who are my enemies without cause.

⁵³They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and have cast a stone on me.

⁵⁴Waters flowed over my head. I said, “I am cut off.”

⁵⁵I called on your name, LORD, out of the lowest dungeon.

⁵⁶You heard my voice: “Don’t hide your ear from my sighing, and my cry.”

⁵⁷You came near in the day that I called on you. You said, “Don’t be afraid.”

⁵⁸Lord, you have pleaded the causes of my soul. You have redeemed my life.

⁵⁹LORD, you have seen my wrong. Judge my cause.

⁶⁰You have seen all their vengeance and all their plans against me.

⁶¹You have heard their reproach, LORD, and all their plans against me,

⁶²the lips of those that rose up against me, and their plots against me all day long.

⁶³You see their sitting down and their rising up. I am their song.

⁶⁴You will pay them back, LORD, according to the work of their hands.

⁶⁵You will give them hardness of heart, your curse to them.

⁶⁶You will pursue them in anger, and destroy them from under the heavens of the LORD.

Lamentations 4

¹How the gold has become dim! The most pure gold has changed! The stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the head of every street.

²The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how they are esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

³Even the jackals offer their breast. They nurse their young ones. But the daughter of my people has become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

⁴The tongue of the nursing child clings to the roof of his mouth for thirst. The young children ask for bread, and no one breaks it for them.

⁵Those who ate delicacies are desolate in the streets. Those who were brought up in purple embrace dunghills.

⁶For the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the sin of Sodom, which was overthrown as in a moment. No hands were laid on her.

⁷Her nobles were purer than snow. They were whiter than milk. They were more ruddy in body than rubies. Their polishing was like sapphire.

⁸Their appearance is blacker than a coal. They are not known in the streets. Their skin clings to their bones. It is withered. It has become like wood.

⁹Those who are killed with the sword are better than those who are killed with hunger; for these pine away, stricken through, for lack of the fruits of the field.

¹⁰The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children. They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

¹¹The LORD has accomplished his wrath. He has poured out his fierce anger. He has kindled a fire in Zion, which has devoured its foundations.

¹²The kings of the earth didn’t believe, neither did all the inhabitants of the world, that the adversary and the enemy would enter into the gates of Jerusalem.

¹³It is because of the sins of her prophets and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the middle of her.

¹⁴They wander as blind men in the streets. They are polluted with blood, So that men can’t touch their garments.

¹⁵“Go away!” they cried to them. “Unclean! Go away! Go away! Don’t touch! When they fled away and wandered, men said among the nations, “They can’t live here any more.”

¹⁶The LORD’s anger has scattered them. He will not pay attention to them any more. They didn’t respect the persons of the priests. They didn’t favor the elders.

¹⁷Our eyes still fail, looking in vain for our help. In our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save.

¹⁸They hunt our steps, so that we can’t go in our streets. Our end is near. Our days are fulfilled, for our end has come.

¹⁹Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the sky. They chased us on the mountains. They set an ambush for us in the wilderness.

²⁰The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD, was taken in their pits; of whom we said, under his shadow we will live among the nations.

²¹Rejoice and be glad, daughter of Edom, who dwells in the land of Uz. The cup will pass through to you also. You will be drunken, and will make yourself naked.

²²The punishment of your iniquity is accomplished, daughter of Zion. He will no more carry you away into captivity. He will visit your iniquity, daughter of Edom. He will uncover your sins.

Lamentations 5

¹Remember, LORD, what has come on us. Look, and see our reproach.

²Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our houses to aliens.

³We are orphans and fatherless. Our mothers are as widows.

⁴We must pay for water to drink. Our wood is sold to us.

⁵Our pursuers are on our necks. We are weary, and have no rest.

⁶We have given our hands to the Egyptians, and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.

⁷Our fathers sinned, and are no more. We have borne their iniquities.

⁸Servants rule over us. There is no one to deliver us out of their hand.

⁹We get our bread at the peril of our lives, because of the sword in the wilderness.

¹⁰Our skin is black like an oven, because of the burning heat of famine.

¹¹They ravished the women in Zion, the virgins in the cities of Judah.

¹²Princes were hanged up by their hands. The faces of elders were not honored.

¹³The young men carry millstones. The children stumbled under loads of wood.

¹⁴The elders have ceased from the gate, and the young men from their music.

¹⁵The joy of our heart has ceased. Our dance is turned into mourning.

¹⁶The crown has fallen from our head. Woe to us, for we have sinned!

¹⁷For this our heart is faint. For these things our eyes are dim:

¹⁸for the mountain of Zion, which is desolate. The foxes walk on it.

¹⁹You, LORD, remain forever. Your throne is from generation to generation.

²⁰Why do you forget us forever, and forsake us for so long a time?

²¹Turn us to yourself, LORD, and we will be turned. Renew our days as of old.

²²But you have utterly rejected us. You are very angry against us.