Jubilee2000 - Lamentations

Chapter 1

1:1  [Aleph] How does the city sit solitary, [that was] full of people! The great one among the nations is become as a widow; the princess of provinces is become tributary.

1:2  [Beth] She weeps sore in the night, and her tears [are] on her cheeks; among all her lovers she has none to comfort [her]; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her; they are become her enemies.

1:3  [Gimel] Judah is gone into captivity because of the affliction and because of the greatness of the servitude; she dwells among the Gentiles; she finds no rest; all her persecutors overtook her between the straits.

1:4  [Daleth] The streets of Zion mourn because there are none to come to the solemnities; all her gates [are] destroyed; her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she [is] in bitterness.

1:5  [He] Her enemies have been made the head; those who hated her have been prospered; for the LORD has afflicted her for the multitude of her rebellions; her children are gone into captivity before the enemy.

1:6  [Vau] And from the daughter of Zion all her beauty is departed; her princes are become like harts [that] find no pasture, and they are gone without strength before the pursuer.

1:7  [Zain] Jerusalem remembered the days of her affliction and of her rebellions and of all her desirable things that she had in the times of old when her people fell into the hand of the enemy, and no one helped her; the enemies saw her [and] mocked at her days of rest.

1:8  [Cheth] Jerusalem has grievously sinned; therefore she is removed; all that honoured her despise her because they have seen her nakedness; yea, she sighs and is turned backward.

1:9  [Teth] Her filthiness [is] in her skirts; she did not remember her latter end; therefore she came down surprisingly; she has no comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction, for the enemy has magnified [himself].

1:10  [Jod] The enemy has spread out his hand upon all her precious things, and [she] saw the Gentiles enter into her sanctuary, whom thou didst command [that] they should not enter into thy congregation.

1:11  [Caph] All her people sought their bread with sadness; they have given all their precious things for food to maintain life; see, O LORD, and consider, for I am [become] vile.

1:12  [Lamed] [Is it] nothing to you, all ye that pass by? behold, and see if there is any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is come unto me because the LORD has afflicted [me] in the day of his fierce anger.

1:13  [Mem] From upon high he has sent fire into my bones, and it prevails against them; he has spread a net for my feet; he has turned me back; he has made me desolate [and] always with pain.

1:14  [Nun] The yoke of my rebellions is bound in his hand; they are wreathed [and] come up upon my neck; he has made my strength to fall; the Lord has delivered me into [their] hands, [from whom] I am not able to rise up.

1:15  [Samech] The Lord has trodden under foot all my mighty [men] in the midst of me; he has called a company against me to crush my young men; the Lord has trodden the virgin daughter of Judah [as] in a winepress.

1:16  [Ain] For these [things] I weep; my eyes, my eyes stream with water because the comforter that gives rest unto my soul has left me; my sons are desolate because the enemy prevailed.

1:17  [Pe] Zion spread forth her hands and has no comforter; the LORD gave a commandment against Jacob that his enemies [should] besiege him; Jerusalem was an abomination in the midst of them.

1:18  [Tzaddi] The LORD is righteous, for I have rebelled against his mouth; hear now, all the peoples and see my sorrow; my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

1:19  [Koph] I called unto my lovers, [but] they have deceived me; my priests and my elders in the city perished seeking food to maintain their lives.

1:20  [Resh] Look, O LORD; for I [am] in distress; my bowels are troubled; my heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled; abroad the sword bereaves; at home [there is] as death.

1:21  [Schin] They have heard that I sigh; and there is no comforter for me; all my enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done [it]. Thou hast brought the day [that] thou hast spoken of, but they shall be like unto me.

1:22  [Tau] Let all their wickedness come before thee; and do unto them as thou hast done unto me for all my rebellions; for my sighs [are] many, and my heart [is] filled with pain.:

Chapter 2

2:1  [Aleph] How has the Lord darkened the daughter of Zion in his anger! He has cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel and not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger!

2:2  [Beth] The Lord has destroyed and has not forgiven; he has destroyed in his wrath all the habitations of Jacob; he has thrown down to the ground the strong holds of the daughter of Judah; he has polluted the kingdom and its princes.

2:3  [Gimel] He has cut off in [his] fierce anger all the horn of Israel; he has caused his right hand to draw back in the presence of the enemy, and he burned in Jacob like a flaming fire, [which] devours round about.

2:4  [Daleth] He has bent his bow like an enemy; he strengthened his right hand as an adversary and slew everything of beauty that could be seen in the tent of the daughter of Zion; he poured out his fury like fire.

2:5  [He] The Lord was as an enemy, he has destroyed Israel; he has destroyed all her palaces; he has dissipated his strong holds and has multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.

2:6  [Vau] And he has violently taken away his tabernacle as [if it were of] a garden; he has destroyed his congregation; the LORD has caused the solemnities and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion and has rejected in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.

2:7  [Zain] The Lord has cast off his altar; he has abhorred his sanctuary; he has given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have shouted in the house of the LORD as in the day of a feast.

2:8  [Cheth] The LORD has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; he has stretched out the line; he has not withdrawn his hand from destroying; therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they were destroyed together.

2:9  [Teth] Her gates were thrown to the ground; he has destroyed and broken her bars; her king and her princes [are carried off] among the Gentiles; there is no law; nor have her prophets found vision from the LORD.

2:10  [Jod] The elders of the daughter of Zion sat upon the ground [and] are silent: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth; the daughters of Jerusalem hung their heads down to the ground.

2:11  [Caph] My eyes fail with tears; my bowels are troubled; my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people because the children and the sucklings faint in the streets of the city.

2:12  [Lamed] They said to their mothers, Where [is] the wheat and the wine? fainting as the dead in the streets of the city, pouring out their souls into their mothers' bosom.

2:13  [Mem] What witness shall I take to thee? Or unto whom shall I liken thee O daughter of Jerusalem? Unto whom shall I compare thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach [is] as great as the sea: who shall heal thee?

2:14  [Nun] Thy prophets have preached vanity and foolishness unto thee; and they have not uncovered thine iniquity to turn away thy captivity but have preached unto thee vain prophecies and digressions.

2:15  [Samech] All that passed by clapped [their] hands over thee and whistled and wagged their heads over the daughter of Jerusalem, [saying], [Is] this the city that [men] called The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?

2:16  [Pe] All thine enemies opened their mouth regarding thee; they whistled and gnashed their teeth; they said, Swallow [her] up; certainly this [is] the day that we looked for; we have found it, we have seen [it].

2:17  [Ain] The LORD has done [that] which he had determined; he has fulfilled his word that he had commanded from [the] time of old; he has destroyed and has not forgiven; and he has caused [thine] enemy to rejoice over thee; he has raised up the horn of thine adversaries.

2:18  [Tsade] Their heart cried unto the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion; let tears run down like a river day and night; give thyself no rest; let not the apple of thine eye cease.

2:19  [Koph] Arise, cry out in the night; in the beginning of the watches; pour out thine heart like water before the face of the Lord; lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young children that faint for hunger in the top of every street.

2:20  [Resh] Look, O LORD, and consider unto whom thou hast shaken thus. Shall the women eat their fruit, the little ones that they are bringing up? shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?

2:21  [Schin] The young and the old lay on the ground in the streets; my virgins and my young men fell by the sword; thou hast slain [them] in the day of thine anger; thou hast killed [and] hast not forgiven.

2:22  [Tau] Thou hast called as to a day of solemnity my terrors from everywhere, so that in the day of the LORD'S anger no one escaped nor remained: those that I have swaddled and brought up my enemy has consumed.:

Chapter 3

3:1  [Aleph] I [am] a man [that] sees affliction in the rod of his wrath.

3:2  [Aleph] He has led me and brought [me into] darkness, but not [into] light.

3:3  [Aleph] Surely he is turned against me; he turns his hand [against me] all the day.

3:4  [Beth] My flesh and my skin he has made old; he has broken my bones.

3:5  [Beth] He has built against me and compassed [me] with gall and travail.

3:6  [Beth] He has set me in dark places as [those that are] dead for ever.

3:7  [Gimel] He has hedged me about that I cannot get out; he has made my chain heavy.

3:8  [Gimel] Even when I cried and shouted, he shut out my prayer.

3:9  [Gimel] He has enclosed my ways with hewn stone; he has made my paths crooked.

3:10  [Daleth] He [was] unto me [as] a bear lying in wait [and as] a lion in secret places.

3:11  [Daleth] He has made my ways crooked and pulled me in pieces; he has made me desolate.

3:12  [Daleth] He has bent his bow and set me as a mark for the arrow.

3:13  [He] He has caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my kidneys.

3:14  [He] I was a derision to all my people [and] their song every day.

3:15  [He] He has filled me with bitterness, he has made me drunk with wormwood.

3:16  [Vau] He has broken my teeth with gravel stones; he has covered me with ashes.

3:17  [Vau] My soul removed itself far from peace; I forgot about good.

3:18  [Vau] And I said, My strength and my hope of the LORD is perished.

3:19  [Zain] Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.

3:20  [Zain] My soul shall have [them] still in remembrance because it is humbled in me.

3:21  [Zain] This shall go down into my heart; therefore I shall wait.

3:22  [Chet] It is of the LORD'S mercies that we are not consumed because his mercies never diminish.

3:23  [Chet They are] new every morning; great [is] thy faith.

3:24  [Chet] The LORD [is] my portion, saith my soul; therefore I will wait for him.

3:25  [Teth] The LORD [is] good unto those that wait in him, to the soul [that] seeks him.

3:26  [Teth] [It is] good to wait quietly in the salvation of the LORD.

3:27  [Teth] [It is] good for the man if he bears the yoke from his youth.

3:28  [Jod] He shall sit alone and keep silence because he has borne [it] upon him.

3:29  [Jod] He shall put his mouth in the dust; if so be there may be hope.

3:30  [Jod] He shall turn [his] cheek unto him that smites him; he shall be filled with reproach.

3:31  [Caph] For the Lord will not cast off for ever:

3:32  [Caph] But though he causes grief, yet he will also have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies.

3:33  [Caph] For he does not afflict nor grieve the sons of men from his heart.

3:34  [Lamed] To crush under his feet all the prisoners of the earth,

3:35  [Lamed] To turn aside the right of a man before the face of the most High,

3:36  [Lamed] To subvert a man in his cause, the Lord does not approve.

3:37  [Mem] Who shall he be that saith that something comes which the Lord has not sent?

3:38  [Mem] Out of the mouth of the most High proceeds not evil and good?

3:39  [Mem] Why does the living man have pain, the man in his sins?

3:40  [Nun] Let us search out our ways, and seek, and turn again to the LORD.

3:41  [Nun] Let us lift up our heart with [our] hands unto God in the heavens.

3:42  [Nun] We have rebelled and been disloyal; therefore thou hast not forgiven.

3:43  [Samech] Thou hast unfurled anger and persecuted us; thou hast slain, thou hast not forgiven.

3:44  [Samech] Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud that [our] prayer should not pass through.

3:45  [Samech] Thou hast made us [as] the offscouring and abomination in the midst of the peoples.

3:46  [Pe] All our enemies have opened their mouths upon us.

3:47  [Pe] Fear and a snare is come upon us, desolation and destruction.

3:48  [Pe] My eyes stream with rivers of water for the destruction of the daughter of my people.

3:49  [Ain] My eyes run down, and cease not, for there is no relief,

3:50  [Ain] Until the LORD looks down, and beholds from the heavens.

3:51  [Ain] My eyes make my soul sad because of all the daughters of my city.

3:52  [Tzaddi] My enemies hunted me like a bird, without cause.

3:53  [Tzaddi] They bound up my life in the dungeon, and cast a stone upon me.

3:54  [Tzaddi] Waters flowed over my head; [then] I said, I am dead.

3:55  [Koph] I called upon thy name, O LORD, out of the low dungeon.

3:56  [Koph] Thou hast heard my voice; do not hide thine ear at my cry that I might breath.

3:57  [Koph] Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee; thou didst say, Fear not.

3:58  [Resh] O Lord, thou hast pleaded the cause of my soul; thou hast redeemed my life.

3:59  [Resh] O LORD, thou hast seen where I was wrong; plead thou my cause.

3:60  [Resh] Thou hast seen all their vengeance [and] all their imaginations against me.

3:61  [Schin] Thou hast heard their reproach, O LORD, [and] all their imaginations against me;

3:62  [Schin] The words of those that rose up against me, and their design against me all the day.

3:63  [Schin] Behold their sitting down, and their rising up; I [am] their music.

3:64  [Tau] Render unto them a recompense, O LORD, according to the work of their hands.

3:65  [Tau] Give them sorrow of heart; thy curse unto them.

3:66  [Tau] Persecute them in thy anger and cut them off from under the heavens, oh LORD.:

Chapter 4

4:1  [Aleph] How is the gold become dim! [how] is the most fine gold changed! the stones of the sanctuary are scattered through the crossings of every street.

4:2  [Beth] The sons of Zion, precious and esteemed more than pure gold, how are they taken for earthen vessels, the work of the hands of the potter!

4:3  [Gimel] Even the sea monsters draw out the breast; they give suck to their young ones; the daughter of my people [is] cruel like the ostriches in the wilderness.

4:4  [Daleth] The tongue of the sucking child cleaves to the roof of his mouth for thirst; the young children ask for bread, and there was no one to break it unto them.

4:5  [He] Those that did feed delicately are made desolate in the streets; those that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.

4:6  [Vau] For the iniquity of the daughter of my people has increased more than the sin of Sodom, that was overthrown as in a moment, and companies did not camp upon her.

4:7  [Zain] Her Nazarites were whiter than snow; they were more radiant than milk; their composure had more fire than the precious stones cut from sapphire:

4:8  [Cheth] Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets; their skin cleaves to their bones; it is withered; it is dry like a stick.

4:9  [Teth] [Those] slain with the sword are better than [those] slain with hunger; for these pine away, stricken through for [want of] the fruits of the earth.

4:10  [Jod] The hands of the compassionate women have cooked their own children; they were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

4:11  [Caph] The LORD has accomplished his fury; he has poured out his fierce anger and has kindled a fire in Zion, and it has devoured the foundations thereof.

4:12  [Lamed] The kings of the earth and all the inhabitants of the world never believed that the adversary and the enemy would enter in through the gates of Jerusalem.

4:13  [Mem] For the sins of her prophets [and] the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her,

4:14  [Nun] They have wandered blindly in the streets; they were polluted in blood, so that no one could touch their garments.

4:15  [Samech] They cried unto them, Depart ye; [it is] unclean; depart, depart, touch not because they were contaminated; and [when they were] thrust through, they said among the Gentiles, They shall never dwell here again.

4:16  [Pe] The anger of the LORD has separated them; he will never look upon them again. They did not respect the countenance of the priests, nor did they have compassion on the elders.

4:17  [Ain] As for us, our eyes have failed in seeking our vain help; in our watching we have watched for people [that] cannot save [us].

4:18  [Tzaddi] They hunt our steps that we cannot walk in our streets; our end came near; our days were fulfilled; for our end is come.

4:19  [Koph] Our persecutors were swifter than the eagles of the heaven; they pursued us upon the mountains; they laid wait for us in the wilderness.

4:20  [Resh] The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD, was taken in their pits, of whom we had said, Under his shadow we shall live among the Gentiles.

4:21  [Schin] Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom that dwellest in the land of Uz; the cup shall also pass even unto thee; thou shalt be drunken and shalt vomit.

4:22  [Tau] The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion; he will never cause thee to be carried away again; he will visit thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom; he will uncover thy sins.:

Chapter 5

5:1  Remember, O LORD, what is come upon us; look, and behold our reproach.

5:2  Our inheritance is turned to strangers, our houses to aliens.

5:3  We are orphans without father; our mothers [are] as widows.

5:4  We have drunk our water for money; our wood is sold unto us.

5:5  Our necks [are] under persecution; we are become tired [and] have no rest.

5:6  We have given the hand [to] the Egyptians [and to] the Assyrians to be satisfied with bread.

5:7  Our fathers have sinned [and are] dead; and we have borne their chastisements.

5:8  Servants have ruled over us: there was no one to deliver [us] out of their hand.

5:9  We got our bread with [the peril of] our lives because of the sword of the wilderness.

5:10  Our skin became black like an oven because of the terrible famine.

5:11  They ravished the women in Zion [and] the virgins in the cities of Judah.

5:12  Princes were hanged up by their hand; the countenance of the elders was not honoured.

5:13  They took the young men to grind, and the children fell under the wood.

5:14  The elders have ceased from the gate, the young men from their music.

5:15  The joy of our heart is ceased; our dance is turned into mourning.

5:16  The crown is fallen [from] our head; woe now unto us, for we have sinned!

5:17  For this our heart is saddened; for these [things] our eyes are become dim.

5:18  Because of the mountain of Zion, which is desolate, the foxes walk upon it.

5:19  Thou, O LORD, [shall] remain for ever; thy throne from generation to generation.

5:20  Why should thou forget us for ever [and] forsake us for such [a] long time?

5:21  Turn us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as at the beginning.

5:22  For in stepping back thou hast rejected us; thou hast become very angry against us.: