Text -- Lamentations 5:1-12 (NET)

The People of Jerusalem Pray:

5:1 O Lord, reflect on what has happened to us; consider and look at our disgrace. 5:2 Our inheritance is turned over to strangers; foreigners now occupy our homes. 5:3 We have become fatherless orphans; our mothers have become widows. 5:4 We must pay money for our own water; we must buy our own wood at a steep price. 5:5 We are pursued– they are breathing down our necks; we are weary and have no rest. 5:6 We have submitted to Egypt and Assyria in order to buy food to eat. 5:7 Our forefathers sinned and are dead, but we suffer their punishment. 5:8 Slaves rule over us; there is no one to rescue us from their power. 5:9 At the risk of our lives we get our food because robbers lurk in the countryside. 5:10 Our skin is hot as an oven due to a fever from hunger. 5:11 They raped women in Zion, virgins in the towns of Judah. 5:12 Princes were hung by their hands; elders were mistreated.

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per phrase)

Wesley: Lam 5:3

We are all of us without a king, (our common father) we are deprived of thy fatherly protection, and many young children among us are left without an earthly parent.

Wesley: Lam 5:4

Whereas at other times there was abundance of wood and water throughout Judea.

Wesley: Lam 5:6

The ten tribes were all carried captives into Assyria, and many of the kingdom of Judah fled into Egypt. Giving the hand may signify labouring for them: or, yielding up themselves to their power.

Wesley: Lam 5:7

The punishment of them.

Wesley: Lam 5:9

The enemies lay encamped in all the plains, so that they could stir out no way but the sword of the Chaldeans was upon them.

JFB: Lam 5:2

"Thine inheritance" (Psa 79:1). The land given of old to us by Thy gift.

JFB: Lam 5:3

Our whole land is full of orphans [CALVIN]. Or, "we are fatherless," being abandoned by Thee our "Father" (Jer 3:19), [GROTIUS].

JFB: Lam 5:4

The Jews were compelled to pay the enemy for the water of their own cisterns after the overthrow of Jerusalem; or rather, it refers to their sojourn in Babylon; they had to pay tax for access to the rivers and fountains. Thus, "our" means the water which we need, the commonest necessary of life.

JFB: Lam 5:4

In Judea each one could get wood without pay; in Babylon, "our wood," the wood we need, must be paid for.

JFB: Lam 5:5

Literally, "On our necks we are persecuted"; that is, Men tread on our necks (Psa 66:12; Isa 51:23; compare Jos 10:24). The extremest oppression. The foe not merely galled the Jews face, back, and sides, but their neck. A just retribution, as they had been stiff in neck against the yoke of God (2Ch 30:8, Margin; Neh 9:29; Isa 48:4).

JFB: Lam 5:6

In token of submission (see on Jer 50:15).

JFB: Lam 5:6

At the death of Josiah (2Ch 36:3-4).

JFB: Lam 5:6

That is, the Chaldeans who occupied the empire which Assyria had held. So Jer 2:18.

JFB: Lam 5:6

(Deu 28:48).

JFB: Lam 5:7

(Jer 31:29).

JFB: Lam 5:7

That is, the punishment of them. The accumulated sins of our fathers from age to age, as well as our own, are visited on us. They say this as a plea why God should pity them (compare Eze 18:2, &c.).

JFB: Lam 5:8

Servants under the Chaldean governors ruled the Jews (Neh 5:15). Israel, once a "kingdom of priests" (Exo 19:6), is become like Canaan, "a servant of servants," according to the curse (Gen 9:25). The Chaldeans were designed to be "servants" of Shem, being descended from Ham (Gen 9:26). Now through the Jews' sin, their positions are reversed.

JFB: Lam 5:9

That is, those of us left in the city after its capture by the Chaldeans.

JFB: Lam 5:9

Because of the liability to attack by the robber Arabs of the wilderness, through which the Jews had to pass to get "bread" from Egypt (compare Lam 5:6).

JFB: Lam 5:10

As an oven is scorched with too much fire, so our skin with the hot blast of famine (Margin, rightly, "storms," like the hot simoom). Hunger dries up the pores so that the skin becomes like as if it were scorched by the sun (Job 30:30; Psa 119:83).

JFB: Lam 5:11

So in just retribution Babylon itself should fare in the end. Jerusalem shall for the last time suffer these woes before her final restoration (Zec 14:2).

JFB: Lam 5:12

A piece of wanton cruelty invented by the Chaldeans. GROTIUS translates, "Princes were hung by the hand of the enemy"; hanging was a usual mode of execution (Gen 40:19).

JFB: Lam 5:12

Officials (Lam 4:16).

Clarke: Lam 5:1

Remember, O Lord - In the Vulgate, Syriac, and Arabic, this is headed, "The prayer of Jeremiah."In my old MS. Bible: Here bigynneth the orison of Jeremye the prophete

Though this chapter consists of exactly twenty-two verses, the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet, yet the acrostic form is no longer observed. Perhaps any thing so technical was not thought proper when in agony and distress (under a sense of God’ s displeasure on account of sin) they prostrated themselves before him to ask for mercy. Be this as it may, no attempt appears to have been made to throw these verses into the form of the preceding chapters. It is properly a solemn prayer of all the people, stating their past and present sufferings, and praying for God’ s mercy

Clarke: Lam 5:1

Behold our reproach - הביט hebita . But many MSS. of Kennicott’ s, and the oldest of my own, add the ה he paragogic , הביטה hebitah , "Look down earnestly with commiseration;"for paragogic letters always increase the sense.

Clarke: Lam 5:2

Our inheritance is turned to strangers - The greater part of the Jews were either slain or carried away captive; and even those who were left under Gedaliah were not free, for they were vassals to the Chaldeans.

Clarke: Lam 5:4

We have drunken our water for money - I suppose the meaning of this is, that every thing was taxed by the Chaldeans, and that they kept the management in their own hands, so that wood and water were both sold, the people not being permitted to help themselves. They were now so lowly reduced by servitude, that they were obliged to pay dearly for those things which formerly were common and of no price. A poor Hindoo in the country never buys fire-wood, but when he comes to the city he is obliged to purchase his fuel, and considers it as a matter of great hardship.

Clarke: Lam 5:5

Our necks are under persecution - We feel the yoke of our bondage; we are driven to our work like the bullock, which has a yoke upon his neck.

Clarke: Lam 5:6

We have given the hand to the Egyptians - We have sought alliances both with the Egyptians and Assyrians, and made covenants with them in order to get the necessaries of life. Or, wherever we are now driven, we are obliged to submit to the people of the countries in order to the preservation of our lives.

Clarke: Lam 5:7

Our fathers have sinned, and are not - Nations, as such, cannot be punished in the other world; therefore national judgments are to be looked for only in this life. The punishment which the Jewish nation had been meriting for a series of years came now upon them, because they copied and increased the sins of their fathers, and the cup of their iniquity was full. Thus the children might be said to bear the sins of the fathers, that is, in temporal punishment, for in no other way does God visit these upon the children. See Eze 18:1, etc.

Clarke: Lam 5:8

Servants have ruled over us - To be subject to such is the most painful and dishonorable bondage: -

Quio domini faciant

audent cum talia fures ?

Virg. Ecl. 3:16

"Since slaves so insolent are grown

What may not masters do?

Perhaps he here alludes to the Chaldean soldiers, whose will the wretched Jews were obliged to obey.

Clarke: Lam 5:9

We gat our bread with the peril of our lives - They could not go into the wilderness to feed their cattle, or to get the necessaries of life, without being harassed and plundered by marauding parties, and by these were often exposed to the peril of their lives. This was predicted by Moses, Deu 28:31.

Clarke: Lam 5:10

Our skin was black - because of the terrible famine - Because of the searching winds that burnt up every green thing, destroying vegetation, and in consequence producing a famine.

Clarke: Lam 5:11

They ravished the women in Zion, and the maids in the cities of Judah - The evil mentioned here was predicted by Moses, Deu 28:30, Deu 28:32, and by Jeremiah, Jer 6:12.

Clarke: Lam 5:12

Princes are hanged up by their hand - It is very probable that this was a species of punishment. They were suspended from hooks in the wall by their hands till they died through torture and exhaustion. The body of Saul was fastened to the wall of Bethshan, probably in the same way; but his head had already been taken off. They were hung in this way that they might be devoured by the fowls of the air. It was a custom with the Persians after they had slain, strangled, or beheaded their enemies, to hang their bodies upon poles, or empale them. In this way they treated Histiaeus of Miletum, and Leonidas of Lacedaemon. See Herodot. lib. 6 c. 30, lib. 7 c. 238.

Calvin: Lam 5:1

This prayer ought to be read as unconnected with the Lamentations, for the initial letters of the verses are not written according to the order of the Alphabet; yet it is a complaint rather than a prayer; for Jeremiah mentions those things which had happened to the people in their extreme calamity in order to turn God to compassion and mercy.

He says first, Remember what has happened to us; and then in the second part he explains himself, Look and see our reproach Now the words, though brief and concise, yet contain a useful doctrine — that God is pleased to bring help to the miserable when their evils come to an account before him, especially when they are unjustly oppressed. It is, indeed, certain that nothing is unknown to God, but this mode of speaking is according to the perceptions of men; for we think that God disregards our miseries, or we imagine that his back is turned to us when he does not immediately succor us. But as I have said, he is simply to be asked to look on our evils, for we know what he testifies of himself; so that as he claims to himself the office of helping the miserable and the unjustly oppressed, we ought to acquiesce in this consolation, that as soon as he is pleased to look on the evils we suffer, aid is at the same time prepared for us.

There is mention especially made of reproach, that the indignity might move God the more: for it was for this end that he took the people under his protection, that they might be for his glory and honor, as Moses says. As, then, it was God’s will that the riches of his glory should appear in that people, nothing could have been more inconsistent that that instead of glory they should have nothing but disgrace and reproach. This, then, is the reason why the Prophet makes a special mention of the reproach of the people. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:2

A catalogue of many calamities is now given by the Prophet, and as I have reminded you, for this end, that he may obtain God’s favor for himself and for the whole people. It was by no means a reasonable thing, that the inheritance of the elect people should be given to aliens; for we know that the land had been promised to Abraham four hundred years before his children possessed it; we know that this promise had been often repeated, “This land shall be to you for an inheritance.” For though God sustained all nations, yet he was pleased to take a peculiar care of his people. In short, no land has ever been given to men in so singular a way as the land of Canaan to the posterity of Abraham. As, then, this inheritance had been for so many ages possessed by the chosen people, Jeremiah does not without reason complain that it was turned over to aliens.

In the second clause he repeats the same thing; but he shews that the Jews had not only been robbed of their fields, but had been cast out of their houses, a more grievous and disgraceful thing. For it sometimes happens, that when one loses his farm, his fields, and vineyards, his house remains to him untouched; but the Prophet here amplifies the misery of his own nation, that they were not only deprived of their fields and possessions, but that they were also ejected from their own houses, and others had possession of them. For it is a sight deemed affecting even among heathens, when one unworthy of any honor succeeds in the place of another eminent in wealth and dignity. Well known are these words, —

O house of Aucus! How ruled by an unequal master! ²²³

As Tarquinius had succeeded and taken possession of the kingdom, the heathen poet upbraidingly said that the house of Ancus had passed over to those who were at first exiles and fugitives, but afterwards became proud and cruel tyrants. So also in this place Jeremiah says that aliens dwelt in the houses of the people. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:3

Here the Prophet not only speaks in the person of the whole people, but utters also the groans and complaints of each; for this could not have been suitable to the whole Church, as he speaks of fathers and mothers. We hence see that this verse does not apply to the whole body, but to individual members, though every one of the people might have said that widows and orphans were everywhere seen.

Now, this usually happens when a nation is consumed either by pestilence or by war; for in one battle all do not so fall that a whole country becomes full of orphans. But the Prophet sets forth here the orphanage and widowhood occasioned through the continued vengeance of God, for he had not ceased to afflict the people until by degrees they were exhausted. It was, indeed, a sad spectacle to see among the chosen people so many widows, and also so many children deprived of their fathers. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:4

The Prophet here relates, that the people were denuded, that they labored under the want of water and of wood. He does not say that they were only deprived of corn and wine, he does not complain that any of their luxuries were lessened; but he mentions water and wood, the common things of life; for the use of water, as it is said, is common to all; no one is so poor, if he dwells not in a land wholly dry, but that he has water enough to drink. For if there be no fountains, there are at least rivers, there are wells; nor do men perish through thirst, except in deserts and in places uninhabitable. As, then, water might be had everywhere, the Prophet here sets forth the extreme misery of the people, for water was even sold to them. In stony and high places water is sold; but this is a very rare thing. The Prophet here means that the people were not only deprived of their wealth, but reduced to such a state of want that they had no water without buying it.

At the same time he seems to express something worse when he says, Our water we drink for money, and our wood is brought to us for a price. It is not strange that wood should be bought; but the Prophet means that water was sold to the Jews which had been their own, and that they were also compelled to buy wood which had been their own. Thus the possessive pronouns are to be considered as emphatical. Then he says, “Our own waters we drink,” etc. ²²⁴ He calls them the waters of the people, which by right they might have claimed as their own; and he also calls the wood The same; it was that to which the people had a legitimate right. He then says that all things had been so taken away by their enemies, that they were forced to buy, not only the wine which had been taken from their cellars, and the corn which had been taken from their granaries, but also the water and the wood.

But were any one disposed to take the words more simply, the complaint would not be unsuitable, — that the people, who before had abundance of wine and all other things, were constrained to buy everything, even water and wood. For it is a grievous change when any one, who could once cut wood of his own, and gather his own wine and corn, is not able to get even a drop of water without buying it. This is a sad change. So this passage may be understood. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:5

Here he says that the people were oppressed with a grievous bondage. It is, indeed, a metaphorical expression when he says, that people suffered persecution on their necks. Enemies may sometimes be troublesome to us, either before our face, or behind our backs, or by our sides; but when they so domineer as to ride on our necks, in this kind of insult there is extreme degradation. Hence the Prophet here complains of the servile and even disgraceful oppression of the people when he says, that the Jews suffered persecution on their necks.

The meaning is, that the enemies so domineered at the, it pleasure, that the Jews dared not to raise up their heads. They were, indeed, worthy of this reward — for we know that they had an iron neck; for when God would have them to bear his yoke, they were wholly unbending; nay, they were like untameable wild beasts. As, then, their hardness had been so great, God rendered to them a just reward for their pride and obstinacy, when their enemies laid such a burden on their necks. ²²⁵

But the Prophet sets forth here this indignity, that he might turn God to mercy; that is, that the Chaldeans thus oppressed as they pleased the chosen people.

He adds, that they labored and had no rest. He intimates by these words that there were no limits nor end to their miseries and troubles; for the phrase in Hebrew is, We have labored and there was no rest. It often happens that when one is pressed down with evils for a short time, a relaxation comes. But the Prophet. says that there was no end to the miseries of the people. Then to labor without rest is the same as to be pressed down with incessant afflictions, from which there is no outlet. Their obstinacy was worthy also of this reward, for they had fought against God, not for a few months or years only, but for many years. We know how long the Prophet called them without any success. Here, however, he seeks favor with God, by saying that the people were miserable without limits or end.

Calvin: Lam 5:6

He speaks here of the mendicity of the people, that they sought bread from every quarter. To give the hand, is explained in three ways: some say that it means humbly to ask; others, to make an agreement; and others, to extend it in token of misery, as he who cannot ask for help, intimates his wants by extending his hand. But the Prophet seems simply to mean that the people were so distressed by want, that they begged bread. I then take the expression, to give the hand, as meaning that they asked bread, as beggars usually do.

He now says that they gave or extended the hand both to the Egyptians and to the Assyrians, which was a most unworthy and disgraceful thing; for the Egyptians had been their most troublesome enemies, and the Assyrians afterwards followed their example. At that time, indeed, the Egyptians pretended to be the friends of the chosen people, and made a treaty with them; but the Jews were held in contempt by them as they deserved, for they had prostituted as it were themselves like harlots. As, then, they had been despised by the Egyptians, it was a disgrace and reproach the most bitter, when they were compelled to beg bread in Egypt, and then in Assyria; for this might have been turned to the bitterest taunts.

We now, then, perceive the meaning of the Prophet; even this reward also God justly rendered to them. He had promised them a fruitful land, in which he was ready to support them to the full. How often is mention made by Moses of corn, wine, and oil; and why? in order that God might shew that that land exceeded every other in fertility. It was, then, an evidence of an extreme curse when the people were compelled to beg bread here and there, while yet the abundance of all things ought to have been sufficient to supply even aliens,

“Thou shalt lend to others, but thou shalt not borrow.” (Deu 15:6.)

They then who ought to have fed others by their plenty, were so reduced that their want forced them to undergo this disgrace, to beg bread of the Egyptians and Assyrians. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:7

The Prophet seems here to contend with God, and to utter that blasphemy mentioned by Ezekiel. For when God severely chastised the people, that proverb was commonly used by them,

“Our fathers did eat a sour grape, and our teeth are blunted.” (Eze 18:2.)

Thus they intimated that they were unjustly and cruelly treated, because they suffered the punishment of others, when they themselves were innocent. So the Prophet seems to quarrel with God when he says that the fathers who sinned were no more; but as we shall presently see, the Prophet confesses also the sins of those who were yet alive. As, then, an ingenuous confession is made by the Prophet, he no doubt abstained here from that blasphemy which is so severely reproved by Ezekiel. Jeremiah had nothing farther from his purpose than to free the people from all blame, as though God had dealt cruelly with them, according to what is said by a heathen poet, —

“For the sins of the fathers thou undeservedly sufferest, O Roman!” ²²⁶

Another says, —

“Enough already by our blood
Have we suffered for the perjuries of Laomedonian Troy.” ²²⁷

They mean that the people of their age were wholly innocent, and seek in Asia and beyond the sea the cause of evils, as though they never had a sin at Rome. But the meaning of Jeremiah was not this, but he simply intended to say that the people who had been long rebellious against God were already dead, and that it was therefore a suitable time for God to regard the miseries of their posterity. The faithful, then, do not allege here their own innocency before God, as though they were blameless; but only mention that their fathers underwent a just punishment, for that whole generation had perished. Daniel speaks more fully when he says,

“We have sinned, and our fathers, and our kings.”
(Dan 9:8.)

He involved in the same condemnation both the fathers and their children.

But our Prophet’s object was different, even to turn God to mercy, as it has been stated; and to attain this object he says, “O Lord, thou indeed hast hitherto executed just punishment, because our fathers had very long abused thy goodness and forbearance; but now the time is come for thee to try and prove whether we are like our fathers: as, then, they have perished as they deserved, receive us now into favor.” We hence see that thus no quarrel or contention is carried on with God, but only that the miserable exiles ask God to look on them, since their fathers who had provoked God and had experienced his dreadful vengeance, were already dead. ²²⁸

And when he says that the sons bore the iniquity of the fathers, though it be a strong expression, yet its meaning is not as though God had without reason punished their children and not their fathers; for unalterable is that declaration,

“The son shall not bear the iniquity of the father, nor the father the iniquity of the son; but the soul that sinneth it shall die.”
(Eze 18:20.)

It may yet be said that children are loaded with the sins of their fathers, because God, as he declares by Moses, extends his vengeance to the third and fourth generation. (Exo 20:5.) And he says also in another place,

“I will return into the bosom of children the iniquity of their fathers.”
(Jer 32:18.)

God then continued his vengeance to their posterity. But yet there is no doubt but that the children who had been so severely punished, bore also the punishment of their own iniquity, for they deserved a hundred deaths. But these two things well agree together, that God returns the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of their children, and yet that the children are chastised for their own sins.

Calvin: Lam 5:8

Another circumstance aggravated the calamity of the people, that they came under the power of servants, which is more degrading than when the rich and the eminent in wealth and power make us their servants. For it is no shame to serve a king, or at, least a man who possesses some eminence; for that servitude which is not apparently degrading is deemed tolerable. But when we become the servants of servants, it is a most afflicting degradation, and most grievously wounds our minds.

It is, then, for this indignity that Jeremiah now expostulates, and says that servants ruled over them. There is, indeed, no doubt but that they were driven into exile by some of the lowest; for the Chaldeans thought it right to exercise towards them every kind of cruelty. But it was yet a very mournful thing for God’s children to be the slaves of servants; for they were before a sacerdotal kingdom, and God had so taken them under his protection, that their condition was better and more desirable than that of any other kingdom. As, then, they had been robbed of their liberty, and not only so, but also made subject to servants, the change was sad in the extreme. ²²⁹ Therefore the Prophet sought another occasion to plead for mercy, when he said that they were ruled by servants. It now follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:9

The word חרב , chereb, means drought as well as sword. As the Prophet is speaking of famine and the desert,, I have no doubt but that dryness or drought is sword the word means here; and I wonder that the word sword had occurred to any; they could not have regarded the context.

He then says that the people sought bread with the soul, that is, at the hazard of their own life. If danger be preferred, I do not object. But as he simply says, with the soul, he seems to express this, that for food they hazarded their own life. Food, indeed, is the support of life, for why is bread sought but for sustaining life? But the hungry so rush headlong to procure food, that they expose themselves to thousand dangers, and they also weary themselves with many labors; and this is to seek bread with their soul, that is, when men not only anxiously labor to procure food, but pour forth as it were their own blood, as when one undertakes a long journey to get some support, lie is almost lifeless when he reaches the distant hospital. As, then, the Jews nowhere found food, the Prophet says that they sought bread with their life, that is, at the hazard of life. This is the view I prefer.

He then adds, For the dryness of the wilderness. What has the sword to do with wilderness? We see that this is wholly unsuitable; there was then no reason why interpreters should pervert this word. But what he calls the dryness of the wilderness was the want by which the people were distressed, as though they were in the wilderness. This is said by way of comparison, — that on account of the dryness of the desert, that is, on account of sterility, they were under the necessity of exposing their life to death, only that they might anywhere find bread. ²³⁰

It may also be, that the Prophet meant, that they were fugitives, and thus went in hunger through woods and forest, when they dared not to go forth into the open country lest the enemy should meet them. But what I have said is most suitable, that is, that they were so famished as though they were in a vast desert, and far away from every hospital, so that bread could nowhere be found. We now, then, perceive the meaning of the Prophet. He adds, —

Calvin: Lam 5:10

Some read, “for tremors;” literally, “from the face of tremors.” Jerome renders it, “tempests,” but the word “burnings” is the most suitable; for he says that their skins were darkened, and he compares them to an oven. This metaphor often occurs in Scripture,

“Though ye have been as among pots in the smoke, and deformed by blackness, yet your wings shall shine.” (Psa 68:14.)

God says that his people had contracted blackness, as though they had touched smoky pots, because they had been burnt as it were by many afflictions; for when we pine away in our evils, filthiness itself deforms us. But here he compares to an oven (which is the same thing) their skins or skin. He then says that the skin of every one was so wrinkled and darkened by blackness, that it was like an oven which is black through constant fire and smoke. The Prophet or whoever was the author of the 119^th Psalm, uses another comparison, that he was like a bottle or a bladder, contracted by the smoke, and had wrinkles together with blackness. ²³¹

The meaning is, that there was a degrading deformity in the people, for they were so famished that no moisture remained in them; and when moisture fails, then paleness and decay follow; and then from paleness a greater deformity and blackness, of which the Prophet now speaks. Hence I have said, that the word “burnings” is the most proper. For, if we say tempests or storms, a tempest does not certainly darken the skin; and if we render it tremors or tremblings, this would be far remote; but if we adopt the word burnings, the whole passage will appear consistent; and we know, that as food as it were irrigates the life of man, so famine burns it up, as Scripture speaks also elsewhere. It follows, —

Calvin: Lam 5:11

He mentions here another kind of reproach, that women had been ravished in Jerusalem, and in other cities. ²³² God had commanded chastity to be observed among his people. When, therefore, virgins and women were thus defiled, it was a thing extremely disgraceful. But the Prophet mentioned this also, in order that God might at length show himself propitious to his people after having been entreated. (Deu 22:21.)

And he mentioned Sion rather than Jerusalem, — it was indeed to state a part for the whole; but that place, we know, had been chosen by God that his name might be there worshipped. Sion, then, was a holy place above any other; it was, in a word, the earthly dwelling of God. As, then, God had there his palace, that he might dwell in the midst of his people, it was a disgraceful sight in the extreme to see women ravished there, for the temple of God was thus violated. It was not only a thing disgraceful to the people, that women were thus ravished, but it was a filthy profanation of God’s worship, and therefore sacrilegious. We now see the design of the Prophet. He mentions also the cities of Judah, but with reference to the same thing. It follows —

Calvin: Lam 5:12

The beginning of the verse may be explained in two ways. All render thus, “The princes have been slain by their hand,” that is, of their enemies. But I wonder how it never occurred to them, that it was far more grievous, that they were slain by their own hand. I certainly do not doubt but that the Prophet says here, that some of the princes had laid violent hands on themselves. For it would be a frigid expression, that the princes were hung by the hand of enemies; but if we read, that the princes were hung by their own hand, this would be far more atrocious, as we have before seen that even women, excelling in humanity, devoured their own offspring. So he says now that princes were hung, not by enemies, for it was a common thing for the conquered to be slain by their enemies, and be also hung by way of reproach; but the Prophet, as it appears to me, meant to express something more atrocious, even that the miserable princes were constrained to lay violent hands on themselves. ²³³

He adds, that the faces of the aged were not honored; which is also a thing not natural; for we know that some honor is always rendered to old age, and that time of life is commonly regarded with reverence. When, therefore, no respect is shown to the aged, the greatest barbarity must necessarily prevail. It is the same, then, as though the Prophet had said that the people had been so disgracefully treated, that their enemies had not even spared the aged. We also now understand why he adds this, for it would have otherwise appeared incredible, that the princes hung themselves by their own hand. But he here intimates that there was no escape for them, except they in despair sought death for themselves, because all humanity had disappeared. It follows, —

Defender: Lam 5:1

The concluding lamentation is not acrostic in its structure like the others, but it does have twenty-two verses like they do. It expresses both hopelessness, and hope in the nature of God and His purpose."

TSK: Lam 5:1

Remember : Lam 1:20, Lam 2:20, Lam 3:19; Neh 1:8; Job 7:7, Job 10:9; Jer 15:15; Hab 3:2; Luk 23:42

behold : Lam 2:15, Lam 3:61; Neh 1:3, Neh 4:4; Psa 44:13-16, Psa 74:10,Psa 74:11, Psa 79:4, Psa 79:12, Psa 89:50,Psa 89:51; Psa 123:3, Psa 123:4

TSK: Lam 5:2

Deut. 28:30-68; Psa 79:1, Psa 79:2; Isa 1:7, Isa 5:17, Isa 63:18; Jer 6:12; Eze 7:21, Eze 7:24; Zep 1:13

TSK: Lam 5:3

Exo 22:24; Jer 18:21; Hos 14:3

TSK: Lam 5:4

have : Deu 28:48; Isa 3:1; Eze 4:9-17

is sold : Heb. cometh for price

TSK: Lam 5:5

Our necks are under persecution : Heb. On our necks are we persecuted, Lam 1:14, Lam 4:19; Deu 28:48, Deu 28:65, Deu 28:66; Jer 27:2, Jer 27:8, Jer 27:11, Jer 27:12, Jer 28:14; Mat 11:29; Act 15:10

labour : Neh 9:36, Neh 9:37

TSK: Lam 5:6

given : Gen 24:2; 2Ki 10:15; Jer 50:15; Eze 17:18

to the Egyptians : Isa 30:1-6, Isa 31:1-3, Isa 57:9; Jer 2:18, Jer 2:36, Jer 44:12-14; Hos 5:13, Hos 7:11, Hos 9:3; Hos 12:1

TSK: Lam 5:7

fathers : Exo 20:5; Jer 16:12, Jer 31:29; Eze 18:2; Mat 23:32-36

and are : Gen 42:13, Gen 42:36; Job 7:8, Job 7:21; Jer 31:15; Zec 1:5

TSK: Lam 5:8

Servants : Gen 9:25; Deu 28:43; Neh 2:19, Neh 5:15; Pro 30:22

there : Job 5:4, Job 10:7; Psa 7:2, Psa 50:22; Isa 43:13; Hos 2:10; Zec 11:6

TSK: Lam 5:9

Jdg 6:11; 2Sa 23:17; Jer 40:9-12, Jer 41:1-10,Jer 41:18, Jer 42:14, Jer 42:16; Eze 4:16, Eze 4:17, Eze 12:18, Eze 12:19

TSK: Lam 5:10

skin : Lam 3:4, Lam 4:8; Job 30:30; Psa 119:83

terrible famine : or, terrors, or storms, of famine

TSK: Lam 5:11

Deu 28:30; Isa 13:16; Zec 14:2

TSK: Lam 5:12

Lam 2:10,Lam 2:20, Lam 4:16; Isa 47:6; Jer 39:6, Jer 39:7, Jer 52:10,Jer 52:11, Jer 52:25-27

Commentary -- Word/Phrase Notes (per Verse)

Barnes: Lam 5:1

What is come upon us - literally, "what"has happened "to us:"our national disgrace.

Barnes: Lam 5:2

Turned - " transferred."The inheritance was the land of Canaan Lev 20:24.

Aliens - Or, "foreigners:"i. e. the Chaldaeans upon their conquest of the country.

Barnes: Lam 5:3

Our mothers are as widows - The particle "as"suggests that the whole verse is metaphorical. Our distress and desolation is comparable only to that of fatherless orphans or wives just bereaved of their husbands.

Barnes: Lam 5:4

Better as in the margin cometh to us for price. The rendering of the the King James Version spoils the carefully studied rhythm of the original. The bitterness of the complaint lies in this, that it was their own property which they had to buy.

Barnes: Lam 5:5

Our necks ... - i. e. we were pursued so actively that our enemies seemed to be leaning over our necks ready to seize us.

We labor - We were wearied, "there was no rest for us:"being chased incessantly.

Barnes: Lam 5:6

"To give the hand"means to submit oneself. Absolutely it was Babylon that had just destroyed their national existence, but Jeremiah means that all feelings of patriotism were crushed, and the sole care that remained was the desire for personal preservation. To secure this the people would readily have submitted to the yoke either of Egypt or Assyria, the great powers from which in their past history they had so often suffered.

Barnes: Lam 5:7

And are not; and we ... - Or, they are not; "we have borne their iniquities."Our fathers who began this national apostasy died before the hour of punishment.

Barnes: Lam 5:8

Servants - i. e. Slaves. A terrible degradation to a high-spirited Jew.

Barnes: Lam 5:9

We gat - Or, We get "our bread at the peril of our lives."This verse apparently refers to those who were left in the land, and who in gathering in such fruits as remained, were exposed to incursions of the Bedouin, here called "the sword of the desert."

Barnes: Lam 5:10

Our skin ... - Or, is fiery red like an oven because of the fever-blast "of famine."

Barnes: Lam 5:11

They ravished - They humbled.

Barnes: Lam 5:12

After the princes had been put to death their bodies were hung up by the hand to expose them to public contumely. Old age, again, no more availed to shield men from shameful treatment than the high rank of the princes. Such treatment of conquered enemies was not uncommon in ancient warfare.

Poole: Lam 5:2

What our fathers inherited as given them by thee, and we as left to us by them, is come into the hands of the Chaldeans.

Poole: Lam 5:3

We are all of us without a king, (who is the common father of the country,) we are deprived of thy fatherly care and protection, many young children amongst us are left without an earthly parent.

Our mothers are as widows either our great cities are like widows, wanting magistrates; or, our women that were married are left widows.

Poole: Lam 5:4

This seemeth to refer to the state of the Jews in Babylon, where it is probable their adversaries made them buy both water and wood, which in the land of Canaan they had plentifully, and without any further charge to them than fetching the one, and cutting down and bringing home the other.

Poole: Lam 5:5

As the generality of prisoners of war are made slaves, and put to hard and incessant labour, so in probability the most of the Jews were at first at least.

Poole: Lam 5:6

The ten tribes were all carried captives into Assyria, many of the kingdom of Judah, as we have heard, fled into Egypt after the taking of Jerusalem.

Giving the hand may either signify working with their hands, and labouring for them; or yielding up themselves to their power, or lifting up the hands as supplicants to them, or striking hands and making covenants with them, or lending them their hand, to help them, and all to get any thing to live upon.

Poole: Lam 5:7

We must not understand this in the same sense as Eze 18:2 , where God reflecteth upon them for using a proverb to this sense. It is the prophet who here speaketh, and in the name of the godly Jews, who would not excuse themselves as if they suffered merely for their forefathers’ sins. But the prophet confesseth and bewaileth that God had punished their iniquities and the iniquities of their forefathers together; and it was better with their forefathers who had sinned, and were dead and gone, than with them, upon whom the punishment of their iniquity did abide, and was like so to do a long time.

Poole: Lam 5:8

Either those who sometimes were our servants, tributary to us, or the posterity of Ham, condemned of old to be servants to our forefather Shem, Gen 9:26 ; or the servants of those masters whom we serve in Babylon: and none will help us and give us more liberty.

Poole: Lam 5:9

The enemies lay encamped in all the plains, so as they could stir out no way but the sword of the Chaldeans was upon them, and what victuals they got they adventured their lives for, during the time of the siege.

Poole: Lam 5:10

The want of bread caused leanness, and paleness, and ill colours in their faces.

Poole: Lam 5:11

Usual outrages of barbarous soldiers. The Hebrew is, They humbled , a modest term to express these actions by.

Poole: Lam 5:12

Most probably by the enemies’ hands, though some would have it by their hands, intimating a more sharp and lingering death. Hanging was an ancient way in the Eastern countries of putting malefactors to death, Gen 40:19 .

Haydock: Lam 5:1

Thou hast. We might read with an interrogation, (Haydock) in Hebrew, "Hast thou?" &c. The Jews superstitiously repeat the last verse, for fear of ending the book in an ominous manner, as they do at the end of Isaias and Malachias. (Calmet) ---

Having treated us so severely, stop thy hand. (Worthington) ---

But I perceive it will be in vain to beg for redress till the seventy years be expired. (Menochius)

Haydock: Lam 5:1

The prayer, &c. This title is not in Hebrew, Septuagint, &c. Theodoret has passed over the chapter, as if he doubted of its authenticity. It does not follow the order of Hebrew letters like the preceding, and seems to be a form of prayer for those who retired into Egypt. (Calmet) ---

Jeremias foresees what would happen, and prays as the people would do. (Worthington)

Haydock: Lam 5:2

Aliens. The Idumeans seized and kept possession of the southern parts.

Haydock: Lam 5:3

Father. Many had none surviving, and all had lost their king. (Worthington)

Haydock: Lam 5:4

Water. Even this was not given for nothing.

Haydock: Lam 5:6

Hand; engaged to serve Egyptians, Babylonians, (Calmet) or other nations, to procure sustenance. (Worthington)

Haydock: Lam 5:7

Iniquities. This was the usual complaint of the Jews, (chap. xxxi. 29.) as if they had committed no offence themselves. If any virtuous people were involved in common ruin, they bore it with resignation, and acknowledged that they had deserved it, 1 Esdras ix. 6., and 2 Esdras i. 6., and Esther xiv. 6., and Daniel iii. 29.

Haydock: Lam 5:8

Servants. One had command over another, Matthew xxiv. 45. The Chaldeans were like slaves, and the race of Cham was condemned to servitude, Genesis ix. 26. (Calmet) ---

The Jews had formerly dominion over Edom, &c., who now treated them so cruelly. (Menochius) (Lyranus)

Haydock: Lam 5:9

Sword. Any one might kill us.

Haydock: Lam 5:11

Oppressed. Hebrew, "afflicted." Brutal insolence prevailed. (Calmet)

Haydock: Lam 5:12

Hand. Thus Leonidas was treated, after his head was cut off, by Xerxes. (Herodotus vii. 238.)

Gill: Lam 5:1

Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us,.... This chapter is called, in some Greek copies, and in the Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions, "the prayer of Jeremiah". Cocceius interprets the whole of the state of the Christian church after the last destruction of Jerusalem; and of what happened to the disciples of Christ in the first times of the Gospel; and of what Christians have endured under antichrist down to the present times: but it is best to understand it of the Jews in Babylon; representing their sorrowful case, as represented by the prophet; entreating that the Lord would remember the affliction they were under, and deliver them out of it, that which he had determined should come upon them. So the Targum,

"remember, O Lord, what was decreed should be unto us;''

and what he had long threatened should come upon them; and which they had reason to fear would come, though they put away the evil day far from them; but now it was come, and it lay heavy upon them; and therefore they desire it might be taken off:

consider, and behold our reproach: cast upon them by their enemies; and the rather the Lord is entreated to look upon and consider that, since his name was concerned in it, and it was for his sake, and because of the true religion they professed; also the disgrace they were in, being carried into a foreign country for their sins; and so were in contempt by all the nations around.

Gill: Lam 5:2

Our inheritance is turned to strangers,.... The land of Canaan in general, which was given to Abraham and his seed to be their inheritance; and their field, and vineyards in particular, which came to them by inheritance from their fathers, were now in the hands of the Chaldeans, strangers to God, and aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, as all Gentiles were, Eph 2:12;

our houses to aliens; which they had built or purchased, or their fathers had left them, were now inhabited by those of another country.

Gill: Lam 5:3

We are orphans and fatherless,.... In every sense; in a natural sense, their fathers having been cut off by the sword, famine, or pestilence; in a civil sense, their king being taken from them; and in a religious sense, God having forsaken them for their sins:

our mothers are as widows; either really so, their husbands being dead; or were as if they had no husbands, they not being able to provide for them, protect and deferred them. The Targum adds,

"whose husbands are gone to the cities of the sea, and it is doubtful whether they are alive.''

Some understand this politically, of their cities being desolate and defenceless.

Gill: Lam 5:4

We have drunken our water for money,.... They who in their own land, which was a land of brooks of water, of fountains and depths, had wells of water of their own, and water freely and in abundance, now were obliged to pay for it, for drink, and other uses:

our wood is sold unto us; or, "comes to us by a price" ^r; and a dear one; in their own land they could have wood out of the forest, for cutting down and bringing home; but now they were forced to give a large price for it.

Gill: Lam 5:5

Our necks are under persecution,.... A yoke of hard servitude and bondage was put upon their necks, as Jarchi interprets it; which they were forced to submit unto: or, "upon our necks we are pursued" ^s; or, "suffer persecution": which Aben Ezra explains thus, in connection with the Lam 5:4; if we carry water or wood upon our necks, the enemy pursues us; that is, to take it away from us. The Targum relates a fable here, that when Nebuchadnezzar saw the ungodly rulers of the children of Israel, who went empty, he ordered to sow up the books of the law, and make bags or wallets of them, and fill them with the stones on the banks of the Euphrates, and loaded them on their necks:

we labour, and have no rest; night nor day, nor even on sabbath days; obliged to work continually till they were weary; and, when they were, were not allowed time to rest themselves, like their forefathers in Egypt.

Gill: Lam 5:6

We have given our hand to the Egyptians,.... Either by way of supplication, to beg bread of them; or by way of covenant and agreement; or to testify subjection to them, in order to be supplied with food: many of the Jews went into Egypt upon the taking of the city, Jer 43:5;

and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread; among whom many of the captives were dispersed; since from hence they are said to be returned, as well as from Egypt, Isa 11:16.

Gill: Lam 5:7

Our fathers have sinned, and are not,.... In the world, as the Targum adds; they were in being, but not on earth; they were departed from hence, and gone into another world; and so were free from the miseries and calamities their children were attended with, and therefore more happy:

and we have borne their iniquities; the punishment of them, or chastisement for them: this is not said by way of complaint, much less as charging God with injustice, in punishing them for their fathers' sins, or to excuse theirs; for they were ready to own that they had consented to them, and were guilty of the same; but to obtain mercy and pity at the hands of God.

Gill: Lam 5:8

Servants have ruled over us,.... The Targum is,

"the sons of Ham, who were given to be servants to the sons of Shem, they have ruled over us;''

referring to the prophecy of Noah, Gen 9:26; or such as had been tributary to the Jews, as the Edomites; so Aben Ezra; the Babylon, an, are meant; and not the nobles and principal inhabitants only, but even their servants, had power and authority over the Jews and they were at their beck and command; which made their servitude the more disagreeable and intolerable:

there is none that doth deliver us out of their hand; out of the hand of these servants.

Gill: Lam 5:9

We gat our bread with the peril of our lives,.... This seems to refer to the time of the siege when they privately went out of the city to get in some provision, but went in danger of their lives:

because of the sword of the wilderness: or, "of the plain" ^t; because of the, word of the Chaldean army, which lay in the plain about Jerusalem into whose hand there was danger of falling, and of being cut to pieces.

Gill: Lam 5:10

Our skin was black like an oven, because of the terrible famine. Or "terrors and horrors of famine"; which are very dreadful and distressing: or, "the storms of famine"; see Psa 11:6; or, "burning winds" ^u; such as are frequent in Africa and Asia; to which the famine is compared that was in Jerusalem, at the siege of it, both by the Chaldeans and Romans; and as an oven, furnace, or chimney becomes black by the smoke of the fire burnt in it, or under it; so the skins of the Jews became black through these burning winds and storms, or burnings of famine; see Lam 4:8. So Jarchi says the word has the signification of "burning"; for famine as it were burns up the bodies of men when most vehement.

Gill: Lam 5:11

They ravished the women in Zion,.... Or "humbled" them ^w; an euphemism; the women that were married to men in Zion, as the Targum; and if this wickedness was committed in the holy mountain of Zion, it was still more abominable and afflicting, and to be complained of; and if by the servants before mentioned, as Aben Ezra interprets it, it is another aggravating circumstance of it; for this was done not in Babylon when captives there; but at the taking of the city of Jerusalem, and by the common soldiers, as is too often practised:

and the maids in the cities of Judah; in all parts of the country, where the Chaldean army ravaged, there they ravished the maids. The Targum is,

"the women that were married to men in Zion were humbled by strangers; (the Targum in the king of Spain's Bible is, by the Romans;) and virgins in the cities of Judah by the Chaldeans;''

suggesting that this account has reference to both destructions of the city, and the concomitants and consequences thereof.

Gill: Lam 5:12

Princes are hanged up by their hand,.... According to some, as Aben Ezra observes, by the hand of the servants before mentioned; however, by the hand of the Chaldeans or Babylonians; see Jer 52:10. Some understand it of their own hands, as if they laid violent hands upon themselves, not being able to bear the hardships and disgrace they were subjected to but I should rather think this is to be understood of hanging them, not by the neck, but by the hand, could any instance be given of such a kind of punishment so early used, and by this people; which has been in other nations, and in more modern times:

the faces of elders were not honoured; no reverence or respect were shown to elders in age or office, or on account of either; but were treated with rudeness and contempt.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Lam 5:1

¹ sn The speaking voice is now that of a choir singing the community’s lament in the first person plural. The poem is not an alphabetic acrostic like the preceding chapters but has 22 verses, the same as the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet.

² tn The basic meaning of זָכַר (zakhar) is “to remember, call to mind” (HALOT 270 s.v. I זכר). Although often used of recollection of past events, זָכַר (zakhar, “to remember”) can also describe consideration of present situations: “to consider, think about” something present (BDB 270 s.v. 5), hence “reflect on,” the most appropriate nuance here. Verses 1-6 describe the present plight of Jerusalem. The parallel requests הַבֵּיט וּרְאֵה (habbet urÿ’eh, “Look and see!”) have a present-time orientation as well. See also 2:1; 3:19-20.

³ tn Heb “Look!” Although often used in reference to visual perception, נָבַט (navat, “to look”) can also refer to cognitive consideration and mental attention shown to a situation: “to regard” (e.g., 1 Sam 16:7; 2 Kgs 3:14), “to pay attention to, consider” (e.g., Isa 22:8; Isa 51:1, 2).

⁴ tn Although normally used in reference to visual sight, רָאָה (ra’ah) is often used in reference to cognitive processes and mental observation. See the note on “Consider” at 2:20.

NET Notes: Lam 5:2

¹ tn Heb “Our inheritance”; or “Our inherited possessions/property.” The term נַחֲלָה (nakhalah) has a range of meanings: (1) “inheritance,” (2) “portion, share” and (3) “possession, property.” The land of Canaan was given by the Lord to Israel as its inheritance (Deut 4:21; 15:4; 19:10; 20:16; 21:23; 24:4; 25:19; 26:1; Josh 20:6) and distributed among the tribes, clans and families (Num 16:14; 36:2; Deut 29:7; Josh 11:23; 13:6; 14:3, 13; 17:4, 6, 14; 19:49; 23:4; Judg 18:1; Ezek 45:1; 47:22, 29). Through the family, the family provided an inheritance (property) to its children with the first-born receiving pride of position (Gen 31:14; Num 27:7-11; 36:3, 8; 1 Kgs 21:3, 4; Job 42:15; Prov 19:14; Ezek 46:16). Here, the parallelism between “our inheritance” and “our homes” would allow for the specific referent of the phrase “our inheritance” to be (1) land or (2) material possessions, or given the nature of the poetry in Lamentations, to carry both meanings at the same time.

² tn Heb “our homes [are turned over] to foreigners.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:4

¹ tn Heb “silver.” The term “silver” is a synecdoche of species (= silver) for general (= money).

² tn Heb “We drink our water for silver.”

³ tn Heb “our wood comes for a price.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:5

¹ tn Heb “We are hard-driven on our necks”

² sn For the theological allusion that goes beyond physical rest, see, e.g., Deut 12:10; 25:19; Josh 1:13; 11:23; 2 Sam 7:1, 11; 1 Chron 22:18; 2 Chron 14:6-7

NET Notes: Lam 5:6

¹ tn Heb “we have given the hand”; cf. NRSV “We have made a pact.” This is a Semitic idiom meaning “to make a treaty with” someone, placing oneself in a subservient position as vassal. The prophets criticized these treaties.

² tn Heb “bread.” The term “bread” is a synecdoche of specific (= bread) for the general (= food).

NET Notes: Lam 5:7

¹ tn Heb “fathers,” but here the term also refers to “forefathers,” i.e., more distant ancestors.

² tn Heb “and are no more.”

³ tc The Kethib is written אֲנַחְנוּ (’anakhnu, “we”) but the Qere reads וַאֲנַחְנוּ (va’anakhnu, “but we”). The Qere is supported by many medieval Hebrew mss, as well as most of the ancient versions (Aramaic Targum, Syriac Peshitta, Latin Vulgate). The ו (vav) prefixed to וַאֲנַחְנוּ (va’anakhnu) functions either in a disjunctive sense (“but”) or resultant sense (“so”).

⁴ tn Heb “so we bear.”

⁵ tn Heb “their iniquities.” The noun עָוֹן (’avon) has a broad range of meanings, including: (1) iniquity, (2) guilt of iniquity, and (3) consequence or punishment for iniquity (cause-effect metonymical relation). The context suggests that “punishment for sin” is most appropriate here (e.g., Gen 4:13; 19:15; Exod 28:38, 43; Lev 5:1, 17; 7:18; 10:17; 16:22; 17:16; 19:8; 20:17, 19; 22:16; 26:39, 41, 43; Num 5:31; 14:34; 18:1, 23; 30:15; 1 Sam 25:24; 28:10; 2 Sam 14:9; 2 Kgs 7:9; Job 10:14; Pss 31:11; 69:28; 106:43; Prov 5:22; Isa 5:18; 30:13; 40:2; 53:6, 11; 64:5, 6; Jer 51:6; Lam 4:22; 5:7; Ezek 4:4-6, 17; 7:16; 14:10; 18:19-20; 21:30, 34; 24:23; 32:27; 35:5; 39:23; 44:10, 12).

NET Notes: Lam 5:8

¹ tn Heb “slaves.” While indicating that social structures are awry, the expression “slaves rule over us” might be an idiom for “tyrants rule over us.” This might find its counterpart in the gnomic truth that the most ruthless rulers are made of former slaves: “Under three things the earth quakes, under four it cannot bear up: under a slave when he becomes king” (Prov 30:21-22a).

² tn Heb “hand.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:9

¹ tn Heb “at the cost of our lives.” The preposition ב (bet) here denotes purchase price paid (e.g., Gen 30:16; Exod 34:20; 2 Sam 3:14; 24:24) (BDB 90 s.v. בְּ 3.a). The expression בְּנַפְשֵׁנוּ (bÿnafshenu) means “at the risk of our lives.” Similar expressions include בְנַפְשׁוֹ (bÿnafsho, “at the cost of his life,” 1 Kgs 2:23; Prov 7:23) and בְּנַפְשׁוֹתָם (bÿnafshotam, “at peril of their lives,” 2 Sam 23:17).

² tn Heb “our soul.” The noun נֶפֶשׁ (nefesh, “soul”) is used as a metonymy (= soul) of association (= life) (e.g., Gen 44:30; Exod 21:23; 2 Sam 14:7; Jon 1:14).

³ tn Heb “bread.” The term “bread” is a synecdoche of specific (= bread) for the general (= food).

⁴ tn Heb “because of the sword.” The term “sword” is a metonymy of instrument (= sword) for the persons who use the instrument (= murderers or marauders).

⁵ tn Heb “the wilderness.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:10

¹ tn Heb “because of the burning heat of famine.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:11

¹ tn Heb “ravished.”

NET Notes: Lam 5:12

¹ tn Heb “elders were shown no respect.” The phrase “shown no respect” is an example of tapeinosis, a figurative expression of understatement: to show no respect to elders = to terribly mistreat elders.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:1

Remember, O LORD, what is come upon us: ^{( a )} consider, and behold our reproach.

^{( a )} This prayer as is thought, was made when some of the people were carried away captive, others such as the poorest remained, and some went into Egypt and other places for comfort, though it seems that the prophet foreseeing their miseries to come, thus prayed.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:4

We have drank our ^{( b )} water for money; our wood is sold to us.

^{( b )} Meaning their extreme servitude and bondage.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:6

We have given the ^{( c )} hand [to] the Egyptians, [and to] the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.

^{( c )} We are joined in league and amity with them, or have submitted ourselves to them.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:7

Our fathers have sinned, [and are] not; and we have borne ^{( d )} their iniquities.

^{( d )} As our fathers have been punished for their sins: so we that are guilty of the same sins are punished.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:9

We procured our bread with [the peril of] our lives because of the sword ^{( e )} of the wilderness.

^{( e )} Because of the enemy that came from the wilderness and would not suffer us to go and seek our necessary food.

Geneva Bible: Lam 5:12

Princes were hung up by ^{( f )} their hand: the faces of elders were not honoured.

^{( f )} That is, by the enemies hand.

Commentary -- Verse Range Notes

TSK Synopsis: Lam 5:1-22

1 A pitiful complaint of Zion in prayer unto God.

MHCC: Lam 5:1-16

Is any afflicted? Let him pray; and let him in prayer pour out his complaint to God. The people of God do so here; they complain not of evils feared, but of evils felt. If penitent and patient under what we suffer for the sins of our fathers, we may expect that He who punishes, will return in mercy to us. They acknowledge, Woe unto us that we have sinned! All our woes are owing to our own sin and folly. Though our sins and God's just displeasure cause our sufferings, we may hope in his pardoning mercy, his sanctifying grace, and his kind providence. But the sins of a man's whole life will be punished with vengeance at last, unless he obtains an interest in Him who bare our sins in his own body on the tree.

Matthew Henry: Lam 5:1-16

Is any afflicted? let him pray; and let him in prayer pour out his complaint to God, and make known before him his trouble. The people of God do so here; being overwhelmed with grief, they give vent to their sorrows at the footstool of the throne of grace, and so give themselves ease. They complain not of evils feared, but of evils felt: " Remember what has come upon us, Lam 5:1. What was of old threatened against us, and was long in the coming, has now at length come upon us, and we are ready to sink under it. Remember what is past, consider and behold what is present, and let not all the trouble we are in seem little to thee, and not worth taking notice of,"Neh 9:32. Note, As it is a great comfort to us, so it ought to be a sufficient one, in our troubles, that God sees, and considers, and remembers, all that has come upon us; and in our prayers we need only to recommend our case to his gracious and compassionate consideration. The one word in which all their grievances are summer up is reproach: Consider, and behold our reproach. The troubles they were in compared with their former dignity and plenty, were a greater reproach to them than they would have been to any other people, especially considering their relation to God and dependence upon him, and his former appearances for them; and therefore this they complain of very sensibly, because, as it was a reproach, it reflected upon the name and honour of that God who had owned them for his people. And what wilt thou do unto thy great name?

I. They acknowledge the reproach of sin which they bear, the reproach of their youth (which Ephraim bemoans himself for, Jer 31:19), of the early days of their nation. This comes in in the midst of their complaints (Lam 5:7), but may well be put in the front of them: Our fathers have sinned and are not; they are dead and gone, but we have borne their iniquities. This is not here a peevish complaint, nor an imputation of unrighteousness to God, like that which we have, Jer 31:29, Eze 18:2. The fathers did eat sour grapes, and the children's teeth are set on edge, and therefore the ways of the Lord are not equal. But it is a penitent confession of the sins of their ancestors, which they themselves also had persisted in, for which they now justly suffered; the judgments God brought upon them were so very great that it appeared that God had in them an eye to the sins of their ancestors (because they had not been remarkably punished in this world) as well as to their own sins; and thus God was justified both in his connivance at their ancestors (he laid up their iniquity for their children ) and in his severity with them, on whom he visited that iniquity, Mat 23:35, Mat 23:36. Thus they do here, 1. Submit themselves to the divine justice: "Lord, thou art just in all that is brought upon us, for we are a seed of evil doers, children of wrath, and heirs of the curse; we are sinful, and we have it by kind."Note, The sins which God looks back upon in punishing we must look back upon in repenting, and must take notice of all that which will help to justify God in correcting us. 2. They refer themselves to the divine pity: "Lord, our fathers have sinned, and we justly smart for their sins; but they are not; they were taken away from the evil to come; they lived not to see and share in these miseries that have come upon us, and we are left to bear their iniquities. Now, though herein God is righteous, yet it must be owned that our case is pitiable, and worthy of compassion."Note, If we be penitent and patient under what we suffer for the sins of our fathers, we may expect that he who punishes will pity, and will soon return in mercy to us.

II. They represent the reproach of trouble which they bear, in divers particulars, which tend much to their disgrace.

1. They are disseised of that good land which God gave them, and their enemies have got possession of it, Lam 5:2. Canaan was their inheritance; it was theirs by promise. God gave it to them and their seed, and they held it by grant from his crown, (Psa 136:21, Psa 136:22); but now, "It is turned to strangers; those possess it who have no right to it, who are strangers to the commonwealth of Israel and aliens from the covenants of promise; they dwell in the houses that we built, and this is our reproach."It is the happiness of all God's spiritual Israel that the heavenly Canaan is an inheritance that they cannot be disseised of, that shall never be turned to strangers.

2. Their state and nation are brought into a condition like that of widows and orphans (Lam 5:3): " We are fatherless (that is, helpless); we have none to protect us, to provide for us, to take any care of us. Our king, who is the father of the country, is cut off; nay, God our Father seems to have forsaken us and cast us off; our mothers, our cities, that were as fruitful mothers in Israel, are now as widows, are as wives whose husbands are dead, destitute of comfort, and exposed to wrong and injury, and this is our reproach; for we who made a figure are now looked on with contempt."

3. They are put hard to it to provide necessaries for themselves and their families, whereas once they lived in abundance and had plenty of every thing. Water used to be free and easily come by, but now (Lam 5:4), We have drunk our water for money, and the saying is no longer true, Usus communis aquarum - Water is free to all. So hardly did their oppressors use them that they could not have a draught of fair water but they must purchase it either with money or with work. Formerly they had fuel too for the fetching; but now, " Our wood is sold to us, and we pay dearly for every faggot."Now were they punished for employing their children to gather wood for fire with which to bake cakes for the queen of heaven, Jer 7:18. They were perfectly proscribed by their oppressors, were forbidden the use both of fire and water, according to the ancient form, Interdico tibi aqua et igni - I forbid thee the use of water and fire. But what must they do for bread? Truly that was as hard to come at as any thing, for (1.) Some of them sold their liberty for it (Lam 5:6): " We have given the hand to the Egyptians and to the Assyrians, have made the best bargain we could with them, to serve them, that we might be satisfied with bread. We were glad to submit to the meanest employment, upon the hardest terms, to get a sorry livelihood; we have yielded ourselves to be their vassals, have parted with all to them, as the Egyptians did to Pharaoh in the years of famine, that we might have something for ourselves and families to subsist on."The neighbouring nations used to trade with Judah for wheat (Eze 27:17), for it was a fruitful land; but now it eats up the inhabitants, and they are glad to make court to the Egyptians and Assyrians. (2.) Others of them ventured their lives for it (Lam 5:9): We got our bread with the peril of our lives; when, being straitened by the siege and all provisions cut off, they either sallied or stole out of the city, to fetch in some supply, they were in danger of falling into the hands of the besiegers and being put to the sword, the sword of the wilderness it is called, or of the plain (for so the word signifies), the besiegers lying dispersed every where in the plains that were about the city. Let us take occasion hence to bless God for the plenty that we enjoy, that we get our bread so easily, scarcely with the sweat of our face, much less with the peril of our lives; and for the peace we enjoy, that we can go out, and enjoy not only the necessary productions, but the pleasures of the country, without any fear of the sword of the wilderness.

4. Those are brought into slavery who were a free people, and not only their own masters, but masters of all about them, and this is as much as any thing their reproach (Lam 5:5): Our necks are under the grievous and intolerable yoke of persecution (the iron yoke which Jeremiah foretold should be laid upon them, Jer 28:14); we are used like beasts in the yoke, that wholly serve their owners, and are at the command of their drivers. That which aggravated the servitude was, (1.) That their labours were incessant, like those of Israel in Egypt, who were daily tasked, nay, overtasked: We labour and have no rest, neither leave nor leisure to rest. The oxen in the yoke are unyoked at night and have rest; so they have, by a particular provision of the law, on the sabbath day; but the poor captives in Babylon, who were compelled to work for their living, laboured and had no rest, no night's rest, no sabbath-rest; they were quite tired out with continual toil. (2.) That their masters were insufferable (Lam 5:8): Servants have ruled over us; and nothing is more vexatious than a servant when he reigns, Pro 30:22. They were not only the great men of the Chaldeans that commanded them, but even the meanest of their servants abused them at pleasure, and insulted over them; and they must be at their beck too. The curse of Canaan had now become the doom of Judah: A servant of servants shall he be. They would not be ruled by their God, and by his servants the prophets, whose rule was gentle and gracious, and therefore justly are they ruled with rigour by their enemies and their servants. (3.) That they saw no probable way for the redress of their grievances: " There is none that doth deliver us out of their hand; not only none to rescue us out of our captivity, but none to check and restrain the insolence of the servants that abuse us and trample upon us,"which one would think their masters should have done, because it was a usurpation of their authority; but, it should seem, they connived at it and encouraged it, and, as if they were not worthy of the correction of gentlemen, they are turned over to the footmen to be spurned by them. Well might they pray, Lord, consider and behold our reproach.

5. Those who used to be feasted are now famished (Lam 5:10): Our skin was black like an oven, dried and parched too, because of the terrible famine, the storms of famine (so the word is); for, though famine comes gradually upon a people, yet it comes violently, and bears down all before it, and there is no resisting it; and this also is their disgrace; hence we read of the reproach of famine, which in captivity their received among the heathen, Eze 36:30.

6. All sorts of people, even those whose persons and characters were most inviolable, were abused and dishonoured. (1.) The women were ravished, even the women in Zion, that holy mountain, Lam 5:11. The committing of such abominable wickednesses there is very justly and sadly complained of. (2.) The great men were not only put to death, but put to ignominious deaths. Princes were hanged, as if they had been slaves, by the hands of the Chaldeans (Lam 5:12), who took a pride in doing this barbarous execution with their own hands. Some think that the dead bodies of the princes, after they were slain with the sword, were hung up, as the bodies of Saul's sons, in disgrace to them, and as it were to expiate the nation's guilt. (3.) No respect was shown to magistrates and those in authority: The faces of elders, elders in age, elders in office, were not honoured. This will be particularly remembered against the Chaldeans another day. Isa 47:6, Upon the ancient hast thou very heavily laid thy yoke. (4.) The tenderness of youth was no more considered than the gravity of old age (Lam 5:13): They took the young men to grind at the hand-mills, nay, perhaps at the horse-mills. The young men have carried the grist (so some), have carried the mill, or mill-stones, so others. They loaded them as if they had been beasts of burden, and so broke their backs while they were young, and made the rest of their lives the more miserable. Nay, they made the little children carry their wood home for fuel, and laid such burdens upon them that they fell down under them, so very inhuman were these cruel taskmasters!

7. An end was put to all their gladness, and their joy was quite extinguished (Lam 5:14): The young men, who used to be disposed to mirth, have ceased from their music, have hung their harps upon the willow-trees. It does indeed well become old men to cease from their music; it is time to lay it by with a gracious contempt when all the daughters of music are brought low; but it speaks some great calamity upon a people when their young men are made to cease from it. It was so with the body of the people (Lam 5:15): The joy of their heart ceased; they never knew what joy was since the enemy came in upon them like a flood, for ever since deep called unto deep, and one wave flowed in upon the neck of another, so that they were quite overwhelmed: Our dance is turned into mourning, instead of leaping for joy, as formerly, we sink and lie down in sorrow. This may refer especially to the joy of their solemn feasts, and the dancing used in them (Jdg 21:21), which was not only modest, but sacred, dancing; this was turned into mourning, which was doubled on their festival days, in remembrance of their former pleasant things.

8. An end was put to all their glory. (1.) The public administration of justice was their glory, but that was gone: The elders have ceased from the gate (Lam 5:14); the course of justice, which used to run down like a river, is now stopped; the courts of justice, which used to be kept with so much solemnity, are put down; for the judges are slain, or carried captive. (2.) The royal dignity was their glory, but that also was gone: The crown has fallen from our head, not only the king himself fallen into disgrace, but the crown; he has no successor; the regalia are all lost. Note, Earthly crowns are fading falling things; but, blessed be God, there is a crown of glory that fades not away, that never falls, a kingdom that cannot be moved. Upon this complaint, but with reference to all the foregoing complaints, they make that penitent acknowledgment, " Woe unto us that we have sinned! Alas for us! Our case is very deplorable, and it is all owing to ourselves; we are undone, and, which aggravates the matter, we are undone by our own hands. God is righteous, for we have sinned. "Note, All our woes are owing to our own sin and folly. If the crown of our head be fallen (for so the words run), if we lose our excellency and become mean, we may thank ourselves, we have by our own iniquity profaned our crown and laid our honour in the dust.

Keil-Delitzsch: Lam 5:1-7

Supplication and statement regarding the distress. The quest made in Lam 5:1 refers to the oppression depicted in what follows. The words, "Remember, O Lord, what hath happened (i.e., befallen) us," are more fully explained in the second member, "Look and behold our disgrace." It is quite arbitrary in Thenius to refer the first member to the past, the second to the present, described in what follows, Lam 5:12-16. The Qeri הבּיטה is an unnecessary alteration, after Lam 1:11; Lam 3:63. - With Lam 5:2 begins the description of the disgrace that has befallen them. This consists, first of all, in the fact that their inheritance has become the possession of strangers. Rosenmüller rightly explains נחלה to mean, terra quae tuo nobis dono quandam est concessa . נחפך is used of the transference of the property to others, as in Isa 60:5. Many expositors would refer בּתּינוּ to the houses in Jerusalem which the Chaldeans had not destroyed, on the ground that it is stated, in 2Ki 25:9 and Jer 52:13, that the Chaldeans destroyed none but large houses. There is no foundation, however, for this restriction; moreover, it is opposed by the parallel נחלתנוּ . Just as by נחלה we are to understand, not merely the possession of Jerusalem, but of the whole country, so also בּתּינוּ are the dwelling-houses of the country in towns and villages; in this case, the question whether any houses still remained standing in Jerusalem does not demand consideration at all. Nägelsbach is wrong in his remark that נחלה and בּתּים respectively mean immovable and portable property, for houses are certainly not moveable property.

Lam 5:3

Lam 5:3 is very variously interpreted by modern expositors. Ewald and Vaihinger understand "father" as meaning the king, while Thenius refers it specially to Zedekiah; the "mothers," according to Ewald and Vaihinger, are the cities of Judah, while Thenius thinks they are the women of Zedekiah's harem. But to call the women of the royal harem "mothers" of the nation, would be as unexampled as the attribution of the title to the cities of Judah. The second clause, "our mothers are like widows," contains a simile: they are not really widows, but like widows, because they have lost the protection which the mother of a family has in her husband. In like manner, the first clause also is to be understood as a comparison. "We are fatherless orphans," i.e., we are like such, as the Chaldee has paraphrased it. Accordingly, C. B. Michaelis, Pareau, Rosenmüller, Kalkschmidt, and Gerlach have rightly explained the words as referring to the custom of the Hebrews: hominies omni modo derelictos omnibusque praesidiis destitutos, pupillos et viduas dicere ; cf. Psa 94:6; Isa 1:17; Jam 1:27.

Lam 5:4

And not merely are the inhabitants of Judah without land and property, and deprived of all protection, like orphans and widows; they are also living in penury and want, and (Lam 5:5) under severe oppression and persecution. Water and wood are mentioned in Lam 5:4 as the greatest necessities of life, without which it is impossible to exist. Both of these they must buy for themselves, because the country, with its waters and forests, is in the possession of the enemy. The emphasis lies on " our water... our wood." What they formerly had, as their own property, for nothing, they must now purchase. We must reject the historical interpretations of the words, and their application to the distress of the besieged (Michaelis); or to the exiles who complained of the dearness of water and wood in Egypt (Ewald); or to those who fled before the Chaldeans, and lived in waste places (Thenius); or to the multitudes of those taken prisoner after the capture of Jerusalem, who were so closely watched that they could not go where they liked to get water and wood, but were obliged to go to their keepers for permission, and pay dearly for their services (Nägelsbach). The purchase of water and wood can scarcely be taken literally, but must be understood as signifying that the people had to pay heavy duties for the use of the water and the wood which the country afforded.

Lam 5:5

"On our necks we are persecuted," i.e., our persecutors are at our necks, - are always close behind us, to drive or hunt us on. It is inadmissible to supply any specific mention of the yoke ( imposito collo gravi servitutis jugo , Raschi, Rosenmüller, Vaihinger, etc.); and we must utterly reject the proposal to connect "our neck" with Lam 5:4 (lxx, Syriac, J. D. Michaelis), inasmuch as the symmetry of the verses is thereby destroyed, nor is any suitable meaning obtained. "We are jaded: no rest is granted us." הוּנח is Hophal of הניח , to give rest to. The Qeri ולא instead of לא is quite as unnecessary as in the case of אין , Lam 5:3, and אינם and אנחנוּ in Lam 5:7. The meaning of the verse is not, "we are driven over neck and head," according to which the subject treated of would be the merciless treatment of the prisoners, through their being driven on (Nägelsbach); still less is it meant to be stated that the company to which the writer of the poem belonged was always tracked out, and hunted about in the waste places where they wished to hide themselves (Thenius). Neither of these interpretations suits the preceding and succeeding context. Nor does the mention of being "persecuted on the neck" necessarily involve a pursuit of fugitives: it merely indicates incessant oppression on the side of the enemy, partly through continually being goaded on to hard labour, partly through annoyances of different kinds, by which the victors made their supremacy and their pride felt by the vanquished nation. In רדף there is contained neither the notion of tracking fugitives nor that of driving on prisoners.

Lam 5:6

The meaning of נתן is more exactly defined by the superadded לשׂבּע לחם , which belongs to both members of the verse. "In order to satisfy ourselves with bread (so as to prolong our lives), we give the hand to Egypt, to Assyria." מצרים and אשּׁוּר are local accusatives. To give the hand is a sign of submission or subjection; see on Jer 50:15. Pareau has correctly given the meaning thus: si victum nobis comparare velimus, vel Judaea nobis relinquenda est atque Aegyptii sunt agnoscendi domini, vel si hic manemus, Chaldaeis victoribus nos subjiciamus necesse est; quocunque nos vertamus, nihil superest nisi tristissima servitus . This complaint shows, moreover, that it is those in Judea who are speaking. נתנּוּ , "we give the hand," shows that the assumption of Thenius, - that the writer here brings to remembrance the fate of two other companies of his fellow-countrymen who were not carried away into exile, - -is an arbitrary insertion. Asshur , as the name of the great Asiatic empire, stands for Babylon, as in Ezr 6:22, cf. Jer 2:18.

Lam 5:7

"We suffer more than we are guilty of; we are compelled to bear the iniquities of our fathers," i.e., to atone for their guilt. There is a great truth contained in the words, "Our fathers have sinned; they are no more; we bear their iniquities (or guilt)." For the fall of the kingdom had not been brought about by the guilt of that generation merely, and of none before; it was due also to the sins of their fathers before them, in previous generations. The same truth is likewise expressed in Jer 16:11; Jer 32:18; and in 2Ki 23:26 it is stated that God did not cease from His great wrath because of the sins of Manasseh. But this truth would be perverted into error, if we were to understand the words as intimating that the speakers had considered themselves innocent. This false view, however, they themselves opposed with the confession in Lam 5:16, "for we have sinned;" thereby they point out their own sins as the cause of their misfortune. If we compare this confession with the verse now before us, this can only mean the following: "The misfortune we suffer has not been incurred by ourselves alone, but we are compelled to atone for the sins of our fathers also." In the same way, too, Jeremiah (Jer 16:11) threatens the infliction of a penal judgment, not merely "because your fathers have forsaken me (the Lord)," but he also adds, "and ye do still worse than your fathers." God does not punish the sins of the fathers in innocent children, but in children who continue the sins of the fathers; cf. Isa 65:7, and the explanation given of Jer 31:29 and Eze 18:2. The design with which the suffering for the sins of the fathers is brought forward so prominently, and with such feeling, is merely to excite the divine compassion for those who are thus chastised.

Keil-Delitzsch: Lam 5:8-16

Further description of the miserable condition under which the congregation languishes. Lam 5:8. "Servants rule over us," etc. עבדים are not the Chaldean soldiers, who are in 2Ki 24:10 designated the servants of Nebuchadnezzar (Pareau, Rosenmüller, Maurer); still less the Chaldeans, in so far as they, till shortly before, had been the subjects of the Assyrians (Kalkschmidt); nor the Chaldean satraps, as servants of the king of Babylon (Thenius, Ewald); nor even "slaves who had been employed as overseers and taskmasters of the captives while on the march" (Nägelsbach); but the Chaldeans. These are called servants, partly because of the despotic rule under which they were placed, partly in the sense already indicated by C. B. Michaelis, as being those qui nobis potius, si pii fuissemus, servire debuissent , in accordance with the analogous designation of Jerusalem as a princess among the countries of the world, Lam 1:1.

Lam 5:9

And in addition to this humiliation under dishonourable servitude, we can get our daily bread only at the risk of our life. Thus there is fulfilled to them the threatening in Deu 28:28, "Ye shall be servants among your enemies, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and want of everything." בּנפשׁנוּ , "for the price of our soul," i.e., with our life at stake, we bring in our bread. The danger is more exactly described by what is added: "before the sword of the wilderness." By this expression are meant the predatory Bedouins of the desert, who, falling upon those that were bringing in the bread, plundered, and probably even killed them. The bringing of the bread is not, however, to be referred (with Rosenmüller, Maurer, and Kalkschmidt) to the attempts made to procure bread from the neighbouring countries; still less is it to be referred (with Thenius, Ewald, and Nägelsbach) to the need for "wringing the bread from the desert and its plunderers;" but it refers to the ingathering of the scanty harvest in the country devastated by war and by the visitations of predatory Bedouins: הביא is the word constantly employed in this connection; cf. 2Sa 9:10; Hag 1:6.

Lam 5:10

The bread which we are thus obliged to struggle for, at the risk of our life, is not even sufficient to allay hunger, which consumes our bodies. נכמר does not mean to be blackened (Chaldee, Kimchi, C. B. Michaelis, Maurer), but in Gen 43:30; 1Ki 3:26, and Hos 11:8, to be stirred up (of the bowels, compassion), hence to kindle, glow. This last meaning is required by the comparison with תּנּוּר , oven, furnace. This comparison does not mean cutis nostra tanquam fornace adusta est (Gesenius in Thes ., Kalkschmidt), still less "black as an oven" (Dietrich in Ges. Lex .), because תּנּוּר does not mean the oven viewed in respect of its blackness, but (from נוּר ) in respect of the fire burning in it. The meaning is, "our skin glows like a baker's oven" (Vaihinger, Thenius, Nägelsbach, Gerlach), - a strong expression for the fever-heat produced by hunger. As to זלעפות , glowing heat, see on Psa 11:6.

Lam 5:11-12

With this must further be considered the maltreatment which persons of every station, sex, and age have to endure. Lam 5:11. Women and virgins are dishonoured in Jerusalem, and in the other cities of the land. Lam 5:12. Princes are suspended by the hand of the enemy (Ewald, contrary to the use of language, renders "along with" them). To hang those who had been put to death was something superadded to the simple punishment by death (Deu 21:22.), and so far as a shameful kind of execution. "The old men are not honoured," i.e., dishonoured; cf. Lam 4:16; Lev 19:32. The words are not to be restricted to the events mentioned in Jer 39:6, but also apply to the present condition of those who are complaining,

Lam 5:13-14

Youths and boys are forced to engage in heavy servile work. טחון נשׂאוּ does not mean "they take them for the mill," ad molendum sumpserunt (Ewald, Rosenmüller). Apart from the consideration that there is no ground for it in the language employed, such a view of the words does not accord with the parallelism. נשׂא , construed with a simple infinitive or accusative (without ל ), does not mean "to take for something." טחון is a substantive, "the mill." "To bear (carry) the mill" signifies to work at and with the mill. We must think of the hand-mill, which was found in every household, and which could thus be carried from one place to another. Grinding was the work of salves; see on Jdg 16:21. The carrying of the mill (not merely of the upper millstone) is mentioned as the heaviest portion of the work in grinding. "Boys stagger (fall down) on the wood laid on them to be carried," i.e., under the burden of it. כּשׁל with בּ means to stumble on something; here בּ denotes the cause of the stumbling; cf. Jer 6:21; Lev 26:37. It is arbitrary to understand עץ as meaning the wooden handle of the mill (Aben Ezra, and Bochart in Hieroz . i. 157, ed. Rosenmüller); the same must also be said regarding the opinion of Thenius and Nägelsbach, who refer the words to the dragging of the hand-mills, and of the wood necessary for baking bread for the comfort of the soldiers, on the march of the captives to Babylon.

Lam 5:15-16

Under the pressure of such circumstances, all public meetings and amusements have ceased. "The elders cease from the fate." The gate was the place of assembly for the people, not merely for deliberating upon public affairs (Rth 4:15; Jos 20:4), but also "for social entertainment (since there were no refreshment-rooms, coffeehouses, and public baths, such as are now to be found in the East), or even for quiet enjoyment in looking at the motley multitude of passers-by; Gen 19:1; 1Sa 4:18; 1Sa 9:18; Job 29:7" (Winer's Bibl. R.W.B. s.v. Thor ). That the gate is here to be regarded as a place of entertainment and amusement, is shown by the parallel member, "young men cease from their instrumental music;" cf. Lam 1:4. On Lam 5:15, cf. Jer 7:34; Jer 16:9, and Jer 31:13; Psa 30:12. Lastly, in Lam 5:16, the writer sums up the whole of the misery in the complaint, "The crown of our head is fallen! woe unto us, for we have sinned," i.e., we suffer the punishment for our sins. "The fallen crown can only be a figurative expression for the honourable position of the people in its entirety, but which is now lost." Such is the view which Ewald rightly takes; on the other hand, the interpretation of Thenius, that "the 'crown of our head' is nothing else than Zion, together with its palaces, placed on Jerusalem, as it were on the head [of the country], and adorning it," deserves mention simply as a curious specimen of exegetical fancy. Nägelsbach has gone too far in restricting the figurative expression to the crown of Jerusalem, which consists in her being mistress among the nations, a princess among the regions of the earth (Lam 1:1), the perfection of beauty, and the joy of the whole earth (Lam 2:15); for "our crown" is not equivalent to Jerusalem, or a crown on the head of Jerusalem.

Constable: Lam 5:1-22

V. The response of the godly (the fifth lament) ch. 5

This poem, like the one in chapter 3, contains verses of only two lines each. It is the only non-acrostic chapter in the book, though like chapters 1, 2, and 4, it consists of 22 verses. The doleful qinah meter is also absent in this chapter giving it a somewhat more positive tone. However, 45 words end in u (in all verses except 19), which gives the chapter a rather mournful tone when read aloud in Hebrew.

The chapter is more of a prayer than a lament, though its content focuses on the pitiful condition of the Judahites because of Jerusalem's fall.

"The best fruit of anyone's mourning is his praying to God."⁵⁵

Jeremiah's prayer, which he voiced for his people, contains two petitions, namely, that God would remember the plight of His people (vv. 1-18) and that He would restore them to their promised covenant blessings (vv. 19-22; cf. Deut. 30:1-11).

"The chapter comprises a confession of sin [v. 16] and a recognition of the abiding sovereignty of God [v. 19]."⁵⁶

Constable: Lam 5:1-18

A. A plea for remembrance 5:1-18

5:1 Jeremiah called on Yahweh to remember the calamity that had befallen His people and to consider the reproach in which they now lived (cf. 3:34-36). The humbled condition of the Judahites reflected poorly on the Lord because the pagans would have concluded that He was unable to keep His people strong and prosperous. The implication was that if Yahweh remembered His people He would act to deliver them (cf. Exod. 2:24-25; 3:7-8).

5:2 The Promised Land, Yahweh's inheritance to His people, had passed over to the control of non-Israelites (Jer. 40:10; 41:3). Their homes also had become the property of alien people (cf. Ezek. 35:10).

5:3 Because the Lord no longer protected and provided for the people they had become virtual orphans. They had lost their rights as well as their property. Jewish men had become defenseless, and Jewish mothers had become as vulnerable as widows having lost their protection.

5:4-5 The extent of their oppression was evident in their having to purchase water and firewood, commodities that were normally free. The Judahites' enemies were trying to squeeze the life out of them (cf. Josh. 10:24; Isa. 51:23). They had worn them out with their heavy demands and taxes (cf. Deut. 28:65-67; Ezek. 5:2, 12).

5:6 Even to get enough food to live the people had to appeal to Egypt and Assyria for help. This may refer to Judah's earlier alliances with these nations that proved futile (cf. Ezek. 16:26-28; 23:12, 21). But probably the writer used Assyria as a surrogate for Babylonia (cf. Jer. 2:18). Judah could no longer provide for herself but had to beg help from her Gentile enemies.

5:7 The present generation of Judeans was bearing the punishment for the sins that their fathers, who had long since died, had initiated. They had continued and increased the sins of their fathers. Jeremiah rejected the idea that God was punishing his generation solely because of the sins of former generations (Jer. 31:29-30). His contemporaries had brought the apostasy of earlier generations to its worst level, and now they were reaping its results.

5:8 Even slaves among the oppressors were dominating God's people, and there was no one to deliver them. Only the poorest of the Judahites remained in the land following the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C., but even the lowest classes of Chaldeans were dominating them.

"Israel, once a kingdom of priests' (Exod. 19:6), is become like Canaan, a servant of servants,' according to the curse (Gen. 9:25). The Chaldeans were designed to be servants' of Shem, being descended from Ham (Gen. 9:26). Now through the Jews' sin, their positions are reversed."⁵⁷

5:9-10 It had become life-threatening for the Judahites even to secure essential food because their enemies tried to kill them when they traveled to obtain bread. Famine had resulted in fever that had given the peoples' skin a scorched appearance.⁵⁸

5:11-12 The enemy had raped the women and girls in Jerusalem and Judah. Respected princes had experienced the most humiliating deaths, and the enemy gave no respect to Judah's elderly. Since Nebuchadnezzar evidently did not torture his victims (cf. Jer. 52:10-11, 24-27), it may be that the Chaldeans strung up the princes by their hands after they had died to dishonor them (cf. Deut. 21:22-23).⁵⁹

5:13-14 Young men had to grind grain like animals (cf. Judg. 16:21), and small children buckled under the loads of firewood that the enemy forced them to carry. Elders no longer sat at the town gates dispensing wisdom and justice, and young men no longer played music bringing joy and happiness into the people's lives. These were marks of the disappearance of peaceful and prosperous community living.

5:15 Joy had left the hearts of the people, and they mourned so sadly that they could not bring themselves to dance. The eventual result of sin is the absence of joy.

5:16 God's blessing and authority, symbolized by a crown, had departed from the head of the nation. All these characteristics marked the nation because it had sinned against Yahweh. She suffered under His judgment.

5:17-18 Divine judgment had demoralized and devastated the people. Wild foxes or jackals prowled on now desolate Mount Zion, which formerly had been full of people and the site of many joyful celebrations.

Introduction / Outline

JFB: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

In the Hebrew Bible these Elegies of Jeremiah, five in number, are placed among the Chetuvim, or "Holy Writings" ("the Psalms," &c., Luk 24:44), between Ruth and Ecclesiastes. But though in classification of compositions it belongs to the Chetuvim, it probably followed the prophecies of Jeremiah originally. For thus alone can we account for the prophetical books being enumerated by JOSEPHUS [Against Apion, 1.1.8] as thirteen: he must have reckoned Jeremiah and Lamentations as one book, as also Judges and Ruth, the two books of Samuel, &c., Ezra and Nehemiah. The Lamentations naturally follow the book which sets forth the circumstances forming the subject of the Elegies. Similar lamentations occur in 2Sa 1:19, &c.; 2Sa 3:33. The Jews read it in their synagogues on the ninth of the month Ab, which is a fast for the destruction of their holy city. As in 2Ch 35:25, "lamentations" are said to have been "written" by Jeremiah on the death of Josiah, besides it having been made "an ordinance in Israel" that "singing women" should "speak" of that king in lamentations; JOSEPHUS [Antiquities, 10.5.1], JEROME, &c., thought that they are contained in the present collection. But plainly the subject here is the overthrow of the Jewish city and people, as the Septuagint expressly states in an introductory verse to their version. The probability is that there is embodied in these Lamentations much of the language of Jeremiah's original Elegy on Josiah, as 2Ch 35:25 states; but it is now applied to the more universal calamity of the whole state, of which Josiah's sad death was the forerunner. Thus Lam 4:20, originally applied to Josiah, was "written," in its subsequent reference, not so much of him, as of the throne of Judah in general, the last representative of which, Zedekiah, had just been carried away. The language, which is true of good Josiah, is too strong in favor of Zedekiah, except when viewed as representative of the crown in general. It was natural to embody the language of the Elegy on Josiah in the more general lamentations, as his death was the presage of the last disaster that overthrew the throne and state.

The title more frequently given by the Jews to these Elegies is, "How" (Hebrew, Eechah), from the first word, as the Pentateuch is similarly called by the first Hebrew word of Gen 1:1. The Septuagint calls it "Lamentations," from which we derive the name. It refers not merely to the events which occurred at the capture of the city, but to the sufferings of the citizens (the penalty of national sin) from the very beginning of the siege; and perhaps from before it, under Manasseh and Josiah (2Ch 33:11; 2Ch 35:20-25); under Jehoahaz, Jehoiakim, and Zedekiah (2Ch 36:3-4, 2Ch 36:6-7, 2Ch 36:10-11, &c.). LOWTH says, "Every letter is written with a tear, every word the sound of a broken heart." The style is midway between the simple elevation of prophetic writing and the loftier rhythm of Moses, David, and Habakkuk. Terse conciseness marks the Hebrew original, notwithstanding Jeremiah's diffuseness in his other writings. The Elegies are grouped in stanzas as they arose in his mind, without any artificial system of arrangement as to the thoughts. The five Elegies are acrostic: each is divided into twenty-two stanzas or verses. In the first three Elegies the stanzas consist of triplets of lines (excepting Lam 1:7; Lam 2:19, which contain each four lines) each beginning with the letters of the Hebrew alphabet in regular order (twenty-two in number). In three instances (Lam 2:16-17; Lam 3:46-51; Lam 4:16-17) two letters are transposed. In the third Elegy, each line of the three forming every stanza begins with the same letter. The stanzas in the fourth and fifth Elegies consist of two lines each. The fifth Elegy, though having twenty-two stanzas (the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet), just as the first four, yet is not alphabetical; and its lines are shorter than those of the others, which are longer than are found in other Hebrew poems, and contain twelve syllables, marked by a cæsura about the middle, dividing them into two somewhat unequal parts. The alphabetical arrangement was adopted originally to assist the memory. GROTIUS thinks the reason for the inversion of two of the Hebrew letters in Lam 2:16-17; Lam 3:46-51; Lam 4:16-17, is that the Chaldeans, like the Arabians, used a different order from the Hebrews; in the first Elegy, Jeremiah speaks as a Hebrew, in the following ones, as one subject to the Chaldeans. This is doubtful.

JFB: Lamentations (Outline)

• THE SAD CAPTURE OF JERUSALEM, THE HOPE OF RESTORATION, AND THE RETRIBUTION AWAITING IDUMEA FOR JOINING BABYLON AGAINST JUDEA. (Lam. 4:1-22)
• EPIPHONEMA, OR A CLOSING RECAPITULATION OF THE CALAMITIES TREATED IN THE PREVIOUS ELEGIES. (Lam. 5:1-22) (Psa 89:50-51).

TSK: Lamentations 5 (Chapter Introduction)

Overview

Lam 5:1, A pitiful complaint of Zion in prayer unto God.

Poole: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH

THE ARGUMENT

This book in Greek, Latin, and English hath its name from the subject matter of it, which is lamentation; so also amongst the Hebrew writers; but in the Hebrew it hath its name from the first word of the book, as also the five books of Moses have.

That it was wrote by Jeremiah none can reasonably question, because in the Hebrew it is styled, The Book of Jeremiah.

There is little controversy about the time or occasion of the writing of it. That the occasion was the miseries of the people, by reason of the famine, sword, and captivity, is evident to those that read any part of it; but whether they were those miseries which began with the death of Josiah, and held on till the city was taken, which was two and twenty or three and twenty years after, or those only which began with the siege and followed on many years, hath been doubted by some. That Jeremiah lamented for Josiah, and all the singing men and singing women spake of Josiah in their lamentations, is plain from 2Ch 35:25 . But that these were the forms they used, or that they were composed upon that sad account, appeareth not; and the miseries which the prophet mentioneth befell not the people in the time of Josiah, but during the siege, more than twenty years after Josiah’ s death. Nor is there any thing which looks like a lamentation for Josiah through the whole book, unless Jer 4:20 , which (as we shall show) may also be fairly interpreted of Zedekiah. Some think that Jeremiah began to write them upon the death of Josiah, and continued his style to the time of the captivity, setting down all the miseries the people suffered all along that time.

The scope of the writing as to those whom it immediately concerned is plain and obvious, viz. to affect the people with those judgments which came upon them for their sins: as to us, (upon whom the ends of the world are come,) to mind us to take heed of their sins, lest we be sharers in their plagues.

The book is made up of complaints of their lamentable condition, petitions unto God for mercy, and prophecies both of their better estate and the ruin of their enemies.

In the four first chapters are several alphabets of letters beginning the several verses, each verse beginning with a new letter, only La 3 , every three verses begin with a new letter; the mystery of which we do not understand, nor possibly was there any mystery intended in it, only the chapters were so composed for the advantage of our memories.

The whole book lets us see from what a height of dignity to what a depth of misery sin may bring nations, how much soever interested in God; and likewise directs us to our duty in such states of affliction and misery if we would obtain mercy.

Poole: Lamentations 5 (Chapter Introduction)

CHAPTER 5

A humble prayer, presenting to the Lord their great misery, Lam 5:1-15 , confessing their sins, Lam 5:16-18 , imploring deliverance, Lam 5:19-22 .

It hath been before observed, that it is very frequent in Scripture to express those acts which are reasonably consequent to the exercise of our exterior or interior senses, by terms which signify the exercise of those senses. That which the prophet here prayeth for is God’ s freeing the Jews from those calamities which oppressed them; this he prayeth for under the notion of God’ s remembering them, and beholding their reproach.

MHCC: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

It is evident that Jeremiah was the author of the Lamentations which bear his name. The book was not written till after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Chaldeans. May we be led to consider sin as the cause of all our calamities, and under trials exercise submission, repentance, faith, and prayer, with the hope of promised deliverance through God's mercy.

MHCC: Lamentations 5 (Chapter Introduction)

The Jewish nation supplicating the Divine favour.

Matthew Henry: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

An Exposition, with Practical Observations, of The Lamentations of Jeremiah

Since what Solomon says, though contrary to the common opinion of the world, is certainly true, that sorrow is better than laughter, and it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting, we should come to the reading and consideration of the melancholy chapters of this book, not only willingly, but with an expectation to edify ourselves by them; and, that we may do this, we must compose ourselves to a holy sadness and resolve to weep with the weeping prophet. Let us consider, I. The title of this book; in the Hebrew it has one, but is called (as the books of Moses are) from the first word Ecah - How; but the Jewish commentators call it, as the Greeks do, and we from them, Kinoth - Lamentations. As we have sacred odes or songs of joy, so have we sacred elegies or songs of lamentation; such variety of methods has Infinite Wisdom taken to work upon us and move our affections, and so soften our hearts and make them susceptible of the impressions of divine truths, as the wax of the seal. We have not only piped unto you, but have mourned likewise, Mat 11:17. II. The penman of this book; it was Jeremiah the prophet, who is here Jeremiah the poet, and vates signifies both; therefore this book is fitly adjoined to the book of his prophecy, and is as an appendix to it. We had there at large the predictions of the desolations of Judah and Jerusalem, and then the history of them, to show how punctually the predictions were accomplished, for the confirming of our faith: now here we have the expressions of his sorrow upon occasion of them, to show that he was very sincere in the protestations he had often made that he did not desire the woeful day, but that, on the contrary, the prospect of it filled him with bitterness. When he saw these calamities at a distance, he wished that his head were waters and his eyes fountains of tears; and, when they came, he made it to appear that he did not dissemble in that wish, and that he was far from being disaffected to his country, which was the crime his enemies charged him with. Though his country had been very unkind to him, and though the ruin of it was both a proof that he was a true prophet and a punishment of them for prosecuting him as a false prophet, which might have tempted him to rejoice in it, yet he sadly lamented it, and herein showed a better temper than that which Jonah was of with respect to Nineveh. III. The occasion of these Lamentations was the destruction of Judah and Jerusalem by the Chaldean army and the dissolution of the Jewish state both civil and ecclesiastical thereby. Some of the rabbies will have these to be the Lamentations which Jeremiah penned upon occasion of the death of Josiah, which are mentioned 2Ch 35:25. But, though it is true that that opened the door to all the following calamities, yet these Lamentations seem to be penned in the sight, not in the foresight, of those calamities - when they had already come, not when they were at a distance; and these is nothing of Josiah in them, and his praise, as was no question, in the lamentations for him. No, it is Jerusalem's funeral that this is an elegy upon. Others of them will have these Lamentations to be contained in the roll which Baruch wrote from Jeremiah's mouth, and which Jehoiakim burnt, and they suggest that at first there were in it only the 1st, 2nd, and 4th chatpers, but that the 3rd and 5th were the many like words that were afterwards added; but this is a groundless fancy; that roll is expressly said to be a repetition and summary of the prophet's sermons, Jer 36:2. IV. The composition of it; it is not only poetical, but alphabetical, all except the 5th chatper, as some of David's psalms are; each verse begins with a several letter in the order of the Hebrew alphabet, the first aleph, the second beth, etc., but the 3rd chapter is a triple alphabet, the first three beginning with aleph, the next three with beth, etc., which was a help to memory (it being designed that these mournful ditties should be got by heart) and was an elegance in writing then valued and therefore not now to be despised. They observe that in the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th chapters, the letter pe is put before ain, which in all the Hebrew alphabets follows it, for a reason of which Dr. Lightfoot offers this conjecture, That the letter ajin, which is the numeral letter for Septuagint, was thus, by being displaced, made remarkable, to put them in mind of the seventy years at the end of which God would turn again their captivity. V. The use of it: of great use, no doubt, it was to the pious Jews in their sufferings, furnishing them with spiritual language to express their natural grief by, helping to preserve the lively remembrance of Zion among them, and their children that never saw it, when they were in Babylon, directing their tears into the right channel (for they are here taught to mourn for sin and mourn to God), and withal encouraging their hopes that God would yet return and have mercy upon them; and it is of use to us, to affect us with godly sorrow for the calamities of the church of God, as becomes those that are living members of it and are resolved to take our lot with it.

Matthew Henry: Lamentations 5 (Chapter Introduction)

This chapter, though it has the same number of verses with the 1st, 2nd, and 4th, is not alphabetical, as they were, but the scope of it is the same with that of all the foregoing elegies. We have in it, I. A representation of the present calamitous state of God's people in their captivity (v. 1-16). II. A protestation of their concern for God's sanctuary, as that which lay nearer their heart than any secular interest of their own (Lam 5:17, Lam 5:18). III. A humble supplication to God and expostulation with him, for the returns of mercy (Lam 5:19-22); for those that lament and do not pray sin in their lamentations. Some ancient versions call this chapter, " The Prayer of Jeremiah."

Constable: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

Introduction

Title and Position

The English title of this book comes from the Talmud (Baba Bathra 15a), which called it "Lamentations" (Heb. qinoth). The Hebrew Bible has the title "Ah, how" or " Alas" (Heb. ekah), the first word in the first, second, and fourth chapters. The title in the Septuagint is "Wailings" (Gr. Threnoi).

The position of Lamentations after Jeremiah in the English Bible follows the tradition of the Septuagint and Vulgate versions. They placed it there because of its connection with the destruction of Jerusalem, which Jeremiah recorded, and the Jewish tradition that Jeremiah wrote both books.

In the Hebrew Bible Lamentations occurs between Ruth and Ecclesiastes as the third book of the "Megilloth" or "Scrolls" within the third and last major division of the Old Testament, namely, the "Hagiographa" or "Writings."¹

Writer and Date

This book does not identify its writer. The common view that Jeremiah wrote it rests on a preface in the Greek Septuagint, which the Latin Vulgate adopted and elaborated on. The Septuagint version of Lamentations begins, "And it came to pass after Israel had been taken away into captivity and Jerusalem had been laid waste that Jeremiah sat weeping and lamented this lamentation over Jerusalem and said." The Vulgate added, "with a bitter spirit sighing and wailing." The translators of these ancient versions may have deduced Jeremiah's authorship of Lamentations from 2 Chronicles 35:25: "Then Jeremiah chanted a lament for Josiah. And all the male and female singers speak about Josiah in their lamentations to this day. And they made them an ordinance in Israel; behold, they are also written in the Lamentations."²

Moderate scholars, both conservative and liberal, who reject the Septuagint tradition, divide fairly equally over the question of Jeremiah's authorship of the book. Those who favor him as the writer do so because of the theological similarities between this book and the Book of Jeremiah, the stylistic similarities with other writings of the same period, and for sentimental reasons. I think probably Jeremiah wrote these lamentations in view of the similarities in style and subject matter between the books of Jeremiah and Lamentations (cf. Lam. 1:2 with Jer. 30:14; Lam. 1: 16; 2:11 with Jer. 9:1, 18; Lam. 2:20; 4:10 with Jer. 19:9; and Lam. 4:21 with Jer. 49:12).³ Also, an eye-witness of Jerusalem's destruction must have written both books.⁴

Almost all Lamentations scholars believe the date of composition lay between 586 and 538 B.C., namely, during the Babylonian Captivity. Most believe that they were written before 561 B.C., when Evilmerodach, King of Babylon, released Jehoiachin from prison (2 Kings 25:27-30; Jer. 31-34). The basis for this view is the absence of national hope in the book. The hope expressed in chapter 3 is personal rather than national. We do not know when Jeremiah died, but if he was born about 643 B.C., as seems probable, the earlier years of the Captivity seem to be a more likely time of composition. The vivid accounts of Jerusalem's destruction also argue for a time of composition not far removed from 586 B.C., probably only a few months or years later.

Some scholars have suggested that the chronological order of the five laments that make up the five chapters is 2, 4, 5, and 1, with 3 unknown.⁵ It is now impossible to discover in what order the writer composed each of the five laments. Their order in the canonical text may not necessarily reflect the order in which the writer wrote them.⁶

Place of Composition

Assuming that Jeremiah wrote the book, he probably did so in Judah following the destruction of Jerusalem, or in Egypt shortly thereafter, or both.

Purpose

Since the Jews read Lamentations on the annual fast that celebrated Jerusalem's destruction as far back as tradition reaches (cf. Zech. 7:3, 5; 8:19), it may be that the writer wrote this book to be read then. Its purpose then would have been to memorialize God's faithfulness in bringing covenant punishment on His people for their unfaithfulness to the Mosaic Covenant. The book would then have taught later generations the importance of covenant faithfulness and God's faithfulness.

"The author of the Book of Lamentations was attempting to show the fulfillment of the curses presented in Deuteronomy 28."⁷

"It [Lamentations] is a mute reminder that sin, in spite of all its allurement and excitement, carries with it heavy weights of sorrow, grief, misery, barrenness, and pain. It is the other side of the eat, drink, and be merry' coin."⁸

"This is one of the most tragic books in the Bible."⁹

Structure and Genre

The book consists of five laments (funeral or mourning songs, elegies). All but the third of these describe the Babylonians' destruction of Jerusalem in 586 B.C. and its aftermath. Each chapter exhibits its own special qualities of form and content, and each of the five laments looks at the destruction of Jerusalem from a different point of view.¹⁰ Yet the basic structure of the book is chiastic.

A The misery of Jerusalem's citizens ch. 1

B God's punishment of Jerusalem ch. 2

C Jeremiah's personal reactions ch. 3

B' God's severity toward Jerusalem ch. 4

A' The response of the godly ch. 5

The whole book is poetry. Chapters 1-4 are in the common meter in which most laments appear in the Hebrew Bible (the so-called qinah meter), with a few verses being exceptions. In the qinah meter the second line is one beat shorter than the first line, giving an incomplete or limping impression to the reader of the Hebrew text. Chapter 5 has the same number of beats in each line and is more like a prayer poem.

The first four chapters are acrostic poems. Chapters 1, 2, and 4 each contain 22 verses, and each verse begins with the succeeding consonant of the Hebrew alphabet. In chapters 2, 3, and 4, however, the Hebrew letter pe comes before the Hebrew letter ayin, contrary to the usual order.

"Several Hebrew abecedaries (alphabets scratched on pieces of broken pottery by Hebrew children learning to write) have been found by archeologists. Some of these alphabetical lists are in the normal order for the Hebrew letters but others are in the reverse pe-'ayin order. Evidently both arrangements of the alphabet were acceptable. Thus the writer of Lamentations was merely employing two forms of the Hebrew alphabet, both of which were used in his time."¹¹

Chapter 3 contains 66 verses. In this chapter the first three verses begin with the first consonant of the Hebrew alphabet, the second three with the second consonant, and so on.¹² The acrostic form may have helped the Jews remember these laments, but it definitely expressed the completeness of their sorrow, controlled their emotions, provided variety of expression, and demonstrated the writer's virtuosity.

Chapter 5 also contains 22 verses, but it is not an acrostic poem perhaps because the writer could not express all that he wanted to say in this chapter in that form.¹³

"Dirge poetry of the kind exemplified by Lamentations was by no means uncommon in Near Eastern antiquity. The Sumerians were the first to write sombre works commemorating the fall of some of their great cities to enemy invaders, one of the most celebrated being the lament over the destruction of Ur. The author of Lamentations stood therefore in a long and respected literary tradition when he bewailed the destruction of Jerusalem and the desolation of Judah in 587 B.C."¹⁴

These laments became a part of Israel's sacred writings the same way many of the Psalms did.

Theology

There are two books in the Old Testament that deal primarily with the problem of suffering. Job treats the problem of personal suffering, and Lamentations deals with the problem of national suffering. Both books present the problem of God's justice and His love, or divine sovereignty and human responsibility, though both of them fall short of solving it. Indeed, this problem is insoluble this side of heaven (cf. Mark 15:34). Both books also present God rather than man as the central figure in human history.

The writer viewed the devastation of Jerusalem and the punishment of the Judahites as divine judgment, not primarily the result of the Babylonian invader from the north. This added a depth to the tragedy that it would not have had if viewed as simply a loss in war.

"It [the book] is a reminder that sin carries with it the consequences of sorrow, grief, misery, and pain."¹⁵

The lack of hope in these laments is due in part to the writer's viewing the tragedy as divine discipline. The destruction had been so great that the people could not see, or had perhaps forgotten, God's promises of a future beyond the conquest. Similarly, Jesus' disciples did not remember the promises of His resurrection because the tragedy of His death so overwhelmed them initially.

Nevertheless, the laments are full of prayer (1:20-22; 2:20-22; 3:55-66), especially the lament in chapter 5, which is entirely prayer. The writer cried out to God, again like Job, in view of the present tragedy. His prayers sound a note of hope in a situation that would otherwise have been completely devoid of hope.

"His prayers provide the faithful of all ages with a model of how God's people should approach the Lord after they have experienced His discipline."¹⁶

There are no messianic predictions in Lamentations as such. Nevertheless, what is true of Yahweh is, of course, true of Jesus Christ. Thus much of the theology of the book is applicable to Christ if not directly revelatory of Him (cf. 3:22; Jude 21). Many expositors have seen foreshadowings of Christ's passion in the dark sayings of Lamentations.

"Protestant Christians, one regrets to say, have too often neglected the reading of these solemn poems. Yet in these days of personal, national, and international crises (and disaster) the message of this book is a challenge to repent of sins personal, national, and international, and to commit ourselves afresh to God's steadfast love. Though this love is ever present and outgoing, a holy and just God must surely judge unrepentant sinners."¹⁷

Message

The church at the beginning of the twenty-first century is very similar to Judah at the beginning of the sixth century B.C. Our times are very similar to Jeremiah's times. We minister in a cultural context that is remarkably like that in which Jeremiah ministered. Lamentations helps us to see the parallels between our culture and Jeremiah's. Francis A. Schaeffer has pointed out many similarities in Death in the City.

First, people had abandoned God. It was not that they ceased to believe that He existed but that they felt He was irrelevant to their lives. This was true of the pagans generally, but it was also true of God's people. Normally in any particular culture what marks unbelievers also marks believers. Temple worship had become formal and unsatisfying. The religious leaders were catering to the people's desires rather than confronting them with their sins. Jeremiah was one of only a few exceptions to this trend in his day.

Second, the people had departed from God's Word. When people believe that God is irrelevant, they quickly stop paying attention to what He says. Jeremiah's contemporaries had neglected the promises of covenant blessing for obedience and punishment for disobedience. Most of the people had stopped reading and studying the Mosaic Law. This opened the door to ignorance of God's will and consequent disobedience and punishment.

Third, the people transferred their trust from God to inadequate objects of hope, namely their political allies and the temple. Rather than turning to Yahweh for provisions and protection, they chose to rely on what they could see and what appeared to be strong. Egypt and Babylon appealed to them especially, but these allies proved to be unreliable and even treacherous. The people also regarded the temple as a fetish. They believed that since God had blessed the temple by inhabiting it, and He had promised to remain faithful to them, nothing could happen to the temple. This conclusion was the result of selective listening to God's Word. They believed only what they wanted to believe, not all that God had said about how He would deal with them.

So Lamentations teaches us that when God's people abandon Him and depart from His Word, tragedy follows inevitably. This is one of the most tragic books in the Bible. It pictures the results of apostasy.

Lamentations is quite similar to the Book of Job.

Both Lamentations and Job deal with the problem of suffering. Job deals with this problem on the personal level. Job suffered greatly as an individual, and the book that bears his name describes his suffering. Lamentations deals with the problem of suffering on the national level. In it we see God's people suffering greatly. This book describes in painful detail the suffering of the nation of Judah and the people of Jerusalem. You will notice as you read Lamentations carefully many statements that recall what Job wrote about his sufferings.

The suffering of God's people is a problem because it pits the love of God against His justice. On the one hand, God loves people and has promised to do what is best to bring about their blessing. But on the other hand, God punishes people for their sins, and this seems to be unloving. This is the same problem that children have who grow up in homes were their parents tell them they love them and then turn around and punish them. Careful attention to the Word of God solves this problem in most cases because God has explained why He punishes those whom He loves. Yet at other times, as in the case of Job, there does not appear to be adequate reason for the judgment. In Jeremiah's day the people did not understand the reason for their suffering. They only saw the punishment, and they had forgotten the reasons for it under the Mosaic Covenant.

But this problem of suffering has an even deeper dimension. It eventually boils down to the antinomy between God's sovereignty and human freedom. If God is sovereign, are human beings genuinely free moral agents? Is God rather than man really responsible for sin? Almost all students of the Scriptures have concluded that the resolution of the biblical teaching of God's sovereignty and man's responsibility lies beyond our present power to comprehend. The best that we can do now is acknowledge that God is indeed sovereign; He is the ultimate authority in the universe. But at the same time human beings are genuinely responsible for their choices. The Jews in Jeremiah's day struggled to keep these revelations in balance, as anyone does who experiences extreme and apparently unjustified punishment. They denied either the sovereignty of God or their own responsibility. Job, too, struggled with these issues but in his personal life.

The great revelation of Lamentations is the covenant faithfulness of God in spite of the covenant unfaithfulness of His people.

God is the central figure in this book, not Jeremiah (who goes unnamed in the book) or the Judahites. This book is a revelation of God, as is every book in the Bible. The aspect of God's character that shines through the book from beginning to end is His sorrow. Sin and apostasy not only result in inevitable discipline for people, but they cause God great pain. He does not enjoy punishing His people for their unfaithfulness. Behind the heartbreak that Jeremiah articulated we can sense the heartbreak of God Himself. We can also see the foreshadowings of Jesus Christ's heartbreak over rebels against God that come through strongly in the Gospels and recall the sentiments that Jeremiah expressed in Lamentations.

The key verses in the book are 3:22-23. These verses appear, appropriately, near the structural center of the book. More importantly, they express the positive truth of God's faithfulness against the black backdrop of the Judahites' unfaithfulness. Unless God was faithful to His covenant promises, the siege of Jerusalem would have spelled the end of Israel. This reference to God's faithfulness is one of the few notes of hope in the litany of tragedy that is the Book of Lamentations. Judgment had to come on Judah because of her covenant unfaithfulness, but Yahweh was faithful to His covenant promises and provided compassion every morning.

There are several abiding values of this book that make it useful for us today.

The first is the revelation Lamentation provides of the heart of God. How does God feel when His people wander away from Him, squander His blessings, and get into trouble? He still loves them and remains committed to their blessing even though He allows them to reap the whirlwind that they have sown. The great New Testament parallel to this revelation is Jesus' parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32).

A second abiding value of this book is that sin eventually and inevitably results in devastation. This is perhaps the most obvious lesson of the book. The terrible consequences of the siege of Jerusalem, which Jeremiah chronicled in all their horrors, were the fruit of unfaithfulness to God. People cannot escape the death that sin brings, even God's people. Romans 6:23 expresses a universal truth: sin always results in death in some form. The Judahites thought they could get away with their sins, but even though God was slow to judge them, they finally experienced the devastating consequences of sin. I think one of the reasons we do not hear more preaching on Lamentations today is that our contemporaries do not want to be reminded of their sin any more than Jeremiah's did. If there was more preaching on Lamentations people would have to face up to the fact that sin leads to terrible devastation.

A third value of this book is its example of how to deal with God after He has brought the devastation of His punishment on us because of our sins. Jeremiah modeled this for us. After judgment people need to turn back to God. We see Jeremiah doing this in his prayers. A prayer concludes each of the first three laments. In each of these chapters Jeremiah focused first on the terrible judgment of God, but then he appealed to God for mercy and restoration. Chapter 5, the climax of the book, is entirely prayer (cf. Habakkuk 3). Having painted graphic pictures of the siege of Jerusalem and its consequences, the prophet concluded his book by praying to God. The normal reaction to devastating circumstances is to turn away from God. Jeremiah teaches us that when we find ourselves flat on our faces in the dust we need to turn back to Him in prayer and repentance.

There is not much hope in Lamentations. The emphasis is on the terrible consequences of apostasy. But the book ends with a reminder of the eternal sovereignty of Yahweh (5:19-22). Its mini-acrostic structure suggests that it is the answer to all the devastation described in the other acrostics in chapters 1-4. Jeremiah's question in verse 20 recalls Jesus question from Calvary: "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" It is not so much a clueless question, in both instances, as it is a question that highlights the drastic consequences of sin. Verse 21 proceeds to request that God will initiate restoration, the only hope of downtrodden sinners. Verse 22 reminds us that God does not utterly reject His people even though His anger may burn against them, though it does so in an almost hopeless way that finishes off the essentially negative message of the book.

God is angry with the church of our day and with professing Christians of our day. We have departed from God, and we can count on His judgment. We may spend too much time on the good news of salvation by grace and not enough time on the bad news that judgment is coming because of sin. Lamentations helps us remember why we need salvation. Its message is much needed in our day.

Constable: Lamentations (Outline)

Outline

I. The destruction and misery of Jerusalem (the first lament) ch. 1

A. An observer's sorrow over Jerusalem's condition 1:1-11

B. Jerusalem's sorrow over her own condition 1:12-22

II. The divine punishment of Jerusalem (the second lament) ch. 2

A. God's anger 2:1-10

B. Jeremiah's grief 2:11-19

C. Jerusalem's plea 2:20-22

III. The prophet's response to divine judgment (the third lament) ch. 3

A. Jeremiah's sorrows 3:1-18

B. Jeremiah's hope 3:19-40

C. Jeremiah's prayer 3:41-66

IV. The anger of Yahweh (the fourth lament) ch. 4

A. Conditions during the siege 4:1-11

B. Causes of the siege 4:12-20

C. Hope following the siege 4:21-22

V. The response of the godly (the fifth lament) ch. 5

A. A plea for remembrance 5:1-18

B. A plea for restoration 5:19-22

Constable: Lamentations

Lamentations

Bibliography

Archer, Gleason L., Jr. A Survey of Old Testament Introduction. Revised ed. Chicago: Moody Press, 1974.

Chisholm, Robert B., Jr. "A Theology of Jeremiah and Lamentations." In A Biblical Theology of the Old Testament, pp. 341-63. Edited by Roy B. Zuck. Chicago: Moody Press, 1991.

Dyer, Charles H. "Lamentations." In The Bible Knowledge Commentary: Old Testament, pp. 1207-23. Edited by John F. Walvoord and Roy B. Zuck. Wheaton: Scripture Press Publications, Victor Books, 1985.

Dyer, Charles H., and Eugene H. Merrill. The Old Testament Explorer. Nashville: Word Publishing, 2001.

Ellison, H. L. "Lamentations." In Isaiah-Ezekiel. Vol. 6 of The Expositor's Bible Commentary. 12 vols. Edited by Frank E. Gaebelein and Richard P. Polcyn. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1986.

Harrison, R. K. Introduction to the Old Testament. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1969.

_____. Jeremiah and Lamentations: An Introduction and Commentary. Tyndale Old Testament Commentaries series. Leicester, Eng. and Downers Grove, Ill.: Inter-Varsity Press, 1973.

Heater, Homer, Jr. "Structure and Meaning in Lamentations." Bibliotheca Sacra 149:595 (July-September 1992):304-15.

Jamieson, Robert; A. R. Fausset; and David Brown. Commentary Practical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible. Reprint ed. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1961.

Jensen, Irving L. Jeremiah and Lamentations. Everyman's Bible Commentary series. Chicago: Moody Press, 1966 (Jeremiah), 1972 (Lamentations).

Kaiser, Walter C., Jr. A Biblical Approach to Personal Suffering. Chicago: Moody Press, 1982.

Keil, Carl Friedrich. "The Lamentations of Jeremiah." In The Prophecies of Jeremiah, 2:333-455. Translated by David Patrick. Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament. Reprint ed. 2 vols. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1960.

Martin, John A. "The Contribution of the Book of Lamentations to Salvation History." Th.M. thesis, Dallas Theological Seminary, 1975.

Price, Ross. "Lamentations." In The Wycliffe Bible Commentary, pp. 695-701. Edited by Charles F. Pfeiffer and Everett F. Harrison. Chicago: Moody Press, 1962.

Schaeffer, Francis A. Death in the City. Chicago: Inter-Varsity Press, 1969.

Swindoll, Charles R. The Lamentations of Jeremiah. Bible Study Guide. Fullerton, Calif.: Insight for Living, 1977.

Young, Edward J. An Introduction to the Old Testament. Revised ed. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1960.

Copyright 2003 by Thomas L. Constable

Haydock: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

THE LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAS.

INTRODUCTION.

In these Jeremias laments in a most pathetic manner the miseries of his people, and the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, in Hebrew verses, beginning with different letters according to the order of the Hebrew alphabet. (Challoner) --- In the first chapter the order is exactly observed, but in the three next phe comes before ain, either for some mystery to us unknown, or by the derangement of transcribers, who perhaps thought that those verses were better connected, as they seem to be, (Calmet) though this is not very clear. (Haydock) --- In such pieces the sentiments of a pensive heart are poured out without much connection. (Worthington) --- The Greeks style this word Greek: threnoi, and Hebrew kinoth, or lamentations. (Haydock) --- St. Jerome, (2 Paralipomenon xxxv. 25.) thinks it was the first composition of Jeremias, and sung at the death of Josias. (Worthington) (St. Jerome, in Zacharias xii. 11.) --- The eulogy of the king seems to belong to him rather than to Sedecias, chap. iv. 20. (Calmet) --- Yet it might afterwards be applied to the latter, (Haydock) and to the ruin of Jerusalem, Ecclesiasticus xlix. 8. (St. Jerome, Pref.; Theodoret, &c.) --- The city is represented standing, and sometimes in ruins. Chap. v. seems to have been written after the rest, ver. 4, 18. (Calmet) --- It is not acrostic like them. The prophet alludes to the wretched condition of the Jews, after the murder of their Messias; and hence the Church makes use of the lamentations on the anniversary of our Saviour's passion, inviting all sinners, both Jews and Gentiles, to repent: "Jerusalem, Jerusalem, be converted to the Lord thy God." (Worthington) --- Many passages are applicable to a soul fallen into sin, as the commentary under the name of St. Jerome, (Haydock) compiled by Rabanus, (Du Pin) shews. (Haydock)

Gill: Lamentations (Book Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO LAMENTATIONS

This book very properly follows the prophecy of Jeremiah, not only because wrote by him, but because of the subject matter of it, the deplorable case of the Jews upon the destruction of their city; and has been reckoned indeed as making one book with it; so Dean Prideaux ^a supposes it was reckoned by Josephus ^b, according to the number of the books of the Old Testament, which he gives; but it does not stand in this order in all printed Hebrew Bibles, especially in those published by the Jews; where it is placed in the Hagiographa, and among the five Megilloth; or with the books of Ruth, Esther, Ecclesiastes, and Solomon's Song, read at their festivals, as this on their public fast, on the ninth of Ab, for the destruction of their city; because they fancy it was not written by the gift of prophecy, but by the Holy Ghost, between which they make a distinction; and therefore remove it from the prophets; but this is the most natural place for it. It is sometimes called by the Jews "Echa", from the first word of it, which signifies "how"; and sometimes "Kinoth", "Lamentations", from the subject of it; and so by the Septuagint version "Threni", which signifies the same; and which is followed by the Vulgate Latin, and others, and by us. That Jeremiah was the writer of it is not questioned; nor is the divine authority of it doubted of. The precise place and time where and when he wrote it is not certain: some say he wrote it in a cave or den near Jerusalem; and Adrichomius ^c makes mention of a place, called

"the Prophet Jeremiah's pit, where he sat in the bitterness of his soul, grieving and weeping; and lamented and described the destruction of Jerusalem made by the Chaldeans, in a fourfold alphabet in metre; where Helena the empress, according to Nicephorus, built some wonderful works;''

but it rather seems that he wrote these Lamentations after he was carried away with the rest of the captives to Ramah, and dismissed to Mizpah, at one or other of these places. It is written in Hebrew metre, though now little understood; and the first four chapters in an alphabetical manner; every verse beginning in order with the letters of the alphabet; and in the third chapter it is done three times over; three verses together beginning with the same letter: this seems to be done to make it more agreeable, and to help the memory. Jarchi thinks that this is the same book, which, having been publicly read by Baruch, was cut to pieces by King Jehoiakim, and cast into the fire ^d and burnt; which consisted of the first, second, and fourth chapters, and to which was afterwards added the third chapter; but it is without any reason or foundation; seeing that contained all Jeremiah's prophecies, not only against Israel and Judah, but against all the nations, Jer 32:2; which this book has nothing of; nor even the words, which are particularly said to be in that, respecting the destruction of Jerusalem by the king of Babylon, Jer 32:29; Josephus ^e seems to have been of opinion that this book of Lamentations was written by Jeremy on account of the death of Josiah, 2Ch 35:25; and in which he is followed by many; but the lamentation made in this book is not for a single person only, but for a city, and even for the whole nation of the Jews; nor is there anything suitable to Josiah, and his case; what seems most plausible is in Lam 4:20; and that better agrees with Zedekiah than with him. It appears plainly to be written after the destruction of the city and temple, and the sad desolation made in the land of Judea, because of the sins of the priests and people; and the design of it is to lament these things; to bring them to repentance and humiliation for their sins, and to give some comfortable hope that God will be merciful to them, and restore them again to their former privileges, for which the prophet prays. The introduction to it, in the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, and Arabic versions, is,

"and it came to pass after Israel was carried captive, and Jerusalem laid waste, Jeremiah sat weeping, and delivered out this lamentation over Jerusalem; and said,''

what follows.

Gill: Lamentations 5 (Chapter Introduction)

INTRODUCTION TO LAMENTATIONS 5

In this chapter are reckoned up the various calamities and distresses of the Jews in Babylon, which the Lord is desired to remember and consider, Lam 5:1; their great concern for the desolation of the temple in particular is expressed, Lam 5:17; and the chapter is concluded with a prayer that God would show favour to them, and turn them to him, and renew their prosperity as of old, though he had rejected them, and been wroth with them, Lam 5:19.