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.10Yet the basic structure of the book is chiastic.
AThe misery of Jerusalem's citizens ch. 1
BGod's punishment of Jerusalem ch. 2
CJeremiah'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 qinahmeter), with a few verses being exceptions. In the qinahmeter 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 pecomes 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-'ayinorder. 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.12The 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.
