The following section of the lament falls into two parts marked by Jeremiah's use of the plural (vv. 41-47) and singular personal pronouns (vv. 48-66). In the first part he called on the Judahites to confess their sins to God. In the second part he recalled God's past deliverance in answer to prayer, which motivated him to ask God to judge his enemies. In both sections the prophet modeled proper behavior for his people.
3:41 Jeremiah lifted up his heart as well as his hands to God in heaven; his praying was heartfelt, not just formal.
3:42 He and his people had transgressed the covenant and had rebelled against the Lord, and He had not pardoned their sin but allowed them to experience judgment.
3:43 The Lord had become angry over the sins of His people and had pursued them in judgment slaying them without stinting.
3:44 The Lord had blocked Himself off from His people, as a cloud blocks the heavens, so their prayers would not affect Him.
3:45-46 The Lord had made the Judahites as scum (Heb. sehi), namely, rejected as unfit for use.45This is how the other nations regarded them. Judah's enemies had also spoken against her (cf. 2:16).
3:47 The results of God's judgment for the Judahites had been panic. They had stumbled into pits that snared them. Devastation and destruction had become their allotment.
3:48-51 Jeremiah wept profusely and unremittingly because of the destruction that the Judahites had experienced (cf. Jer. 9:1; 14:17). He would do this until the Lord acknowledged the plight of His people by sending them some relief. What Jeremiah saw of the devastation of Jerusalem pained him greatly. Here "the daughters of my city"may refer to the dependent villages round about Jerusalem that the foe also took.46
3:52 The prophet's enemies had pursued him mercilessly, as hunters track a bird.
3:53-54 They silenced him by placing him in a pit and covering its mouth with a large stone (cf. Jer. 38:1-6). He thought he would drown because of the water that engulfed him.
3:55-56 Jeremiah prayed to the Lord out of his desperate condition (cf. Ps. 88:7, 14; 130:1; Jon. 2:1). He believed the Lord had heard his prayer, and he begged that the Lord would pay attention to his petition and grant him deliverance.
3:57-58 In the past the Lord had heeded Jeremiah's prayers and had given him hope. The Lord had come to his rescue and had redeemed (delivered) him from destruction (cf. Lev. 25:25-28, 47-54; Ruth 4:1-12).
"No greater testimony can a sinner offer to God than to say, in thanksgiving, Thou hast redeemed my life' (3:58)."47
3:59-61 Jeremiah knew that Yahweh had seen his affliction. He asked that He would judge him knowing that the Lord would be fair.
"Perhaps because of their status as the Chosen People the Jews were always sensitive to abuse and injury inflicted from outside, whatever the source. Consequently they found it impossible to overlook these hostile acts, with the result that the imprecations which they hurled at their enemies, while typical of such Near Eastern utterances, seem to possess an unexpected and unusual degree of vindictiveness (cf. Ps. 137:9)."48
3:62-63 The prophet's enemies plotted against him constantly. But he called on God to witness all that his enemies were doing and how they had mocked him.
3:64-65 Jeremiah believed that the Lord would pay his enemies back as they deserved (cf. Ps. 28:4; 2 Cor. 3:15). He would harden their hearts and so bring judgment on them.
3:66 The Lord would pursue them anywhere they might go and destroy them in His anger. The Lord did this to Jeremiah's enemies when the city fell to the Babylonians (cf. Jer. 39:4-7; 52:7-11, 24-27).
