How solitary and lonely sits the city [Jerusalem]
That was [once] full of people!
How like a widow she has become.
She who was great among the nations!
The princess among the provinces,
Has become a forced laborer!

(Gimel) Judah has departed into exile under affliction and harsh oppression. She lives among the nations; she has found no resting place. All who pursued her overtook her in narrow straits.

Those who are against her have become the head, everything goes well for her haters; for the Lord has sent sorrow on her because of the great number of her sins: her young children have gone away as prisoners before the attacker.

A sin hath Jerusalem sinned, Therefore impure she hath become, All who honoured her have esteemed her lightly, For they have seen her nakedness, Yea, she herself hath sighed and turneth backward.

The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things: for she hath seen that the heathen entered into her sanctuary, whom thou didst command that they should not enter into thy congregation.

Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, whom Jehovah hath afflicted in the day of his fierce anger.

The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand: they are wreathed, and come up upon my neck: he hath made my strength to fall, the Lord hath delivered me into their hands, from whom I am not able to rise up.

“I weep for these things;
My eyes overflow with tears,
Because a comforter,
One who could restore my soul, is far away from me.
My children are desolate and perishing,
For the enemy has prevailed.”

Zion spreads forth her hands; there is none to comfort her; Yahweh has commanded concerning Jacob, that those who are around him should be his adversaries: Jerusalem is among them as an unclean thing.

ד DaletHe has bent His bow like an enemy;
His right hand is positioned like an adversary.
He has killed everyone who was loved,
pouring out His wrath like fire
on the tent of Daughter Zion.

My eyes are wasted with weeping, the inmost parts of my body are deeply moved, my inner parts are drained out on the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people; because of the young children and babies at the breast who are falling without strength in the open squares of the town.

What thing shall I take to witness for thee? what thing shall I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach is great like the sea: who can heal thee?

All who pass along the way
Clap their hands in derision at you;
They scoff and shake their heads
At the Daughter of Jerusalem, saying,
“Is this the city that was called
‘The perfection of beauty,
The joy of all the earth’?”

The Lord has done that which was his purpose; he has put into force the orders which he gave in the days which are past; pulling down without pity, he has made your hater glad over you, lifting up the horn of those who were against you.

Arise, cry out in the night, in the beginning of the watches; pour out thy heart like water before the face of the Lord: lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young children, who faint from hunger at the top of all the streets.

Behold, O LORD, and consider to whom thou hast done this. Shall the women eat their fruit, and children of a span long? shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?

{Shin} Young and old lie behind the streets, upon the ground; my maidens and young men are slain with the sword: whom thou in the day of thy wrathful indignation hast put to death. Yea, even thou hast put them to death, and not spared them.

Thou dost call as at a day of appointment, My fears from round about, And there hath not been in the day of the anger of Jehovah, An escaped and remaining one, They whom I stretched out and nourished, My enemy hath consumed!

I am the man who hath seen affliction By the rod of His wrath.

He has made me dwell in darkness
like those who have been dead for ages.

The Lord is good to those who wait [confidently] for Him,
To those who seek Him [on the authority of God’s word].

[It is] good for a man who carries the yoke of his childhood.

Let him give his cheek to the one who strikes him;
Let him be filled with reproach.

Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not?

Why should any living mortal, or any man,
Complain [of punishment] in view of his sins?

Without cause my enemies
Hunted me down like a bird;

The lips of those who came up against me, and their thoughts against me all the day.

The precious sons of Zion, Who are comparable with fine gold, How have they been reckoned earthen bottles, Work of the hands of a potter.

Those who feasted on delicacies
Are perishing in the streets;
Those reared in purple [as nobles]
Embrace ash heaps.

Those killed with the sword
Are more fortunate than those killed with hunger;
For the hungry pine and ebb away,
For the lack of the fruits of the field.

(Yod) The hands of tenderhearted women cooked their own children, who became their food, when my people were destroyed.

It is for the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, who have shed the blood of the righteous in the midst of her.

ק QofThose who chased us were swifter
than eagles in the sky;
they relentlessly pursued us over the mountains
and ambushed us in the wilderness.

The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD, was taken in their pits, of whom we said, Under his shadow we shall live among the heathen.

Rejoice and be glad, O Daughter of Edom,
Who lives in the land of Uz.
But the cup [of the wine of God’s wrath] will pass to you as well;
You will become drunk and make yourself naked.

Our heritage is given up to men of strange lands, our houses to those who are not our countrymen.

Our fathers sinned, and are no more;
It is we who have borne their iniquities.

We get our bread at the risk of our lives
Because of the sword [of the Arabs] in the wilderness [who may attack if we go out to harvest the crop].