Lamentations 5

¹³You have made us a reproach to our neighbors, a mockery and derision to those around us.

¹⁴You have made us a byword among the nations, a laughingstock among the peoples.

⁵⁰Remember, O Lord, the reproach of Your servants, which I bear in my heart from so many people—

⁵¹how Your enemies have taunted, O Lord, and have mocked every step of Your anointed one!

⁶¹O Lord, You have heard their insults, all their plots against me—

¹²Pay back into the laps of our neighbors sevenfold the reproach they hurled at You, O Lord.

¹⁵You understand, O Lord; remember me and attend to me. Avenge me against my persecutors. In Your patience, do not take me away. Know that I endure reproach for Your honor.

⁴Hear us, O God, for we are despised. Turn their scorn back upon their own heads, and let them be taken as plunder to a land of captivity.

⁷Your land is desolate; your cities are burned with fire. Foreigners devour your fields before you—a desolation demolished by strangers.

¹³Their wealth will be plundered and their houses laid waste. They will build houses but not inhabit them, and plant vineyards but never drink their wine.

³⁰You will be pledged in marriage to a woman, but another man will violate her. You will build a house but will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but will not enjoy its fruit.

³¹Your ox will be slaughtered before your eyes, but you will not eat any of it. Your donkey will be taken away and not returned to you. Your flock will be given to your enemies, and no one will save you.

¹A Psalm of Asaph. The nations, O God, have invaded Your inheritance; they have defiled Your holy temple and reduced Jerusalem to rubble.

²They have given the corpses of Your servants as food to the birds of the air, the flesh of Your saints to the beasts of the earth.

¹⁸For a short while Your people possessed Your holy place, but our enemies have trampled Your sanctuary.

²¹And I will hand these things over as plunder to foreigners and loot to the wicked of the earth, who will defile them.

²¹Therefore, hand their children over to famine; pour out the power of the sword upon them. Let their wives become childless and widowed; let their husbands be slain by disease, their young men struck down by the sword in battle.

²⁴My anger will be kindled, and I will kill you with the sword; then your wives will become widows and your children will be fatherless.

⁸I will make their widows more numerous than the sand of the sea. I will bring a destroyer at noon against the mothers of young men. I will suddenly bring upon them anguish and dismay.

³Assyria will not save us, nor will we ride on horses. We will never again say, ‘Our gods!’ to the work of our own hands. For in You the fatherless find compassion.”

¹For behold, the Lord God of Hosts is about to remove from Jerusalem and Judah both supply and support: the whole supply of food and water,

⁴⁸you will serve your enemies the Lord will send against you in famine, thirst, nakedness, and destitution. He will place an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.

⁹But take wheat, barley, beans, lentils, millet, and spelt; put them in a single container and make them into bread for yourself. This is what you are to eat during the 390 days you lie on your side.

¹⁰You are to weigh out twenty shekels of food to eat each day, and you are to eat it at set times.

¹⁴My transgressions are bound into a yoke, knit together by His hand; they are draped over my neck, and the Lord has broken my strength. He has delivered me into the hands of those I cannot withstand.

³⁶So here we are today as slaves in the land You gave our fathers to enjoy its fruit and goodness—here we are as slaves!

³⁷Its abundant harvest goes to the kings You have set over us because of our sins. And they rule over our bodies and our livestock as they please. We are in great distress.

¹⁴For this is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘I have put a yoke of iron on the neck of all these nations to make them serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and they will serve him. I have even given him control of the beasts of the field.’”

¹¹But the nation that will put its neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon and serve him, I will leave in its own land, to cultivate it and reside in it, declares the Lord.”

¹²And to Zedekiah king of Judah I spoke the same message: “Put your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon; serve him and his people, and live!

⁴⁸you will serve your enemies the Lord will send against you in famine, thirst, nakedness, and destitution. He will place an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.

⁸As for the nation or kingdom that does not serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon and does not place its neck under his yoke, I will punish that nation by sword and famine and plague, declares the Lord, until I have destroyed it by his hand.

¹Ephraim feeds on the wind and pursues the east wind all day long; he multiplies lies and violence; he makes a covenant with Assyria and sends olive oil to Egypt.

³They will not remain in the land of the Lord; Ephraim will return to Egypt and eat unclean food in Assyria.

¹⁸Now what will you gain on your way to Egypt to drink the waters of the Nile? What will you gain on your way to Assyria to drink the waters of the Euphrates?

¹¹So Ephraim has become like a silly, senseless dove—calling out to Egypt, then turning to Assyria.

²So Abraham instructed the chief servant of his household, who managed all he owned, “Place your hand under my thigh,

³⁶How impulsive you are, constantly changing your ways! You will be disappointed by Egypt just as you were by Assyria.

¹²And you have done more evil than your fathers. See how each of you follows the stubbornness of his evil heart instead of obeying Me.

²⁹“In those days, it will no longer be said: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the children are set on edge.’

²“What do you people mean by quoting this proverb about the land of Israel: ‘The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the teeth of the children are set on edge’?

²⁰We acknowledge our wickedness, O Lord, the guilt of our fathers; indeed, we have sinned against You.

⁵You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on their children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate Me,

³²Fill up, then, the measure of the sin of your fathers.

³³You snakes! You brood of vipers! How will you escape the sentence of hell?

¹⁵The governors before me had heavily burdened the people, taking from them bread and wine plus forty shekels of silver. Their servants also oppressed the people. But I did not do this, because of my fear of God.

⁶For I will no longer have compassion on the people of the land, declares the Lord, but behold, I will cause each man to fall into the hands of his neighbor and his king, who will devastate the land, and I will not deliver it from their hands.”

²²a servant who becomes king, a fool who is filled with food,

²or they will shred my soul like a lion and tear me to pieces with no one to rescue me.

¹⁰And then I will expose her lewdness in the sight of her lovers, and no one will deliver her out of My hands.

²²Now consider this, you who forget God, lest I tear you to pieces, with no one to rescue you:

¹⁶Then He told me, “Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of food in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat bread rationed by weight, and in despair they will drink water by measure.

¹⁷So they will lack food and water; they will be appalled at the sight of one another wasting away in their iniquity.

¹⁸“Son of man, eat your bread with trembling, and drink your water with quivering and anxiety.

¹⁹Then tell the people of the land that this is what the Lord God says about those living in Jerusalem and in the land of Israel: ‘They will eat their bread with anxiety and drink their water in dread, for their land will be stripped of everything in it because of the violence of all who dwell in it.

⁹Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, swore an oath to them and their men, assuring them, “Do not be afraid to serve the Chaldeans. Live in the land and serve the king of Babylon, and it will go well with you.

¹⁰As for me, I will stay in Mizpah to represent you before the Chaldeans who come to us. As for you, gather wine grapes, summer fruit, and oil, place them in your storage jars, and live in the cities you have taken.”

¹⁸to escape the Chaldeans. For they were afraid of the Chaldeans because Ishmael son of Nethaniah had struck down Gedaliah son of Ahikam, whom the king of Babylon had appointed over the land.

¹In the seventh month, Ishmael son of Nethaniah, the son of Elishama, who was a member of the royal family and one of the king’s chief officers, came with ten men to Gedaliah son of Ahikam at Mizpah, and they ate a meal together there.

²Then Ishmael son of Nethaniah and the ten men who were with him got up and struck down Gedaliah son of Ahikam, the son of Shaphan, with the sword, killing the one whom the king of Babylon had appointed to govern the land.

¹⁴and if you say, ‘No, but we will go to the land of Egypt and live there, where we will not see war or hear the sound of the ram’s horn or hunger for bread,’

⁸But now their appearance is blacker than soot; they are not recognized in the streets. Their skin has shriveled on their bones; it has become as dry as a stick.

³⁰My skin grows black and peels, and my bones burn with fever.

⁸³Though I am like a wineskin dried up by smoke, I do not forget Your statutes.

⁴He has worn away my flesh and skin; He has shattered my bones.

¹⁶Their infants will be dashed to pieces before their eyes, their houses will be looted, and their wives will be ravished.

²For I will gather all the nations for battle against Jerusalem, and the city will be captured, the houses looted, and the women ravished. Half of the city will go into exile, but the rest of the people will not be removed from the city.

³⁰You will be pledged in marriage to a woman, but another man will violate her. You will build a house but will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but will not enjoy its fruit.

¹⁶The presence of the Lord has scattered them; He regards them no more. The priests are shown no honor; the elders find no favor.

⁶I was angry with My people; I profaned My heritage, and I placed them under your control. You showed them no mercy; even on the elderly you laid a most heavy yoke.

¹⁰There at Riblah the king of Babylon slaughtered the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes, and he also killed all the officials of Judah.

¹¹Then he put out Zedekiah’s eyes, bound him with bronze shackles, and took him to Babylon, where he kept him in custody until his dying day.

²⁰Look, O Lord, and consider: Whom have You ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the infants they have nurtured? Should priests and prophets be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

²⁵Of those still in the city, he took a court official who had been appointed over the men of war, as well as seven trusted royal advisers. He also took the scribe of the captain of the army, who had enlisted the people of the land, and sixty men who were found in the city.

²⁶Nebuzaradan captain of the guard took them and brought them to the king of Babylon at Riblah.

¹⁰The elders of the Daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence. They have thrown dust on their heads and put on sackcloth. The young women of Jerusalem have bowed their heads to the ground.

²¹Then the Philistines seized him, gouged out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, where he was bound with bronze shackles and forced to grind grain in the prison.

⁴They tie up heavy, burdensome loads and lay them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.

²Take millstones and grind flour; remove your veil; strip off your skirt, bare your thigh, and wade through the streams.

⁵If you see the donkey of one who hates you fallen under its load, do not leave it there; you must help him with it.

¹About that time there was a great outcry from the people and their wives against their fellow Jews.

²Some were saying, “We and our sons and daughters are numerous. We must get grain in order to eat and stay alive.”

¹⁰then may my own wife grind grain for another, and may other men sleep with her.

³⁴I will remove from the cities of Judah and the streets of Jerusalem the sounds of joy and gladness and the voices of the bride and bridegroom, for the land will become a wasteland.”

⁷The new wine dries up, the vine withers. All the merrymakers now groan.

⁸The joyful tambourines have ceased; the noise of revelers has stopped; the joyful harp is silent.

²²And the sound of harpists and musicians, of flute players and trumpeters, will never ring out in you again. Nor will any craftsmen of any trade be found in you again, nor the sound of a millstone be heard in you again.

¹³So I will silence the sound of your songs, and the music of your lyres will no longer be heard.

⁴The roads to Zion mourn, because no one comes to her appointed feasts. All her gates are deserted; her priests groan, her maidens grieve, and she herself is bitter with anguish.

¹⁹I called out to my lovers, but they have betrayed me. My priests and elders perished in the city while they searched for food to keep themselves alive.

¹⁰I will turn your feasts into mourning and all your songs into lamentation. I will cause everyone to wear sackcloth and every head to be shaved. I will make it like a time of mourning for an only son, and its outcome like a bitter day.

¹⁰Moreover, I will banish from them the sounds of joy and gladness, the voices of the bride and bridegroom, the sound of the millstones, and the light of the lamp.

⁴You lie on beds inlaid with ivory, and lounge upon your couches. You dine on lambs from the flock and calves from the stall.

⁵You improvise songs on the harp like David and invent your own musical instruments.

¹¹You turned my mourning into dancing; You peeled off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,

⁹Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom.

¹⁰Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.

³⁹You have renounced the covenant with Your servant and sullied his crown in the dust.

⁹The expression on their faces testifies against them, and like Sodom they flaunt their sin; they do not conceal it. Woe to them, for they have brought disaster upon themselves.

¹⁰Tell the righteous it will be well with them, for they will enjoy the fruit of their labor.

⁹He has stripped me of my honor and removed the crown from my head.

¹⁸Say to the king and to the queen mother: “Take a lowly seat, for your glorious crowns have fallen from your heads.”

¹How lonely lies the city, once so full of people! She who was great among the nations has become a widow. The princess of the provinces has become a slave.

¹³But this was for the sins of her prophets and the guilt of her priests, who shed the blood of the righteous in her midst.

⁷My eyes fail from grief; they grow dim because of all my foes.

⁵Why do you want more beatings? Why do you keep rebelling? Your head has a massive wound, and your whole heart is afflicted.

¹¹My eyes fail from weeping; I am churning within. My heart is poured out in grief over the destruction of the daughter of my people, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city.

⁷My eyes have grown dim with grief, and my whole body is but a shadow.

¹⁴I chirp like a swallow or crane; I moan like a dove. My eyes grow weak as I look upward. O Lord, I am oppressed; be my security.”

⁷And when they ask, ‘Why are you groaning?’ you are to say, ‘Because of the news that is coming. Every heart will melt, and every hand will go limp. Every spirit will faint, and every knee will turn to water.’ Yes, it is coming and it will surely happen, declares the Lord God.”

¹²Therefore, because of you, Zion will be plowed like a field, Jerusalem will become a heap of rubble, and the temple mount a wooded ridge.

¹¹“And I will make Jerusalem a heap of rubble, a haunt for jackals; and I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.”

⁸The Lord determined to destroy the wall of the Daughter of Zion. He stretched out a measuring line and did not withdraw His hand from destroying. He made the ramparts and walls lament; together they waste away.

⁹Her gates have sunk into the ground; He has destroyed and shattered their bars. Her king and her princes are exiled among the nations, the law is no more, and even her prophets find no vision from the Lord.

¹³and for the land of my people, overgrown with thorns and briers—even for every house of merriment in this city of revelry.

¹⁴For the palace will be forsaken, the busy city abandoned. The hill and the watchtower will become caves forever—the delight of wild donkeys and a pasture for flocks—

²Remember Your congregation, which You purchased long ago and redeemed as the tribe of Your inheritance—Mount Zion, where You dwell.

³Turn Your steps to the everlasting ruins, to everything in the sanctuary the enemy has destroyed.

¹³He burned down the house of the Lord, the royal palace, and all the houses of Jerusalem—every significant building.

¹²But You, O Lord, sit enthroned forever; Your renown endures to all generations.

⁸But about the Son He says: “Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever, and justice is the scepter of Your kingdom.

⁹You have loved righteousness and hated wickedness; therefore God, Your God, has anointed You above Your companions with the oil of joy.”

⁶Your throne, O God, endures forever and ever, and justice is the scepter of Your kingdom.

¹³Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom, and Your dominion endures through all generations. The Lord is faithful in all His words and kind in all His actions.

²⁵In the beginning You laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands.

²⁶They will perish, but You remain; they will all wear out like a garment. Like clothing You will change them, and they will be passed on.

⁷But the Lord abides forever; He has established His throne for judgment.

²⁴Why do You hide Your face and forget our affliction and oppression?

¹For the choirmaster. A Psalm of David. How long, O Lord? Will You forget me forever? How long will You hide Your face from me?

¹⁹Have You rejected Judah completely? Do You despise Zion? Why have You stricken us so that we are beyond healing? We hoped for peace, but no good has come, and for the time of healing, but there was only terror.

²⁰We acknowledge our wickedness, O Lord, the guilt of our fathers; indeed, we have sinned against You.

⁹Do not be angry, O Lord, beyond measure; do not remember our iniquity forever. Oh, look upon us, we pray; we are all Your people!

¹⁰Your holy cities have become a wilderness. Zion has become a wasteland and Jerusalem a desolation.

¹A Maskil of Asaph. Why have You rejected us forever, O God? Why does Your anger smolder against the sheep of Your pasture?

⁴⁶How long, O Lord? Will You hide Yourself forever? Will Your wrath keep burning like fire?

³Restore us, O God, and cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved.

⁷Restore us, O God of Hosts, and cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved.

⁴Restore us, O God of our salvation, and put away Your displeasure toward us.

¹⁸I have surely heard Ephraim’s moaning: ‘You disciplined me severely, like an untrained calf. Restore me, that I may return, for You are the Lord my God.

¹⁹Restore us, O Lord God of Hosts; cause Your face to shine upon us, that we may be saved.

³This is what the Lord says: “I will return to Zion and dwell in Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the Lord of Hosts will be called the Holy Mountain.”

⁴This is what the Lord of Hosts says: “Old men and old women will again sit along the streets of Jerusalem, each with a staff in hand because of great age.

¹For the choirmaster. To the tune of “The Lily of the Covenant.” A Miktam of David for instruction. When he fought Aram-naharaim and Aram-zobah, and Joab returned and struck down 12,000 Edomites in the Valley of Salt. You have rejected us, O God; You have broken us; You have been angry; restore us!

²You have shaken the land and torn it open. Heal its fractures, for it is quaking.

⁶Gomer again conceived and gave birth to a daughter, and the Lord said to Hosea, “Name her Lo-ruhamah, for I will no longer have compassion on the house of Israel, that I should ever forgive them.

¹¹Then He said to me, “Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Look, they are saying, ‘Our bones are dried up, and our hope has perished; we are cut off.’

⁹But You have rejected and humbled us; You no longer go forth with our armies.

⁹Do not be angry, O Lord, beyond measure; do not remember our iniquity forever. Oh, look upon us, we pray; we are all Your people!

¹Then the Lord said to me: “Even if Moses and Samuel should stand before Me, My heart would not go out to this people. Send them from My presence, and let them go!

²If they ask you, ‘Where shall we go?’ you are to tell them that this is what the Lord says: ‘Those destined for death, to death; those destined for the sword, to the sword; those destined for famine, to famine; and those destined for captivity, to captivity.’