Lamentations 3:2–18

⁹¶ Therefore is judgment far from us, neither doth justice overtake us: we wait for light, but behold obscurity; for brightness, but we walk in darkness.

²⁶When I looked for good, then evil came unto me: and when I waited for light, there came darkness.

¹⁸Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! to what end is it for you? the day of the Lord is darkness, and not light.

¹⁹As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; or went into the house, and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him.

²⁰Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not light? even very dark, and no brightness in it?

²⁹And thou shalt grope at noonday, as the blind gropeth in darkness, and thou shalt not prosper in thy ways: and thou shalt be only oppressed and spoiled evermore, and no man shall save thee.

¹⁶Give glory to the Lord your God, before he cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, he turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness.

²³I beheld the earth, and, lo, it was without form, and void; and the heavens, and they had no light.

¹⁸He shall be driven from light into darkness, and chased out of the world.

¹³Raging waves of the sea, foaming out their own shame; wandering stars, to whom is reserved the blackness of darkness for ever.

⁶And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day.

¹HOW hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger, and cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger!

⁵³They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and cast a stone upon me.

⁵⁴Waters flowed over mine head; then I said, I am cut off.

⁵⁵¶ I called upon thy name, O Lord, out of the low dungeon.

²⁰The Lord will not spare him, but then the anger of the Lord and his jealousy shall smoke against that man, and all the curses that are written in this book shall lie upon him, and the Lord shall blot out his name from under heaven.

²⁵¶ And I will turn my hand upon thee, and purely purge away thy dross, and take away all thy tin:

²⁵Therefore is the anger of the Lord kindled against his people, and he hath stretched forth his hand against them, and hath smitten them: and the hills did tremble, and their carcases were torn in the midst of the streets. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still.

¹⁰¶ But they rebelled, and vexed his holy Spirit: therefore he was turned to be their enemy, and he fought against them.

²¹If I have lifted up my hand against the fatherless, when I saw my help in the gate:

⁴He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that were pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out his fury like fire.

⁵The Lord was as an enemy: he hath swallowed up Israel, he hath swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong holds, and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.

⁶And he hath violently taken away his tabernacle, as if it were of a garden: he hath destroyed his places of the assembly: the Lord hath caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.

⁷The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have made a noise in the house of the Lord, as in the day of a solemn feast.

¹³I reckoned till morning, that, as a lion, so will he break all my bones: from day even to night wilt thou make an end of me.

⁸Make me to hear joy and gladness; that the bones which thou hast broken may rejoice.

¹⁷¶ Israel is a scattered sheep; the lions have driven him away: first the king of Assyria hath devoured him; and last this Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon hath broken his bones.

⁹Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble: mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly.

¹⁰For my life is spent with grief, and my years with sighing: my strength faileth because of mine iniquity, and my bones are consumed.

²For thine arrows stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore.

³There is no soundness in my flesh because of thine anger; neither is there any rest in my bones because of my sin.

⁴For mine iniquities are gone over mine head: as an heavy burden they are too heavy for me.

⁵My wounds stink and are corrupt because of my foolishness.

⁶I am troubled; I am bowed down greatly; I go mourning all the day long.

⁷For my loins are filled with a loathsome disease: and there is no soundness in my flesh.

⁸I am feeble and sore broken: I have roared by reason of the disquietness of my heart.

³For my days are consumed like smoke, and my bones are burned as an hearth.

⁴My heart is smitten, and withered like grass; so that I forget to eat my bread.

⁵By reason of the voice of my groaning my bones cleave to my skin.

⁸And thou hast filled me with wrinkles, which is a witness against me: and my leanness rising up in me beareth witness to my face.

⁹He teareth me in his wrath, who hateth me: he gnasheth upon me with his teeth; mine enemy sharpeneth his eyes upon me.

¹⁴I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint: my heart is like wax; it is melted in the midst of my bowels.

³When I kept silence, my bones waxed old through my roaring all the day long.

¹⁹Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.

¹⁵Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts concerning the prophets; Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall: for from the prophets of Jerusalem is profaneness gone forth into all the land.

⁸He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.

¹⁴Why do we sit still? assemble yourselves, and let us enter into the defenced cities, and let us be silent there: for the Lord our God hath put us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we have sinned against the Lord.

¹⁵Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.

⁷He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy.

⁸Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my prayer.

⁹He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.

²¹They gave me also gall for my meat; and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink.

⁵Free among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, whom thou rememberest no more: and they are cut off from thy hand.

⁶Thou hast laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps.

³For the enemy hath persecuted my soul; he hath smitten my life down to the ground; he hath made me to dwell in darkness, as those that have been long dead.

⁷Hear me speedily, O Lord: my spirit faileth: hide not thy face from me, lest I be like unto them that go down into the pit.

⁸He hath fenced up my way that I cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my paths.

²³Why is light given to a man whose way is hid, and whom God hath hedged in?

⁶¶ Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.

⁶Then took they Jeremiah, and cast him into the dungeon of Malchiah the son of Hammelech, that was in the court of the prison: and they let down Jeremiah with cords. And in the dungeon there was no water, but mire: so Jeremiah sunk in the mire.

⁴And now, behold, I loose thee this day from the chains which were upon thine hand. If it seem good unto thee to come with me into Babylon, come; and I will look well unto thee: but if it seem ill unto thee to come with me into Babylon, forbear: behold, all the land is before thee: whither it seemeth good and convenient for thee to go, thither go.

¹⁴The 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.

⁸Thou hast put away mine acquaintance far from me; thou hast made me an abomination unto them: I am shut up, and I cannot come forth.

¹²And he hath confirmed his words, which he spake against us, and against our judges that judged us, by bringing upon us a great evil: for under the whole heaven hath not been done as hath been done upon Jerusalem.

⁹He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.

⁵Our necks are under persecution: we labour, and have no rest.

²⁰I cry unto thee, and thou dost not hear me: I stand up, and thou regardest me not.

²O my God, I cry in the daytime, but thou hearest not; and in the night season, and am not silent.

⁷Behold, I cry out of wrong, but I am not heard: I cry aloud, but there is no judgment.

⁴⁴Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud, that our prayer should not pass through.

⁴⁶And about the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani? that is to say, My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?

²O Lord, how long shall I cry, and thou wilt not hear! even cry out unto thee of violence, and thou wilt not save!

⁴O Lord God of hosts, how long wilt thou be angry against the prayer of thy people?

¹⁷¶ O Lord, why hast thou made us to err from thy ways, and hardened our heart from thy fear? Return for thy servants’ sake, the tribes of thine inheritance.

⁶¶ Therefore, behold, I will hedge up thy way with thorns, and make a wall, that she shall not find her paths.

²⁸And his breath, as an overflowing stream, shall reach to the midst of the neck, to sift the nations with the sieve of vanity: and there shall be a bridle in the jaws of the people, causing them to err.

¹¹He hath turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces: he hath made me desolate.

¹⁸Woe unto you that desire the day of the Lord! to what end is it for you? the day of the Lord is darkness, and not light.

¹⁹As if a man did flee from a lion, and a bear met him; or went into the house, and leaned his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him.

²⁰Shall not the day of the Lord be darkness, and not light? even very dark, and no brightness in it?

⁷Therefore I will be unto them as a lion: as a leopard by the way will I observe them:

⁸I will meet them as a bear that is bereaved of her whelps, and will rend the caul of their heart, and there will I devour them like a lion: the wild beast shall tear them.

¹⁴For I will be unto Ephraim as a lion, and as a young lion to the house of Judah: I, even I, will tear and go away; I will take away, and none shall rescue him.

¹COME, and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up.

¹³I reckoned till morning, that, as a lion, so will he break all my bones: from day even to night wilt thou make an end of me.

¹⁶For it increaseth. Thou huntest me as a fierce lion: and again thou shewest thyself marvellous upon me.

⁹He lieth in wait secretly as a lion in his den: he lieth in wait to catch the poor: he doth catch the poor, when he draweth him into his net.

¹²Like as a lion that is greedy of his prey, and as it were a young lion lurking in secret places.

¹COME, and let us return unto the Lord: for he hath torn, and he will heal us; he hath smitten, and he will bind us up.

¹²I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.

¹³His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground.

¹³From above hath he sent fire into my bones, and it prevaileth against them: he hath spread a net for my feet, he hath turned me back: he hath made me desolate and faint all the day.

⁴⁰And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.

⁴¹And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters’ clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay.

⁴²And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken.

⁴³And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.

⁴⁴And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.

²³Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.

²⁶And her gates shall lament and mourn; and she being desolate shall sit upon the ground.

⁸And I will make this city desolate, and an hissing; every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished and hiss because of all the plagues thereof.

⁴³And fields shall be bought in this land, whereof ye say, It is desolate without man or beast; it is given into the hand of the Chaldeans.

⁶Wherefore a lion out of the forest shall slay them, and a wolf of the evenings shall spoil them, a leopard shall watch over their cities: every one that goeth out thence shall be torn in pieces: because their transgressions are many, and their backslidings are increased.

²⁰Thou art my battle axe and weapons of war: for with thee will I break in pieces the nations, and with thee will I destroy kingdoms;

²¹And with thee will I break in pieces the horse and his rider; and with thee will I break in pieces the chariot and his rider;

²²With thee also will I break in pieces man and woman; and with thee will I break in pieces old and young; and with thee will I break in pieces the young man and the maid;

⁸Be thou instructed, O Jerusalem, lest my soul depart from thee; lest I make thee desolate, a land not inhabited.

¹⁰For the mountains will I take up a weeping and wailing, and for the habitations of the wilderness a lamentation, because they are burned up, so that none can pass through them; neither can men hear the voice of the cattle; both the fowl of the heavens and the beast are fled; they are gone.

¹¹And I will make Jerusalem heaps, and a den of dragons; and I will make the cities of Judah desolate, without an inhabitant.

⁷But now he hath made me weary: thou hast made desolate all my company.

³⁸Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.

⁸¶ And the remnant of Jacob shall be among the Gentiles in the midst of many people as a lion among the beasts of the forest, as a young lion among the flocks of sheep: who, if he go through, both treadeth down, and teareth in pieces, and none can deliver.

²²Now consider this, ye that forget God, lest I tear you in pieces, and there be none to deliver.

¹⁹And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas, that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.

²For thine arrows stick fast in me, and thy hand presseth me sore.

²⁰I have sinned; what shall I do unto thee, O thou preserver of men? why hast thou set me as a mark against thee, so that I am a burden to myself?

⁴For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit: the terrors of God do set themselves in array against me.

⁴He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all that were pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out his fury like fire.

¹²If he turn not, he will whet his sword; he hath bent his bow, and made it ready.

¹³He hath also prepared for him the instruments of death; he ordaineth his arrows against the persecutors.

¹²I was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck, and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for his mark.

¹³His archers compass me round about, he cleaveth my reins asunder, and doth not spare; he poureth out my gall upon the ground.

⁴For the arrows of the Almighty are within me, the poison whereof drinketh up my spirit: the terrors of God do set themselves in array against me.

²³I will heap mischiefs upon them; I will spend mine arrows upon them.

²⁸The arrow cannot make him flee: slingstones are turned with him into stubble.

⁷¶ O Lord, thou hast deceived me, and I was deceived: thou art stronger than I, and hast prevailed: I am in derision daily, every one mocketh me.

⁶³Behold their sitting down, and their rising up; I am their musick.

⁶But I am a worm, and no man; a reproach of men, and despised of the people.

⁷All they that see me laugh me to scorn: they shoot out the lip, they shake the head, saying,

⁹For I think that God hath set forth us the apostles last, as it were appointed to death: for we are made a spectacle unto the world, and to angels, and to men.

¹⁰We are fools for Christ’s sake, but ye are wise in Christ; we are weak, but ye are strong; ye are honourable, but we are despised.

¹¹Even unto this present hour we both hunger, and thirst, and are naked, and are buffeted, and have no certain dwellingplace;

¹²And labour, working with our own hands: being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it:

¹³Being defamed, we intreat: we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day.

²⁷For was not Israel a derision unto thee? was he found among thieves? for since thou spakest of him, thou skippedst for joy.

¹BUT now they that are younger than I have me in derision, whose fathers I would have disdained to have set with the dogs of my flock.

²Yea, whereto might the strength of their hands profit me, in whom old age was perished?

³For want and famine they were solitary; fleeing into the wilderness in former time desolate and waste.

⁴Who cut up mallows by the bushes, and juniper roots for their meat.

⁵They were driven forth from among men, (they cried after them as after a thief;)

⁶To dwell in the clifts of the valleys, in caves of the earth, and in the rocks.

⁷Among the bushes they brayed; under the nettles they were gathered together.

⁸They were children of fools, yea, children of base men: they were viler than the earth.

⁹And now am I their song, yea, I am their byword.

³⁹¶ And they that passed by reviled him, wagging their heads,

⁴⁰And saying, Thou that destroyest the temple, and buildest it in three days, save thyself. If thou be the Son of God, come down from the cross.

⁴¹Likewise also the chief priests mocking him, with the scribes and elders, said,

⁴²He saved others; himself he cannot save. If he be the King of Israel, let him now come down from the cross, and we will believe him.

⁴³He trusted in God; let him deliver him now, if he will have him: for he said, I am the Son of God.

⁴⁴The thieves also, which were crucified with him, cast the same in his teeth.

²And he spake before his brethren and the army of Samaria, and said, What do these feeble Jews? will they fortify themselves? will they sacrifice? will they make an end in a day? will they revive the stones out of the heaps of the rubbish which are burned?

³Now Tobiah the Ammonite was by him, and he said, Even that which they build, if a fox go up, he shall even break down their stone wall.

⁴Hear, O our God; for we are despised: and turn their reproach upon their own head, and give them for a prey in the land of captivity:

³Have mercy upon us, O Lord, have mercy upon us: for we are exceedingly filled with contempt.

⁴Our soul is exceedingly filled with the scorning of those that are at ease, and with the contempt of the proud.

³For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.

¹⁵But in mine adversity they rejoiced, and gathered themselves together: yea, the abjects gathered themselves together against me, and I knew it not; they did tear me, and ceased not:

¹⁶With hypocritical mockers in feasts, they gnashed upon me with their teeth.

¹³Thou makest us a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and a derision to them that are round about us.

¹¹I made sackcloth also my garment; and I became a proverb to them.

¹²They that sit in the gate speak against me; and I was the song of the drunkards.

⁴We are become a reproach to our neighbours, a scorn and derision to them that are round about us.

¹⁵Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Behold, I will feed them, even this people, with wormwood, and give them water of gall to drink.

¹⁷¶ Awake, awake, stand up, O Jerusalem, which hast drunk at the hand of the Lord the cup of his fury; thou hast drunken the dregs of the cup of trembling, and wrung them out.

¹⁸There is none to guide her among all the sons whom she hath brought forth; neither is there any that taketh her by the hand of all the sons that she hath brought up.

¹⁹These two things are come unto thee; who shall be sorry for thee? desolation, and destruction, and the famine, and the sword: by whom shall I comfort thee?

²⁰Thy sons have fainted, they lie at the head of all the streets, as a wild bull in a net: they are full of the fury of the Lord, the rebuke of thy God.

²¹¶ Therefore hear now this, thou afflicted, and drunken, but not with wine:

²²Thus saith thy Lord the Lord, and thy God that pleadeth the cause of his people, Behold, I have taken out of thine hand the cup of trembling, even the dregs of the cup of my fury; thou shalt no more drink it again:

¹⁵Therefore thus saith the Lord of hosts concerning the prophets; Behold, I will feed them with wormwood, and make them drink the water of gall: for from the prophets of Jerusalem is profaneness gone forth into all the land.

¹⁵¶ For thus saith the Lord God of Israel unto me; Take the wine cup of this fury at my hand, and cause all the nations, to whom I send thee, to drink it.

¹⁶And they shall drink, and be moved, and be mad, because of the sword that I will send among them.

¹⁷Then took I the cup at the Lord’s hand, and made all the nations to drink, unto whom the Lord had sent me:

¹⁸To wit, Jerusalem, and the cities of Judah, and the kings thereof, and the princes thereof, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, an hissing, and a curse; as it is this day;

²⁷Therefore thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel; Drink ye, and be drunken, and spue, and fall, and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send among you.

¹⁸He will not suffer me to take my breath, but filleth me with bitterness.

¹⁹Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.

³Thou hast shewed thy people hard things: thou hast made us to drink the wine of astonishment.

²⁰And she said unto them, Call me not Naomi, call me Mara: for the Almighty hath dealt very bitterly with me.

¹⁷Bread of deceit is sweet to a man; but afterwards his mouth shall be filled with gravel.

²⁶¶ O daughter of my people, gird thee with sackcloth, and wallow thyself in ashes: make thee mourning, as for an only son, most bitter lamentation: for the spoiler shall suddenly come upon us.

⁷Arise, O Lord; save me, O my God: for thou hast smitten all mine enemies upon the cheek bone; thou hast broken the teeth of the ungodly.

⁶Break their teeth, O God, in their mouth: break out the great teeth of the young lions, O Lord.

⁸And he took him a potsherd to scrape himself withal; and he sat down among the ashes.

¹⁰The roaring of the lion, and the voice of the fierce lion, and the teeth of the young lions, are broken.

⁶For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes.

¹¹If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent?

⁹Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone?

⁹For I have eaten ashes like bread, and mingled my drink with weeping,

¹¹We roar all like bears, and mourn sore like doves: we look for judgment, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far off from us.

³⁰And there shall arise after them seven years of famine; and all the plenty shall be forgotten in the land of Egypt; and the famine shall consume the land;

¹⁷Behold, for peace I had great bitterness: but thou hast in love to my soul delivered it from the pit of corruption: for thou hast cast all my sins behind thy back.

¹⁰For the mountains shall depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee.

¹⁹Hast thou utterly rejected Judah? hath thy soul lothed Zion? why hast thou smitten us, and there is no healing for us? we looked for peace, and there is no good; and for the time of healing, and behold trouble!

⁵For thus saith the Lord, Enter not into the house of mourning, neither go to lament nor bemoan them: for I have taken away my peace from this people, saith the Lord, even lovingkindness and mercies.

¹⁴¶ Cursed be the day wherein I was born: let not the day wherein my mother bare me be blessed.

¹⁵Cursed be the man who brought tidings to my father, saying, A man child is born unto thee; making him very glad.

¹⁶And let that man be as the cities which the Lord overthrew, and repented not: and let him hear the cry in the morning, and the shouting at noontide;

¹⁷Because he slew me not from the womb; or that my mother might have been my grave, and her womb to be always great with me.

¹⁸Wherefore came I forth out of the womb to see labour and sorrow, that my days should be consumed with shame?

¹⁵We looked for peace, but no good came; and for a time of health, and behold trouble!

⁷O remember that my life is wind: mine eye shall no more see good.

¹⁶For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water, because the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me: my children are desolate, because the enemy prevailed.

¹⁵⁵Salvation is far from the wicked: for they seek not thy statutes.

¹⁰For before these days there was no hire for man, nor any hire for beast; neither was there any peace to him that went out or came in because of the affliction: for I set all men every one against his neighbour.

¹⁵And where is now my hope? as for my hope, who shall see it?

¹AND David said in his heart, I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul: there is nothing better for me than that I should speedily escape into the land of the Philistines; and Saul shall despair of me, to seek me any more in any coast of Israel: so shall I escape out of his hand.

¹¹¶ Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel: behold, they say, Our bones are dried, and our hope is lost: we are cut off for our parts.

¹¹What is my strength, that I should hope? and what is mine end, that I should prolong my life?

¹¹I said in my haste, All men are liars.

²²For I said in my haste, I am cut off from before thine eyes: nevertheless thou heardest the voice of my supplications when I cried unto thee.