Lamentations 2

¹ How the Lord, in his anger, covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud! He hurled Israel’s beauty from heaven to earth and did not remember his footstool on the day of his anger.

² The Lord devoured all the dwellings of Jacob without mercy. In his fury he tore down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah and threw them to the ground; he profaned the kingdom and its princes.

³ In fierce anger he cut off all the strength of Israel; he drew back his right hand before the enemy. He burned in Jacob like a blazing fire that devours all around.

⁴ He bent his bow like an enemy, set his right hand like an adversary, and killed everything pleasing to the eye. In the tent of the daughter of Zion he poured out his fury like fire.

⁵ The Lord became an enemy: he devoured Israel, devoured all its palaces, destroyed its strongholds, and multiplied mourning and lament in the daughter of Judah.

⁶ He tore down his shelter as if it were a garden; he destroyed his meeting place. The LORD made feast and Sabbath forgotten in Zion, and in the fury of his anger rejected king and priest.

⁷ The Lord rejected his altar and despised his sanctuary. He handed the walls of her palaces over to the enemy; they shouted in the house of the LORD as on a festival day.

⁸ The LORD decided to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; he stretched out the measuring line and did not withdraw his hand from the destruction. He made outer wall and rampart mourn; together they wasted away.

⁹ Her gates sank into the ground; he broke and destroyed her bars. Her king and princes are among the nations; there is no Law, and her prophets find no vision from the LORD either.

¹⁰ The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence; they have put dust on their heads and dressed in sackcloth. The young women of Jerusalem have bowed their heads to the ground.

¹¹ My eyes are spent with tears, my insides churn. My liver has been poured out on the ground because of the ruin of the daughter of my people, because children and infants faint in the city squares.

¹² The children say to their mothers, “Where are the grain and wine?”—and they faint like the wounded in the city squares, as their lives ebb away in their mothers’ arms.

¹³ What can I say about you? What can I compare you to, daughter of Jerusalem? What can I liken you to, to comfort you, virgin daughter of Zion? For your ruin is as vast as the sea; who can heal you?

¹⁴ Your prophets saw false and worthless visions for you; they did not expose your guilt to restore your fortunes. They saw false and deceptive oracles for you.

¹⁵ All who pass along the road clap their hands at you; they whistle and shake their heads at the daughter of Jerusalem: “Is this the city they called perfect in beauty, the joy of the whole earth?”

¹⁶ All your enemies open their mouths against you; they whistle, grind their teeth, and say, “We have devoured her. This is surely the day we were waiting for; we have reached it, we have seen it.”

¹⁷ The LORD did what he planned; he fulfilled his word, which he had commanded long ago. He tore down without mercy, let the enemy rejoice over you, and raised the strength of your adversaries.

¹⁸ Their hearts cried out to the Lord. Wall of the daughter of Zion, let your tears flow like a river day and night; give yourself no rest, and let the pupil of your eye never stop.

¹⁹ Rise up, cry out at night, at the start of the watches; pour out your heart like water before the Lord. Lift your hands to him for the lives of your little ones, who faint from hunger at every street corner.

²⁰ Look, LORD, and see whom you have treated this way. Should women eat their own fruit, the children they have cradled? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

²¹ Boys and old men lie on the ground in the streets; my young women and young men have fallen by the sword. You killed them on the day of your anger; you slaughtered without mercy.

²² As on a festival day, you summoned from every side those who terrify me; on the day of the LORD’s anger no one escaped or survived. My enemy exterminated those I had nurtured and raised.

Read and listen to this chapter in the Shalem app, free: narration, chapter video and reading progress. Get the app