Lamentations 2

Lamentations 2

1How has the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger!

He has cast the beauty of Israel down from heaven to the earth ,

and hasn’t remembered his footstool in the day of his anger.

2The Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob

without pity .

He has thrown down in his wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah .

He has brought them down to the ground.

He has profaned the kingdom and its princes .

3He has cut off all the horn of Israel in fierce anger .

He has drawn back his right hand from before the enemy.

He has burnt up Jacob like a flaming fire,

which devours all around .

4He has bent his bow like an enemy .

He has stood with his right hand as an adversary .

He has killed all that were pleasant to the eye .

In the tent of the daughter of Zion , he has poured out his wrath like fire.

5The Lord has become as an enemy.

He has swallowed up Israel .

He has swallowed up all her palaces.

He has destroyed his strongholds .

He has multiplied mourning and lamentation in the daughter of Judah .

6He has violently taken away his tabernacle ,

as if it were a garden .

He has destroyed his place of assembly .

The LORD has caused solemn assembly and Sabbath to be forgotten in Zion .

In the indignation of his anger , he has despised the king and the priest .

7The Lord has cast off his altar .

He has abhorred his sanctuary .

He has given the walls of her palaces into the hand of the enemy.

They have made a noise in the LORD ’s house ,

as in the day of a solemn assembly .

8The LORD has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion .

He has stretched out the line .

He has not withdrawn his hand from destroying ;

He has made the rampart and wall lament.

They languish together .

9Her gates have sunk into the ground.

He has destroyed and broken her bars .

Her king and her princes are amongst the nations where the law is not .

Yes , her prophets find no vision from the LORD .

10The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground .

They keep silence .

They have cast up dust on their heads .

They have clothed themselves with sackcloth .

The virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground .

11My eyes fail with tears .

My heart is troubled .

My bile is poured on the earth,

because of the destruction of the daughter of my people ,

because the young children and the infants swoon in the streets of the city .

12They ask their mothers,

“Where is grain and wine ?”

when they swoon as the wounded in the streets of the city ,

when their soul is poured out into their mothers’ bosom .

13What shall I testify to you ?

What shall I liken to you , daughter of Jerusalem ?

What shall I compare to you ,

that I may comfort you , virgin daughter of Zion ?

For your breach is as big as the sea .

Who can heal you ?

14Your prophets have seen false and foolish visions for you .

They have not uncovered your iniquity ,

to reverse your captivity ,

but have seen for you false revelations and causes of banishment .

15All that pass by clap their hands at you .

They hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem , saying,

“Is this the city that men called ‘The perfection of beauty ,

the joy of the whole earth’?”

16All your enemies have opened their mouth wide against you .

They hiss and gnash their teeth .

They say , “We have swallowed her up .

Certainly this is the day that we looked for .

We have found it .

We have seen it .”

17The LORD has done that which he planned .

He has fulfilled his word that he commanded in the days of old .

He has thrown down ,

and has not pitied .

He has caused the enemy to rejoice over you .

He has exalted the horn of your adversaries .

18Their heart cried to the Lord.

O wall of the daughter of Zion ,

let tears run down like a river day and night .

Give yourself no relief .

Don’t let your eyes rest .

19Arise , cry out in the night ,

at the beginning of the watches!

Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord.

Lift up your hands towards him for the life of your young children ,

who faint for hunger at the head of every street .

20“Look , LORD , and see to whom you have done thus !

Should the women eat their offspring ,

the children that they held and bounced on their knees?

Should the priest and the prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord ?

21“The youth and the old man lie on the ground in the streets .

My virgins and my young men have fallen by the sword .

You have killed them in the day of your anger.

You have slaughtered , and not pitied .

22“You have called , as in the day of a solemn assembly , my terrors on every side .

There was no one that escaped or remained in the day of the LORD ’s anger.

My enemy has consumed those whom I have cared for and brought up .

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