A Lament for Israel’s Princes

¹Moreover take up a lamentation for the officials of Israel,[#2Ki 24:6; Eze 26:17]

²and say:

What was your mother?

A lioness among lions!

She lay down among young lions;

she nourished her whelps.

³When she brought up one of her whelps,

he became a lion

and learned to catch his prey;

he devoured men.

⁴The nations also heard of him;

he was taken in their pit,

and they brought him with chains

to the land of Egypt.

⁵Now when she saw as she had waited

that her hope was lost,

then she took another of her whelps

and made him a young lion.

⁶He went up and down among the lions;

he became a young lion,

and learned to catch the prey,

and devoured men.

⁷He destroyed their fortified palaces,

and he laid waste their cities;

and the land and its fullness

were appalled by the noise of his roaring.

⁸Then the nations set against him

on every side from their provinces,

and spread their net over him;

he was taken in their pit.

⁹They put him in a cage with hooks

and brought him to the king of Babylon;

they brought him in hunting nets,

so that his voice would be heard no more

on the mountains of Israel.

¹⁰Your mother was like a vine in your vineyard,

planted by the waters;

it was fruitful and full of branches

by reason of many waters.

¹¹It had strong rods

for the scepters of those who rule.

And its stature

was exalted above the clouds,

so it appeared in its height

with the multitude of its branches.

¹²But it was plucked up in fury,

it was cast down to the ground,

and the east wind dried up its fruit.

Its strong rod was broken and it withered;

the fire consumed it.

¹³Now it is planted in the wilderness,

in a dry and thirsty ground.

¹⁴Fire has gone out from its branch;[#Jdg 9:20]

it has devoured its shoots and fruit,

so that there is no strong rod in it,

a scepter to rule.

This is a lamentation, and has become a lamentation.