Lamentations 1

1How she sits alone, the city once full of people! She has become like a widow, she who was great among the nations, a princess among the provinces; she has become subject to forced labor.

2She weeps bitterly in the night, with her tears on her cheeks; among all her lovers she has no comforter. All her companions have dealt treacherously with her; they have become her enemies.

3Judah has gone into exile because of affliction and because of great servitude; she dwells among the nations and finds no rest. All her pursuers have overtaken her in the narrow places.

4The roads of Zion mourn, because no one comes to the appointed feast; all her gates are desolate, her priests groan, her virgins grieve, and she herself is bitter.

5Her foes have become the head; her enemies prosper, because Yahweh has afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions. Her children have gone away into captivity before the foe.

6From daughter Zion all her splendor has departed; her princes have become like deer that find no pasture; they went without strength before the pursuer.

7Jerusalem remembered in the days of her affliction and her wanderings all her precious things that were from days of old. When her people fell into the hand of the foe, and there was no one to help her, foes saw her; they laughed at her ruin.

8Jerusalem has sinned grievously; therefore she has become unclean. All who honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness. She herself also groans and turns backward.

9Her uncleanness was in her skirts; she did not remember her end. So she came down astonishingly; there was no comforter for her. Look, O Yahweh, my affliction, for the enemy has magnified himself.

10The enemy has stretched out his hand over all her precious things, for she has seen nations enter her sanctuary—those whom you commanded not to enter your assembly.

11All her people groan, seeking bread; they have given their precious things for food to restore life. Look, O Yahweh, and see, for I have become despised.

12Is it nothing to you, all you who pass by on the road? Look and see whether there is any sorrow like my sorrow, which was dealt to me, with which Yahweh afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.

13From on high he sent fire into my bones, and it prevailed against them; he spread a net for my feet; he turned me back; he made me desolate, faint all day long.

14The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand; they are woven together, they have come up upon my neck; he has made my strength fail. The Lord has given me into hands from which I cannot rise.

15The Lord has rejected all my mighty men in my midst; he has summoned an appointed time against me to crush my young men. The Lord has trodden the winepress for the virgin daughter of Judah.

16For these things I am weeping; my eye, my eye runs down with water, because the comforter who restores my soul is far from me. My children have become desolate, because the enemy has prevailed.

17Zion has spread out her hands; there is no one to comfort her. Yahweh has commanded concerning Jacob that his enemies surround him; Jerusalem has become an unclean thing among them.

18Yahweh is righteous, for I have rebelled against his word. Hear, please, all peoples, and see my pain: my virgins and my young men have gone into captivity.

19I called to my lovers; they deceived me. My priests and my elders perished in the city while they sought food for themselves to restore their lives.

20Look, O Yahweh, for I am in distress; my inward parts are churning; my heart is overturned within me, because I have been very rebellious. Outside the sword bereaves; inside the house it is like death.

21They have heard that I groan; there is no one to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble; they rejoice that you have done it. You have brought the day you proclaimed; let them become like me.

22Let all their evil come before you, and deal with them as you have dealt with me because of all my transgressions; for my groans are many, and my heart is sick.