1 Jer. xiii, 17.

2 She weepeth sore in the "night, and her tears are on A.C. 588. her cheeks: among all her lovers she hath none to comfort ker: all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they m Job vii. 3. are become her enemies.

3 Judah is gone into captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude: she dwelleth among the hea- * Heh. for the

of servitude.

the present deplorable and wretched condition of his country, and her
former state of prosperity ; and ascribes the unhappy change chiefly to the
profligacy of its priests and prophets. The national calamities are deeply
and tenderly lamented, especially the captivity of their sovereign Zedekiah.
This elegy concludes with predicting the judgments that were impending

over the Edomites, who had insulted the Jews in their distress.
ELEOY 5. is an epilogue or conclusion to the preceding chapters or elegies. In

the Syriac, Arabic, and Vulgate versions, this chapter is entitled THE PRAYER
OF JEREMIAH ; but no such title appears in the Hebrew copies, or in the
Septuagint version. It is rather, as Dr. Blayney has remarked, a memo-
rial, representing, in the name of the whole body of Jewish exiles, the
numerous calamities under which they groaned; and humbly supplicating
God to commiserate their wretchedness, and to restore them to his favour,

and to their ancient prosperity.
III. The Lamentations are evidently written in metre, and contain a number
of plaintive effusions composed after the manner of funeral dirges. Bishop
Lowth is of opinion, that they were originally written by the prophet, as they
arose in bis mind, in a long course of separate stanzas, and that they were
subsequently collected into one poem. Each elegy consists of twenty-two pe-
riods, according to the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet ; although it is
in the four first chapters only that the several periods begin (after the manner of
an acrostic) with the different letters following each other in alphabetical order.
By this contrivance, the metre is more precisely marked and ascertained, parti-
cularly in the third chapter, where each period contains three verses, all having
the same initial letter. The two first chapters, in like manner, consist of trip-
lets, excepting only the seventh period of the first and the nineteenth of the
second, each of which has a supernumerary line. The fourth chapter resembles
the three former in metre, but the periods are only couplets ; and in the fifth
chapter the periods are couplets, though of a considerably shorter measure.

Although there is no artificial or methodical arrangement of the subject in these incomparable elegies, yet they are totally free from wild incoherency or abrupt transition. Never, perhaps, was there a greater variety of beautiful, tender, and pathetic images, all expressive of the deepest distress and sorrow, more happily chosen and applied than in the lamentations of this prophet; nor can we too much admire the full and graceful flow of that pathetic eloquence, in which the author pours forth the effusions of a patriot heart, and piously weeps over the ruin of his venerable country --Vide Horne's Critical Introduction, from which this note is extracted.

* Dr. Blayney's Jeremiah, pp. 455, et seq. Bishop Lowth's Lectures on Hebrew Poetry, lect. xxii. in fine. Jahn, Introd. ad Vet. Fæd. pp. 415—417. Carpzov. Introd. ad Libros Biblicos, pars iii. cap, iv. pp. 177-197.

n Deut. xxviii. 43, 44,

A.C. 588. then, she findeth no rest: all her persecutors overtook her

between the straits.

4 The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the solemn feasts: all her gates are desolate : her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she is in bitterness.

5 Her adversaries are the chief, her enemies prosper;

for the LORD hath afflicted her for the multitude of her o Jer lii, 28. transgressions : her children are gone into captivity before

6 And from the daughter of Zion all her beauty is departed : her princes are become like harts that find no pasture, and they are gone without strength before the pur

the enemy

suer.

ble, ver10.

come a remov.

dering

7 Jerusalem remembered in the days of her affliction and * Or, de irn- of her miseries all her * pleasant things that she had in the

days of old, when her people fell into the hand of the enemy,
and none did help her: the adversaries saw her, and did

mock at her sabbaths. + Heb. is be

8 Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she t is ing, orwan- removed : all that honoured her despise her, because they

have seen her nakedness : yea, she sigheth, and turneth
backward.

9 Her filthiness is in her skirts; she remembereth not her
last end; therefore she came down wonderfully: she had no
comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction : for the enemy
hath magnified himself.

10 The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her
Or,desirable. I pleasant things : for she hath seen that the heathen entered
B
Deut. xxiii. into her sanctuary, whom thou didst command that P they

should not enter into thy congregation.

11 All her people sigh, they seek bread; they have given Or, to make their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul: see, O come again. Lord, and consider; for I am become vile.

12 | Is it nothing to you, all ye that * pass by? be-
nothing.
Heb.pass hold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow,

which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted
me in the day of his fierce anger.

13 From 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.

14 The 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.

15 The Lord hath trodden under foot all my mighty men in the midst of me: he hath called an assembly against me

How

11 Or, It is

by the way.

* Or, the

& xiv. 17. ch.

+ Heb. bring back.

to crush my young men : the LORD hath trodden * the vir- A.C. 588. gin, the daughter of Judah, as in a winepress.

16 For these things I weep; " mine eye, mine eye run- winepress of neth down with water, because the comforter that should 9 Jer. St. Sti. † relieve my soul is far from me: my children are desolate, it is because the enemy prevailed.

17 Zion spreadeth forth her hands, and there is none to comfort her: the LORD hath commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him: Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them.

18 ( The Lord is "righteous; for I have rebelled against Dan. ix. 7. his commandment: hear, I pray you, all people, and be- ^ Heb. mouth, hold my sorrow: my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

19 I called for my lovers, but they deceived me: my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.

20 Behold, O LORD; for I am in distress : my s bowels $ Is. xvi. 11. are troubled ; mine heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled : abroad the sword bereaveth, at home there is as death.

21 They have heard that I sigh : there is none to comfort me : all mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done it: thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me.

Or, pro22 Let all their wickedness come before thee; and do unto them, as thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions : for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.

Jer. xlviii, 36,

claimed,

LAMENTATIONS II,

1 Jeremiah lamenteth the misery of Jerusalem. 20 He complaineth thereof to God.

1 How 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!

2 The Lord hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and hath not pitied: he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the daughter of Judah; he hath | brought them down to the ground: he hath polluted the || Heb, made kingdom and the princes thereof.

3 He hath cut off in his fierce anger all the horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy, and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about.

4 He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew * all that were * Heb, all the

to touch.

desirable of

the eye.

t Ps. lxxx. 12. & lxxxix. 40. Is. v. 5.

the.

up.

lowing up.

A.C. 588. pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion :

he poured out his fury like fire.

5 The 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.

6 And he hath violently taken away his * tabernacle, as

if it were of a garden : he hath destroyed his places of the * Os, hedge. assembly: the Lord hath caused the solemn feasts and sab

baths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath despised in the in-
dignation of his anger the king and the priest.

7 The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his + Heb, shut 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.

8 The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the

daughter of Zion : he hath stretched out a line, he hath not Heb. swal withdrawn his hand from Idestroying: therefore he made

the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished toge-
ther.

9 Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath destroyed

and broken her bars : her king and her princes are among Ps. Ixxiv.9. the Gentiles : the law is no more; her " prophets also find

no vision from the LORD.

10 The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground, and keep silence: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth : the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.

11 Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the

daughter of my people; because the children and the suck$ Or,faint. lings 5 swoon in the streets of the city.

12 They say to their mothers, Where is corn and wine ? when they swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city, when their soul was poured out into their mothers' bosom.

13 What thing shall I take to witness for thee? thing shall I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem ? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach is great like the sea : who can heal thee?

14 Thy * prophets have seen vain and foolish things for Ya. * *xii. ie. thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn

away thy captivity ; but have seen for thee false burdens and
causes of banishment.

15 All that pass || by clap their hands at thee; they hiss
and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, saying,

x Jer. ii. 8. & v. 31. & xiv.

# Heb. by the way.

y Ps. xlviii. 2.

cease,

Is this the city that men call » The perfection of beauty, The A.C. 588.
joy of the whole earth ?

16. All thine enemies have opened their mouth against
thee: they hiss and gnash the teeth : they say, We have
swallowed her up: certainly this is the day that we looked
for; we have found, we have seen it.

17 The LORD hath done that which he had a devised; he ? Lev. xxvi.
hath fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days xxviii

. 15, &c.
of old : he hath thrown down, and hath not pitied : and he
hath caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee, he hath set up
the horn of thine adversaries.

18 Their heart cried unto the LORD, O wall of the
daughter of Zion, a let tears run down like a river day and a Jer. xiv. 17.
night: give thyself no rest; let not the apple of thine eye

19 Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the
watches

pour

out thine heart like water before the face of
the LORD: lift up thy hands toward him for the life of
thy young children, that faint for hunger in the top of every
street.

20 Behold, O LORD, and consider to whom thou hast
done this. Shall the women eat their fruit, and children
* of a span long ? shall the priest and the prophet be slain Or, swad-
in the sanctuary of the LORD?

21 The young and the old lie on the ground in the streets :
my virgins and my young men are fallen by the sword; thou
hast slain them in the day of thine anger; thou hast killed,
and not pitied.

22 Thou hast called as in a solemn day my terrors round about, so that in the day of the Lord's anger none escaped nor remained : those that I have swaddled and brought up hath mine enemy consumed.

dled with their
hands.

LAMENTATIONS III.

1 The faithful beu

their calamities. 22 the mercies of God they nourish
their hope. 87 They acknowledge God's justice. 55 They pray for deliver-
ance, 64 and vengeance on their enemies.

1 I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his
wrath.
2 He hath led me, and brought me into darkness, but not

3 Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all

the day. 4 My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken

5 He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travel.

into light.

my bones.