Eichah (Book of Lamentations), Jeremiah
Eichah (Book of Lamentations)
Jeremiah
Category: Judaism
0:25 h
The Jewish Publication Society of America Version (JPS) of the Tanakh (the Hebrew Bible) was the first Bible translation published by the Jewish Publication Society of America and the first translation of the Tanakh into English by a committee of Jews. The full publication title is The Holy Scriptures According to the Masoretic Text: A New Translation with the Aid of Previous Versions and with Constant Consultation of Jewish Authorities.

Eichah
(Book of Lamentations)

אֵיכָה

Ketuvim - כְּתוּבִים

Eichah - Chapter 1

How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! How is she become as a widow! She that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how is she become tributary! {S}

She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks; she hath none to comfort her among all her lovers; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies. {S}

Judah is gone into exile because of affliction, and because of great servitude; she dwelleth among the nations, she findeth no rest; all her pursuers overtook her within the straits. {S}

The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the solemn assembly; all her gates are desolate, her priests sigh; her virgins are afflicted, and she herself is in bitterness. {S}

Her adversaries are become the head, her enemies are at ease; for the LORD hath afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions; her young children are gone into captivity before the adversary. {S}

And gone is from the daughter of Zion all her splendour; her princes are become like harts that find no pasture, and they are gone without strength before the pursuer. {S}

Jerusalem remembereth in the days of her affliction and of her anguish all her treasures that she had from the days of old; now that her people fall by the hand of the adversary, and none doth help her, the adversaries have seen her, they have mocked at her desolations. {S}

Jerusalem hath grievously sinned, therefore she is become as one unclean; all that honoured her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness; she herself also sigheth, and turneth backward. {S}

Her filthiness was in her skirts, she was not mindful of her end; therefore is she come down wonderfully, she hath no comforter. ‘Behold, O LORD, my affliction, for the enemy hath magnified himself.’ {S}

The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her treasures; for she hath seen that the heathen are entered into her sanctuary, concerning whom Thou didst command that they should not enter into Thy congregation. {S}

All her people sigh, they seek bread; they have given their pleasant things for food to refresh the soul. ‘See, O LORD, and behold, how abject I am become.’ {S}

‘Let it not come unto you, all ye that pass by! Behold, and see if there be any pain like unto my pain, which is done unto me, wherewith the LORD hath afflicted me in the day of His fierce anger. {S}

From on high 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. {S}

The yoke of my transgressions is impressed by His hand; they are knit together, they are come up upon my neck; He hath made my strength to fail; the Lord hath delivered me into their hands, against whom I am not able to stand. {S}

The Lord hath set at nought all my mighty men in the midst of me; He hath called a solemn assembly against me to crush my young men; the Lord hath trodden as in a winepress the virgin the daughter of Judah.’ {S}

‘For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water; because the comforter is far from me, even he that should refresh my soul; my children are desolate, because the enemy hath prevailed.’ {S}

Zion spreadeth forth her hands; there is none to comfort her; the LORD hath commanded concerning Jacob, that they that are round about him should be his adversaries; Jerusalem is among them as one unclean. {S}

‘The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled against His word; hear, I pray you, all ye peoples, and behold my pain: my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity. {S}

I called for my lovers, but they deceived me; my priests and mine elders perished in the city, while they sought them food to refresh their souls. {S}

Behold, O LORD, for I am in distress, mine inwards burn; my heart is turned within me, for I have grievously rebelled. Abroad the sword bereaveth, at home there is the like of death. {S}

They have heard that I sigh, there is none to comfort me; all mine enemies have heard of my trouble, and are glad, for Thou hast done it; Thou wilt bring the day that Thou hast proclaimed, and they shall be like unto me. {S}

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.’ {P}

Eichah - Chapter 2

How hath the Lord covered with a cloud the daughter of Zion in His anger! He hath cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel, and hath not remembered His footstool in the day of His anger. {S}

The Lord hath swallowed up unsparingly all the habitations of Jacob; He hath thrown down in His wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah; He hath brought them down to the ground; He hath profaned the kingdom and the princes thereof. {S}

He hath cut off in fierce anger all the horn of Israel; He hath drawn back His right hand from before the enemy; and He hath burned in Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about. {S}

He hath bent His bow like an enemy, standing with His right hand as an adversary, and hath slain all that were pleasant to the eye; in the tent of the daughter of Zion He hath poured out His fury like fire. {S}

The Lord is become as an enemy, He hath swallowed up Israel; He hath swallowed up all her palaces, He hath destroyed his strongholds; and He hath multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and moaning. {S}

And He hath stripped His tabernacle, as if it were a garden, He hath destroyed His place of assembly; the LORD hath caused to be forgotten in Zion appointed season and sabbath, and hath rejected in the indignation of His anger the king and the priest. {S}

The Lord hath cast off His altar, He hath abhorred His 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 assembly. {S}

The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; He hath stretched out the line, He hath not withdrawn His hand from destroying; but He hath made the rampart and wall to mourn, they languish together. {S}

Her gates are sunk into the ground; He hath destroyed and broken her bars; her king and her princes are among the nations, instruction is no more; yea, her prophets find no vision from the LORD. {S}

They sit upon the ground, and keep silence, the elders of the daughter of Zion; 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. {S}

Mine eyes do fail with tears, mine inwards burn, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the breach of the daughter of my people; because the young children and the sucklings swoon in the broad places of the city. {S}

They say to their mothers: ‘Where is corn and wine?’ when they swoon as the wounded in the broad places of the city, when their soul is poured out into their mothers’ bosom. {S}

What shall I take to witness for thee? What 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? {S}

Thy prophets have seen visions for thee of vanity and delusion; and they have not uncovered thine iniquity, to bring back thy captivity; but have prophesied for thee burdens of vanity and seduction. {S}

All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem: ‘Is this the city that men called the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth?’ {S}

All thine enemies have opened their mouth wide 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.’ {S}

The LORD hath done that which He devised; He hath performed His word that He commanded in the days of old; He hath thrown down unsparingly; and He hath caused the enemy to rejoice over thee, He hath exalted the horn of thine adversaries. {S}

Their heart cried unto the Lord: ‘O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night; give thyself no respite; let not the apple of thine eye cease. {S}

Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the watches; pour out thy 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 at the head of every street.’ {S}

‘See, O LORD, and consider, to whom Thou hast done thus! Shall the women eat their fruit, the children that are dandled in the hands? Shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord? {S}

The youth and the old man 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 slaughtered unsparingly. {S}

Thou hast called, as in the day of a solemn assembly, my terrors on every side, and there was none in the day of the LORD’S anger that escaped or remained; those that I have dandled and brought up hath mine enemy consumed.’ {P}

Eichah - Chapter 3

I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of His wrath.

He hath led me and caused me to walk in darkness and not in light.

Surely against me He turneth His hand again and again all the day. {S}

My flesh and my skin hath He worn out; He hath broken my bones.

He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.

He hath made me to dwell in dark places, as those that have been long dead. {S}