First lamentation
1How forlorn the city lies,
once teeming with people!
How like a widow is she,
once mistress of the nations!
A princess among the cities,
she has now become a slave.
2She spends her nights weeping,
drenching her cheeks with tears.
Who is there to comfort her
among all her lovers?
All her friends have betrayed her
and have become her enemies.
3Humiliated, exhausted,
Judah has gone into exile
but she finds no rest among the nations where she sojourns;
her pursuers have overtaken her
where there is no way of escape.
4All roads to Zion are in mourning;
no one comes to her feasts.
Her gates are deserted,
her priests groan,
her virgins grieve.
What bitter anguish she suffers!
5She is at the mercy of her foes
who enjoy prosperity and power.
Yahweh himself has made her suffer for all her iniquity.
Her children, driven into captivity,
take the lonely road to exile.
6Gone from the daughter of Zion
is all her majestic splendor.
Her rulers, like harts
that find no pasture,
have fled helplessly
before the oppressors.
7Jerusalem recalls her days
of wandering and affliction,
her people fell into the hands of her foes
and there was no help.
Haters gloated over her downfall
and laughed at her destruction.
8Greatly has Jerusalem sinned;
she has become as a thing unclean.
Honored before,
but now despised by those who have seen her naked,
she herself groans in dismay
and turns her face away.
9Her filth clings to her skirt.
She gave no thought to her doom,
and so her fall came suddenly,
with no one to offer comfort.
“Look, O Yahweh, upon my misery,
for my enemy has overcome me.”
10She has seen how the enemy
has laid hands on her treasures.
She has seen how the nations
have defiled her sanctuary –
those peoples you have not allowed
to come into your assembly.
11All her people groan
as they search for bread;
just to keep themselves alive,
they give their jewels for food.
Look, Yahweh, and mark
how I have been despised.
12All you who pass by,
look and see.
Is there any calamity
like this, inflicted on me
by Yahweh on the day
of his burning anger.
13From above he sent a fire
down into my very bones,
he ensnared my feet
and threw me down,
and left me in pain
the whole day long.
14He bound my sins into a yoke
and fastened them together,
then set them upon my neck
and caused my strength to fail.
Yahweh gave me into the hands
of those I cannot withstand.
15Yahweh has spurned
the bravest of my fighters;
he has summoned an army
to crush my young warriors.
Yahweh has trodden in his winepress
Judah’s virgin daughter.
16This is what I weep about,
what makes my tears well up.
No one is near to restore my spirit,
no one at hand to console me.
My children are desolate,
for the enemy has triumphed.
17Zion stretches out her hands,
but there is no one to give comfort.
Yahweh has decreed for Jacob
that his neighbors become his foes.
As an unclean thing among them
has Jerusalem become.
18Yahweh acts justly,
for I have defied his order.
Listen, all you peoples,
and see how I suffer.
My young men and maidens
have all gone into exile.
19I cried for help to my lovers,
but they betrayed me.
My priests and my elders
perished in the city
they sought anything to eat,
but finally they had to die.
20Look, Yahweh, upon my distress:
all within me is in anguish.
My heart recoils within me:
I know that I have been rebellious.
See, outside the sword that kills,
and within, death that stalks.
21People have heard my moaning
but no one comes to comfort me.
My foes have known of my suffering,
they rejoice at what you have done.
Hasten the day you have proclaimed,
that they may be even as I am.
22Let their evil come
before you, and deal with them
as you have dealt with me
on account of my sins.
Great indeed is my groaning.
How sick at heart I am!
