How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people!
She is become as a widow, that was great among the nations!
She that was a princess among the provinces is become tributary!
She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks;
Among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her:
All her friends have dealt treacherously with her; they are become her enemies.
Judah is gone into {Or, exile}captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude;
She dwelleth among the nations, she findeth no rest:
All her persecutors overtook her within the straits.
The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the {Or, appointed feast}solemn assembly;
All her gates are desolate, her priests do sigh:
Her virgins are afflicted, and she herself is in bitterness.
Her adversaries are become the head, her enemies prosper;
For Jehovah hath afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions:
Her young children are gone into captivity before the adversary.
And from the daughter of Zion all her {Or, beauty}majesty is departed:
Her princes are become like harts that find no pasture,
And they are gone without strength before the pursuer.
Jerusalem remembereth in the days of her affliction and of her {Or, wanderings}miseries all her pleasant things that were from the days of old:
When her people fell into the hand of the adversary, and none did help her,
The adversaries saw her, they did mock at her {Hebrew: ceasings.}desolations.
Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she {Or, is removed}is become as an unclean thing;
All that honored her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness:
Yea, she sigheth, and turneth backward.
Her filthiness was in her skirts; she remembered not her latter end;
Therefore is she come down wonderfully; she hath no comforter:
Behold, O Jehovah, my affliction; for the enemy hath magnified himself.
The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things:
For she hath seen that the nations are entered into her sanctuary,
Concerning whom thou didst command that they should not enter into thine assembly.
All her people sigh, they seek bread;
They have given their pleasant things for food to refresh the soul:
See, O Jehovah, and behold; for I am become abject.
Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?
Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is brought upon me,
{Or, Whom Jehovah hath afflicted}Wherewith Jehovah hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.
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.
The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand;
They are knit together, they are come up upon my neck; he hath made my strength to {Hebrew: stumble.}fail:
The Lord hath delivered me into their hands, {Or, from whom I am not able to rise up}against whom I am not able to stand.
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 daughter of Judah.
For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water;
Because the comforter that should refresh my soul is far from me:
My children are desolate, because the enemy hath prevailed.
Zion spreadeth forth her hands; there is none to comfort her;
Jehovah hath commanded concerning Jacob, that they that are round about him should be his adversaries:
Jerusalem is among them as an unclean thing.
Jehovah is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment:
Hear, I pray you, all ye peoples, and behold my sorrow:
My virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.
I called for my lovers, but they deceived me:
My priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city,
While they sought them food to refresh their souls.
Behold, O Jehovah; for I am in distress; my heart is troubled;
My heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled:
Abroad the sword bereaveth, at home there is as death.
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 proclaimed, and they shall be like unto me.
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.
Querverweise zu Klagelieder 1,20 Klgl 1,20
Her filthiness was in her skirts; she remembered not her latter end;Therefore is she come down wonderfully; she hath no comforter:Behold, O Jehovah, my affliction; for the enemy hath magnified himself.
Mine eyes do fail with tears, my heart is troubled;My liver is poured upon the earth, because of the {Or, breach}destruction of the daughter of my people,Because the young children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.
Jehovah is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment:Hear, I pray you, all ye peoples, and behold my sorrow:My virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.
They that are slain with the sword are better than they that are slain with hunger;For these {Hebrew: flow away.}pine away, stricken through, for want of the fruits of the field.
All her people sigh, they seek bread;They have given their pleasant things for food to refresh the soul:See, O Jehovah, and behold; for I am become abject.
My heart is troubled, and resteth not;Days of affliction are come upon me.
And they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, in their trespass which they trespassed against me, and also that, because they walked contrary unto me,
I also walked contrary unto them, and brought them into the land of their enemies: if then their uncircumcised heart be humbled, and they then accept of the punishment of their iniquity;
then will I remember my covenant with Jacob; and also my covenant with Isaac, and also my covenant with Abraham will I remember; and I will remember the land.
The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children;They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
Like a swallow or a crane, so did I chatter;I did moan as a dove; mine eyes fail with looking upward:O Lord, I am oppressed, be thou my surety.
I am poured out like water,And all my bones are out of joint:My heart is like wax;It is melted within me.
yet if they shall bethink themselves in the land whither they are carried captive, and turn again, and make supplication unto thee in the land of them that carried them captive, saying, We have sinned, and have done perversely, we have dealt wickedly;
if they return unto thee with all their heart and with all their soul in the land of their enemies, who carried them captive, and pray unto thee toward their land, which thou gavest unto their fathers, the city which thou hast chosen, and the house which I have built for thy name:
then hear thou their prayer and their supplication in heaven thy dwelling-place, and maintain their cause;
and forgive thy people who have sinned against thee, and all their transgressions wherein they have transgressed against thee; and give them {Hebrew: to be for compassion.}compassion before those who carried them captive, that they may have compassion on them
Without shall the sword bereave,And in the chambers terror;It shall destroy both young man and virgin,The suckling with the man of gray hairs.
Wherefore my heart soundeth like a harp for Moab, and mine inward parts for Kir-heres.
He {Or, looketh upon men}singeth before men, and saith,I have sinned, and perverted that which was right,And {Or, it was nor requited unto me Or, it was not meet for me}it profited me not:
For death is come up into our windows, it is entered into our palaces; to cut off the children from without, and the young men from the streets.
My anguish, my anguish! {Another reading is, I will wait patiently}I am pained at {Hebrew: the walls of my heart.}my very heart; my heart is disquieted in me; I cannot hold my peace; because {Or, as otherwised read, my soul heareth}thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war.
For I know my transgressions;And my sin is ever before me.
Speak, Thus saith Jehovah, The dead bodies of men shall fall as dung upon the open field, and as the handful after the harvestman; and none shall gather them.
Is Ephraim my dear son? is he a darling child? for as often as I speak against him, I do earnestly remember him still: therefore my heart {Hebrew: soundeth.}yearneth for him; I will surely have mercy upon him, saith Jehovah.
Against thee, thee only, have I sinned,And done that which is evil in thy sight;That thou mayest be justified when thou speakest,And be clear when thou judgest.
If I go forth into the field, then, behold, the slain with the sword! and if I enter into the city, then, behold, {Hebrew: the sickness of famine.}they that are sick with famine! for both the prophet and the priest {Or, traffic}go about {Or, into a land that they know not}in the land, and have no knowledge.
Therefore my heart soundeth for Moab like pipes, and my heart soundeth like pipes for the men of Kir-heres: therefore the abundance that he hath gotten is perished.
He that covereth his transgressions shall not prosper:But whoso confesseth and forsaketh them shall obtain mercy.
The sword is without, and the pestilence and the famine within: he that is in the field shall die with the sword: and he that is in the city, famine and pestilence shall devour him.
How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? how shall I cast thee off, Israel? how shall I make thee as Admah? how shall I set thee as Zeboiim? my heart is turned within me, my compassions are kindled together.
Yet thou saidst, I am innocent; surely his anger is turned away from me. Behold, I will enter into judgment with thee, because thou sayest, I have not sinned.
I heard, and my body trembled,My lips quivered at the voice;Rottenness entereth into my bones, and I tremble in my place;Because I must wait quietly for the day of trouble, {Or, When there shall come up against the people he that invadeth them}For the coming up of the people that invadeth us.
Only {Or, know}acknowledge thine iniquity, that thou hast transgressed against Jehovah thy God, and hast scattered thy ways to the strangers under every green tree, and ye have not obeyed my voice, saith Jehovah.
I will arise and go to my father, and will say unto him, Father, I have sinned against heaven, and in thy sight:
I am no more worthy to be called thy son: make me as one of thy hired servants.
But the {See marginal note on chapter 3:12.}publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote his breast, saying, God, {Or, be thou propitiated}be thou merciful to me {Or, the sinner}a sinner.
I say unto you, This man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be humbled; but he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.