Chapter 5

¹ Remember, O Lord, what has happened to us: behold, and look on our reproach.

² Our inheritance has been turned away to aliens, our houses to strangers: ³ we are become orphans, we have no father, our mothers are as widows. ⁴ We have drunk our water for money; our wood ¹is sold to us for a burden on our neck: ⁵ we have been persecuted, we have laboured, we have had no rest.

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⁶ Egypt gave the hand to us, Assur to their ²own satisfaction. ⁷ Our fathers sinned, and are not: we have borne their iniquities. ⁸ Servants have ruled over us: there is none to ransom us out of their hand. ⁹ We shall bring in our bread with danger of our lives, because of the sword of the wilderness. ¹⁰ Our skin is blackened like an oven; they are convulsed, because of the storms of famine. ¹¹ They humbled the women in Sion, the virgins in the cities of Juda. ¹² Princes were hanged up by their hands: the elders were not honoured. ¹³ The chosen men lifted up the voice in weeping, and the youths fainted under the wood. ¹⁴ And the elders ceased from the gate, the chosen men ceased from their ³music. ¹⁵ The joy of our heart has ceased; our dance is turned into mourning. ¹⁶ The crown has fallen from our head: yea, woe to us! for we have sinned.

¹⁷ For this has grief come; our heart is sorrowful: for this our eyes are darkened. ¹⁸ Over the mountain of Sion, because it is made desolate, foxes have walked therein.

¹⁹ But thou, O Lord, shalt dwell for ever; thy throne shall endure to generation and generation. ²⁰ Wherefore wilt thou ⁴utterly forget us, and abandon us a long time? ²¹ Turn us, O Lord, to thee, and we shall be turned; and renew our days as before. ²² For thou hast indeed rejected us; thou hast been very wroth against us.