CHAPTER 2

1 How hath the Lord clouded in his wrath The daughter of Sion! He hath cast down from heaven to the earth The glory of Israel; And hath not remembered his footstool In the day of his wrath!

2 Destroyed hath the Lord, and spared not, All the habitations of Jacob; He hath demolished in his indignation The fortresses of the daughter of Judah; He hath cast them to the ground, he hath profaned Her kingdom and her princes.

3 He hath broken in the indignation of his wrath Every horn of Israel; He hath withdrawn his right hand From before the enemy; And he burned like fire in Jacob, The flame devoured all around.

4 Bent hath he his bow as an enemy, Stand did his right hand as an adversary, And he slew all the delights of the eye In the tabernacle of the daughter of Sion He hath poured forth As fire, his wrath.

5 The Lord hath been like an enemy, He hath destroyed Israel; He hath destroyed all his palaces, He hath demolished his fortresses; He hath increased in the daughter of Judah Mourning and lamentation:

6 And he hath removed as a garden His tabernacle; He hath destroyed his testimony; Forgotten hath Jehovah in Sion The assembly and the Sabbath; He hath rejected, in the indignation of his wrath, The king and the priest:

7 Abhorred hath Jehovah his altar, He hath cast off his sanctuary; Given up hath he into the hand of the enemy The walls of her palaces: A noise they made in the house of Jehovah, As on the day of the assembly.

8 Resolve did Jehovah to destroy the wall Of the daughter of Sion; He extended a line, He drew not back his hand from scattering; Therefore mourned hath the rampart and the wall, They have fallen together.

9 Sunk have her gates in the ground; He hath destroyed and broken her bars; Her king and her princes, They are among the heathens; There is no law, her prophets, They find no vision from Jehovah:

10 They sit on the ground, they are silent, The elders of the daughter of Sion; They cast dust on their head, They gird themselves with sackcloth; Bend to the ground their head Do the virgins of Jerusalem.

11 Consume with tears did mine eyes, Troubled were my bowels; Poured forth on the ground was my liver, For the breach of the daughter of my people; When the child and the suckling Vanished away in the streets of the city.

12 To their mothers they say,- “Where is corn and wine“ While they vanish away, as a dying man, In the streets of the city, And while they pour out their souls Into the bosom of their mothers

13 What can I testify to thee? What can I compare to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? What can I liken to thee, to comfort thee, O virgin, the daughter of Sion? For great as the sea is thy breach, Who can heal thee?

14 Thy prophets have seen for thee Vanity and insipidity. And they disclosed not thine iniquity, That they might reverse thy captivity; And they saw for thee Prophecies of vanity and expulsions.

15 They clapped at thee their hands, All who passed by on the road; They hissed and moved their head At the daughter of Jerusalem, — “Is this the city of which they said, Perfect in beauty, the joy of all the earth?

16 Opened at thee their mouth Have all thine enemies; They hissed and gnashed the teeth, They said, “We shall devour her, Surely the day which we expected We have found, we have seen.”

17 Jehovah hath done what he had purposed; He hath fulfilled his word, Which he had commanded from days of old; He hath overthrown and not spared; And tie hath made to rejoice over thee the enemy, He hath raised up the horn of thine adversaries.

18 Cry out did their heart to the Lord: O wall of the daughter of Sion, Make tears to flow down As a river, day and night; Give thyself no rest, Let not the pupil of thine eye cease.

19 Rise, cry aloud in the night, At the beginning of the watches; Pour out like waters Thy heart before the Lord; Raise lip to him thy hands For the life of thy little ones, Who faint through famine At the head of all the streets.

20 See, Jehovah, and look, To whom thou hast done this: Should women eat their own fruit, Infants while nursed! Should they be slain in the Lord’s sanctuary, The priest and the prophet!

21 Lie on the ground in the streets Did boys and old men; My virgins and my young men, They fell by the sword: Thou hast killed in the day of thy wrath, Thou hast slaughtered and not spared.

22 Thou hast summoned, as on t festive day, My terrors all around; And in the day of the indignation of Jehovah!, There was none surviving or remaining; Whom I nursed and brought up, The enemy consumed them.