Lamentations 3:1-66
א [ʼAʹleph]*
3 I am the able-bodied man that has seen affliction+ because of the staff of his fury.
2 It is I whom he has led and makes to walk in darkness and not in light.+
3 Indeed, it is against me that he repeatedly turns his hand all day long.+
ב [Behth]
4 He has caused my flesh and my skin to wear away.+ He has broken my bones.+
5 He has built against me, that he may encircle+ [me] with poisonous plant+ and hardship.
6 In dark places+ he has made me sit like men dead for a long time.+
ג [Giʹmel]
7 He has blocked me up as with a stone wall, that I may not go forth.+ He has made my copper fetters+ heavy.
8 Also, when I call for aid and cry for help, he actually hampers my prayer.+
9 He has blocked up my ways with hewn stone.+ My roadways he has twisted.+
ד [Daʹleth]
10 As a bear lying in wait he is to me,+ as a lion in places of concealment.+
11 My ways he has disarranged, and he makes me lie fallow.* He has made me one laid desolate.+
12 He has trodden his bow,+ and he sets me up as the target for the arrow.+
ה [Heʼ]
13 He has brought into my kidneys the sons of his quiver.+
14 I have become an object of laughter+ to all people against me,* the theme of their song all day long.+
15 He has given me a sufficiency of bitter things.+ He has saturated me with wormwood.+
ו [Waw]
16 And with gravel he makes my teeth get broken.+ He has made me cower in the ashes.+
17 You also do a casting off so that there is no peace for my soul. I have lost memory of what good is.+
18 And I keep saying: “My excellency has perished, and my expectation from Jehovah.”+
ז [Zaʹyin]
19 Remember my affliction and my homeless state,+ the wormwood and the poisonous plant.+
20 Without fail your* soul will remember and bow low over me.+
21 This is what I shall bring back to my heart.+ That is why I shall show a waiting attitude.+
ח [Chehth]
22 It is the acts of loving-kindness*+ of Jehovah that we have not come to our finish,+ because his mercies will certainly not come to an end.+
23 They are new each morning.+ Your faithfulness is abundant.+
24 “Jehovah is my share,”+ my soul has said, “that is why I shall show a waiting attitude for him.”+
ט [Tehth]
25 Good is Jehovah to the one hoping in him,+ to the soul that keeps seeking for him.+
26 Good it is that one should wait,+ even silently,+ for the salvation of Jehovah.+
27 Good it is for an able-bodied man that he should carry the yoke during his youth.+
י [Yohdh]
28 Let him sit solitary and keep silent,+ because he has laid [something] upon him.+
29 Let him put his mouth in the very dust.+ Perhaps there exists a hope.+
30 Let him give [his] cheek to the very one striking him.+ Let him have his sufficiency of reproach.+
כ [Kaph]
31 For not to time indefinite will Jehovah* keep on casting off.+
32 For although he has caused grief,+ he will also certainly show mercy according to the abundance of his loving-kindness.+
33 For not out of his own heart has he afflicted or does he grieve the sons of men.*+
ל [Laʹmedh]
34 For crushing beneath one’s feet+ all the prisoners of the earth,+
35 For turning aside the judgment of an able-bodied man before the face of the Most High,+
36 For making a man* crooked in his legal case, Jehovah* himself has had no countenance.+
מ [Mem]
37 Who, now, has said that something should occur [when] Jehovah* himself has not commanded?+
38 From the mouth of the Most High bad things and what is good do not go forth.+
39 How can a living man* indulge in complaints,+ an able-bodied man on account of his sin?+
נ [Nun]
40 Do let us search out our ways and explore them,+ and do let us return clear to Jehovah.+
41 Let us raise our heart along with [our] palms to God* in the heavens:+
42 “We ourselves have transgressed, and we have behaved rebelliously.+ You yourself have not forgiven.+
ס [Saʹmekh]
43 You have blocked approach with anger,+ and you keep pursuing us.+ You have killed; you have shown no compassion.+
44 You have blocked approach to yourself with a cloud mass,+ that prayer may not pass through.+
45 You make us mere offscouring and refuse in the midst of the peoples.”+
פ [Peʼ]*
46 Against us all our enemies have opened their mouth.+
47 Dread and the hollow themselves have become ours,+ desolateness and breakdown.+
48 With streams of water my eye keeps running down on account of the breakdown of the daughter of my people.+
ע [ʽAʹyin]
49 My very eye has been poured forth and will not keep still, so that there are no pauses,+
50 Until Jehovah looks down and sees from heaven.+
51 My own eye has dealt severely with my soul,+ because of all the daughters* of my city.+
צ [Tsa·dhehʹ]
52 My enemies have positively hunted for me just as for a bird,+ for no cause.+
53 They have silenced my life in the pit itself,+ and they kept hurling stones at me.
54 Waters have flowed over my head.+ I have said: “I shall certainly be cut off!”+
ק [Qohph]
55 I have called out your name, O Jehovah, from a pit of the lowest sort.+
56 My voice you must hear.+ Do not hide your ear to my relief, to my cry for help.+
57 You have drawn near in the day that I kept calling you.+ You said: “Do not be afraid.”+
ר [Rehsh]
58 You have taken up, O Jehovah,* the contests of my soul.+ You have repurchased my life.+
59 You have seen, O Jehovah, the wrong done to me.+ O do conduct the judgment for me.+
60 You have seen all their vengeance, all their thoughts against me.+
ש [Sin] or [Shin]
61 You have heard their reproach, O Jehovah, all their thoughts against me,+
62 The lips of those rising up against me+ and their whispering against me all day long.+
63 Do look at their very sitting down and their rising up.+ I am the subject of their song.+
ת [Taw]
64 You will give back to them a treatment, O Jehovah, according to the work of their hands.+
65 You will give to them the insolence of heart,+ your curse to them.+
66 You will pursue in anger and annihilate them+ from under the heavens of Jehovah.+
Footnotes
^ Each line in each section of this chapter begins with the same Heb. letter in alphabetic order; the Peʼ section (vss 46-48) precedes the ʽAʹyin section (vss 49-51).
^ Or, “he tears me to pieces.”
^ “All my people,” MLXXVg; Sy, “all peoples”; T, “all scatterers of my people.”
^ “Your,” emended by the Sopherim to read “my” in M; one of the Eighteen Emendations. See App 2B.
^ Or, “loyal love.”
^ One of 134 scribal changes from YHWH to ʼAdho·naiʹ. See App 1B.
^ “Men.” Heb., ʼish, sing. but in a collective sense.
^ Or, “an earthling man.” Heb., ʼa·dhamʹ.
^ See vs 31 ftn.
^ See vs 31 ftn.
^ Or, “a living earthling man.” Heb., ʼa·dhamʹ chai.
^ “God.” Heb., ʼEl; Vg, “Jehovah.”
^ In the Heb. alphabet Peʼ follows ʽAʹyin.
^ Or, “dependent towns.”
^ See vs 31 ftn.
