About this book
We call this book Lamentations because it is a sad book. It has five parts. All five parts are about the city called Jerusalem. God wanted people to look after Jerusalem and the special house there. God wanted people to worship only him in that house. But the people who lived in Jerusalem did not obey God. In the end, he was angry with those people. He let armies come from another country. Those armies came to destroy Jerusalem and to take the people away. The writer lived in Jerusalem. We think that he was a man called Jeremiah. We can read a translation of Lamentations in a very old book called the Septuagint. It says that Jeremiah wrote Lamentations. He certainly wrote another book in the Bible, which is called Jeremiah. Jeremiah was a man who loved God and his own people. He was very sad when they destroyed his city, Jerusalem. Jeremiah wrote the book about 586 years before Jesus was born.
In the first two parts of the book, Jeremiah writes sometimes as if he himself is speaking. Other times he writes as if Jerusalem city and its people are speaking. The city speaks as if a woman is speaking. In the next two parts, only Jeremiah speaks. In the last part, he writes as if the city’s people are praying to God.
The first part is about the lonely city. The second part says that God was like an angry enemy. In the next part, Jeremiah remembers how good God is. If people really love God, they can hope for better things always. After that, Jeremiah talks about the cruel enemies. He remembers what those enemies did to the people in the city. In the last part, the city’s people know that they have done many wrong things. So they ask God to forget those bad things.
Lamentations shows us that God gets angry about sin. He is happy when we change. This book also shows us what God wants. He wants us to love him. He wants us to obey him. If we do that, he helps us. He will help us to be good and to do good things.
1
Jeremiah is speaking
1 The city that was full of people is lonely now.The city is like the wife of a dead husband.Once she was great.She was like a queen among the other places in the country.Now she is a slave.God made Jerusalem great and important. So he can stop it being great or important. He will stop it if the people go against him. In Isaiah 47:1-11 and Revelation 18:1-8, he says that he will do this to another city.
2 She weeps in the nightand there are tears on her face.Not one of her lovers will help her to feel better.All her friends have left her.They have gone against her and they are now her enemies.·Many people had always come to Jerusalem. They do not come any longer. God took their friends away so that Jerusalem’s people would turn back to him.·See how very sad Jeremiah is: Jeremiah 9:1.
3 The enemies have taken Judah’s people away as slaves.The slaves have only trouble and difficult work.They now live among strangers.They have no rest, and they live far away from home.They cannot go away from those who do cruel things to them.Jerusalem was the capital city of the country called Judah. Zion is another name for Jerusalem.
4 Zion’s streets are sad places now.Nobody comes to worship God there any longer.There is nothing to hear at the city gates.The priests are sad.Strangers are cruel to the young women.The people in Zion are very sad.The leaders always met at the city gate to talk together. See Lamentations 5:14.
5 The people’s enemies rule them now.Those who hate them have plenty.The Lord has caused trouble for the peoplebecause they did so many wrong things.The enemies took the children away to work as slaves.
6 Zion is not beautiful any longer.Her leaders are like animals without food.They are too weak to run from their enemies.
7 Jerusalem’s people are in trouble and they are away from their homes now.So, they remember the good thingsthat they had a long time ago.When their enemies came, nobody was there with them.Nobody helped them.Their enemies laughed when they destroyed Jerusalem.
8 Jerusalem’s people have sinned very much.That is why this city is not clean any longer.People thought that this city was the best.Now they think that it is not important.They see it as it is.Jerusalem’s people make sad noises and they want to hide themselves away.
9 Jerusalem seemed dirty because the people were so bad.They never thought that the end would be like this.But their enemies destroyed the city.They do not have anyone who can help them to feel better.God did not listen any longer when they asked for his help.‘Lord, see our troubles.See how happy our enemies are’, the people pray.
10 The enemies have taken away all Jerusalem’s valuable things.Foreign people have walked into God’s holy house.But God had said that people like that must not go in there.They are not his people.
11 Jerusalem’s people are making sad noises.They are sad as they look for food.They sell things that they love.They use them to buy food.That way, they can keep themselves alive. The city’s people are speaking like one person‘Lord, see what is happening.Think about me,because nobody else does’, the people pray.
12 ‘Come and really look at me!All you people who pass me do not show any interest in me.But you have never seen anything as sad as I am.The Lord was very angry with me.So it was the Lord who did this to me.’ The city’s people are speaking
13 ‘It is like God has sent fire down into our bones to hurt us.He wants us to turn towards him again.So he has caused things to be very difficult for us.All day he causes us to feel lonely and weak.
14 He has caused our sins to seem like something very heavy that lies on our necks.It makes us weak.He has let the enemy be very strong.He let them win against us.So we cannot beat them.
15 The Lord has let the enemy beat all our strong men.He brought a big army to fight our young men.And the enemy won that fight.People walk on grapes to break them.Like that, the Lord let the enemy hurt our young women here in Judah.’People walk on the fruit called grapes to break them. This makes something to drink come out of them. This means that the Lord caused trouble and pain for the strong men, the young men and the women. He was punishing them. But he also did it to teach them. He wanted them to change.
16 ‘We weep because of these things.Tears run down our faces because God is not with us.Nobody will help us.We are the children of this cityand we have nothing now.The enemy has won.’ Jeremiah is speaking again
17 Zion’s people ask for help,but nobody is their friend.They are Jacob’s children.But the Lord has said that he will cause their enemiesto come from every country near them.Those other people think about Jerusalem as they would think about something dirty.Jacob was a man of God who lived a long time ago. The Bible sometimes uses the name Jacob to mean all God’s people, Israel. God often saved Israel from troubles (Psalm 44:1-8). Now they are in trouble because they have turned against God. The city’s people are speaking again
18 ‘The Lord is right to punish us.We have not obeyed him.Listen, all people everywhere, and look at us.We are in very bad trouble.The enemy has taken away our young womenand our young men to be slaves.’When God causes trouble, he causes it for a reason. People should know that he is right. Some people might say that he is wrong. If they say that, they do not understand either him or themselves. See 2 Chronicles 12:5-6.
19 ‘We shouted to our friends.They had said that they would help us.But they did not help us.Our priests and our leaders died in the city.They were looking for food to keep them alive.
20 Look, Lord, we are in a lot of trouble.We are very sad.We are weak deep inside ourselvesbecause we have done so many bad things.They are killing our people in the streets.People are dying in the houses.’Jerusalem’s people are talking to God, (see verses 20-22). It helps people to know that God sees all their troubles. God thinks about their troubles because he loves them. He will even cause good things to be the result of bad things.
21 ‘Everybody knows that we are very sad.Nobody wants to help us.All our enemies know about our trouble.They are happy, God, that you caused that trouble.Please cause trouble for those enemies too, as you promised.
22 You know that they have done many bad things.Punish them as you have punished us.You punished us because we did many bad things.Now we are ashamed and we are very sad.’
2
Jeremiah is speaking
1 The Lord was very angry.He wanted Zion’s people to be ashamed.Zion was the most beautiful city in Israel.But he has put it down to the ground from its high place.Zion was like a place where he had rested his feet.Now that he is angry, he has forgotten about that.Some people think that the holy house of God in Jerusalem made the city beautiful. See Isaiah 64:11.‘he rested his feet’. See Isaiah 60:13.
2 The Lord has destroyed all the houses where Jacob’s people lived.He decided that he must punish them.Because he is angry,he has destroyed all Judah’s strong towns.Yes, he has destroyed all the buildings.And he has killed the rulers and all the people.
3 Yes, because he is very angry,he has destroyed Israel’s whole army.He did not help them when they were fighting the enemy.He was like a big hot firethat burned Jacob’s people from all sides.
4 He has bent his bow like an enemy ready to kill people.And, like an enemy,he has killed all those who once gave him pleasure.He has shown how angry he was.He has sent a fire and he burned all Zion’s houses.
5 The Lord has become like an enemy.He has destroyed Israeland all the beautiful houses there.He has destroyed all the strong towns that had walls.He has caused Judah’s people to weep.They are very sad.
6 He has knocked down his own holy houseas easily as someone can knock down a hut in a garden.He has destroyed this place where people once met him.He has caused Zion’s people to forgetthe special events and the Sabbaths in his holy house.He was very angry.So he thought that our king and our priests were not important.He refused to help them.The ‘holy house’ is the place in Jerusalem where Israel’s people went to worship God. The Bible calls it ‘the Temple’. King Solomon built the Temple that Jeremiah is talking about here. See 1 Kings 5:1-5.
7 His holy house and his altar thereno longer give pleasure to the Lord.He has given Zion’s most beautiful houses to the enemy.They shout in the holy house of the Lordas people shout on a special holy day.
8 The Lord decided to destroy the strong walls of Zion.He carefully broke away each stone.It causes us to weep when we look at those walls.He destroyed them all.He destroyed the inside walls and he destroyed the strong outside walls.
9 Zion’s gates fell down on the ground.He destroyed them and he has broken them in pieces.The enemies have taken away our kingand his sons to a foreign country.The people have nearly forgotten God’s rules.And God does not send messages to us any longer.His prophets have nothing to say to us.Verse 7 Foreign people should not be in the ‘holy house’. See Nehemiah 13:1.Verse 9 ‘nearly forgotten’. God’s rules were still there, but people did not think about them any longer. They did not obey them.
10 Zion’s leaders sit on the ground and they are saying nothing.They have dressed themselves in sackclothand they throw dirt on their own heads.They are showing everyone that they are very sad.And the young women of Jerusalem can only look down to the ground,because they are very sad too.In those times, people sometimes put dirt on their heads and they put on clothes of sackcloth. They did it to show that they were very sad.
11 I have cried so much that my eyes are red now.Even the parts inside my body hurt,because my people are dying.I feel ill because I am so sad.The children and babies fall in the city’s streetsbecause they are so weak.
12 ‘Where has all the food and drink gone?’the hungry children ask their mothers.Then they fall down in pain on the streets of the city.They die in their mothers’ arms.
13 I want to help you people of Jerusalem.But there is nothing that I can say to you.I do not know about anything like what has happened to you.God has destroyed Zion completely!I do not know anyone who can make you people better.
14 Your prophets have promised you many good things.Those good things will not happen.They should have told you that you should not do wrong things.If they had told you that, none of these troubles would have happened.The prophets do not tell you true messages from Godand their dreams are false.God had told the people many times that they must not listen to these false prophets. God also told the people how to recognise good prophets. Only good prophets brought messages from God. See Jeremiah 23:16-22; 28:9.
15 Everyone who goes by laughs.They are happy because you are sad.They see how the enemy has destroyed everything in Jerusalem.“Surely this cannot be the city that men called ‘most beautiful’ ”, they say.“People have said that this city is the best city on earth.”
16 All your enemies make noises through their teethbecause they are very happy.‘We have won!’ they say.‘We have waited for this day.Now we have beaten you!Now we have seen it!’
17 The Lord has done what he decided to do.Yes, he has done what he told you about a long time ago.He has destroyed your city and he has not felt sorry about it.He has caused your enemies to be happy.He has made them strongso that they could win against you.See Deuteronomy 28:15, 36, 47-68; 29:22-28; 30:1-5. God gave people clear messages a long time before this time. If they did not obey him, their enemies would beat them. And God would help their enemies.
18 Day and night, cause your tears to run like a river round the walls of Zion.Cry to the Lord all the time, you people.Do not rest.Do not let your eyes stop crying.
19 Stand up and pray for God’s help.Talk to God all night.Pour out your words and thoughts to Godas you pour out water from a jar.Lift up your hands to him when you ask him.And ask him to save the lives of your children.They fall down to die at the end of every streetbecause they are so hungry. Jerusalem’s people speak
20 ‘Look at us, Lord’, you should say.‘You have done all this to your people.Women eat their own children now!But they are the children that they looked after.People have killed your own priests and prophetsin your holy house!
21 Young people and old people lie dead in the streets.The enemy has killed the young men and women with long knives.But it was really you who killed them.You were very angry with us.