“1 How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his
anger, [and] cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel,
and remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger! 2 The Lord
hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and hath not pitied: he
hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the daughter of Judah;
he hath brought [them] down to the ground: he hath polluted the kingdom
and the princes thereof. 3 He hath cut off in [his] fierce anger all the
horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy,
and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, [which] devoureth round
about. 4 He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right
hand as an adversary, and slew all [that were] pleasant to the eye in
the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out his fury like
fire. 5 The Lord was as an enemy: he hath swallowed up Israel, he hath
swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong holds, and
hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation. 6 And
he hath violently taken away his tabernacle, as [if it were of] a
garden: he hath destroyed his places of the assembly: the LORD hath
caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath
despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest. 7 The
Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath
given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have
made a noise in the house of the LORD, as in the day of a solemn feast.
8 The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he
hath stretched out a line, he hath not withdrawn his hand from
destroying: therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they
languished together. 9 Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath
destroyed and broken her bars: her king and her princes [are] among the
Gentiles: the law [is] no [more]; her prophets also find no vision from
the LORD.”
“10 The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground, [and] keep
silence: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded
themselves with sackcloth: the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their
heads to the ground. 11 Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are
troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the
daughter of my people; because the children and the sucklings swoon in
the streets of the city. 12 They say to their mothers, Where [is] corn
and wine? when they swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city,
when their soul was poured out into their mothers’ bosom. 13 What thing
shall I take to witness for thee? what thing shall I liken to thee, O
daughter of Jerusalem? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort
thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach [is] great like the sea:
who can heal thee? 14 Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for
thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy
captivity; but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of
banishment. 15 All that pass by clap [their] hands at thee; they hiss
and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, [saying, Is] this the
city that [men] call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole
earth? 16 All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee: they
hiss and gnash the teeth: they say, We have swallowed [her] up:
certainly this [is] the day that we looked for; we have found, we have
seen [it]. 17 The LORD hath done [that] which he had devised; he hath
fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days of old: he hath
thrown down, and hath not pitied: and he hath caused [thine] enemy to
rejoice over thee, he hath set up the horn of thine adversaries. 18
Their heart cried unto the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion, let
tears run down like a river day and night: give thyself no rest; let not
the apple of thine eye cease. 19 Arise, cry out in the night: in the
beginning of the watches pour out thine heart like water before the face
of the Lord: lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young
children, that faint for hunger in the top of every street. 20 Behold, O
LORD, and consider to whom thou hast done this. Shall the women eat
their fruit, [and] children of a span long? shall the priest and the
prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord? 21 The young and the old
lie on the ground in the streets: my virgins and my young men are fallen
by the sword; thou hast slain [them] in the day of thine anger; thou
hast killed, [and] not pitied. 22 Thou hast called as in a solemn day my
terrors round about, so that in the day of the LORD’S anger none escaped
nor remained: those that I have swaddled and brought up hath mine enemy
consumed.” (Lamentations 2:1-22 AV)