The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Advertisement.
• Revisers’ Preface.
• Old Testament
• The First Book of Moses, Commonly Called Genesis.
• The Second Book of Moses, Commonly Called Exodus.
• The Third Book of Moses, Commonly Called Leviticus.
• The Fourth Book of Moses, Commonly Called Numbers.
• The Fifth Book of Moses, Called Deuteronomy.
• The Book of Joshua.
• The Book of Judges.
• The Book of Ruth.
• The First Book of Samuel.
• The Second Book of Samuel.
• The First Book of the Kings.
• The Second Book of the Kings.
• The First Book of the Chronicles.
• The Second Book of the Chronicles.
• Ezra.
• The Book of Nehemiah.
• The Book of Esther.
• The Book of Job.
• The Psalms.
• Book I.
• Book II.
• Book III.
• Book IV.
• Book V.
• The Proverbs.
• Ecclesiastes; Or, the Preacher.
• The Song of Songs.
• The Book of the Prophet Isaiah.
• The Book of the Prophet Jeremiah.
• The Lamentations of Jeremiah.
• The Book of the Prophet Ezekiel.
• The Book of Daniel.
• Hosea.
• Joel.
• Amos.
• Obadiah.
• Jonah.
• Micah.
• Nahum.
• Habakkuk.
• Zephaniah.
• Haggai.
• Zechariah.
• Malachi.
• Appendix.
• Classes of Passages.

THE LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH.

1

• 1

  How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people!
• How is she become as a widow!
• She that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces,
• How is she become tributary!

• 2

  She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks;
• Among all her lovers she hath none to comfort her:
• All her friends have dealt treacherously with her,
• They are become her enemies.

• 3

  Judah is gone into 1 captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude;
• She dwelleth among the heathen, she findeth no rest:
• All her persecutors overtook her within the straits.

• 4

  The ways of Zion do mourn, because none come to the 2 solemn assembly;
• All her gates are desolate, her priests do sigh:
• Her virgins are afflicted, and she herself is in bitterness.

• 5

  Her adversaries are become the head, her enemies prosper;
• For the Lord hath afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions:
• Her young children are gone into captivity before the adversary.

• 6

  And from the daughter of Zion all her 3 majesty is departed:
• Her princes are become like harts that find no pasture,
• And they are gone without strength before the pursuer.

• 7

  Jerusalem remembereth in the days of her affliction and of her 4 miseries
• All her pleasant things that were from the days of old:
• When her people fell into the hand of the adversary, and none did help her,
• The adversaries saw her, they did mock at her 5 desolations.

• 8

  Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she 6 is become as an unclean thing:
• All that honoured her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness:
• Yea, she sigheth, and turneth backward.

• 9

  Her filthiness was in her skirts; she remembered not her latter end;
• Therefore is she come down wonderfully; she hath no comforter:
• Behold, O Lord, my affliction; for the enemy hath magnified himself.

• 10

  The adversary hath spread out his hand upon all her pleasant things:
• For she hath seen that the heathen are entered into her sanctuary,
• Concerning whom thou didst command that they should not enter into thy congregation.

• 11

  All her people sigh, they seek bread;
• They have given their pleasant things for meat to refresh the soul:
• See, O Lord, and behold; for I am become vile.

• 12

  Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by?
• Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me,
• 1 Wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me in the day of his fierce anger.

• 13

  From on high hath he sent fire into my bones, and it prevaileth against them:
• He hath spread a net for my feet, he hath turned me back;
• He hath made me desolate and faint all the day.

• 14

  The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand;
• They are knit together, they are come up upon my neck; he hath made my strength to 2 fail:
• The Lord hath delivered me into their hands, 3 against whom I am not able to stand.

• 15

  The Lord hath set at nought all my mighty men in the midst of me;
• He hath called a solemn assembly against me to crush my young men:
• The Lord hath trodden as in a winepress the virgin daughter of Judah.

• 16

  For these things I weep; mine eye, mine eye runneth down with water;
• Because the comforter that should refresh my soul is far from me:
• My children are desolate, because the enemy hath prevailed.

• 17

  Zion spreadeth forth her hands; there is none to comfort her;
• The Lord hath commanded concerning Jacob, that they that are round about him should be his adversaries:
• Jerusalem is among them as an unclean thing.

• 18

  The Lord is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment:
• Hear, I pray you, all ye peoples, and behold my sorrow:
• My virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

• 19

  I called for my lovers, but they deceived me:
• My priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city,
• While they sought them meat to refresh their souls.

• 20

  Behold, O Lord; for I am in distress; my bowels are troubled;
• Mine heart is turned within me; for I have grievously rebelled:
• Abroad the sword bereaveth, at home there is as death.

• 21

  They have heard that I sigh; there is none to comfort me;
• All mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done it:
• Thou wilt bring the day that thou hast proclaimed, and they shall be like unto me.

• 22

  Let all their wickedness come before thee;
• And do unto them, as thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions:
• For my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.

2

• 1

  How hath the Lord covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger!
• He hath cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel,
• And hath not remembered 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 profaned the kingdom and the princes thereof.

• 3

  He hath cut off in fierce anger 1 all the horn of Israel;
• He hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy:
• And he hath burned up Jacob like a flaming fire, which devoureth round about.

• 4

  He hath bent his bow like an enemy, he hath stood with his right hand as an adversary,
• And hath slain all that were pleasant to the eye:
• 2 In the tent of the daughter of Zion he hath poured out his fury like fire.

• 5

  The Lord is become as an enemy, he hath swallowed up Israel;
• He hath swallowed up all her palaces, he hath destroyed his strong holds:
• And he hath multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.

• 6

  And he hath violently taken away his 3 tabernacle, as if it were of a garden;
• He hath destroyed his place of assembly:
• The Lord hath caused 4 solemn assembly and sabbath 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 assembly.

• 8

  The Lord hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion;
• He hath stretched out the line, he hath not withdrawn his hand from 5 destroying:
• But he hath made the rampart and wall to lament; they languish together.

• 9

  Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath destroyed and broken her bars:
• Her king and her princes are among the nations where the law is not;
• Yea, her prophets find no vision from the Lord.

• 10

  The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground, they 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 6 destruction of the daughter of my people;
• Because the young children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.

• 12

  They say to their mothers, Where is corn and wine?
• When they swoon as the wounded in the streets of the city,
• When their soul is poured out into their mothers’ bosom.

• 13

  What shall I 7 testify unto thee? what 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 visions for thee of vanity and foolishness;
• And they have not discovered thine iniquity, to bring again thy captivity:
• But have seen for thee 8 burdens of vanity and 9 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 called The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?

• 16

  All thine enemies have opened their mouth wide 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 devised;
• He hath 1 fulfilled his word that he commanded in the days of old;
• He hath thrown down, and hath not pitied:
• And he hath caused the enemy to rejoice over thee,
• He hath exalted 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 respite; let not the apple of thine eye cease.

• 19

  Arise, cry out in the night, at 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 at the top of every street.

• 20

  See, O Lord, and behold, to whom thou hast done thus!
• Shall the women eat their fruit, the children that are dandled in the hands?
• Shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?

• 21

  The youth and the old man 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 slaughtered, and not pitied.

• 22

  Thou hast called, as in the day of a solemn assembly, 2 my terrors on every side,
• And there was none that escaped or remained in the day of the Lord’s anger:
• Those that I have dandled and brought up hath mine enemy consumed.

3

• • I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

  • 2

    He hath led me and caused me to walk in darkness 3 and not in light.

  • 3

    Surely against me he turneth his hand again and again all the day.

• • 4

    My flesh and my skin hath he 4 made old; he hath broken my bones.

  • 5

    He hath builded against me, and compassed me with 5 gall and travail.

  • 6

    6 He hath made me to dwell in dark places, as those that have been long dead.

• • 7

    He hath fenced me about, that I cannot go forth; he hath made my chain heavy.

  • 8

    Yea, when I cry and call for help, he shutteth out my prayer.

  • 9

    He hath fenced up my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my paths crooked.

• • 10

    He is unto me as a bear lying in wait, as a lion in secret places.

  • 11

    He hath turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces; he hath made me desolate.

  • 12

    He hath bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.

• • 13

    He hath caused the 7 shafts of his quiver to enter into my reins.

  • 14

    I am become a derision to all my people; and their song all the day.

  • 15

    He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath sated me with wormwood.

• • 16

    He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he hath covered me with ashes.

  • 17

    And thou hast 1 removed my soul far off from peace; I forgat prosperity.

  • 18

    And I said, My strength is perished, and mine expectation from the Lord.

• • 19

    Remember mine affliction and my 2 misery, the wormwood and the gall.

  • 20

    My soul hath them still in remembrance, and is bowed down within me.

  • 21

    This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope.

• • 22

    It is of the Lord’s mercies that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not.

  • 23

    They are new every morning; great is thy faithfulness.

  • 24

    The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him.

• • 25

    The Lord is good unto them that wait for him, to the soul that seeketh him.

  • 26

    It is good that a man should hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord.

  • 27

    It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.

• • 28

    3 Let him sit alone and keep silence, because he hath laid it upon him.

  • 29

    Let him put his mouth in the dust; if so be there may be hope.

  • 30

    Let him give his cheek to him that smiteth him; let him be filled full with reproach.

• • 31

    For the Lord will not cast off for ever.

  • 32

    For though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies.

  • 33

    For he doth not afflict 4 willingly, nor grieve the children of men.

• • 34

    To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,

  • 35

    To turn aside the right of a man before the face of the Most High,

  • 36

    To subvert a man in his cause, the Lord 5 approveth not.

• • 37

    Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when the Lord commandeth it not?

  • 38

    Out of the mouth of the Most High cometh there not evil and good?

  • 39

    Wherefore doth a living man complain, 6 a man for the punishment of his sins?

• • 40

    Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the Lord.

  • 41

    Let us lift up our heart with our hands unto God in the heavens.

  • 42

    We have transgressed and have rebelled; thou hast not pardoned.

• • 43

    Thou hast 7 covered with anger and pursued us; thou hast slain, thou hast not pitied.

  • 44

    Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud, that our prayer should not pass through.

  • 45

    Thou hast made us as the offscouring and refuse in the midst of the peoples.

• • 46

    All our enemies have opened their mouth wide against us.

  • 47

    Fear and the pit are come upon us, 8 devastation and destruction.

  • 48

    Mine eye runneth down with rivers of water, for the destruction of the daughter of my people.

• • 49

    Mine eye poureth down, and ceaseth not, without any intermission,

  • 50

    Till the Lord look down, and behold from heaven.

  • 51

    Mine eye affecteth my soul, because of all the daughters of my city.

• • 52

    They have chased me sore like a bird, that are mine enemies without cause.

  • 53

    They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and have cast a stone upon me.

  • 54

    Waters flowed over mine head; I said, I am cut off.

• • 55

    I called upon thy name, O Lord, out of the lowest dungeon.

  • 56

    Thou heardest my voice; hide not thine ear at my breathing, at my cry.

  • 57

    Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee: thou saidst, Fear not.

• • 58

    O Lord, thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul; thou hast redeemed my life.

  • 59

    O Lord, thou hast seen my wrong; judge thou my cause.

  • 60

    Thou hast seen all their vengeance and all their devices against me.

• • 61

    Thou hast heard their reproach, O Lord, and all their devices against me;

  • 62

    The lips of those that rose up against me, and their imagination against me all the day.

  • 63

    Behold thou their sitting down, and their rising up; I am their song.

• • 64

    Thou wilt render unto them a recompence, O Lord, according to the work of their hands.

  • 65

    Thou wilt give them 1 hardness of heart, thy curse unto them.

  • 66

    Thou wilt pursue them in anger, and destroy them from under the heavens of the Lord.

4

• 1

  How is the gold become dim! how is the most pure gold changed!
• The stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the top of every street.

• 2

  The precious sons of Zion, 2 comparable to fine gold,
• How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

• 3

  Even the jackals draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones:
• The daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.

• 4

  The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst:
• The young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them.

• 5

  They that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets:
• They that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.

• 6

  For 3 the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than 4 the sin of Sodom,
• That was overthrown as in a moment, and no hands 5 were laid upon her.

• 7

  Her 6 nobles were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk,
• They were more ruddy in body than 7 rubies, their polishing was as of sapphire:

• 8

  Their visage is 8 blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets:
• Their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick.

• 9

  They that be slain with the sword are better than they that be slain with hunger;
• For these 9 pine away, stricken through, for want of the fruits of the field.

• 10

  The hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own children;
• They were their meat in the destruction of the daughter of my people.

• 11

  The Lord hath accomplished his fury, he hath poured out his fierce anger;
• And he hath kindled a fire in Zion, which hath devoured the foundations thereof.

• 12

  The kings of the earth believed not, neither all the inhabitants of the world,
• That the adversary and the enemy should enter into the gates of Jerusalem.

• 13

  It is because of the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests,
• That have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her.

• 14

  They wander as blind men in the streets, they are polluted with blood,
• So that men cannot touch their garments.

• 15

  Depart ye, they cried unto them, Unclean! depart, depart, touch not:
• 1 When they fled away and wandered, men said among the nations, They shall no more sojourn here.

• 16

  The 2 anger of the Lord hath divided them; he will no more regard them:
• They respected not the persons of the priests, they favoured not the elders.

• 17

  Our eyes do yet fail in looking for our vain help:
• In our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save.

• 18

  They hunt our steps, that we cannot go in our streets:
• Our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end is come.

• 19

  Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven:
• They chased us upon the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness.

• 20

  The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the Lord, was taken in their pits;
• Of whom we said, Under his shadow we shall live among the nations.

• 21

  Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz:
• The cup shall pass through unto thee also; thou shalt be drunken, and shalt make thyself naked.

• 22

  3 The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion;
• He will no more carry thee away into captivity:
• He will visit thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom;
• He will discover thy sins.

5

• 1

  Remember, O Lord, what is come upon us:
• Behold, and see our reproach.

• 2

  Our inheritance is turned unto strangers,
• Our houses unto aliens.

• 3

  We are orphans and fatherless,
• Our mothers are as widows.

• 4

  We have drunken our water for money;
• Our wood 4 is sold unto us.

• 5

  Our pursuers are upon our necks:
• We are weary, and have no rest.

• 6

  We have given the hand to the Egyptians,
• And to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.

• 7

  Our fathers have sinned, and are not;
• And we have borne their iniquities.

• 8

  Servants rule over us:
• There is none to deliver us out of their hand.

• 9

  We get our bread with the peril of our lives
• Because of the sword of the wilderness.

• 10

  Our skin is 5 black like an oven
• Because of the burning heat of famine.

• 11

  They ravished the women in Zion,
• The maidens in the cities of Judah.

• 12

  Princes were hanged up by their hand:
• The faces of elders were not honoured.

• 13

  The young men bare the mill,
• And the children stumbled under the wood.

• 14

  The elders have ceased from the gate,
• The young men from their music.

• 15

  The joy of our heart is ceased;
• Our dance is turned into mourning.

• 16

  The crown is fallen from our head:
• Woe unto us! for we have sinned.

• 17

  For this our heart is faint;
• For these things our eyes are dim;

• 18

  For the mountain of Zion, which is desolate;
• The 1 foxes walk upon it.

• 19

  Thou, O Lord,2 abidest for ever;
• Thy throne is from generation to generation.

• 20

  Wherefore dost thou forget us for ever,
• And forsake us so long time?

• 21

  Turn thou us unto thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned;
• Renew our days as of old.

• 22

  3 But thou hast utterly rejected us,
• Thou art very wroth against us.

[1 ]Or, exile

[2 ]Or, appointed feast

[3 ]Or, beauty

[4 ]Or, wanderings

[5 ]Heb. ceasings.

[6 ]Or, is removed

[1 ]Or, Whom the Lord hath afflicted

[2 ]Heb. stumble.

[3 ]Or, from whom I am not able to rise up

[1 ]Or, every horn

[2 ]Or, On

[3 ]Or, booth Or, hedge

[4 ]Or, appointed feast

[5 ]Heb. swallowing up.

[6 ]Or, breach

[7 ]Or, take to witness for thee

[8 ]Or, oracles

[9 ]Or, things to draw thee aside

[1 ]Or, finished

[2 ]See Jer. vi 25.

[3 ]Or, without light

[4 ]Or, worn out

[5 ]See Deut. xxix. 18.

[6 ]See Ps cxliii. 3.

[7 ]Heb. sons.

[1 ]Or, cast off

[2 ]Or, wandering Or, outcast state

[3 ]Or, He sitteth alone &c (vv. 28—30)

[4 ]Heb. from his heart.

[5 ]Heb. seeth not.

[6 ]Or, a man that is in his sins

[7 ]Or, covered thyself

[8 ]Or, tumult

[1 ]Or, blindness Heb. covering.

[2 ]Heb. that may be weighed against.

[3 ]Or, the punishment of the iniquity

[4 ]Or, the punishment of the sin

[5 ]Or, fell See 2 Sam. iii 29.

[6 ]Or, Nazirites

[7 ]Or, corals

[8 ]Heb. darker than blackness.

[9 ]Heb. flow away.

[1 ]Or, Yea

[2 ]Heb. face.

[3 ]Or, Thine iniquity hath an end

[4 ]Heb. cometh for price.

[5 ]Or, hot

[1 ]Or, jackals

[2 ]Or, sittest as king

[3 ]Or, Unless thou . . . and art &c.