Old Testament
Lamentations
5 chapters
Start reading: Lamentations 1About this book
Lamentations is a set of five poems mourning the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple by the Babylonians. Four of the poems are acrostics, each verse or stanza beginning with the next letter of the Hebrew alphabet, as if grief is being given complete expression from beginning to end. The poems describe hunger, shame and the loss of a city once full of people. They also admit that Judah's sin played a part, and they refuse to pretend that God has nothing to do with the suffering. In the exact middle of the book, the writer turns to remember God's steadfast love, which is new every morning. The final poem is a prayer asking God to restore his people. Lamentations gives believers permission to grieve honestly before God. It models how to pray when there is no easy answer, and it keeps hope alive without hurrying past pain. Anyone walking through deep loss may also want to talk with a pastor or counselor.
- Author
- Unnamed in the text; Jewish and Christian tradition has long credited Jeremiah, though many scholars think an eyewitness poet or poets wrote it.
- Date
- Soon after Jerusalem fell in 586 BC, probably within a few decades.
- Audience
- The survivors of Jerusalem and the exiles, and later every community that mourns.
Themes
Outline
- 1:1–1:22Jerusalem alone and weeping
- 2:1–2:22The Lord's anger and the city's ruin
- 3:1–3:66One man's pain and hope
- 4:1–4:22The siege and its aftermath
- 5:1–5:22A prayer for restoration
Key verses
Chapters of Lamentations
- 1Lamentations 1Jerusalem, once full of people and great among the nations, sits alone like a widow.
- 2Lamentations 2The second poem describes the Lord's anger as if he had become an enemy: he has torn down the strongholds of Judah, abandoned his altar and let the temple fall silent.
- 3Lamentations 3This central and longest poem shifts to one suffering man who says he has seen affliction under God's rod: walled in, worn down, his prayers seemingly unheard.
- 4Lamentations 4The fourth poem contrasts Jerusalem's glory with its ruin: gold has lost its luster, the precious sons of Zion are treated like common clay pots, and even jackals care for their young better than the people did in the siege.
- 5Lamentations 5The final poem is a communal prayer.