21 How the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion With a cloud in His anger ! He has cast from heaven to earth The glory of Israel , And has not remembered His footstool e In the day of His anger . 2 The Lord has swallowed up; He has not spared All the habitations of Jacob . In His wrath He has thrown down The strongholds of the daughter of Judah ; He has brought them down to the ground ; He has profaned the kingdom and its princes . 3 In fierce anger He has cut off All the strength of Israel ; He has drawn back His right hand From before the enemy . And He has burned in Jacob like a flaming fire Consuming round about . 4 He has bent His bow like an enemy ; He has set His right hand like an adversary And slain all that were pleasant to the eye ; In the tent of the daughter of Zion He has poured out His wrath like fire . 5 The Lord has become like an enemy . He has swallowed up Israel ; He has swallowed up all its palaces , He has destroyed its strongholds And multiplied in the daughter of Judah Mourning and moaning . 6 And He has violently treated His tabernacle like a garden booth; He has destroyed His appointed meeting place . The Lord has caused to be forgotten The appointed feast and sabbath in Zion , And He has despised king and priest In the indignation of His anger . 7 The Lord has rejected His altar , He has abandoned His sanctuary ; He has delivered 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 an appointed feast . 8 The Lord determined to destroy The wall of the daughter of Zion . He has stretched out a line , He has not restrained His hand from destroying , And He has caused rampart and wall to lament ; They have languished together . 9 Her gates have sunk into the ground , He has destroyed and broken her bars . Her king and her princes are among the nations ; The law is no more . Also , her prophets find No vision from the Lord .
10 The elders of the daughter of Zion Sit on the ground , they are silent . They have thrown dust on their heads ; They have girded themselves with sackcloth . The virgins of Jerusalem Have bowed their heads to the ground . 11 My eyes fail because of tears , My spirit is greatly troubled ; My heart is poured out on the earth Because of the destruction of the daughter of my people , When little ones and infants faint In the streets of the city . 12 They say to their mothers , " Where is grain and wine ?" As they faint like a wounded man In the streets of the city , As their life is poured out On their mothers' bosom . 13 How shall I admonish you? To what shall I compare you, O daughter of Jerusalem ? To what shall I liken you as I comfort you, O virgin daughter of Zion ? For your ruin is as vast as the sea ; Who can heal you? 14 Your prophets have seen for you False and foolish visions; And they have not exposed your iniquity So as to restore you from captivity , But they have seen for you false and misleading oracles . 15 All who pass along the way Clap their hands in derision at you; They hiss and shake their heads At the daughter of Jerusalem , "Is this the city of which they said , ' The perfection of beauty , A joy to all the earth '?" 16 All your enemies Have opened their mouths wide against you; They hiss and gnash their teeth . They say , "We have swallowed her up! Surely this is the day for which we waited ; We have reached it, we have seen it." 17 The Lord has done what He purposed ; He has accomplished His word Which He commanded from days of old . He has thrown down without sparing , And He has caused the enemy to rejoice over you; He has exalted the might of your adversaries . 18 Their heart cried out to the Lord , "O wall of the daughter of Zion , Let your tears run down like a river day and night ; Give yourself no relief , Let your eyes have no rest . 19 "Arise , cry aloud in the night At the beginning of the night watches ; Pour out your heart like water Before the presence of the Lord ; Lift up your hands to Him For the life of your little ones Who are faint because of hunger At the head of every street ." 20 See , O Lord , and look ! With whom have You dealt thus ? Should women eat their offspring , The little ones who were born healthy ? Should priest and prophet be slain In the sanctuary of the Lord ? 21 On the ground in the streets Lie young and old ; My virgins and my young men Have fallen by the sword . You have slain them in the day of Your anger , You have slaughtered , not sparing . 22 You called as in the day of an appointed feast My terrors on every side ; And there was no one who escaped or survived In the day of the Lord'S anger . Those whom I bore and reared , My enemy annihilated them.
