(Alef)Alas! The city once full of people now sits all alone! The prominent lady among the nations has become a widow! The princess who once ruled the provinces has become a forced laborer!

She weepeth sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks; among all her lovers she hath no comforter; all her friends have dealt treacherously with her, they are become her enemies.

Judah is gone into captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude: she dwelleth among the heathen, she findeth no rest: all her persecutors overtook her between the straits.

The roads to Zion are in mourning
Because no one comes to the appointed feasts.
All her gates are desolate;
Her priests are groaning,
Her virgins are grieved and suffering,
And she suffers bitterly.

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

Remembered hath Jerusalem In the days of her affliction and her mournings, all her desirable things that were from the days of old, In the falling of her people into the hand of an adversary, And she hath no helper; Seen her have adversaries, They have laughed at her cessation.

ח KhetJerusalem has sinned grievously;
therefore, she has become an object of scorn.
All who honored her now despise her,
for they have seen her nakedness.
She herself groans and turns away.

Her filthiness is in her skirts; she remembereth not her last end; therefore she came down wonderfully: she had no comforter. O LORD, behold my affliction: for the enemy hath magnified himself.

A watch is kept on my sins; they are joined together by his hand, they have come on to my neck; he has made my strength give way: the Lord has given me up into the hands of those against whom I have no power.

“The Lord has rejected all the strong men
In my midst;
He has proclaimed an established time against me
To crush my young men.
The Lord has trampled down as in a wine press
The Virgin Daughter of Judah.

ע AyinI weep because of these things;
my eyes flow with tears.
For there is no one nearby to comfort me,
no one to keep me alive.
My children are desolate
because the enemy has prevailed.

Spread forth hath Zion her hands, There is no comforter for her, Jehovah hath charged concerning Jacob, His neighbours are his adversaries, Jerusalem hath become impure among them.

The Lord is upright; for I have gone against his orders: give ear, now, all you peoples, and see my pain, my virgins and my young men have gone away as prisoners.

I sent for my lovers, but they were false to me: my priests and my responsible men were breathing their last breath in the town, while they were looking for food to give them new life.

They have heard that I sigh: I have no comforter: all mine enemies have heard of my calamity; they are glad that thou hast done it. Thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me.

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.

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.

You have summoned my horror from all around, as if for a feast day; no one on the day of Yahweh's anger [is] a fugitive and a survivor; whoever I have cared for and reared, my enemy has destroyed.

By him I have been made to go in the dark where there is no light.

My soul is sent far away from peace, I have no more memory of good.

I thought in myself, "I am undone; there is no hope for me in the LORD."

It is through the Lord's love that we have not come to destruction, because his mercies have no limit.

They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

For he has no pleasure in troubling and causing grief to the children of men.

In his doing wrong to a man in his cause, the Lord has no pleasure.

Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through.

You have made us like waste and that for which there is no use, among the peoples.

My eyes are streaming without stopping, they have no rest,

צ TsadeFor no apparent reason, my enemies
hunted me like a bird.

They poured water upon my head, then thought I, "Now am I undone."

You have heard my voice,
“Do not hide Your ear from my prayer for relief,
From my cry for help.”

You came near in the day when I made my prayer to you: you said, Have no fear.

LORD, you observed how I have been wronged; now make your ruling in my case.

(Bet) The precious sons of Zion were worth their weight in gold -- Alas! -- but now they are treated like broken clay pots, made by a potter.

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.

(He) Those who once feasted on delicacies are now starving to death in the streets. Those who grew up wearing expensive clothes are now dying amid garbage.

For the punishment of the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the punishment of the sin of Sodom, that was overthrown as in a moment, and no hands stayed on her.

[Now] their appearance is blacker than soot, they are not recognized in the streets; their skin has shriveled on their bones, it has become dry like wood.

נ NunBlind, they stumbled in the streets,
defiled by this blood,
so that no one dared
to touch their garments.

They cried unto them, Depart ye; it is unclean; depart, depart, touch not: when they fled away and wandered, they said among the heathen, They shall no more sojourn there.

The 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.

{Pe} Wherefore yet our eyes fail us, while we look for vain help: seeing we be ever waiting upon a people that can do us no good.

(Sin/Shin) Rejoice and be glad for now, O people of Edom, who reside in the land of Uz. But the cup of judgment will pass to you also; you will get drunk and take off your clothes.

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.

Our inheritance is turned over to strangers; foreigners now occupy our homes.

We are now orphans without fathers and our mothers are like widows.

Our necks are under persecution: we labour, and have no rest.

Afore time we yielded ourselves to the Egyptians, and now to the Assyrians, only that we might have bread enough.

Our fathers sinned, and are no more;
It is we who have carried their sin.

Bondmen rule over us: there is no deliverer out of their hand.

Princes are hung up by their hands;
elders are shown no respect.

Elders are no longer at the gate, young men no longer play stringed instruments.

Our hearts no longer have any joy; our dancing is turned to mourning.

Fallen hath the crown from our head, Woe is now to us, for we have sinned.

Make us come back to you, O Lord, and let us be turned; make our days new again as in the past.

for thou hast now banished us long enough, and hast been sore displeased at us.