An elegiac poem, composed by the prophet on occasion of the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. The first two chapters principally describe the calamities of a the sieges of Jerusalem; the third deplores the persecution which Jeremiah himself had suffered; and fourth adverts to the ruin and desolation of the city and temple, and the misfortune of Zedekiah; and the fifth is a kind of form of prayer for the Jews in their captivity. At the close, the prophet speaks of the cruelty of the Edomites, who had insulted Jerusalem in her misery, and threatens them with the wrath of God, B. C. 586.

The first four chapters of the Lamentations are in the acrostic form; every verse beginning with a letter of the Hebrew alphabet, in regular order. The first, second, and fourth chapters contain twenty-two verses each, according to the letters of the alphabet; the third chapter has three successive verses beginning with the same letter, making sixty-six in all. Moreover, all the verses in each chapter are nearly of the same length. The fifth chapter is not acrostic. See LETTERS. The style of Jeremiah's Lamentations is lively, tender, pathetic, and affecting. It was the talent of this prophet to write melancholy and moving elegies, 2Ch 35:25; and never was a subject more worthy of tears, nor treated with more tender and affecting sentiments. One would think, as it has often been said, that every letter was written with a tear, and every word was the sob of a broken heart. Yet he does not forget that a covenant God still reigns.

This book shows the compassion and interest God has in the afflictions of His people, and that these are not lessened even when the afflictions have been brought about by Himself because of their sins. It is declared of the Lord that "in all their affliction he was afflicted," Isa 63:9; and this was seen when the Lord was on earth in His weeping over Jerusalem. Jeremiah had a like spirit and lamented over the calamities that had fallen upon his beloved people and their city Jerusalem. He appealed to the passers by: could they see such sorrow, caused by an affliction sent by Jehovah in His fierce wrath, and be unmoved by it? La 1:12. Then he adds that Jehovah in these dealings was righteous, for they had rebelled against His commandments.

Lam. 3. The prophet details his personal sufferings: they were like the sympathetic sufferings of Christ spoken of elsewhere; but in La 3:22 the prophet remembers the mercies of Jehovah, and expresses his hope in Him. Because of His compassions they were not consumed; and it was good to wait and hope. Jehovah will not cast off for ever, and He does not afflict willingly. The prophet then calls for repentance and a turning to Jehovah. He has confidence that God hears, and he asks for the destruction of their enemies.

Lam. 4. Jeremiah as in the presence of Jehovah spreads out all the humiliating reverses that had fallen upon them, mentioning separately the Nazarites, the prophets, the priests, and the people; and then he foretells that God's wrath should pass also unto Edom, who had doubtless rejoiced at the calamities of Jerusalem. He could add that the punishment of the daughter of Zion was accomplished, she should no more be carried away.

Lam. 5. An affecting appeal is made to God. All had been confessed, and hope in God had been expressed; yet the afflictions pressed heavily upon the prophet. His last words are: "Turn thou us unto thee, O Lord, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old. But thou hast utterly rejected us: thou art very wroth against us."

The composition of the Lamentations is uncommon. The first four chapters are arranged in alphabetical order and the chapters contain 22 verses each, the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet, except that Lam. 3 has 22 stanzas of three verses, making in all 66. In Lam. 1, Lam. 2, and Lam. 4, verse 1 begins with A; verse 2 with B, and so on, as in some of the Psalms. In Lam. 3 each verse in a stanza begins with the same letter, thus verses 1, 2, 3 begin with A; verses 4, 5, 6 with B, and so on to the end. The prayer in Lam. 5: is not alphabetical. In the Hebrew Bible the 'Lamentations' form a part of the Hagiographa (Holy Writings), and is placed between Ruth and Ecclesiastes. In the Jewish Liturgy this book was appointed to be repeated on the Fast of the ninth of Ab (fifth month), to commemorate the destruction of the city and the temple by the Chaldeans and also by the Romans.

Lamentations of Jeremiah.

Title. --The Hebrew title of this book, Ecah, is taken, like the titles of the five books of Moses, from the Hebrew word with which it opens. Author. --The poems included in this collection appear in the Hebrew canon with no name attached to them, but Jeremiah has been almost universally regarded as their author. Date. --The poems belong unmistakably to the last days of the kingdom, or the commencement of the exile, B.C. 629-586. They are written by one who speaks, with the vividness and intensity of an eye-witness, of the misery which he bewails. Contents. --The book consists of five chapter, each of which, however, is a separate poem, complete in itself, and having a distinct subject, but brought at the same time under a plan which includes them all. A complicated alphabetic structure pervades nearly the whole book. (1) Chs. 1,2 and 4 contain twenty-two verses each, arranged in alphabetic order, each verse falling into three nearly balanced clauses; ch.

La 2:19

forms an exception, as having a fourth clause. (2) Ch. 3 contains three short verses under each letter of the alphabet, the initial letter being three times repeated. (3) Ch. 5 contains the same number of verses as chs. 1,2,4, but without the alphabetic order. Jeremiah was not merely a patriot-poet, weeping over the ruin of his country; he was a prophet who had seen all this coming, and had foretold it as inevitable. There are perhaps few portions of the Old Testament which appear to have done the work they were meant to do more effectually than this. The book has supplied thousands with the fullest utterance for their sorrows in the critical periods of national or individual suffering. We may well believe that it soothed the weary years of the Babylonian exile. It enters largely into the order of the Latin Church for the services of passion-week. On the ninth day of the month of Ab (July-August), the Lamentations of Jeremiah were read, year by year, with fasting and weeping, to commemorate the misery out of which the people had been delivered.

LAMENTATIONS OF JEREMIAH. This book was formerly annexed to his prophecies, though it now forms a separate book. Josephus, and several other learned men, have referred them to the death of Josiah; but the more common opinion is, that they were applicable only to some period subsequent to the destruction of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar. But though it be allowed that the Lamentations were primarily intended as a pathetic description of present calamities, yet while Jeremiah mourns the desolation of Judah and Jerusalem during the Babylonian captivity, he may be considered as prophetically painting the still greater miseries they were to suffer at some future time: this seems plainly indicated by his referring to the time when the punishment of their iniquity shall be accomplished, and they shall no more be carried into captivity, La 4:22. The Lamentations are written in metre, and consist of a number of plaintive effusions, composed after the manner of funeral dirges. They seem to have been originally written by the author as they arose in his mind, and to have been afterward joined together as one poem. There is no regular arrangement of the subject, or disposition of the parts: the same thought is frequently repeated with different imagery, or expressed in different words. There is, however, no wild incoherency, or abrupt transition; the whole appears to have been dictated by the feelings of real grief. Tenderness and sorrow form the general character of these elegies; and an attentive reader will find great beauty in many of the images, and great energy in some of the expressions. This book of Lamentations is divided into five chapters; in the first, second, and fourth, the prophet speaks in his own person, or by an elegant and interesting personification introduces the city of Jerusalem as lamenting her calamities, and confessing her sins; in the third chapter a single Jew, speaking in the name of a chorus of his countrymen, like the Coryphaeus of the Greeks, describes the punishment inflicted upon him by God, but still acknowledges his mercy, and expresses some hope of deliverance; and in the fifth chapter, the whole nation of the Jews pour forth their united complaints and supplications to almighty God.

Every chapter, with the exception of the third, contains twenty-two verses, corresponding in number with the letters of the Hebrew alphabet; and each verse commences with a different letter, the first with aleph, the second with beth, the third with gimel, &c. The third chapter, consisting of sixty- six verses, has three verses together beginning with the same letter, the following three with the next letter, &c. This peculiarity may be seen in Psalm cxix; the first eight verses in which commence with aleph, the next eight with beth, &c, till the whole alphabet has been consecutively taken. This mode of versification, which has some distant resemblance to the modern acrostic style, seems to have been employed by the Hebrews in some of their elegiac poetry, perhaps to assist the memory.