How desolate the city sits [that] was full of people! She has become like a widow, [once] great among the nations! Like a woman of nobility in the provinces, she has become a forced laborer.

She weeps bitterly in the night, her tears [are] on her cheeks; she has no comforter among all her lovers. All her friends have been unfaithful to her; they have become her enemies.

Judah has gone into exile with misery and under hard servitude; she lives among the nations, she has not found a resting place; all her pursuers have overtaken her amidst [her] distress.

Zion stretches out her hands; there is no one to comfort her. Yahweh has commanded against Jacob, [that] those surrounding him [should be] his enemies; Jerusalem has become a defilement among them.

Her gates have sunk into the earth; he has ruined and broken her bars, her kings and its princes [are] among the nations; there is no more law. Also, her prophets have not found a revelation from Yahweh.

"Go away! Defiled!" they shout to them. "Go away! Go away! Do not touch!" so they left, they left; it was said among the nations, "{They will no longer dwell with us}."

The breath of our nostrils, the anointed one of Yahweh, was captured in their pits; of whom we said, "In his shadow we will live among the nations."