ב BetShe weeps aloud during the night,
with tears on her cheeks.
There is no one to offer her comfort,
not one from all her lovers.
All her friends have betrayed her;
they have become her enemies.

Judah went into captivity because of affliction, and from great slavery. She dwells among the nations; she finds no rest; all her pursuers have overtaken her between the narrows.

The ways of Zion mourn from none coming to the appointment: all her gates being desolated: her priests groaning, her virgins grieved, and it is bitterness to her.

Thus hath gone forth from the daughter of Zion, all that adorned her, - Her princes have become like harts that have found no pasture, and have gone strengthless before the pursuer.

Jerusalem hath remembered in the days of her humiliation and her fleeings - all her precious things, which have existed from the days of old, - Now that her people have been falling into the hand of the adversary, with none to help her, the adversaries have seen her, have mocked over her sabbath-keepings.

Her (ceremonial) uncleanness was on her skirts;
She did not [seriously] consider her future.
Therefore she has come down [from throne to slavery] in an astonishing manner;
She has no comforter.
“O Lord” [cries Jerusalem], “look at my affliction,
For the enemy has magnified himself [in triumph]!”

All her people sighing, seeking bread; they gave from their delights for food to turn back the soul: see, O Jehovah, and regard; for I was despised.

From on high, sent he fire, among my bones, and laid them prostrate, - He spread out a net for my feet, he made me turn back, he made me desolate, all the day, faint.

The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand: they are woven together, and come up upon my neck: he has made my strength to fall, the Lord has delivered me into their hands, from whom I am not able to rise up.

For these things, am, I, weeping, Mine eye, mine eye, is running down with waters, for, far from me, is any who could comfort, could bring back my life, - My sons are amazed, for strong is the foe.

See, O Yahweh, that {I am in distress}; {my stomach} is in torment, my heart has turned inside me because I have certainly rebelled. From outside a sword brings bereavement, inside the house [it is] like death.

{Tav} From thee shall come all their adversity: thou shalt pluck them away, even as thou hast plucked me, because of all my wickedness. For my sorrow is very great, and my heart is heavy.

How could My Lord, in his anger, enshroud in gloom, the daughter of Zion? have cast from the heavens to the earth, the beauty of Israel? and not have remembered his footstool, in the day of his anger?

He hath broken off - in the glow of his anger - the whole horn of Israel, hath turned back his right hand, from the face of the foe, - and hath kindled against Jacob, a very fire of flame, devouring round about.

And he has violently taken away his tent, as from a garden; he has made waste his meeting-place: the Lord has taken away the memory of feast and Sabbath in Zion, and in the passion of his wrath he is against king and priest.

The Lord has given up his altar and has been turned in hate from his holy place; he has given up into the hands of the attacker the walls of her great houses: their voices have been loud in the house of the Lord as in the day of a holy meeting.

Yahweh hath devised to lay in ruins, the wall of the daughter of Zion, he hath stretched out a line, he hath not turned back his hand from swallowing up, - Thus hath he caused to mourn - rampart and wall, together, have they languished!

Her gates, have sunk in the earth, He hath destroyed and broken in pieces, her bars, - Her king and her princes, are among the nations, There is no instruction, Even her prophets, have found no vision, from Yahweh.

כ KafMy eyes are worn out from weeping;
I am churning within.
My heart is poured out in grief
because of the destruction of my dear people,
because children and infants faint
in the streets of the city.

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.

Yahweh has done what he has planned; he has fulfilled his promise that he ordained from the days of old; he has demolished and not shown mercy; he has made an enemy rejoice over you, he has exalted the {might} of your foes.

(Tsade) Cry out from your heart to the Lord, O wall of Daughter Zion! Make your tears flow like a river all day and all night long! Do not rest; do not let your tears stop!

ק QofArise, cry out in the night
from the first watch of the night.
Pour out your heart like water
before the Lord’s presence.
Lift up your hands to Him
for the lives of your children
who are fainting from hunger
on the corner of every street.

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.

(Alef) I am the man who has experienced affliction from the rod of his wrath.

Surely He has turned His hand against me
Repeatedly all the day.

And thou hast removed my soul far off from peace: I forgat prosperity.

And I said, My strength and my hope hath perished from the LORD:

It is good to wait quietly
for deliverance from the Lord.

O how good is it, for a man, to take the yoke upon him from his youth up?

Surely he hath not afflicted from his heart, nor caused sorrow to the sons of men.

[Is] it not from the mouth of the Most High [that] disaster and good will come?

You have wrapped Yourself with a cloud from any prayer passing through.

Rivers of water are running down from my eyes, for the destruction of the daughter of my people.

My eye flows out and does not cease, from there being no intermission,

Till the LORD shall look down, and behold from heaven.

I have called your name, O Yahweh, from the depths of the pit.

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

Watch them from morning to evening; I am the object of their mocking songs.

Persecute and destroy them in anger from under the heavens of the LORD.

ד DaletThe nursing infant’s tongue
clings to the roof of his mouth from thirst.
Little children beg for bread,
but no one gives them any.

Those who die by the sword are better off than those who die from starvation, who slowly waste away like those pierced through for lack of food from the fields.

From the sins of her prophets the iniquities of her priests shedding the blood of the just in her midst,

ע AyinAll the while our eyes were failing
as we looked in vain for assistance;
we watched from our towers
for a nation that refused to help.

They hunted our steps, from walking in our streets; our end has come near, {our days are finished}, our end has come.

Completed is thy punishment, O daughter of Zion, He will no more carry thee away captive - He hath punished thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom, he hath stripped the veil from off thy sins.

Slaves, have ruled over us, There is none to set free from their hand.

With our souls we shall bring our bread from the face of the sword of the desert

Our skin is heated like an oven because of our burning heat from need of food.

The young men perform menial labor; boys stagger from their labor.

The elders have ceased from the gate, the young men from their music.

The crown is fallen from our head: woe to us, that we have sinned!

Thou, O LORD, remainest for ever; thy throne from generation to generation.

Why have we gone from your memory for ever? why have you been turned away from us for so long?