Jerusalem remembers her time of affliction and misery; all her valued belongings of days gone by, when her people fell into enemy hands, with no one to help her, and her enemies stared at her, mocking her downfall.

Jerusalem sinned greatly, and she became unclean. All who honored her now despise her, because they saw her naked. She herself groans and turns her face away.

Zion spreads out her hands; no one is there to comfort her. The LORD has issued an order against Jacob, that all who are around him are to be his enemies; Jerusalem has become unclean among them.

Jerusalem's gates collapsed to the ground; he destroyed and broke the bars of her gates. Both king and prince have gone into captivity. There is no instruction, and the prophets receive no vision from the LORD.

The leaders of cherished Zion sit silently on the ground; they throw dust on their heads and dress in mourning clothes. The young women of Jerusalem bow their heads in sorrow.

What can be said about you? To what should you be compared, fair Jerusalem? To what may I liken you, so I may comfort you, fair one of Zion? Indeed, your wound is as deep as the sea who can heal you?

Everyone who passes by on the road shake their fists at you. They hiss and shake their heads at cherished Jerusalem: "Is this the city men used to call "The Perfection of Beauty,' and "The Joy of the Entire Earth'"?

None of the kings of the earth would have believed, nor the world's inhabitants, that the adversary and the enemy could have breached the gates of Jerusalem.