A sin hath Jerusalem sinned, Therefore impure she hath become, All who honoured her have esteemed her lightly, For they have seen her nakedness, Yea, she herself hath sighed and turneth backward.

Is it nothing to you, all ye passing by the way? Look attentively, and see, If there is any pain like my pain, That He is rolling to me? Whom Jehovah hath afflicted In the day of the fierceness of His anger.

What do I testify to thee, what do I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? What do I equal to thee, and I comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? For great as a sea is thy breach, Who doth give healing to thee?

Arise, cry aloud in the night, At the beginning of the watches. Pour out as water thy heart, Over against the face of the Lord, Lift up unto Him thy hands, for the soul of thine infants, Who are feeble with hunger at the head of all out-places.

See, O Jehovah, and look attentively, To whom Thou hast acted thus, Do women eat their fruit, infants of a handbreadth? Slain in the sanctuary of the Lord are priest and prophet?

Thou dost call as at a day of appointment, My fears from round about, And there hath not been in the day of the anger of Jehovah, An escaped and remaining one, They whom I stretched out and nourished, My enemy hath consumed!

I am the man who hath seen affliction By the rod of His wrath.

Who is this -- he hath said, and it is, And the Lord hath not commanded it?

The precious sons of Zion, Who are comparable with fine gold, How have they been reckoned earthen bottles, Work of the hands of a potter.

Because of the sins of her prophets, The iniquities of her priests, Who are shedding in her midst the blood of the righteous,

The breath of our nostrils -- the anointed of Jehovah, Hath been captured in their pits, of whom we said: 'In his shadow we do live among nations.'