Lamentations

The second poem says it outright: “The Lord was as an enemy” (2:5). It lists what he did in his anger, from the cloud with which he covered Zion (2:1) to the altar he cast off (2:7). It is not chance but his word kept: “The LORD hath done that which he had devised; he hath fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days of old” (2:17). The law had warned that if Israel would not hearken, “all these curses shall come upon thee” (Deuteronomy 28:15), down to eating “the fruit of thine own body … in the siege” (28:53), and the fourth poem records it done (4:10). So the book asks, “Wherefore doth a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?” (3:39)

The first poem says it five times. Among all her lovers Jerusalem “hath none to comfort her” (1:2); “she had no comforter” (1:9); “the comforter that should relieve my soul is far from me” (1:16); Zion spreads forth her hands “and there is none to comfort her” (1:17); “there is none to comfort me” (1:21). The lovers she called for deceived her (1:19), and the nation she watched for “could not save us” (4:17). Even the poet asks, “what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee” (2:13). The LORD had already given the answer through Isaiah: “Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God” (Isaiah 40:1); cry unto Jerusalem “that her iniquity is pardoned” (40:2).

The turn in chapter 3 comes from memory, not from any change outside: “This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope” (3:21). What he recalls is the LORD himself. The people are not consumed because of his mercies, and “They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness” (3:23). “The LORD is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in him” (3:24). The affliction is still from the LORD, but it is not his last word: “though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies. For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men” (3:32–33). Malachi gives the same ground: “I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed” (Malachi 3:6).

The call to repent comes in the middle poem: “Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to the LORD” (3:40). The last poem asks the LORD to do the turning: “Turn thou us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old” (5:21). It rests the request on what did not fall with the city: “Thou, O LORD, remainest for ever; thy throne from generation to generation” (5:19). The book ends with the prayer still unanswered, and its last verse states the people’s condition as it stands: “thou hast utterly rejected us; thou art very wroth against us” (5:22). The answer is in Jeremiah, where Ephraim prays the same words, “turn thou me, and I shall be turned,” and the LORD replies, “I will surely have mercy upon him” (Jeremiah 31:18–20).