2:1 How the Lord has covered the Daughter of Zion with the cloud of his anger! He has hurled down the splendor of Israel from heaven to earth; he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger.
2:2 Without pity the Lord has swallowed up all the dwellings of Jacob; in his wrath he has torn down the strongholds of the Daughter of Judah. He has brought her kingdom and its princes down to the ground in dishonor.
2:3 In fierce anger he has cut off every horn of Israel. He has withdrawn his right hand at the approach of the enemy. He has burned in Jacob like a flaming fire that consumes everything around it.
2:4 Like an enemy he has strung his bow; his right hand is ready. Like a foe he has slain all who were pleasing to the eye; he has poured out his wrath like fire on the tent of the Daughter of Zion.
2:5 The Lord is like an enemy; he has swallowed up Israel. He has swallowed up all her palaces and destroyed her strongholds. He has multiplied mourning and lamentation for the Daughter of Judah.
2:6 He has laid waste his dwelling like a garden; he has destroyed his place of meeting. The LORD has made Zion forget her appointed feasts and her Sabbaths; in his fierce anger he has spurned both king and priest.
2:7 The Lord has rejected his altar and abandoned his sanctuary. He has handed over to the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have raised a shout in the house of the LORD as on the day of an appointed feast.
2:8 The LORD determined to tear down the wall around the Daughter of Zion. He stretched out a measuring line and did not withhold his hand from destroying. He made ramparts and walls lament; together they wasted away.
2:9 Her gates have sunk into the ground; their bars he has broken and destroyed. Her king and her princes are exiled among the nations, the law is no more, and her prophets no longer find visions from the LORD.
2:10 The elders of the Daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence; they have sprinkled dust on their heads and put on sackcloth. The young women of Jerusalem have bowed their heads to the ground.
2:11 My eyes fail from weeping, I am in torment within, my heart is poured out on the ground because my people are destroyed, because children and infants faint in the streets of the city.
2:12 They say to their mothers, “Where is bread and wine?” as they faint like wounded men in the streets of the city, as their lives ebb away in their mothers’ arms.
2:13 What can I say for you? With what can I compare you, O Daughter of Jerusalem? To what can I liken you, that I may comfort you, O Virgin Daughter of Zion? Your wound is as deep as the sea. Who can heal you?
2:14 The visions of your prophets were false and worthless; they did not expose your sin to ward off your captivity. The oracles they gave you were false and misleading.
2:15 All who pass your way clap their hands at you; they scoff and shake their heads at the Daughter of Jerusalem: “Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth?”
2:16 All your enemies open their mouths wide against you; they scoff and gnash their teeth and say, “We have swallowed her up. This is the day we have waited for; we have lived to see it.”
2:17 The LORD has done what he planned; he has fulfilled his word, which he decreed long ago. He has overthrown you without pity, he has let the enemy gloat over you, he has exalted the horn of your foes.
2:18 The hearts of the people cry out to the Lord. O wall of the Daughter of Zion, let your tears flow like a river day and night; give yourself no relief, your eyes no rest.
2:19 Arise, cry out in the night, as the watches of the night begin; pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint from hunger at the head of every street.
2:20 “Look, O LORD, and consider: Whom have you ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the children they have cared for? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
2:21 “Young and old lie together in the dust of the streets; my young men and maidens have fallen by the sword. You have slain them in the day of your anger; you have slaughtered them without pity.
2:22 “As you summon to a feast day, so you summoned against me terrors on every side. In the day of the LORD’S anger no one escaped or survived; those I cared for and reared, my enemy has destroyed.”
2:1 How the Lord in His anger / Has covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud! / He has cast from heaven to earth / The glory of Israel, / And has not remembered His footstool / In the day of His anger.
2:2 The Lord has swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob; / He has not spared; / He has torn down in His overflowing wrath / The strongholds of the daughter of Judah. / He has brought them down to the ground; / He has profaned the kingdom and its princes.
2:3 He has cut off in fierce anger / All the horn of Israel. He has withdrawn His right hand / From before the enemy. / He has burned among Jacob like a flame of fire; / It consumes all around.
2:4 He has bent His bow like an enemy; / He has set His right hand like an adversary / And has slain all that was pleasant to the eye. / In the tent of the daughter of Zion / He has poured out His wrath like fire.
2:5 The Lord has become like an enemy; / He has swallowed up Israel; / He has swallowed up all her palaces; / He has destroyed her strongholds / And multiplied in the daughter of Judah / Mourning and lamentation.
2:6 And He has violently taken away His pavilion like a garden; / He has destroyed the place of His assembly; / Jehovah has caused the appointed feast and the Sabbath / To be forgotten in Zion; / He has despised, in the indignation of His anger, / The king and the priest.
2:7 The Lord has cast off His altar; / He has abhorred His sanctuary; / He has delivered up into the hand of the enemy / The walls of her palaces. / They have made a noise in the house of Jehovah / As though it were the day of an appointed feast.
2:8 Jehovah has thought to destroy / The walls of the daughter of Zion; / He has stretched out the line / And has not withdrawn His hand from destroying; / And He has made the rampart and the wall to mourn; / They languish together.
2:9 Her gates have sunk into the ground; / He has destroyed and broken her bars; / Her king and her princes are among nations / Where there is no law; / Her prophets also do not find / A vision from Jehovah.
2:10 The elders of the daughter of Zion / Sit on the ground; they are silent. / They have cast dust upon their head; / They have girded themselves with sackcloth. / The virgins of Jerusalem / Hang down their head to the ground.
2:11 My eyes are consumed with tears; / My bowels are in ferment; / My liver is poured out on the earth, / Because of the brokenness of the daughter of my people, / Because the little ones and the nursing children / Faint in the streets of the city.
2:12 They say to their mothers, / Where is the grain and the wine? / When they faint like one wounded / In the streets of the city, / When they pour out their soul / Into their mothers bosom.
2:13 What shall I testify to you? What shall I liken you to, / O daughter of Jerusalem? / What shall I compare you to, that I may comfort you, / O virgin daughter of Zion? / For your breach is great like a sea. / Who will heal you?
2:14 Your prophets have seen for you / Vanity and folly, / And they have not uncovered your iniquity / To turn again your captivity; / But they have seen for you burdens / Of vanity and of causes of banishment.
2:15 All those who pass on the way / Clap their hands at you; / They hiss and wag their head / At the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, / Is this the city which they called, / The perfection of beauty, / The joy of the whole earth?
2:16 All your enemies / Have opened their mouth against you; / They hiss and gnash the teeth; / They say, We have swallowed her up. / This is certainly the day that we have looked for; / We have found it; we have seen it.
2:17 Jehovah has done what He purposed; / He has fulfilled His word, / Which He commanded from the days of old; / He has torn down and has not spared, / And He has caused the enemy to rejoice over you; / He has exalted the horn of your adversaries.
2:18 Their heart cried out to the Lord: / O wall of the daughter of Zion, / Let tears run down like a stream / Day and night; / Give yourself no respite; / Let not the pupil of your eye cease.
2:19 Arise, cry out in the night / At the beginning of the watches; / Pour out your heart like water / Before the face of the Lord; / Lift up your hands toward Him / For the life of your little ones, / Who faint because of famine / At the head of every street.
2:20 See, O Jehovah, and look, / With whom You have dealt thus? / Shall the women eat their fruit, / The little ones nursed by them? / Shall the priest and the prophet be slain / In the sanctuary of the Lord?
2:21 The youth and the old man / Lie on the ground in the streets; / My virgins and my young men / Have fallen by the sword; / You have slain them in the day of Your anger; / You have slaughtered; You have not spared.
2:22 You have called for, as though in the day of an appointed feast, / My terrors on every side, / And in the day of Jehovah s anger / There was none who escaped or remained; / Those whom I have nursed and brought up / My enemy has consumed.