meta: {"file": "/data/tomer/Sefaria-Export/txt/Tanakh/Writings/Lamentations/English/The Rashi Ketuvim by Rabbi Shraga Silverstein.txt"}
text: Lamentations
  איכה
  The Rashi Ketuvim by Rabbi Shraga Silverstein
  
  
  Lamentations
  
  
  
  
  
  	How solitary does she sit, the city [formerly] rich in people. She has become like a widow. The great among the nations, the princess of the provinces, has become tributary.
  	She weeps, she weeps [(two "weepings" for two Temples)] at night [(the Temple having been destroyed at night)], and her tears are on her cheeks [(with constant weeping)]. She has no consolers of all her lovers. All her lovers have betrayed her; they have become foes to her.
  	Judah has gone into exile from affliction and from much servitude [(of the Kasdim.)] She sat among the nations, (but) found no rest. All of her pursuers overtook her between the straits.
  	The ways of Zion mourn, without the festival-pilgrims. All of her gates are desolate; her priests sigh; her virgins are afflicted; and she is bitter unto herself.
  	Her adversaries have become the heads; her foes have prospered. For the L-rd has afflicted her for the multitude of her transgressions. Her young children are gone captive before the enemy.
  	And there went forth from the daughter of Zion all of her splendor. Her princes have become like harts not finding pasture, and they have gone without strength before the pursuer.
  	Jerusalem [(i.e., the daughter of Zion in her exile)] remembered the days of [her destruction which led to] her affliction and her grieving. [She remembered] all of her precious things which she enjoyed in days of yore. When her people fell into the hand of the oppressor, with none to help her, oppressors beheld her and rejoiced at her cessations [(the cessations of her joyous festivals, New Moons, and Sabbaths)].
  	A sin has Jerusalem sinned; she has, therefore, been made an exile. All who honored her cheapened her, for they saw her shame; she herself sighed and recoiled.
  	Her blood was on her skirts [i.e., she sinned openly]. She did not bethink herself of her latter end, wherefore she has fallen awesomely, with none to console her. See, O L-rd, my affliction, for the foe has grown bold.
  	The foe [(Ammon and Moav)] has stretched out his hand against all her precious things [(Torah scrolls)]. For she has seen nations entering her sanctuary, concerning whom You commanded [viz. Deuteronomy 23:4]: They may not enter the congregation [(of Israel)] unto you.
  	All her people sigh, seeking bread. They have given their precious things for food to restore their souls. See, O L-rd, and look upon it, how I have been cheapened.
  	May [such woe] nevermore [be inflicted upon] all who transgress the way [i.e., the ordinance of the L-rd]! Look and see if there is a pain like my pain that has been wrought unto me, which the L-rd inflicted (upon me) in the day of His wrath.
  	From the heights He sent fire against my bones, and He has overmastered [(and broken them)]. He has spread a net for my feet. He has set me back. He has made me desolate, faint all the day.
  	The yoke of my offenses has become spotted in His hand [i.e., each of them has become an indelible spot before Him]. They have intermixed and come up upon my neck. My strength has failed. The L-rd has delivered me into the hands of [one against whom] I cannot rise.
  	The L-rd has trodden down all my mighty ones in my midst. He has called out a host against me to break my young men. As a winepress did the L-rd tread the virgin daughter of Judah.
  	Over these I weep. My eye, my eye, [endlessly] sheds water; for consolation is far from me, the restorer of my soul. My children are become desolate, for the foe has grown strong.
  	Zion has spread out her hands [(in agony)]; there is none to console her. The L-rd has commanded against Jacob his foes roundabout him. [(Even when they were exiled to Bavel and Ashur, Sancherev exiled their foes, Ammon and Moav, and settled them around them to harass them.)] Jerusalem has become an outcast among them.
  	Righteous is the L-rd, for I have rebelled against His word. Hear, I pray you, all the peoples, and see my pain. My virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.
  	I called [(those who appeared to be)] my lovers; they deceived me. My priests and my elders perished in the city while seeking bread for themselves wherewith to restore their souls.
  	See, O L-rd, that I am afflicted; my innards are shriveled. My heart is overturned in my midst, for I have deeply rebelled. Outside, the sword bereaved; inside [it was] like death.
  	They have heard how I sigh, but none console me. All of my foes have heard of my evil. They have rejoiced, for You have wrought (it) [i.e., You have caused them to hate me by forbidding me to intermingle with them]. Would that you brought [upon them] the day [(of destruction)] that You called out [upon me], that they be as I.
  	Let all their evil come [(in remembrance)] before You, and do to them as You have done to me for all of my offenses; for my sighs are many and my heart is faint.
  
  
  
  	How the L-rd has beclouded in His wrath the daughter of Zion! He has cast down from heaven to earth the glory of Israel and not remembered His footstool [(the Temple)] in the day of His wrath.
  	The L-rd has swallowed up without pity all the habitations of Jacob. He has destroyed in His wrath the strongholds of the daughter of Judah. He has brought them down to the ground. He has profaned the kingdom [(Israel, "a kingdom of priests")] and its princes.
  	He has cut off in burning wrath all the glory of Israel. He has drawn back His right hand [(from the defense of Israel] from before the foe; and He has burned against Jacob as a flaming fire, devouring roundabout.
  	He has drawn His bow as an enemy; He has set His right hand as an oppressor, and He has slain all that delighted the eye in the tent of the daughter of Zion. He has spilled out His fire-like wrath.
  	The L-rd has become like an enemy. He has swallowed up Israel; He has swallowed up all its palaces; He has destroyed its strongholds; and He has increased in the daughter [i.e., the congregation] of Judah affliction and wailing.
  	And He has cut off His abode [(the Temple)] as [(one cuts the vegetables of)] a garden. He has destroyed His meeting place [(the holy of holies)]. The L-rd has caused to go forgotten in Zion festival and Sabbath; and He has cast out in the raging of His wrath, king [(Tzidkiyahu)] and [high-] priest [(Serayahu)].
  	The L-rd has voided His altar; He has abolished His sanctuary. He has handed over to the enemy the walls of her palaces. A shout did they raise in the house of the L-rd as on a festival day.
  	The L-rd had [long] thought to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion. He stretched out a line [(of judgment)]; He did not draw back His hand from swallowing up. And He cast into mourning rampart and wall; together did they languish.
  	Her gates are sunk in the ground. He has destroyed and broken her bars. Her kings and her princes [are] among the nations devoid of instruction. Her prophets, too, have not found a vision from the L-rd.
  	They have sat upon the ground; they have been silent, the elders of the daughters of Zion. They have cast dust upon their heads; they have donned sackcloth. They bent their heads to the ground, the virgins of Jerusalem.
  	My eyes have failed with tears; my innards have shriveled up; my liver is poured upon the ground over the breaking of the daughter of my people, over the languishing of child and suckling in the streets of the city.
  	To their mothers they say: Where is corn and wine, expiring as a slain one in the streets of the city, spilling out their souls at their mothers' bosom.
  	What testimony shall I bring for you? What shall I compare to you? [(saying: Why are you amazed over your destruction? Did the same not happen to this and this nation?)] What shall I liken to you to console you [(saying: the very same thing happened to so and so)], O virgin daughter of Zion? For great as the sea is your breaking — Who shall heal you?
  	Your prophets prophesied for you vanity and folly, and they did not expose [and chastise you for] your iniquity to turn back your backsliding. And they prophesied for you burdens of vanity and recalcitrance [(against the L-rd)].
  	All the wayfarers clapped their hands over you. They whistled [in astonishment] and shook their heads over the daughter of Jerusalem: Is this the city of which it was said: "the sum of beauty, the joy of all the earth"?
  	They opened their mouths against you, all of your enemies. They hissed and gnashed their teeth. They said: We have swallowed her up. Truly, this is the day that we waited for. We have found it. We have seen it.
  	The L-rd has wrought what He devised. He consummated His word which He pronounced in days of yore [viz. Leviticus 26:18]. He has destroyed and not pitied. And He has caused the foe to rejoice over you; He has lifted the horn of your oppressors.
  	Their [(Israel's)] heart cried out to the L-rd: O wall of the daughter of Zion, shed tears like a stream day and night! Give yourself no respite! Let the pupil of your eye not be still!
  	Arise, cry out in the night, at the start of [(the last two)] of the [(three night-)] watches. Spill out your heart as water before the presence of the L-rd. Lift your hands to Him for the Lives of your young ones, who languish with hunger at the head of every street.
  	See, O L-rd, and behold: To whom have You wrought thus? Shall women eat their fruit? their fondled young ones? Shall there be killed in the sanctuary of the L-rd, priest and prophet?
  	They lay on the ground in the streets, young and old. My virgins and my young men fell by the sword. You killed on the day of Your wrath; You slaughtered; You did not pity.
  	You have called, as on a festival day, my [evil] neighbors roundabout [to participate in the slaughter], and there remained not on the day of the L-rd's wrath a survivor or a remnant. Those [(children)] whom I fondled and reared, my foe destroyed.
  
  
  
  	I [(Jeremiah, am the prophet who)] has seen affliction [(i.e., the destruction of the Temple), more so than any other prophet who foretold it (it not having taken place in their days, but in mine)], by the rod of His wrath.
  	He has led me, and He has brought [me into] darkness and not light.
  	Only against me does He renew [His blows], turning His hand [against me] all the day.
  	He has worn away my flesh and my skin. He has broken my bones.
  	He has built [(mounds)] upon me and has encompassed me with gall and woe.
  	In darkness did He seat me, as the dead of yore.
  	He has fenced me about; I cannot escape. He has weighted down my [foot] with shackles.
  	Though I call and cry out, He closes up [(the "windows of heaven" to)] my prayer.
  	He has blocked my ways with hewn stones; He has made my paths crooked [(by blocking the roads)].
  	He has become a bear in ambush to me; a lion in the covert.
  	He has turned aside my ways and straitened my strides; He has made me desolate.
  	He has bent His bow and set me up as a target for the arrow.
  	He has brought into my reins the "sons of His quiver" [i.e., His arrows].
  	I was a mockery to all my people, their song the entire day.
  	He has sated me with bitterness; He has glutted me with wormwood.
  	He broke my teeth with gravel [(The exiles were constrained to knead their dough in the ground and earth particles adhered to it)]; He pressed me [i.e., my face] down to the dust.
  	My soul was removed from peace; I forgot good.
  	And I said: My world and my hope are lost from the L-rd.
  	Remember my affliction and my plaint, wormwood and gall.
  	My soul well remembers and is bowed down within me.
  	(But) this shall I return to my heart, and, therefore, I shall hope [again]:
  	The lovingkindnesses of the L-rd do not cease, for His mercies are endless.
  	They renew themselves every morning; great is Your trust [(to fulfill Your assurances, and our trust in You to do so)].
  	The L-rd is my portion, my soul has said; and, therefore, I shall trust in Him.
  	The L-rd is good to those who hope in him, to the soul that seeks Him.
  	It is good that one hope and await the salvation of the L-rd.
  	It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.
  	Let him [(the mourner)] sit alone and await [(reprieve)], for He has imposed [the decree] upon him.
  	Let him place his mouth in the dust; perhaps there is hope.
  	Let him give his cheek to his smiter; let him take his fill of insult.
  	For the L-rd does not abandon (one) forever.
  	For if he sorrows [(over his sin)], He will pity (him) in the abundance of His lovingkindness.
  	For He does not afflict (men) from His heart [i.e., from His will] and cause men to sorrow [(but their suffering stems from their sins)].
  	[("For He does not afflict, etc.")] to humble under His feet all the bound ones of the earth,
  	to turn aside a man's judgment before the face of the Most High,
  	to subvert a man in his quarrel — the L-rd does not countenance [such things].
  	[(And if you would contend that all of these things are chance,)] who, then, would say [i.e., command] and it [(a thing)] be, [if] the L-rd did not command,
  	[if] it did not come forth from the mouth of the Most High, [both] the bad and the good?
  	What, then, should a living man complain of? — [Each] man [should complain] of his sins!
  	Let us seek out our ways and search them out, and let us return to the L-rd!
  	Let us lift up our hearts [(in contrition)] with our palms [(in prayer)] to the Almighty in heaven!
  	We have offended and rebelled [(as is our way)], [but] You have not forgiven [(as should be Your way)]!
  	You have covered [Yourself] with wrath [(as a partition between You and us)] and have pursued us [with it]. You killed; You did not pity.
  	You have covered Yourself with a cloud against the passing of prayer.
  	Repulsive and loathsome have You rendered us in the midst of the peoples.
  	They have opened their mouths against us, all of our foes.
  	Fear and, [(when we fled from it,)] the pit [(into which we fell)] are come upon us, the desolation and the breaking.
  	Streams of water shall my eye shed over the destruction of the daughter of my people.
  	My eye shall flow and not be still, without surcease,
  	until the L-rd look and behold from heaven.
  	My eye has disfigured my face [with ceaseless weeping] more than all the daughters [i.e., the families] of my city [(my priestly family having been elected above all of Israel for sacred service)].
  	They hunted me as a bird, my foes — in vain.
  	They bound my life in the pit [(in the prison-house)], and [(that not sufficing them)] cast a stone upon me.
  	Waters flowed over my head; I said: I am cut off [(from life)].
  	I called Your name, O L-rd, from the nethermost pit.
  	You heard my voice; deaden not Your ear to my sigh, to my cry.
  	[(In the past)] You drew near on the day that I called You. You said: Do not fear.
  	[(In the past)] You battled, my L-rd, the battles of my soul; You redeemed my life.
  	You have seen, O L-rd, how I am wronged. Judge my cause [(as You did in the past)].
  	You have seen all their revenge, all their thoughts against me.
  	You have heard their insults, O L-rd, all their thoughts against me,
  	the lips of those who rose against me, and their muttering against me all the day.
  	Behold their sitting down and their rising up — I am their song.
  	Render them their recompense, O L-rd, according to the work of their hands.
  	Give them breaking of heart; [cast] Your curse upon them!
  	Pursue (them) in wrath and wipe them out from under the heavens of the L-rd!
  
  
  
  	How is the gold [(the face of King Yoshiyahu, which glowed like gold)] dulled! [How is] the fine gold transformed! [viz. Chronicles 35:25], the hallowed stones [(young men who shone like precious stones)] spilled out at the head of every street!
  	The precious sons of Zion, valued as fine gold — how are they become as earthen jugs, the work of the potter!
  	Even the jackals draw out the breast; they give suck to their young ones. The daughter of my people has become cruel [(They deafen themselves to the cries of their starving children to assuage their own hunger)], like ostriches in the wilderness.
  	The tongue of the nursing child cleaves to its palate in thirst. Young children begged for bread. There is no one to break it for them.
  	Those who were fed on delicacies expired in the streets. Those who were reared in scarlet embraced the dung hills.
  	And the transgression of the daughter of my people [(judging from the severity and duration of its punishment)] was greater than the sins of Sodom, which was overturned but in a moment, the hands [of enemies] not prevailing in her [(but those of angels)].
  	Her [(Jerusalem's)] Nazirites were purer than snow, whiter than milk, ruddier than rubies, formed as the sapphire.
  	[But now,] darker than coal is their visage; they are not recognized in the streets. Their skin is shriveled upon them; it has become dry as a stick.
  	More fortunate were those slain by the sword than those slain by hunger. For they [(the latter)] oozed [excrement] when [their bellies] split [(from hunger and)] from the fruits of the field [i.e., from the roots and grasses that they were forced to subsist on].
  	The hands of merciful women boiled their children. They were a meal to them in the breaking of the daughter of my people.
  	The L-rd has consummated His wrath [(which burned in Him for many years)]. He has poured out His burning wrath. And He has kindled a fire in Zion, which has consumed her foundations.
  	The kings of the earth could not believe, and all the inhabitants of the world, that the oppressor and the foe could enter the gates of Jerusalem.
  	Because of the sins of her prophets, the transgressions of her priests, the spilling in her midst of the blood of the righteous.
  	The blind wandered in the streets, smeared with the blood [(of the slain, on which they slipped)]. [Their kin,] being unable to touch their garments —
  	Away! unclean ones, they cried out to them. Away! Away! do not touch. For they were befouled; they had also slipped [on the blood]. They said among the nations: They will not continue to live [here].
  	The face [(of wrath)] of the L-rd has divided them [(among the nations)]. He will look on them no more, [for] they did not respect the priests; they were not gracious to the elders [(when they were at peace)].
  	[When the evil came upon us,] our eyes yet looked out for our vain help [(Egypt)], keeping a watch for a nation that would not save.
  	They [(our enemies)] spied out our steps against walking in our broad places. Our end has drawn near. Our days have run full, for our end has come.
  	Swifter were our pursuers than the eagles in the heavens. On the mountains they chased us; in the desert they lay in wait for us.
  	The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the L-rd [(King Yoshiyahu, viz. II Chronicles 35:25)] was caught in their pits — he of whom we said: Under his [(protective)] shadow shall we live among the nations.
  	[(Jeremiah now prophesies the destruction of the second Temple by the Romans:)] Rejoice and regale, O daughter of Edom, dweller in the land of Utz, [but] over you, too, will pass the cup [(of punishment)]. You will become drunk [on it] and vomit [it up]!
  	Your transgression is ended, O daughter of Zion [i.e., you have been punished for all of your sins]; He will exile you no more — He has remembered your transgression, O daughter of Edom; He has bared all of your sins [(for punishment)].
  
  
  
  	Remember, O L-rd, what has become of us. Look, and behold our shame.
  	Our inheritance has been overturned by foreigners; our houses, by strangers.
  	We are as orphans, without a father; our mothers, as widows.
  	[(Fearing to draw water from the river lest we be attacked by our foes,)] we drank our water for money [i.e., we bought it from them]; our wood was sold to us.
  	We were pursued [with the yoke of hard labor] on our necks. We wearied ourselves [(to earn something)], but it [(what we earned)] was not left with us [(but exacted in taxes)].
  	[To] Egypt we stretched out a hand [(to support ourselves on them)]; [to] Ashur, to be sated with [their] bread.
  	Our fathers sinned and are no more, and we have borne their sins.
  	Slaves ruled over us; there is no redeemer from their hand.
  	At [the risk of] our lives we brought our bread, because of the sword of [marauders in] the wilderness.
  	Our skin as [(in)] an oven was parched, because of the burning famine.
  	Women in Zion they ravished; virgins in the cities of Judah.
  	Princes they hanged by their hands; they showed no deference for elders.
  	Young men carried millstones [(on their shoulders to weary them when they were being led in chains)]; youths were weakened by [burdens of] wood.
  	Elders have ceased form the gate; young men from their song.
  	The joy of our heart has ceased; our dance turned to mourning.
  	The crown of our head is fallen — Woe unto us, for we have sinned!
  	For this [(what follows)] our heart was afflicted; for these our eyes were darkened:
  	For Mount Zion, which is desolate; foxes prowl on it.
  	[But] You, O L-rd, forever shall preside; Your throne, from generation to generation.
  	Why [then] should You forget us eternally, forsake us everlastingly? [(Did You not swear to us [to preserve us] by Your everlasting Presence?)]
  	Return us, O L-rd, to You, and we shall return; renew our days as of yore.
  	For though You have deeply despised us [for our sins], You were overly wrathful with us.