Lamentations

The Lamentations of Jeremiah, chapter 5, New English Translation and King James Version

Chapter 5 New English Translation

The People of Jerusalem Pray:

   1 O LORD, reflect on what has happened to us; consider and look at our disgrace.
   2 Our inheritance is turned over to strangers; foreigners now occupy our homes.
   3 We have become fatherless orphans; our mothers have become widows.
   4 We must pay money for our own water; we must buy our own wood at a steep price.
   5 We are pursued - they are breathing down our necks; we are weary and have no rest.
   6 We have submitted to Egypt and Assyria in order to buy food to eat.
   7 Our forefathers sinned and are dead, but we suffer their punishment.
   8 Slaves rule over us; there is no one to rescue us from their power.
   9 At the risk of our lives we get our food because robbers lurk in the countryside.
   10 Our skin is hot as an oven due to a fever from hunger.
   11 They raped women in Zion, virgins in the towns of Judah.
   12 Princes were hung by their hands; elders were mistreated.
   13 The young men perform menial labor; boys stagger from their labor.
   14 The elders are gone from the city gate; the young men have stopped playing their music.
   15 Our hearts no longer have any joy; our dancing is turned to mourning.
   16 The crown has fallen from our head; woe to us, for we have sinned!
   17 Because of this, our hearts are sick; because of these things, we can hardly see through our tears.
   18 For wild animals are prowling over Mount Zion, which lies desolate.
   19 But you, O LORD, reign forever; your throne endures from generation to generation.
   20 Why do you keep on forgetting us? Why do you forsake us so long?
   21 Bring us back to yourself, O LORD, so that we may return to you; renew our life as in days before,
   22 unless you have utterly rejected us and are angry with us beyond measure.

King James Version

   1 Remember, O LORD, what is come upon us: consider, and behold our reproach.
   2 Our inheritance is turned to strangers, our houses to aliens.
   3 We are orphans and fatherless, our mothers are as widows.
   4 We have drunken our water for money; our wood is sold unto us.
   5 Our necks are under persecution: we labour, and have no rest.
   6 We have given the hand to the Egyptians, and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.
   7 Our fathers have sinned, and are not; and we have borne their iniquities.
   8 Servants have ruled over us: there is none that doth deliver us out of their hand.
   9 We gat our bread with the peril of our lives because of the sword of the wilderness.
   10 Our skin was black like an oven because of the terrible famine.
   11 They ravished the women in Zion, and the maids in the cities of Judah.
   12 Princes are hanged up by their hand: the faces of elders were not honoured.
   13 They took the young men to grind, and the children fell under the wood.
   14 The elders have ceased from the gate, the young men from their musick.
   15 The joy of our heart is ceased; our dance is turned into mourning.
   16 The crown is fallen from our head: woe unto us, that we have sinned!
   17 For this our heart is faint; for these things our eyes are dim.
   18 Because of the mountain of Zion, which is desolate, the foxes walk upon it.
   19 Thou, O LORD, remainest for ever; thy throne from generation to generation.
   20 Wherefore dost thou forget us for ever, and forsake us so long time?
   21 Turn thou us unto thee, O LORD, and we shall be turned; renew our days as of old.
   22 But thou hast utterly rejected us; thou art very wroth against us.