เพลงคร่ำครวญ 1:17 วิจารณ์

We have here the first alphabet of this lamentation, twenty-two stanzas, in which the miseries of Jerusalem are bitterly bewailed and her present deplorable condition is aggravated by comparing it with her former prosperous state; all along, sin is acknowledged and complained of as the procuring cause of all these miseries; and God is appealed to for justice against their enemies and applied to for compassion towards them. The chapter is all of a piece, and the several remonstrances are interwoven; but here is, I. A complaint made to God of their calamities, and his compassionate consideration desired (Lam 1:1-11). II. The same complaint made to their friends, and their compassionate consideration desired (Lam 1:12-17). III. An appeal to God and his righteousness concerning it (Lam 1:18-22), in which he is justified in their affliction and is humbly solicited to justify himself in their deliverance.

This chapter contains a complaint of the miseries of the city of Jerusalem, and the nation of the Jews; first by the Prophet Jeremiah, then by the Jewish people; and is concluded with a prayer of theirs. The prophet deplores the state of the city, now depopulated and become tributary, which had been full of people, and ruled over others; but now in a very mournful condition, and forsaken and ill used by her lovers and friends, turned her enemies, Lam 1:1; and next the state of the whole nation; being carried captive for their sins among the Heathens; having no rest, being overtaken by their persecutors, Lam 1:3; but what most of all afflicted him was the state of Zion; her ways mourning; her solemn feasts neglected; her gates desolate; her priests sighing, and virgins afflicted; her adversaries prosperous; her beauty departed; her sabbaths mocked; her nakedness seen; and all her pleasant things in the sanctuary seized on by the adversary; and all this because of her many transgressions, grievous sins, and great pollution and vileness, which are confessed, Lam 1:4; then the people themselves, or the prophet representing them, lament their case, and call upon others to sympathize with them, Lam 1:12; observing the sad desolation made by the hand of the Lord upon them for their iniquities, Lam 1:13; on account of which great sorrow is expressed; and their case is represented as the more distressing, that they had no comforter, Lam 1:16; then follows a prayer to God, in which his righteousness in doing or suffering all this is acknowledged, and mercy is entreated for themselves, and judgments on their enemies, Lam 1:18.

Zion spreadeth forth her hands,.... Either as submitting to the conqueror, and imploring mercy; or rather as calling to her friends to help and relieve her. The Targum is, "Zion spreadeth out her hands through distress, as a woman spreads out her hands upon the seat to bring forth;'' see Jer 4:31. Some render the words, "Zion breaks with her hands" (f); that is, breaks bread; and Joseph Kimchi observes, that it was the custom of comforters to break bread to the mourner; but here she herself breaks it with her hands, because there was none to comfort her: and there is none to comfort her; to speak a word of comfort to her, or to help her out of her trouble; her children gone into captivity; her friends and lovers at a distance; and God himself departed from her; See Gill on Lam 1:16; the Lord hath commanded concerning Jacob, that his adversaries should be round about him; that he should be surrounded by them, and carried captive, and should be in the midst of them in captivity: this was the decree and determination of God; and, agreeably to it, he ordered it in his providence that the Chaldeans should come against him, encompass him, and overcome him; and that because he had slighted and broken the commandments of the Lord; and therefore was justly dealt with, as is acknowledged in Lam 1:18. So the Targum, "the Lord gave to the house of Jacob commandments, and a law to keep, but they transgressed the decree of his word; therefore his enemies encompassed the house of Jacob round about:'' Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them; reckoned filthy and unclean, abominable and nauseous; whom none cared to come near, but shunned, despised, and abhorred; as the Jews separated from the Gentiles, and would not converse with them; so neither now would the Chaldeans with the Jews; but treat them as the offscouring of all things. (f) "frangit Sion manibus suis", sub. "panem", Vatablus.

Repentance came by John, grace by Christ. He, as the Lord, gives the one; the other is proclaimed, as it were, by the servant. The church, then, keeps both that it may attain to grace and not cast away repentance, for grace is the gift of One who confers it; repentance is the remedy of the sinner.Jeremiah knew that penitence was a great remedy, which he in his Lamentations took up for Jerusalem and brings forward Jerusalem itself as repenting when he says, “She wept sore in the night, and her tears are on her cheeks, nor is there one to comfort her of all who love her. The ways of Zion do mourn.” And he says further, “For these things I weep, my eyes have grown dim with weeping, because he who used to comfort me is gone far from me.” We notice that he thought this the bitterest addition to his woes, that he who used to comfort the mourner was gone far from him. How, then, can you take away the very comfort by refusing to repentance the hope of forgiveness? But let those who repent learn how they ought to carry it out, with what zeal, with what affection, with what intention of mind, with what shaking of the inmost bowels, with what conversion of heart: “Behold,” he says, “O Lord, that I am in distress; my bowels are troubled by my weeping; my heart is turned within me.” Here you recognize the intention of the soul, the faithfulness of the mind, the disposition of the body: “The elders of the daughters of Zion sat,” he says, “on the ground, they put dust on their heads, they girded themselves with haircloth, the princes hung their heads to the ground, the virgins of Jerusalem fainted with weeping, my eyes grew dim, my bowels were troubled, my glory was poured on the earth.” So, too, did the people of Nineveh mourn and escaped the destruction of their city. Such is the remedial power of repentance, that God seems because of it to change his intention. To escape is, then, in your own power; the Lord wants to be asked, he wants people to hope in him, he wants supplication to be made to him. You are a human being, and you want to be asked to forgive, and you think that God will pardon you without asking him? The Lord wept over Jerusalem, that, inasmuch as it would not weep itself, it might obtain forgiveness through the tears of the Lord. He wills that we should weep in order that we may escape, as you find it in the Gospel: “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me, but weep for yourselves.”

SION HAS SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS: the fourth topic of complaint. Historical interpretation ZION HAS SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS: this signifies pain as that of a woman in labor, whence it is said elsewhere: As he that swims stretches forth his hands to swim, likewise also Zion in the midst of straits, and Isaiah says: Anguish hath taken hold of me as the anguish of a woman in labor. Indeed, it is the straightness of the heart that is expressed in the extension of the hands, more than with a cry from the mouth. Hence PHE is written before, that is interpreted ‘of the mouth’. Because, when ‘ZION HAS SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS in the midst of straits’, she shows that which she cannot express with her mouth, namely that she suffers in her heart, when she is without a comforter, whence: Depart from me, I will weep bitterly: labor not to comfort me. THE LORD HAS COMMANDED AGAINST JACOB: with the just judgement of God, both the Chaldeans and the Romans have been brought in, for a people shall not arise against another unless God has previously given order. AS A MENSTROUS WOMAN: just as a woman is abominable, when she undergoes menstruation, likewise the Jews are looked upon over the whole world. Allegorical interpretation SION HAS SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS: as often as the Church is surrounded by the army of heretics, THE LORD commands AGAINST JACOB, that is to say, the Church, who ought to overthrow her vices, the enemies’ armies against her, because she has dismissed the Holy Ghost, her teacher and comforter, without whom no one is educated to the faith, no one is freed from vices. Therefore HAS she SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS, in the midst of pressures and pains, and there is no worthy voice of the mouth for her, with which she would be able to overcome the dogmas of the enemies and defend her own, whence she is often polluted with the foulness of her carnal works and with the blood of her fleshly desires among the enemies, by whom she is afflicted within and without. Hence: Woe to them that are with child, and that give suck in those days. Moral interpretation SION HAS SPREAD FORTH HER HANDS: when the soul, who used to be a mirror of God and an over-thrower of vices, because of her iniquity is delivered to spiritual wickedness, she looks in vain for a comforter without, who has lost the spirit within. Justly therefore, THE LORD HAS COMMANDED AGAINST JACOB &c, that is against the soul, once overthrowing her vices, now bragging of the name only, whence her spiritual ENEMIES besiege her AROUND, that she cannot escape. She who often sees her surrounded, spreads FORTH HER HANDS in the midst of straits of thoughts, and there is no voice of the mouth for her, nor any excuse for speaking, because she is A MENSTROUS WOMAN, that is, stained with bloody deeds, from which she is never freed without the comforter, when also the prophet testifies to that all our justices are before him as the rag of a menstruous woman.

Here is first a loud lamentation, second, it is due to a captivity during the reign of Zedekiah, the last king of Judah, when the people were totally captive. As to this situation three more ideas are proposed. First, is the siege, or blockade, as bewailed, second the captivity itself. As further on said: "The Lord is in the right for I have rebelled against his word." (Verse 18). Third, is the corruption, due to a famine. As further on declared: "I called to my lovers but they deceived me, my priests and elders perished in the city, while they sought food to revive their strength." (Verse 19). Regarding the siege, or blockade, three further notions are made. First is reckoned a lack of friends, who could be of aid in preventing the siege. As declared: "Zion stretches out her hands, but there is none to comfort her". That is, as if, seeking aid from the Egyptians. As finally expressed in Chapter 5:6: "We have given the hand to Egypt, and to Assyria, to get bread enough." Or, also aid from the Lord God. As the prophet Isaiah expresses: "When you spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you" (Is 1:15). Second, as to the captivity itself, the arrival of the enemy is considered in Verse 17: "the Lord has commanded against Jacob that his neighbors should be his foes." Namely, like the Chaldeans. As Isaiah 10:6 proclaimed: "and against the people of my wrath I commanded him to take spoil and seize plunder." Third, the consumption, due to famine, considers the management of the siege. As Verse 17 says finally: "Jerusalem has become a filthy thing among them." That is, against Jerusalem, no one advances in order to defend it. As Jeremiah 2:2 declares: "None who seek her need weary themselves; in her mouth they will find her."

The prophet begins with lamenting the dismal reverse of fortune that befell his country, confessing at the same time that her calamities were the just consequence of her sins, Lam 1:1-6. Jerusalem herself is then personified and brought forward to continue the sad complaint, and to solicit the mercy of God, vv. 7-22. In all copies of the Septuagint, whether of the Roman or Alexandrian editions, the following words are found as a part of the text: Και εγενετο μετα το αιχμαλωτισθηναι τον Ισραηλ, και Ιερουσαλημ ερημωθηναι, εκαθισεν Ιερεμιας κλαιων, και εθρηνησεν τον θρηνον τουτον επι Ιερουσαλημ, και ειπεν· - And it came to pass after Israel had been carried away captive, and Jerusalem was become desolate, that Jeremiah sat weeping: and he lamented with this lamentation over Jerusalem; and he said." The Vulgate has the same, with some variations: - "Et factum est, postquam in captivitatem redactus est Israel, et Jerusalem deserta est, sedit Jeremias propheta fiens, et planxit lamentations hac in Jerusalem, et amaro animo suspirans et ejulans, digit." The translation of this, as given in the first translation of the Bible into English, may be found at the end of Jeremiah, taken from an ancient MS. in my own possession. I subjoin another taken from the first Printed edition of the English Bible, that by Coverdale, 1535. "And it came to passe, (after Israel was brought into captyvitie, and Jerusalem destroyed); that Jeremy the prophet sat weeping, mournynge, and makinge his mone in Jerusalem; so that with an hevy herte he sighed and sobbed, sayenge." Matthew's Bible, printed in 1549, refines upon this: "It happened after Israell was brought into captyvite, and Jerusalem destroyed, that Jeremy the prophet sate wepyng, and sorrowfully bewayled Jerusalem; and syghynge and hewlynge with an hevy and wooful hert, sayde." Becke's Bible of the same date, and Cardmarden's of 1566, have the same, with a trifling change in the orthography. On this Becke and others have the following note: - "These words are read in the lxx. interpreters: but not in the Hebrue." All these show that it was the ancient opinion that the Book of Lamentations was composed, not over the death of Josiah, but on account of the desolations of Israel and Jerusalem. The Arabic copies the Septuagint. The Syriac does not acknowledge it; and the Chaldee has these words only: "Jeremiah the great priest and prophet said."

Zion spreadeth forth her hands - Extending the hands is the form in supplication. Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman - To whom none dared to approach, either to help or comfort, because of the law, Lev 15:19-27.

how is she . . . widow! she that was great, &c.--English Version is according to the accents. But the members of each sentence are better balanced in antithesis, thus, "how is she that was great among the nations become as a widow! (how) she who was princess among the provinces (that is, she who ruled over the surrounding provinces from the Nile to the Euphrates, Gen 15:18; Kg1 4:21; Ch2 9:26; Ezr 4:20) become tributary!" [MAURER]. sit--on the ground; the posture of mourners (Lam 2:10; Ezr 9:3). The coin struck on the taking of Jerusalem by Titus, representing Judea as a female sitting solitary under a palm tree, with the inscription, JudÃ&brvbra Capta, singularly corresponds to the image here; the language therefore must be prophetical of her state subsequent to Titus, as well as referring retrospectively to her Babylonian captivity.

Like a woman in labor-throes (Jer 4:31). menstruous woman--held unclean, and shunned by all; separated from her husband and from the temple (compare Lam 1:8; Lev 14:19, &c.).

Sorrow and Wailing over the Fall of Jerusalem and Judah (Note: Keil has attempted, in his German translation of this and the next three chapters, to reproduce something of the alphabetic acrosticism of the original (see above, p. 466); but he has frequently been compelled, in consequence, to give something else than a faithful reproduction of the Hebrew. It will be observed that his example has not been followed here; but his peculiar renderings have generally been given, except where these peculiarities were evidently caused by the self-imposed restraint now mentioned. He himself confesses, in two passages omitted from the present translation (pp. 591 and 600 of the German original), that for the sake of reproducing the alphabeticism, he has been forced to deviate from a strict translation of the ideas presented in the Hebrew. - Tr.) 1 Alas! how she sits alone, the city that was full of people! She has become like a widow, that was great among the nations; The princess among provinces has become a vassal. 2 She weeps bitterly through the night, and her tears are upon her cheek; She has no comforter out of all her lovers: All her friends have deceived her; they have become enemies to her. 3 Judah is taken captive out of affliction, and out of much servitude; She sitteth among the nations, she hath found no rest; All those who pursued her overtook her in the midst of her distresses. 4 The ways of Zion mourn, for want of those who went up to the appointed feast; All her gates are waste; her priests sigh; Her virgins are sad, and she herself is in bitterness. 5 Her enemies have become supreme; those who hate her are at ease; For Jahveh hath afflicted her because of the multitude of her transgressions: Her young children have gone into captivity before the oppressor. 6 And from the daughter of Zion all her honour has departed; Her princes have become like harts [that] have found no pasture, And have gone without strength before the pursuer. 7 In the days of her affliction and her persecutions, Jerusalem remembers all her pleasant things which have been from the days of old: When her people fell by the hand of the oppressor, and there was none to help her, Her oppressors saw her, - they laughed at her times of rest. 8 Jerusalem hath sinned grievously, therefore she hath become an abomination: All those who honoured her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness; And she herself sighs, and turns backward. 9 Her filth is on her flowing skirts; she remembered not her latter end; And so she sank wonderfully: she has no comforter. "O Jahveh, behold my misery!" for the enemy hath boasted. 10 The oppressor hath spread out his hand upon all her precious things; For she hath seen [how] the heathen have come into her sanctuary, [Concerning] whom Thou didst command that they should not enter into Thy community. 11 All her people [have been] sighing, seeking bread; They have given their precious things for bread, to revive their soul. See, O Jahveh, and consider that I am become despised. 12 [Is it] nothing to you, all ye that pass along the way? Consider, and see if there be sorrow like my sorrow which is done to me, Whom Jahveh hath afflicted in the day of the burning of His anger. 13 From above He sent fire in my bones, so that it mastered them; He hath spread a net for my feet, He hath turned me back; He hath made me desolate and ever languishing. 14 The yoke of my transgressions hath been fastened to by His hand; They have interwoven themselves, they have come up on my neck; it hath made my strength fail: The Lord hath put me into the hands of [those against whom] I cannot rise up. 15 The Lord hath removed all my strong ones in my midst; He hath proclaimed a festival against me, to break my young men in pieces: The Lord hath trodden the wine-press for the virgin daughter of Judah. 16 Because of these things I weep; my eye, my eye runneth down [with] water, Because a comforter is far from me, one to refresh my soul; My children are destroyed, because the enemy hath prevailed. 17 Zion stretcheth forth her hands, [yet] there is none to comfort her; Jahveh hath commanded concerning Jacob; his oppressors are round about him: Jerusalem hath become an abomination among them. 18 Jahveh is righteous, for I have rebelled against His mouth. Hear now, all ye peoples, and behold my sorrow; My virgins and my young men are gone into captivity. 19 I called for my lovers, [but] they have deceived me; My priests and my elders expired in the city, When they were seeking bread for themselves, that they might revive their spirit. 20 Behold, O Jahveh, how distressed I am! my bowels are moved; My heart is turned within me, for I was very rebellious: Without, the sword bereaveth [me]; within, [it is] like death. 21 They have heard that I sigh, I have no comforter: All mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad because Thou hast done it. Thou bringest the day [that] Thou hast proclaimed, that they may be like me. 22 Let all their wickedness come before Thee, And do to them as Thou hast done to me because of all my transgressions; For my sighs are many and my heart is faint. Lamentations 1:1-22 The poem begins with a doleful meditation on the deeply degraded state into which Jerusalem has fallen; and in the first half (Lam 1:1-11), lament is made over the sad condition of the unhappy city, which, forsaken by all her friends, and persecuted by enemies, has lost all her glory, and, finding no comforter in her misery, pines in want and disesteem. In the second half (Lam 1:12-22), the city herself is introduced, weeping, and giving expression to her sorrow over the evil determined against her because of her sins. Both portions are closely connected. On the one hand, we find, even in Lam 1:9 and Lam 1:11, tones of lamentation, like signs from the city, coming into the description of her misery, and preparing the way for the introduction of her lamentation in Lam 1:12-22; on the other hand, her sin is mentioned even so early as in Lam 1:5 and Lam 1:8 as the cause of her misfortune, and the transition thus indicated from complaint to the confession of guilt found in the second part. This transition is made in Lam 1:17 by means of a kind of meditation on the cheerless and helpless condition of the city. The second half of the poem is thereby divided into two equal portions, and in such a manner that, while in the former of these (Lam 1:12-16) it is complaint that prevails, and the thought of guilt comes forward only in Lam 1:14, in the latter (Lam 1:18-22) the confession of God's justice and of sin in the speaker becomes most prominent; and the repeated mention of misery and oppression rises into an entreaty for deliverance from the misery, and the hope that the Lord will requite all evil on the enemy.

The complaint regarding the want of comforters is corroborated by the writer, who further developes this thought, and gives some proof of it. By this contemplative digression he breaks in on the lamentation of the city, as if the voice of the weeping one were choked with tears, thus he introduces into the complaint a suitable pause, that both serves to divide the lamentation into two, and also brings a turn in its contents. It is in vain that Zion stretches out her hands (פּרשׁ בּ, to make a spreading out with the hands) for comforters and helpers; there is none she can embrace, for Jahveh has given orders against Jacob, that those round about him should act as oppressors. סביביו are the neighbouring nations round about Israel. These are all of hostile disposition, and strive but to increase his misery; cf. Lam 1:2. Jerusalem has become their abomination (cf. Lam 1:8), since God, in punishment for sins, has exposed her before the heathen nations (cf. Lam 1:8). בּיניהם, "between them," the neighbouring nations, who live round about Judah. The thought that Jahveh has decreed the suffering which has come on Jerusalem, is laid to heart by her who makes complaint, so that, in Lam 1:18, she owns God's justice, and lets herself be roused to ask for pity, Lam 1:19-22. Starting with the acknowledgment that Jahveh is righteous, because Jerusalem has opposed His word, the sorrowing one anew (Lam 1:18, as in Lam 1:12) calls on the nations to regard her sorrow, which attains its climax when her children, in the bloom of youth, are taken captives by the enemy. But she finds no commiseration among men; for some, her former friends, prove faithless, and her counsellors have perished (Lam 1:19); therefore she turns to God, making complaint to Him of her great misery (Lam 1:20), because the rest, her enemies, even rejoice over her misery (Lam 1:21): she prays that God may punish these. Gerlach has properly remarked, that this conclusion of the chapter shows Jerusalem does not set forth her fate as an example for the warning of the nations, nor desires thereby to obtain commiseration from them in her present state (Michaelis, Rosenmller, Thenius, Vaihinger); but that the apostrophe addressed to the nations, as well as that to passers-by (Lam 1:12), is nothing more than a poetic turn, used to express the boundless magnitude of this her sorrow and her suffering. On the confession "Righteous is Jahveh," cf. Jer 12:1; Deu 32:4; Ch2 12:6; Psa 119:37, etc. "Because I have rebelled against His mouth" (i.e., His words and commandments), therefore I am suffering what I have merited. On מרה , cf. Num 20:24; Kg1 13:26. כּל־עמּים (without the article, which the Qeri supplies) is a form of expression used in poetry, which often drops the article; moreover, we must here bear in mind, that it is not by any means the idea of the totality of the nations that predominates, but nations are addressed merely in indefinite generality: the expression in the text means nations of all places and countries. In order to indicate the greatness of her grief, the sorrowing one mentions the carrying into captivity of the young men and virgins, who are a mother's joy and hope.