Lamentations 4
Butler4:1 How is the gold become dim! how is the most pure gold changed!
The stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the top of every street.
2. The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold,
How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!
3. Even the jackals draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones:
The daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.
4. The tongue of the sucking child cleaveth to the roof of his mouth for thirst:
The young children ask bread, and no man breaketh it unto them.
5. They that did feed delicately are desolate in the streets:
They that were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills.
6. For the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the sin of Sodom,
That was overthrown as in a moment, and no hands were laid upon her.
7. Her nobles were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk,
They were more ruddy in body than rubies, their polishing was as of sapphire:
8. Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets: Their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick.9 They that be slain with the sword are better than they that be slain with hunger; For these pine away, stricken through, for want of the fruits of the field.10 The hands of the pitiful women have sodden their own children; They were their meat in the destruction of the daughter of my people.11 The LORD hath accomplished his fury, he hath poured out his fierce anger; And he hath kindled a fire in Zion, which hath devoured the foundations thereof.12 The kings of the earth believed not, neither all the inhabitants of the world, That the adversary and the enemy should enter into the gates of Jerusalem.13 It is because of the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, That have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her.14 They wander as blind men in the streets, they are polluted with blood, So that men cannot touch their garments.15 Depart ye, they cried unto them, Unclean! depart, depart, touch not: When they fled away and wandered, men said among the nations, They shall no more sojourn here.
Chap. 4. This chapter resumes the strain of a funeral elegy from the close of chap. 2. The prophet bewails the calamities which have fallen on Jerusalem as a whole, on her infant children and on her guilty princes and leading men. H. C.
1-12. The elegy in this chapter begins with a lamentation of the sad change which the judgments of God had made in Jerusalem. The city that had been as gold, as the most fine gold, so rich and splendid, the perfection of beauty, and the joy of the whole earth, is become dim, and is changed, has lost its lustre, lost its value, is not what it was, it is become dross. The Temple is laid waste, which was the glory of Jerusalem and its protection; it is given up into the hands of the enemy. The stones of the sanctuary, which were curiously wrought, were thrown down by the Chaldeans when they demolished it or were brought down by the force of the fire, and were poured out and thrown about in the top of every street, they lay mingled without distinction among
16. The anger of the LORD hath divided them; he will no more regard them: They respected not the persons of the priests, they favoured not the elders.17 Our eyes do yet fail in looking for our vain help: In our watching we have watched for a nation that could not save.18 They hunt our steps, that we cannot go in our streets: Our end is near, our days are fulfilled; for our end is come.19 Our pursuers were swifter than the eagles of the heaven: They chased us upon the mountains, they laid wait for us in the wilderness.20 The breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the LORD, was taken in their pits; Of whom we said, Under his shadow we shall live among the nations.21 Rejoice and be glad, O daughter of Edom, that dwellest in the land of Uz: The cup shall pass through unto thee also; thou shalt be drunken, and shalt make thyself naked.22 The punishment of thine iniquity is accomplished, O daughter of Zion; He will no more carry thee away into captivity: He will visit thine iniquity, O daughter of Edom; He will discover thy sins.
the common ruins. When the God of the sanctuary was by sin provoked to withdraw, no wonder that the stones of the sanctuary were thus profaned. H.
1,2. In the first clause I understand the word “gold” to represent, not the literal and identical gold which was yet in the Temple at its fall, nor the chief men in either civil or religious stations, but in general the glory and beauty of Zion. What was exceedingly beautiful and glorious has now faded and lost its splendor. The precious “stones of the sanctuary” are probably its building stones; tenderly sacred in the eyes of God’s people, now thrown about rudely anywhere! “The precious sons of Zion,” including probably both priests and princes who would naturally be compared to fine gold, how are they now only “as earthen pitchers,” vile wares! H. C.
1. How is the gold become dim! How is the glory of the Temple obscured! The sanctuary now lies in ruins! And the stones of it are not distinguished from the common rubbish!
In like manner the priests and Levites who attended upon the service of God, and the elders of the people, the members of the great Sanhedrim who kept their court within the precincts of the Temple, these persons, that might be resembled to the pillars or corner-stones of that sacred building, are now involved in the same common destruction with the meanest of the people. (See verse 16.) W. Lowth.
2. “Precious sons . . . fine gold,” . . . become “earthen pitchers.” The prophet’s appreciation of the proper dignity and value of his nation was naturally very exalted; in proportion were his sorrows and humiliation when his country rebelled against the Lord, and became, in consequence, a prey to the despised and hated foreigner. The reflections are applicable, not to Judah only, but to all the sinful and rebellious among men; for there is no escape from the action of the moral law, from the chastisement of the righteous Judge. The true value and proper dignity of man. Comparable to “fine gold” in beauty, preciousness and use is our humanity when in the state designed by the Creator, free from the corroding rust of sin, and minted and stamped with the image and superscription of the Most High. Sin involves chastisement, and chastisement brings disgrace. The striking contrast between gold, fine and solid, on the one hand, and “earthen pitchers” on the other hand, is a pictorial and effective representation of the change which took place in Judah. A holy nation, a kingdom of priests, the chosen of the Eternal, was reduced to the level of the poorest, meanest tribe vanquished and despoiled by an unsparing enemy. Here, as so often, the chosen nation was an emblem of humanity. For though man be by nature the sublimest of God’s creatures, when he is abandoned to sin and all its consequences he sinks below the level of the brutes. Only Divine grace and power can restore the beauty and dignity of which sin has robbed humanity. The Gospel of Christ transforms the earthen pitcher into the fine gold of the sanctuary. T.
In the dimming of the brightness of the Temple mourning patriots saw an illustration of the shame that had come over the nation, and especially of the degradation of the noblest of the citizens of Jerusalem. But whenever rich gifts and graces of God are corrupted we may echo the same lament, “How is the gold become dim!” The graces of the spiritual life are as finest gold. God counts His people as His jewels (Mal. 3:17). Rare and bright and beautiful, glorious and golden in the sunlight of God’s love, is the character of true saintliness. There is no beauty comparable to the beauty of holiness. But alas! when the saint trails his white robe in the ways of sin and casts the pearls that adorn him to the swine, how is all the glory and beauty degraded! The fallen Christian defiles himself and dims his gold and brings shame on the name of Christ by his sin. Adeney.
3-5. These points in the description reveal the horrors of famine. Had the mothers of Jerusalem become heartless and cruel like the ostrich forsaking her eggs, that they should cease to furnish them sustenance? Job (chap. 39:13-16) gives the character of the ostrich who “leaveth her eggs on the earth and forget-teth that the foot may crush them; she is hardened against her young ones as though they were not hers.” H. C.
A more graphic, a more terrible picture than this of the misery of a captured, starved and desolated city no pencil could paint. If the circumstances of the famine-stricken population of Jerusalem are portrayed with too literal a skill and with too sickening an effect, it must be borne in mind that the description is not that of an artist, but of a prophet, and that the aim is not merely to horrify, but to instruct, and especially to represent the frightful consequences involved in a nation’s sin and apostasy. T.—“The daughter of my people” would not have become cruel if her life had gone on in its ordinary way. But all at once the supplies that have been so regular become uncertain, and at last virtually stop. The cruelty, if in such circumstances it may be truly called so, is an involuntary one. And yet it is not involuntary in this sense, that the state of things was altogether unpreventable. The famine came from disobedience to God. It is stated on authority. It were presuming far too much to trace a connection between particular suffering and particular wrong-doing, but where the connection between particular wrong-doing and particular suffering is made perfectly plain, we shall be very foolish if we do not take heed to it. Whatever wrong thing we do will have some evil consequences, and we know not how soon they may come, how widely they may spread, and how much suffering and difficulty they may bring to the innocent. Y.
6. This verse sets forth that the punishment of Jerusalem was more terrible than that of Sodom, because the latter was sudden and transient, while the former was the slow torture of famine and the lingering slaughter of a siege. H. C.—God was doing nothing new or indefensible in allowing Jerusalem thus to be wasted and humiliated. The Israelites had in their possession illustrations more than one of how great sin had been followed by great suffering. Jeremiah quotes Sodom, and he might have said something about Egypt when God visited it with the plagues. We must not, of course, press too literally the statement that the sin of Jerusalem was greater than that of Sodom. The prophet’s aim is simply to insist that no sin could have been greater than that of Jerusalem. If it was a right and a necessary thing that Sodom should be so suddenly visited, so completely overwhelmed, then assuredly no complaint could be made against the severe treatment experienced by Jerusalem. Indeed, relatively, Jerusalem might think itself very well off. If the height on which Jerusalem stood had sunk in another Dead Sea, there would have been no ground for complaint. No impartial Israelite, looking at the privileges of Israel, considering how much it had been instructed and warned, and how patiently it had been dealt with, could do anything but confess that on the whole it had been mildly visited. Y.
12. On the part of the Jews, this extreme self-confidence came of their strong presumption that the Almighty was on their side and would not let His Temple and His holy name go down before the heathen. Alas, they did not consider that their sins had provoked Him to wrath, so that instead of being their great defender, He must, by virtue of His own eternal attributes, become their terrible destroyer! This precisely was their grand mistake! They had lost the true idea of God as holy and just, and as demanding pure hearts and clean hands in His covenant people, and, moreover, as one who forevermore holds all nations to justice and righteousness, and visits fearful retribution on guilty oppressors. H. C.
The people of Jerusalem had come to rest in the comfortable feeling that their city was reckoned impregnable. Do not let our safety rest in what other people think about us. If our safety is not of God, if it does not rest in trusting Him and obeying Him, then sooner or later that will happen to us in our life which happened to Jerusalem. The walls of our life will be broken down, our most precious treasures taken away, our hearts made desolate. Y.
Jerusalem was deluded by the flattery of her neighbors. When there is a general opinion that all is well it is hard for individual souls to see and feel their danger. In a condition of worldly ease the prophet of repentance is opposed by the mocking indifference of popular opinion, and souls are lulled to sleep with a hollow security that says, “Peace, peace,” when there is no peace. The antidote to this dangerous anodyne of conscience must be sought in the Word of God, which speaks of judgment, and warns us to flee from the wrath to come for refuge where only safety can be found—not in the flattery of our neighbors, but at the cross of Christ. Adeney.
13,14. The false prophets and the wicked priests were the chief instigators of that persecution before which some (we know not how many) just men like Urijah (26:20-23) fell. For their sins they now wander like blind men in the streets, as men so stained with the innocent blood of victims murdered by their own hand that none could touch their garments. H. C.
Once again, as so often, the prophet and priest stand forth in a shameful revelation. Their life is so contrary to their office. The prophet whose force should have come from the strong righteousness of his heart within and be directed straight against all evil-doers, is found ranging himself with the wicked and making evil put on the semblance of good. And as for the priest, he does holy things with his hands and offers sacrifices for sin, while those whose lives are a continual protest against sin he hates and strives to slay. Not that we must reduce the prophet and the priest here spoken of to the level of vulgar murderers. Doubtless, in many instances, they persuaded themselves they were right and doing God’s service. Fanaticism and class feeling, where each one blows the flame of his neighbor’s zeal, will urge men on to the greatest atrocities. There may be no danger, most likely there will be no opportunity, that we should go as far as these prophets and priests, but we need to guard against having their narrow spirits in our hearts. We may not shed the blood of the just, but nevertheless we may do much to hinder and trouble them. Y.
14. The cause of this blindness. Sin (see verse 13). Priests and prophets had shed the blood of the just. Gross abuse of power and tyrannous violence were iniquities enough to blunt the spiritual vision of the most gifted. This is one of the most terrible fruits of sin. It always tends to deaden conscience and darken the eye of the soul. We must do right if we would see truth. It is not only sensuality, passion and gross worldliness that debase the soul beyond the power of perceiving higher things, but more spiritual sins—pride, bigotry, self-will, etc.—also blind it. Purity of heart is essential to clearness of vision. The effect of this blindness. “They wandered as blind men in the streets.” Darkness of vision leads to confusion in action. We must see clearly that we may walk straightly. A confused conscience will make an uncertain will. Practical truth is not merely a subject for discussion in the seclusion of the study. It is a necessary chart to guide our course by. When the seeing and teaching of this is at fault all life is thrown into helpless disorder.
15. Jerusalem, when in her prosperity she abandoned herself to idolatry and immorality, was more unclean than when she lay in ashes a charnel-house of slaughtered citizens. Yet no man cried, “Unclean!” in the prosperous times. The degradation was thought to be defiling, while the sin which led to it was connived at. This mistake is common in various forms. The criminal with the brand of punishment upon him is shunned, while the far more vicious man who has contrived to keep himself safe is courted. Parents fear the corruption of manners which their children may contract by mingling with social inferiors, and yet permit them to mix with far more corrupt society if only the rank of it be higher than their own. Many people look with contempt on certain kinds of honest business, who will engage in pursuits of very questionable morality without compunction. We want a healthier conscience, that will declare no honest pursuit to be dishonorable and no immoral one to be respectable simply because patronized by rank and fashion. Adency.
17-20. Here the elegy speaks for the masses of the people. Up to the last moment their eyes were looking for some help that proved all in vain. They expected the Egyptians to intervene, but they could not save. The enemy hunted them so closely that none were safe in their streets. Clearly, their final end had come! Verse 20 must refer primarily to Zedekiah, then on their throne. They seem to have hoped that the Chaldeans would take him unharmed with themselves into captivity, and allow them to live quietly under him as their king. But he was “taken in their pits,” as a lion or a bear in the pit-holes dug to entrap them, and he found little mercy. How could they assume so confidently that God would save their nation out of His regard to kings so base and wicked as the last three—apostate offspring of the good Josiah—Jehoiakim, Jehoia-chin his son, and Zedekiah. H. C.
17. Vain help and hope. When Jerusalem was besieged by the Chaldeans its inhabitants seem to have looked for assistance from their Egyptian neighbors. This was a policy and an expectation displeasing to Jehovah, who ever taught His people to rely, not upon an arm of flesh, but upon the eternal King of righteousness. In this verse the prophet pictures the attitude of the Jews as day after day they strained their weary eyes to catch some glimpse of an approaching deliverer. How striking a picture of the folly and vanity of those hopes which man fixes upon his fellow-man!
18. The end is come! The progress of the enemy’s works, the approach of the enemy’s forces, the frequency of the enemy’s assaults, all tended to dishearten the citizens of the besieged Jerusalem. The prophet represents the discouraged and dismayed citizens as gazing with terror upon the assailants and their strategy, and exclaiming in despair, “Our end is come!” The dealing and the discipline of God with the souls of the disobedient and rebellious may well awaken the same conviction and elicit the same cry. T.
21,22. This address to Edom is keen irony. “Rejoice and be glad” if thou wilt, O Edom; go on! So wilt thou only the more surely seal thy righteous doom! Let Edom exult in our fall, if she will. The wine-cup of God’s wrath will come round to her lips all the sooner and the surer; she will be drunken, and will expose herself in her nakedness and filth before all the nations. (See Jer. 25: 15-36.) H. C.
It will be a righteous destruction; God will herein visit thine iniquity and discover thy sins; He will punish them, and to justify Himself therein He will discover them, and make it to appear that He has just cause thus to proceed against them. Nay, the punishment of the sin shall so exactly answer the sin that it shall itself plainly discover it. Sometimes God does so visit the iniquity that he that runs may read the sin in the punishment. But, sooner or later, sin will be visited and discovered, and all the hidden works of darkness brought to light. H.