Sabbaths are consigned to oblivion. In His fierce anger, God has renounced king and priest.
7 God has rejected His altar. He has spurned His Temple, and ceded to the enemy the walls of our sacred citadel. It is now they who raise a commotion in the House of the Lord, as on a Festival day.
8 He determined to destroy, to dispatch the walls of Fair Zion. The Lord was calculating in His resolve and did not withdraw His hand from the destructive plan. He brought grief to every wall and rampart; they anguish together.
9 In ruins lie her gates; her beams and buttresses are broken. Her king and her nobles have been exiled. Torah is no more. Her prophets are granted no further vision from the Lord.
10 Jerusalem’ s elders sit low on the ground, wrapped in sackcloth, placing dust upon their heads in mourning for Fair Zion. The young daughters of Jerusalem are bowed in abject grief.
11 Keening and weeping at such length that my eyes have no more tears, I am aggrieved to my very core. I spew bitter bile on the ground at the downfall of my beautiful nation, at the sight of children and suckling infants sheltering in the streets of a once renowned city.
12 Languishing like those mortally wounded, asking for their mothers:“ Where is the grain and wine?” Their tender lives expire in the street, clutched to their mothers’ bosom.
13 My beloved Jerusalem, how can I do you justice in describing your beauty? With what images can I console you, innocent Fair Zion? Your tragedy is as profound as the sea. Who will bring you healing?
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