Lamentations 2

NEW AMERICAN BIBLE	CATHOLIC PUBLIC DOMAIN
1 How the Lord in his wrath has detested daughter Zion! He has cast down from heaven to earth the glory of Israel, Unmindful of his footstool on the day of his wrath.	1 ALEPH. O how the Lord has covered the daughter of Zion with gloom in his fury! O how he has thrown down from heaven to earth the famous one of Israel, and he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his fury.
2 The Lord has consumed without pity all the dwellings of Jacob; He has torn down in his anger the fortresses of daughter Judah; He has brought to the ground in dishonor her king and her princes.	2 BETH. The Lord has cast down, and he has not been lenient, with all the beauties of Jacob. In his fury, he has destroyed the fortifications of the virgin of Judah, and he has thrown them down to the ground. He has polluted the kingdom and its leaders.
3 He broke off, in fiery wrath, the horn that was Israel's whole strength; He withheld the support of his right hand when the enemy approached; He blazed up in Jacob like a flaming fire devouring all about it.	3 GHIMEL. In the anger of his fury, he has broken the entire horn of Israel. He has drawn back his right hand before the face of the enemy. And he has kindled within Jacob a flaming fire, devouring all around.
4 Like an enemy he made taut his bow; with his arrows in his right hand He took his stand as a foe, and slew all on whom the eye doted; Over the tent of daughter Zion he poured out his wrath like fire.	4 DALETH. He has bent his bow like an enemy. He has fixed his right hand like an adversary. And he has cut down all that was beautiful to behold in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion. He has poured out his indignation like fire.
5 The Lord has become an enemy, he has consumed Israel: Consumed all her castles and destroyed her fortresses; For daughter Judah he has multiplied moaning and groaning.	5 HE. The Lord has become like an enemy. He has thrown down Israel. He has thrown down all of his defenses. He has torn apart his fortifications. And he has filled the daughter of Judah with humbled men and humbled women.
6 He has demolished his shelter like a garden booth, he has destroyed his dwelling; In Zion the LORD has made feast and sabbath to be forgotten; He has scorned in fierce wrath both king and priest.	6 VAU. And he has torn apart her tent like a garden. He has demolished her tabernacle. In Zion, the Lord has delivered feast and Sabbath into oblivion, and king and priest into disgrace, and into the indignation of his fury.
7 The Lord has disowned his altar, rejected his sanctuary; The walls of her towers he has handed over to the enemy, Who shout in the house of the LORD as on a feast day.	7 ZAIN. The Lord has pushed away his own altar. He has cursed his own sanctuary. He has delivered the walls of its towers into the hand of the enemy. They have made a noise in the house of the Lord, as if on the day of a solemnity.
8 The LORD marked for destruction the wall of daughter Zion: He stretched out the measuring line; his hand brought ruin, yet he did not relent-- He brought grief on wall and rampart till both succumbed.	8 HETH. The Lord has decided to tear down the wall of the daughter of Zion. He has stretched out his measuring line, and he has not turn away his hand from perdition. And the rampart has mourned, and with the wall it has been torn apart.
9 Sunk into the ground are her gates; he has removed and broken her bars. Her king and her princes are among the pagans; priestly instruction is wanting, And her prophets have not received any vision from the LORD.	9 TETH. Her gates have been buried in the ground. He has ruined and crushed its bars. Her king and her princes are with the Gentiles. There is no law, and her prophets have found no vision from the Lord.
10 On the ground in silence sit the old men of daughter Zion; They strew dust on their heads and gird themselves with sackcloth; The maidens of Jerusalem bow their heads to the ground.	10 JOD. The elders of the daughter of Zion have become idle; they sit on the ground. They have sprinkled their heads with ashes. They have been wrapped with haircloth. The virgins of Jerusalem have cast their heads down to the ground.
11 Worn out from weeping are my eyes, within me all is in ferment; My gall is poured out on the ground because of the downfall of the daughter of my people, As child and infant faint away in the open spaces of the town.	11 CAPH. My eyes have exhausted their tears. My internal organs have become disturbed. My liver has been poured out on the earth, over the grief of the daughter of my people, when the little ones and the infants passed away in the streets of the town.
12 They ask their mothers, "Where is the cereal?"--in vain, As they faint away like the wounded in the streets of the city, And breathe their last in their mothers' arms.	12 LAMED. They said to their mothers, “Where is the wheat and the wine?” when they fell like the wounded in the streets of the city, when they breathed out their lives into the bosoms of their mothers.
13 To what can I liken or compare you, O daughter Jerusalem? What example can I show you for your comfort, virgin daughter Zion? For great as the sea is your downfall; who can heal you?	13 MEM. To what shall I compare you, or to what shall I liken you, O daughter of Jerusalem? To what shall I equate you, so as to console you, O virgin daughter of Zion? For your destruction is as great as the sea. Who will cure you?
14 Your prophets had for you false and specious visions; They did not lay bare your guilt, to avert your fate; They beheld for you in vision false and misleading portents.	14 NUN. Your prophets have seen false and foolish things for you. And they have not laid open your iniquity, so as to provoke you to repentance. Yet they have seen for you false revelations and banishments.
15 All who pass by clap their hands at you; They hiss and wag their heads over daughter Jerusalem: "Is this the all-beautiful city, the joy of the whole earth?"	15 SAMECH. All those who passed by the way have clapped their hands over you. They have hissed and shook their heads over the daughter of Jerusalem, saying, “Is this the city of perfect dignity, the joy of all the earth?”
16 All your enemies open their mouths against you; They hiss and gnash their teeth. They say, "We have devoured her. This at last is the day we hoped for; we have lived to see it!"	16 PHE. All your enemies have opened their mouth over you. They have hissed and gnashed their teeth, and they said: “We will devour her. Yes, this is the day we waited for. We have found it, we have seen it.”
17 The LORD has done as he decreed: he has fulfilled the threat He set forth from days of old; he has destroyed and had no pity, Letting the enemy gloat over you and exalting the horn of your foes.	17 AIN. The Lord has done what he decided to do. He has fulfilled his word, which he instructed since the days of antiquity. He has destroyed, and he has not been lenient, and he has caused the enemy to rejoice over you, and he has exalted the horn of your adversaries.
18 Cry out to the Lord; moan, O daughter Zion! Let your tears flow like a torrent day and night; Let there be no respite for you, no repose for your eyes.	18 SADE. Their heart cried out to the Lord from the walls of the daughter of Zion. Let tears run down like a torrent throughout the day and the night. Do not give rest to yourself, and do not allow the pupil of your eye to cease.
19 Rise up, shrill in the night, at the beginning of every watch; Pour out your heart like water in the presence of the Lord; Lift up your hands to him for the lives of your little ones (Who faint from hunger at the corner of every street).	19 COPH. Rise up. Give praise in the night, in the first of the watches. Pour out your heart like water before the sight of the Lord. Lift up your hands to him on behalf of the souls of your little ones, who have passed away from famine at the head of all the crossroads.
20 "Look, O LORD, and consider: whom have you ever treated thus? Must women eat their offspring, their well-formed children? Are priest and prophet to be slain in the sanctuary of the LORD?	20 RES. O Lord, see and consider those whom you have made into a such vintage. So then, shall women eat their own fruit, little ones measured by the palm of the hand? Shall priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
21 "Dead in the dust of the streets lie young and old; My maidens and young men have fallen by the sword; You have slain on the day of your wrath, slaughtered without pity.	21 SIN. The boy and the old man lie down on the ground outside. My virgins and my youths have fallen by the sword. You have slain them in the day of your fury. You have struck down, and you have not shown pity.
22 "You summoned as for a feast day terrors against me from all sides; There was not, on the day of your wrath, either fugitive or survivor; Those whom I bore and reared my enemy has utterly destroyed."	22 THAU. You have called, as if to a day of solemnity, those who would terrify me all around. And there was no one, in the day of the fury of the Lord, who escaped or was left behind. Those whom I educated and nourished, my enemy has consumed.