2 The Lord has given up to destruction all the living-places of Jacob without pity; pulling down in his wrath the strong places of the daughter of Judah, stretching out on the earth the wounded, even her king and her rulers.
Covering yourself with wrath you have gone after us, cutting us off without pity;
The Lord has done that which was his purpose; he has put into force the orders which he gave in the days which are past; pulling down without pity, he has made your hater glad over you, lifting up the horn of those who were against you.
Your chiefs have made my holy place unclean, so I have made Jacob a curse, and Israel a thing of shame.
And the strong tower of your walls has been broken by him, made low, and crushed even to the dust.
And as for me, my eye will not have mercy, and I will have no pity, but I will send the punishment of their ways on their heads.
The young men and the old are stretched on the earth in the streets; my virgins and my young men have been put to the sword: you have sent death on them in the day of your wrath, causing death without pity.
For he has made low those who are lifted up, all the people of the town of pride: he makes it low, crushing it down to the earth; he makes it low in the dust.
Though Edom says, We are crushed down but we will come back, building up the waste places; this is what the Lord of armies has said: They may put up buildings, but I will have them pulled down; and they will be named The land of evil-doing, and The people against whom the Lord keeps his wrath for ever.
Was it not right for you to have mercy on the other servant, even as I had mercy on you?
And the Lord said to the Satan, Have you taken note of my servant Job, for there is no one like him on the earth, a man without sin and upright, fearing God and keeping himself far from evil? and he still keeps his righteousness, though you have been moving me to send destruction on him without cause.
Whose owners put them to death and have no sense of sin; and those who get a price for them say, May the Lord be praised for I have much wealth: and the keepers of the flock have no pity for them. For I will have no more pity for the people of the land, says the Lord; but I will give up everyone into his neighbour's hand and into the hand of his king: and they will make the land waste, and I will not keep them safe from their hands.
I will put an end to your use of secret arts, and you will have no more readers of signs: And I will have your images and your pillars cut off from you; and you will no longer give worship to the work of your hands.
For this reason I will let loose my wrath: my eye will not have mercy, and I will have no pity.
My eye will not have mercy on you, and I will have no pity: but I will send the punishment of your ways on you, and your disgusting works will be among you: and you will be certain that I am the Lord.
For this cause, by my life, says the Lord, because you have made my holy place unclean with all your hated things and all your disgusting ways, you will become disgusting to me; my eye will have no mercy and I will have no pity.
And after that, says the Lord, I will give up Zedekiah, king of Judah, and his servants and his people, even those in the town who have not come to their end from the disease and the sword and from need of food, into the hands of Nebuchadrezzar, king of Babylon, and into the hands of their haters, and into the hands of those desiring their death: he will put them to the sword; he will not let anyone get away, he will have no pity or mercy.
I will have them smashed against one another, fathers and sons together, says the Lord: I will have no pity or mercy, I will have no feeling for them to keep me from giving them to destruction.
Go up against her vines and make waste; let the destruction be complete: take away her branches, for they are not the Lord's.
When its branches are dry they will be broken off; the women will come and put fire to them: for it is a foolish people; for this cause he who made them will have no mercy on them, and he whose work they are will not have pity on them.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Lamentations 2
Commentary on Lamentations 2 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 2
The second alphabetical elegy is set to the same mournful tune with the former, and the substance of it is much the same; it begins with Ecah, as that did, "How sad is our case! Alas for us!'
The hand that wounded must make whole.
Lam 2:1-9
It is a very sad representation which is here made of the state of God's church, of Jacob and Israel, of Zion and Jerusalem; but the emphasis in these verses seems to be laid all along upon the hand of God in the calamities which they were groaning under. The grief is not so much that such and such things are done as that God has done them, that he appears angry with them; it is he that chastens them, and chastens them in wrath and in his hot displeasure; he has become their enemy, and fights against them; and this, this is the wormwood and the gall in the affliction and the misery.
Lam 2:10-22
Justly are these called Lamentations, and they are very pathetic ones, the expressions of grief in perfection, mourning and woe, and nothing else, like the contents of Ezekiel's roll, Eze. 2:10.