5 Our pursuers are on our necks: We are weary, and have no rest.
Behold, we are servants this day, and as for the land that you gave to our fathers to eat the fruit of it and the good of it, behold, we are servants in it. It yields much increase to the kings whom you have set over us because of our sins: also they have power over our bodies, and over our cattle, at their pleasure, and we are in great distress.
therefore shall you serve your enemies whom Yahweh shall send against you, in hunger, and in thirst, and in nakedness, and in want of all things: and he shall put a yoke of iron on your neck, until he have destroyed you.
Among these nations shall you find no ease, and there shall be no rest for the sole of your foot: but Yahweh will give you there a trembling heart, and failing of eyes, and pining of soul; and your life shall hang in doubt before you; and you shall fear night and day, and shall have no assurance of your life.
Thus says Yahweh to me: Make you bonds and bars, and put them on your neck;
It shall happen, that the nation and the kingdom which will not serve the same Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, and that will not put their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, that nation will I punish, says Yahweh, with the sword, and with the famine, and with the pestilence, until I have consumed them by his hand.
But the nation that shall bring their neck under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him, that [nation] will I let remain in their own land, says Yahweh; and they shall till it, and dwell therein. I spoke to Zedekiah king of Judah according to all these words, saying, Bring your necks under the yoke of the king of Babylon, and serve him and his people, and live.
For thus says Yahweh of Hosts, the God of Israel: I have put a yoke of iron on the neck of all these nations, that they may serve Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon; and they shall serve him: and I have given him the animals of the field also.
The yoke of my transgressions is bound by his hand; They are knit together, they are come up on my neck; he has made my strength to fail: The Lord has delivered me into their hands, against whom I am not able to stand.
Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart; and you will find rest for your souls.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Lamentations 5
Commentary on Lamentations 5 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 5
This chapter, though it has the same number of verses with the 1st, 2nd, and 4th, is not alphabetical, as they were, but the scope of it is the same with that of all the foregoing elegies. We have in it,
Some ancient versions call this chapter, "The Prayer of Jeremiah.'
Lam 5:1-16
Is any afflicted? let him pray; and let him in prayer pour out his complaint to God, and make known before him his trouble. The people of God do so here; being overwhelmed with grief, they give vent to their sorrows at the footstool of the throne of grace, and so give themselves ease. They complain not of evils feared, but of evils felt: "Remember what has come upon us, v. 1. What was of old threatened against us, and was long in the coming, has now at length come upon us, and we are ready to sink under it. Remember what is past, consider and behold what is present, and let not all the trouble we are in seem little to thee, and not worth taking notice of,' Neh. 9:32. Note, As it is a great comfort to us, so it ought to be a sufficient one, in our troubles, that God sees, and considers, and remembers, all that has come upon us; and in our prayers we need only to recommend our case to his gracious and compassionate consideration. The one word in which all their grievances are summer up is reproach: Consider, and behold our reproach. The troubles they were in compared with their former dignity and plenty, were a greater reproach to them than they would have been to any other people, especially considering their relation to God and dependence upon him, and his former appearances for them; and therefore this they complain of very sensibly, because, as it was a reproach, it reflected upon the name and honour of that God who had owned them for his people. And what wilt thou do unto thy great name?
Lam 5:17-22
Here,