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 are slain with the sword are better than they that are 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 boiled their own children; They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on Lamentations 4
Commentary on Lamentations 4 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 4
This chapter is another single alphabet of Lamentations for the destruction of Jerusalem, like those in the first two chapters.
Lam 4:1-12
The elegy in this chapter begins with a lamentation of the very sad and doleful change which the judgments of God had made in Jerusalem. The city that was formerly as gold, as the most fine gold, so rich and splendid, the perfection of beauty and the joy of the whole earth, has become dim, and is changed, has lost its lustre, lost its value, is not what it was; it has become dross. Alas! what an alteration is here!
Lam 4:13-20
We have here,
Lam 4:21-22
David's psalms of lamentation commonly conclude with some word of comfort, which is as life from the dead and light shining out of darkness; so does this lamentation here in this chapter. The people of God are now in great distress, their aspects all doleful, their prospects all frightful, and their ill-natured neighbours the Edomites insult over them and do all they can to exasperate their destroyers against them. Such was their violence against their brother Jacob (Obad. 10), such their spleen at Jerusalem, of which they cried, Rase it, rase it, Ps. 137:7. Now it is here foretold, for the encouragement of God's people,