The Anger of Yahweh
א Aleph
How the Lord has acovered the daughter of Zion
With a cloud in His anger!
He has bcast from heaven to earth
The cbeauty of Israel,
And has not remembered the dfootstool of His feet
In the day of His anger.
ב Beth
2 The Lord has aswallowed up; He has not spared
All the habitations of Jacob.
In His wrath He has bpulled down
The strongholds of the daughter of Judah;
He has cbrought them down to the ground;
He has dprofaned the kingdom and its princes.
ג Gimel
3 In hot anger He has cut in pieces
All the astrength of Israel;
He has bturned back His right hand
From before the enemy.
And He has cburned in Jacob like a flaming fire
Devouring round about.
ד Daleth
4 He has bent His abow like an enemy;
He has set His right hand like an adversary
And killed all that were bdesirable to the eye;
In the tent of the daughter of Zion
He has cpoured out His wrath like fire.
ה He
5 The Lord has become like an aenemy.
He has bswallowed up Israel;
He has swallowed up all its cpalaces;
He has brought its strongholds to ruin
And dmultiplied in the daughter of Judah
Mourning and moaning.
ו Vav
6 And He has violently treated His tabernacle like a garden booth;
He has abrought His appointed meeting place to ruin.
Yahweh has bcaused to be forgotten
The appointed time and sabbath in Zion,
And He has cspurned king and priest
In the indignation of His anger.
ז Zayin
7 The Lord has arejected His altar;
He has abandoned His sanctuary;
He bhas delivered into the hand of the enemy
The walls of her palaces.
They have made a cnoise in the house of Yahweh
As in the day of an appointed time.
ח Heth
8 Yahweh determined to bring to ruin
The wall of the daughter of Zion.
He has astretched out a line;
He has not turned His hand back from swallowing up,
And He has bcaused rampart and wall to mourn;
They have languished together.
ט Teth
9 Her agates have sunk into the ground;
He has destroyed and broken her bars.
Her king and her princes are among the nations;
The blaw is no more.
Also, her prophets find
cNo vision from Yahweh.
י Yodh
10 The elders of the daughter of Zion
aSit on the ground; they bare silent.
They have thrown cdust up on their heads;
They have girded themselves with dsackcloth.
The evirgins of Jerusalem
Have bowed their heads down to the ground.
כ Kaph
11 My aeyes fail because of tears;
My binmost being is greatly disturbed;
My cheart is poured out on the earth
dBecause of the destruction of the daughter of my people,
When einfants and nursing babies faint
In the open squares of the city.
ל Lamedh
12 They say to their mothers,
“aWhere is grain and wine?”
As they faint like a wounded man
In the open squares of the city,
As their blife is poured out
On their mothers’ bosom.
מ Mem
13 What shall I testify about you?
To what ashall I equate you,
O daughter of Jerusalem?
To what shall I liken you as I comfort you,
O bvirgin daughter of Zion?
For your destruction is as vast as the sea;
Who can cheal you?
נ Nun
14 Your aprophets have beheld for you
Worthless and ineffective visions;
And they have not buncovered your iniquity
So as to return you from captivity,
But they have cbeheld for you worthless and misleading oracles.
ס Samekh
15 All who pass along the way
aClap their hands in derision at you;
They bhiss and shake their heads
At the daughter of Jerusalem,
“Is this the city of which they said,
‘cThe perfection of beauty,
dThe joy of the whole earth’?”
פ Pe
16 All ayour enemies
Have opened their mouths wide against you;
They hiss and bgnash their teeth.
They say, “We have cswallowed her up!
Surely this is the dday for which we have hoped;
We have found it, we have seen it.”
ע Ayin
17 Yahweh has adone what He purposed;
He has completed His word
Which He commanded from days of old.
He has pulled down bwithout sparing,
And He has caused the enemy to cbe glad over you;
He has dexalted the might of your adversaries.
צ Tsadhe
18 Their aheart cried out to the Lord,
“O bwall of the daughter of Zion,
Let your ctears run down like a river day and night;
Give yourself no relief;
Let your eyes not be still.
ק Qoph
19 Arise, cry aloud in the anight
At the head of the night watches;
bPour out your heart like water
Before the presence of the Lord;
Lift up your hands to Him
For the clife of your infants
Who are dfaint because of hunger
At the head of every street.”
ר Resh
20 See, O Yahweh, and look!
With awhom have You dealt thus?
Should women beat their offspring,
The infants who were born healthy?
Should cpriest and prophet be killed
In the sanctuary of the Lord?
שׁ Shin
21 On the ground in the streets
Lie ayoung and old;
My bvirgins and my young men
Have fallen by the sword.
You have killed them in the day of Your anger;
You have slaughtered, cnot sparing.
ת Tav
22 You called as in the day of an appointed time
My aterrors on every side;
And there was bno one who escaped or survived
In the day of Yahweh’s anger.
Those cwhom I gave birth to and reared,
My enemy consumed them.