King James Version · Babylon and the exile
Lamentations 3
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I am the man that hath seen affliction by the of his . He hath led me, and brought me into , but not into . Surely against me is he turned; he turneth his hand against me all the day. My and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones. He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail. He hath set me in dark places, as they that be of old. He hath hedged me about, that I cannot get out: he hath made my chain heavy. Also when I cry and shout, he shutteth out my . He hath inclosed my ways with hewn stone, he hath made my crooked. He was unto me as a bear lying in wait, and as a lion in secret places. He hath turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces: he hath made me desolate. He hath bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow. He hath caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my reins. I was a derision to all my people; and their song all the day. He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood. He hath also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he hath covered me with . And thou hast removed far off from peace: I forgat prosperity. And I said, My strength and my is from : Remembering mine affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall. hath them still in remembrance, and is humbled in me. This I recall to my , therefore have I . It is of ’s that we are not consumed, because his compassions fail not. They are new every morning: great is thy . is my , saith ; therefore will I in him. is good unto them that wait for him, to the that seeketh him. It is good that a man should both and quietly wait for the of . It is good for a man that he bear the in his youth. He sitteth alone and keepeth silence, because he hath borne it upon him. He putteth his in ; if so be there may be . He giveth his cheek to him that smiteth him: he is filled full with . For will not cast off for ever: But though he cause grief, yet will he have according to of his . For he doth not afflict willingly nor grieve the children of men. To crush all the prisoners of the earth, 35To turn aside the right of a man before the of , To subvert a man in his cause, approveth not. Who is he that saith, and it cometh to pass, when commandeth it not? Out of the of proceedeth not evil and good? Wherefore doth a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his ? Let us search and try our ways, and turn again to . Let us lift up our with our hands unto in . We have transgressed and have rebelled: thou hast not pardoned. Thou hast covered with , and persecuted us: thou hast slain, thou hast not pitied. Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud, that our should not pass through. Thou hast made us as the offscouring and refuse in the midst of the people. All our have opened their mouths against us. Fear and a snare is come upon us, desolation and . Mine eye runneth down with rivers of water for the of the daughter of my people. Mine eye trickleth down, and ceaseth not, without any intermission, Till look down, and behold from . Mine eye affecteth mine because of all the daughters of my city. Mine chased me sore, like a bird, without cause. They have my life in the dungeon, and cast a stone upon me. Waters flowed over mine head; then I said, I am . I called upon thy name, O , out of the low dungeon. Thou hast heard my voice: hide not thine ear at my breathing, at my cry. Thou drewest near in the day that I called upon thee: thou saidst, Fear not. O , thou hast pleaded the causes of ; thou hast my life. O , thou hast seen my wrong: judge thou my cause. Thou hast seen all their and all their imaginations against me. Thou hast heard their , O , and all their imaginations against me; of those that rose up against me, and their device against me all the day. Behold their sitting down, and their rising up; I am their musick. Render unto them a recompence, O , according to the work of their hands. Give them sorrow of , thy unto them. Persecute and destroy them in from under of .
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Babylon and the exile, 612 BC to 539 BC ›
Babylon replaces Assyria, Jerusalem and its temple are destroyed in 586 BC, and the leadership of Judah lives in Mesopotamia without a king, a temple, or a country.
- Babylon
- Nebuchadnezzar II rebuilds the city on a scale meant to be seen from a distance: the Ishtar Gate in glazed blue brick, the processional way, the ziggurat, and gardens later counted among the wonders of the world. Babylonian tablets record rations issued to the captive king Jehoiachin of Judah by name, which is one of the tidier points of contact between the Bible and the archives.
- Egypt
- Briefly resurgent. Pharaoh Neco marches north, kills King Josiah at Megiddo, and installs and deposes kings in Jerusalem, until Babylon beats him decisively at Carchemish in 605 BC. Jeremiah spends his career saying that betting on Egypt is suicide, and is proved right.
- Judah
- Deported in stages, then destroyed. The temple is burned, the walls broken, and the leadership marched to Mesopotamia. What happens next is one of the strangest survivals in history: a people keeps its identity without land, king, or sanctuary, and comes out of it with its scriptures more central than before.
- Further afield
- An extraordinary century for ideas everywhere at once. Thales and the first Greek philosophers, Solon's reforms at Athens, the Buddha in India, Confucius and Lao Tzu in China, and Zoroaster in Persia all fall within a few generations of the exile.