[Brother V]

Lamentations 1-3

Lamentations 1

Today we begin Lamentations. It is normally ascribed to Jeremiah. People claim that he wrote it from a cave outside the Damascus gate, where he could see the city being destroyed.

Lamentations is a poem. In the original Hebrew each verse starts with the next letter of the alphabet, making this an acrostic poem. There are 22 letters in the alphabet, and 5 more... um... different letters. Some people believe it was written this way so that people would learn the poems and have an easy way to remember the verses. The third chapter has 66 verses and verses 1-3 start with A, 4-6 start with B, 7-9 start with C... (not actually a,b,c... when translated into English) The fifth chapter is not alphabetical, but does have 22 verses. Additionally, chapters 2,3, and 4 have the letter pe before ain, (17 before 16). Ain is the value for the number 70, which people believe refers to the amount of time from the destruction to the completion of the rebuilding of the temple. (see the timeline).

Lamentations means sorrow.

1 How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow! she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how is she become tributary!

In Hebrew, the book Lamentations is called "How" which is the first word. אֵיכָה

The first letter of the word how (read right to left) is Aleph or א.

If you remember, in the book of Jeremiah, people accused him of not caring about Jerusalem. Now, all those people are gone, and Jeremiah is truly sad about the passing of a once great city, nation, people.

3 Judah is gone into captivity because of affliction, and because of great servitude: she dwelleth among the heathen, she findeth no rest: all her persecutors overtook her between the straits.

Judah is gone <---(lamentation smiley)

8 Jerusalem hath grievously sinned; therefore she is removed: all that honoured her despise her, because they have seen her nakedness: yea, she sigheth, and turneth backward.

Even though Jeremiah is sad at it's passing, he still knows that they brought it on themselves. It's a reminder to not grievously sin.

18 The LORD is righteous; for I have rebelled against his commandment: hear, I pray you, all people, and behold my sorrow: my virgins and my young men are gone into captivity.

See, the people rebelled. God is still righteous. Even when he's out doing evil on his people, God's evil is still righteous.

Lamentations 2

1 How hath the LORD covered the daughter of Zion with a cloud in his anger, and cast down from heaven unto the earth the beauty of Israel, and remembered not his footstool in the day of his anger!

God was angry. (note the "how")

2 The LORD hath swallowed up all the habitations of Jacob, and hath not pitied: he hath thrown down in his wrath the strong holds of the daughter of Judah; he hath brought them down to the ground: he hath polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof.

God should really take some anger management classes. Or learn how to take care of problems early before they become huge problems. If God had just killed off one person early on (the initial person who proposed worshiping some other god) he could have spared having the entirety of Judah (and the northern kingdom too) being taken away.

5 The LORD was as an enemy: he hath swallowed up Israel, he hath swallowed up all her palaces: he hath destroyed his strong holds, and hath increased in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.

An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

17 The LORD hath done that which he had devised; he hath fulfilled his word that he had commanded in the days of old: he hath thrown down, and hath not pitied: and he hath caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee, he hath set up the horn of thine adversaries.

You'll note that Jeremiah never gives the Chaldeans (Babylon) any credit for the destruction. They were just a tool of the LORD. God did it all.

Lamentations 3

1 I AM the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

I'm bad, I'm so bad, I should be in detention.

5 He hath builded against me, and compassed me with gall and travail.

Gall is bitterness.

15 He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood.

Wormwood? Drunken with wormwood? Isn't that Absinthe? I wonder if it was the french method or the bohemian method. You could drink Absinthe without fire... but that'd be like going to a Kiss concert that had no fireworks.

31 For the LORD will not cast off for ever:

God doesn't really do anything "for ever" even things that are listed as "everlasting" only last so long.

32 But though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the multitude of his mercies.


God causes grief; did you see that modern christians? God causes it, you modern christians give the devil way too much power.

42 We have transgressed and have rebelled: thou hast not pardoned.

You didn't really do anything to stop it either, but you didn't pardon.

64 Render unto them a recompence, O LORD, according to the work of their hands.

Ok, God did send prophets to tell of impending doom, but that's no where near an active a role as he took in the destruction.

So what have we learned today?

1. Alef is the first letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Beit is the second letter... alefbeit, alphabet. It's amazingly similar to the greek alphabet, with Alpha being the first letter and Beta being the second.

2. There were 22 letters in the Hebrew Alefbeit. Lamentations was written in the alefbeit so that people could more easily memorize it.

3. God is only hands on when he wants to be, other times, he just sort of sits there and has someone say words that he knows will go unheeded.

YIC
V