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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "//www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="//www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0;"/><title>Lamentations 2 Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers</title><link rel="canonical" href="https://biblehub.com/commentaries/expositors/lamentations/2.htm" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/5001com.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 4800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 4800px)" href="/4801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1550px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1550px)" href="/1551.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1250px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1250px)" href="/1251.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 1050px), only screen and (max-device-width: 1050px)" href="/1051.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 900px), only screen and (max-device-width: 900px)" href="/901.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 800px), only screen and (max-device-width: 800px)" href="/801.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-width: 575px), only screen and (max-device-width: 575px)" href="/501.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link media="handheld, only screen and (max-height: 450px), only screen and (max-device-height: 450px)" href="/h451.css" type="text/css" rel="stylesheet" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /><script type="application/javascript" src="https://scripts.webcontentassessor.com/scripts/8a2459b64f9cac8122fc7f2eac4409c8555fac9383016db59c4c26e3d5b8b157"></script><script src='https://qd.admetricspro.com/js/biblehub/biblehub-layout-loader-revcatch.js'></script><script id='HyDgbd_1s' src='https://prebidads.revcatch.com/ads.js' type='text/javascript' async></script><script>(function(w,d,b,s,i){var cts=d.createElement(s);cts.async=true;cts.id='catchscript'; 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because the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.">Lamentations 2:11-22</a>).<p>The image that floats before the poet’s mind is that of a dark thunder-cloud breaking into a tempest, which overthrows the “beauty of Israel,” <span class= "ital">sc. </span>the Temple (<a href="/isaiah/64-11.htm" title="Our holy and our beautiful house, where our fathers praised you, is burned up with fire: and all our pleasant things are laid waste.">Isaiah 64:11</a>), or, as in <a href="/2_samuel/1-19.htm" title="The beauty of Israel is slain on your high places: how are the mighty fallen!">2Samuel 1:19</a>, the heroes who defended it. The footstool is, as in <a href="/1_chronicles/28-2.htm" title="Then David the king stood up on his feet, and said, Hear me, my brothers, and my people: As for me, I had in my heart to build an house of rest for the ark of the covenant of the LORD, and for the footstool of our God, and had made ready for the building:">1Chronicles 28:2</a>; <a href="/psalms/99-5.htm" title="Exalt you the LORD our God, and worship at his footstool; for he is holy.">Psalm 99:5</a>, the ark of the covenant, which was involved in the destruction of the Temple. The <span class= "ital">“</span>Lord” is, as before, <span class= "ital">Adonai, </span>not Jehovah.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-2.htm">Lamentations 2:2</a></div><div class="verse">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 <i>them</i> down to the ground: he hath polluted the kingdom and the princes thereof.</div>(2) <span class= "bld">The habitations of Jacob . . .</span>—The term is used primarily for the dwellings of shepherds, and it accordingly stands here for the open unwalled villages as contrasted with the fortified towns that are here mentioned.<p><span class= "bld">He hath polluted the kingdom.</span>—See <a href="/psalms/89-39.htm" title="You have made void the covenant of your servant: you have profaned his crown by casting it to the ground.">Psalm 89:39</a>. The term involves the thought that it had been a consecrated thing. It had become unclean, first through the sins, and then through the defeat and degradation, of its rulers.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-3.htm">Lamentations 2:3</a></div><div class="verse">He hath cut off in <i>his</i> fierce anger all the horn of Israel: he hath drawn back his right hand from before the enemy, and he burned against Jacob like a flaming fire, <i>which</i> devoureth round about.</div>(3) <span class= "bld">All the horn of Israel . . .</span>—The horn, as elsewhere (<a href="/1_samuel/2-1.htm" title="And Hannah prayed, and said, My heart rejoices in the LORD, my horn is exalted in the LORD: my mouth is enlarged over my enemies; because I rejoice in your salvation.">1Samuel 2:1</a>; <a href="/psalms/92-10.htm" title="But my horn shall you exalt like the horn of an unicorn: I shall be anointed with fresh oil.">Psalm 92:10</a>; <a href="/psalms/112-9.htm" title="He has dispersed, he has given to the poor; his righteousness endures for ever; his horn shall be exalted with honor.">Psalm 112:9</a>), is the symbol of strength, aggressive or defensive, and may therefore stand here for every element of strength, warriors, rulers, fortresses.<p><span class= "bld">He burned against Jacob.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">And He kindled a burning; i.e., </span>was as one who applies the torch.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-4.htm">Lamentations 2:4</a></div><div class="verse">He hath bent his bow like an enemy: he stood with his right hand as an adversary, and slew all <i>that were</i> pleasant to the eye in the tabernacle of the daughter of Zion: he poured out his fury like fire.</div>(4) <span class= "bld">He stood with his right hand . . .</span>—The point of the phrase is that the “right hand,” the natural symbol of divine power, which had been of old stretched forth to protect, was now seen shooting the arrows and wielding the sword of vengeance.<p><span class= "bld">Slew all that were pleasant . . .</span>—Better, “<span class= "ital">Destroyed </span>ail that <span class= "ital">was </span>pleasant,” the destruction including not only warriors and youths, but everything dear and precious.<p><span class= "bld">The tabernacle . . .</span>—Not the Temple, but the city itself as the habitation of the people, who are collectively represented as “the daughter of Zion.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-5.htm">Lamentations 2:5</a></div><div class="verse">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.</div>(5) <span class= "bld">Her palaces: . . . his strong holds . . .</span>—The change of gender is remarkable, probably rising from the fact that the writer thought of the “palaces” in connection with the “daughters of Zion,” and of the “strong holds” in connection with the land or people. A like combination is found in <a href="/hosea/8-14.htm" title="For Israel has forgotten his Maker, and builds temples; and Judah has multiplied fenced cities: but I will send a fire on his cities, and it shall devour the palaces thereof.">Hosea 8:14</a>.<p><span class= "bld">Mourning and lamentation.</span>—The two Hebrew nouns are formed from the same root, and have an assonance like “the sorrow and sighing” of <a href="/isaiah/35-10.htm" title="And the ransomed of the LORD shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy on their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.">Isaiah 35:10</a>.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-6.htm">Lamentations 2:6</a></div><div class="verse">And he hath violently taken away his tabernacle, as <i>if it were of</i> a garden: he hath destroyed his places of the assembly: the LORD hath caused the solemn feasts and sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion, and hath despised in the indignation of his anger the king and the priest.</div>(6) <span class= "bld">He hath violently taken away his tabernacle . . .</span>—The noun represents a “booth” or “shed,” like those erected in the Feast of Tabernacles. Jehovah is represented as laying waste that “tabernacle,” <span class= "ital">i.e., </span>His own temple, as a man might remove a temporary shed from an orchard or garden.<p><span class= "bld">His places of the assembly.</span>—The noun is the same as that rendered “solemn feasts” in the next clause. The destruction involved the non-observance of all such feasts, as well as of the sabbath. “King and priest,” the two representatives of the nation’s life (<a href="/jeremiah/33-21.htm" title="Then may also my covenant be broken with David my servant, that he should not have a son to reign on his throne; and with the Levites the priests, my ministers.">Jeremiah 33:21</a>), were alike, as it seemed, rejected.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-7.htm">Lamentations 2:7</a></div><div class="verse">The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have made a noise in the house of the LORD, as in the day of a solemn feast.</div>(7) <span class= "bld">Hath cast off . . . hath abhorred.</span>—The two verbs are used in a like context in <a href="/psalms/89-38.htm" title="But you have cast off and abhorred, you have been wroth with your anointed.">Psalm 89:38</a>.<p><span class= "bld">His sanctuary.</span>—The word points to the Holy of Holies, and “the walls of her palaces” are therefore those of the Temple rather than of the city.<p><span class= "bld">They have made a noise.</span>—The shouts of the enemies in their triumph, perhaps even the shouts of their worship, had taken the place of the hallelujahs of the “solemn feast.”<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-8.htm">Lamentations 2:8</a></div><div class="verse">The LORD hath purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he hath stretched out a line, he hath not withdrawn his hand from destroying: therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished together.</div>(8) <span class= "bld">He hath stretched out a line.</span>—The phrase implies (See Notes on <a href="/2_kings/21-13.htm" title="And I will stretch over Jerusalem the line of Samaria, and the plummet of the house of Ahab: and I will wipe Jerusalem as a man wipes a dish, wiping it, and turning it upside down.">2Kings 21:13</a>; <a href="/isaiah/34-11.htm" title="But the cormorant and the bittern shall possess it; the owl also and the raven shall dwell in it: and he shall stretch out on it the line of confusion, and the stones of emptiness.">Isaiah 34:11</a>; <a href="/amos/7-7.htm" title="Thus he showed me: and, behold, the LORD stood on a wall made by a plumb line, with a plumb line in his hand.">Amos 7:7</a>) the systematic thoroughness of the work of destruction.<p><span class= "bld">He made the rampart.</span>—Even the very stones of the walls of Zion are thought of as “crying out” and wailing over their own downfall. (Comp. <a href="/habakkuk/2-11.htm" title="For the stone shall cry out of the wall, and the beam out of the timber shall answer it.">Habakkuk 2:11</a>; <a href="/luke/19-40.htm" title="And he answered and said to them, I tell you that, if these should hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry out.">Luke 19:40</a>.)<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-9.htm">Lamentations 2:9</a></div><div class="verse">Her gates are sunk into the ground; he hath destroyed and broken her bars: her king and her princes <i>are</i> among the Gentiles: the law <i>is</i> no <i>more</i>; her prophets also find no vision from the LORD.</div>(9) <span class= "bld">Her gates . . .</span>—The picture of ruin is completed. The gates are broken, and hidden by heaps of rubbish as if they had been buried in the earth; they cannot be closed, for the bars are gone. King and princes are captives to the Chaldæans. The Law was practically repealed, for the conditions of its observance were absent, and prophecy had become a thing of the past. The outward desolation was but the shadow of that of the nation’s spiritual life.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-10.htm">Lamentations 2:10</a></div><div class="verse">The elders of the daughter of Zion sit upon the ground, <i>and</i> keep silence: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth: the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.</div>(10) <span class= "bld">The elders of the daughter of Zion . . .</span>—The despondency of the people is indicated by the outward signs of woe. Instead of taking counsel for the emergency, the elders sit, like Job’s friends (<a href="/context/job/2-11.htm" title="Now when Job's three friends heard of all this evil that was come on him, they came every one from his own place; Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite: for they had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and to comfort him.">Job 2:11-13</a>), as if the evil were inevitable. The maidens, who had once joined with timbrels and dances in festive processions, walk to and fro with downcast eyes.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-11.htm">Lamentations 2:11</a></div><div class="verse">Mine eyes do fail with tears, my bowels are troubled, my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people; because the children and the sucklings swoon in the streets of the city.</div>(11) <span class= "bld">My liver is poured upon the earth . . .</span>—The phrase is not found elsewhere, but admits of an easy explanation. The “liver,” like the “heart” and the “bowels,” is thought of as the centre of all intense emotions, both of joy or sorrow (<a href="/proverbs/7-23.htm" title="Till a dart strike through his liver; as a bird hastens to the snare, and knows not that it is for his life.">Proverbs 7:23</a>). As such it is represented as giving way without restraint (comp. <a href="/lamentations/2-19.htm" title="Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the watches pour out your heart like water before the face of the LORD: lift up your hands toward him for the life of your young children, that faint for hunger in the top of every street.">Lamentations 2:19</a>), under the pressure of the horror caused by the calamities which the next words paint, by the starving children who fainted for hunger in the streets of the city.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-12.htm">Lamentations 2:12</a></div><div class="verse">They say to their mothers, Where <i>is</i> corn and wine? when they swooned as the wounded in the streets of the city, when their soul was poured out into their mothers' bosom.</div>(12) <span class= "bld">They say . . .</span>—The words seem to paint what was actually passing before the writer’s eye, but may be the vivid present which represents the past. The children cried for food, and their mothers had none to give them. They were like wounded men at their last gasp, and breathed out their life as they clung in their despair to their mothers’ breasts.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-13.htm">Lamentations 2:13</a></div><div class="verse">What thing shall I take to witness for thee? what thing shall I liken to thee, O daughter of Jerusalem? what shall I equal to thee, that I may comfort thee, O virgin daughter of Zion? for thy breach <i>is</i> great like the sea: who can heal thee?</div>(13) <span class= "bld">What thing shall I take to witness . . .</span>—Practically the question is the same as that which follows, and implies that there was no parallel to the sufferings of Zion in the history of the past. Had there been, and had it been surmounted, it might have been cited in evidence, and some consolation might have been derived from it. As it was there was no such parallel, no such witness. Her “breach,” <span class= "ital">i.e., </span>her ruin, was illimitable as the ocean, and therefore irremediable.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-14.htm">Lamentations 2:14</a></div><div class="verse">Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee: and they have not discovered thine iniquity, to turn away thy captivity; but have seen for thee false burdens and causes of banishment.</div>(14) <span class= "bld">Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things.</span>—The words are eminently characteristic of Jeremiah, whose whole life had been spent in conflict with the false prophets (<a href="/jeremiah/2-8.htm" title="The priests said not, Where is the LORD? and they that handle the law knew me not: the pastors also transgressed against me, and the prophets prophesied by Baal, and walked after things that do not profit.">Jeremiah 2:8</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/5-13.htm" title="And the prophets shall become wind, and the word is not in them: thus shall it be done to them.">Jeremiah 5:13</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/6-13.htm" title="For from the least of them even to the greatest of them every one is given to covetousness; and from the prophet even to the priest every one deals falsely.">Jeremiah 6:13</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/8-10.htm" title="Therefore will I give their wives to others, and their fields to them that shall inherit them: for every one from the least even to the greatest is given to covetousness, from the prophet even to the priest every one deals falsely.">Jeremiah 8:10</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/14-14.htm" title="Then the LORD said to me, The prophets prophesy lies in my name: I sent them not, neither have I commanded them, neither spoke to them: they prophesy to you a false vision and divination, and a thing of nothing, and the deceit of their heart.">Jeremiah 14:14</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/28-9.htm" title="The prophet which prophesies of peace, when the word of the prophet shall come to pass, then shall the prophet be known, that the LORD has truly sent him.">Jeremiah 28:9</a>, and elsewhere), who spoke smooth things, and prophesied deceit. They did not call men to repent of their iniquity.<p><span class= "bld">False burdens.</span>—The noun is used, as in <a href="/jeremiah/23-33.htm" title="And when this people, or the prophet, or a priest, shall ask you, saying, What is the burden of the LORD? you shall then say to them, What burden? I will even forsake you, said the LORD.">Jeremiah 23:33</a>, with a touch of irony, as being that in which the false prophets delighted. What they uttered, however, as a vision of God, did not tend to restoration, but was itself a “cause of banishment,” and tended to perpetuate and aggravate the miseries of exile.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-15.htm">Lamentations 2:15</a></div><div class="verse">All that pass by clap <i>their</i> hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, <i>saying, Is</i> this the city that <i>men</i> call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?</div>(15) <span class= "bld">All that pass by.</span>—The triumphant exultation of the enemies of Zion came to add bitterness to her sorrows. They reminded her of what she had been in the past, and contrasted it with her present desolation.<p><span class= "bld">The perfection of beauty . . .</span>—Like phrases are used of Zion in <a href="/psalms/48-2.htm" title="Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the great King.">Psalm 48:2</a>; <a href="/psalms/50-2.htm" title="Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God has shined.">Psalm 50:2</a>; of Tyre in <a href="/ezekiel/27-3.htm" title="And say to Tyrus, O you that are situate at the entry of the sea, which are a merchant of the people for many isles, Thus said the Lord GOD; O Tyrus, you have said, I am of perfect beauty.">Ezekiel 27:3</a>. Now that beauty was turned into squalor and desolation.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-16.htm">Lamentations 2:16</a></div><div class="verse">All thine enemies have opened their mouth against thee: they hiss and gnash the teeth: they say, We have swallowed <i>her</i> up: certainly this <i>is</i> the day that we looked for; we have found, we have seen <i>it</i>.</div>(16) <span class= "bld">All thine enemies.</span>—The exultation of the enemies is expressed by every feature in the physiognomy of malignant hate, the wide mouth, the hissing, the gnashing of the teeth. They exult, as in half-broken utterances, in the thought that they have brought about the misery at which they mock. It is what they had long looked for; they had at last seen it.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-17.htm">Lamentations 2:17</a></div><div class="verse">The LORD hath done <i>that</i> 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 <i>thine</i> enemy to rejoice over thee, he hath set up the horn of thine adversaries.</div>(17) <span class= "bld">The Lord hath done . . .</span>—The writer points, in opposition to the boasts of the enemies, to the true author of the misery of the people. In that thought, terrible as it might at first seem, there was an element of hope. It was better to fall into the hands of God than into those of men (<a href="/2_samuel/24-14.htm" title="And David said to Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man.">2Samuel 24:14</a>). The suffering came as a chastisement for past transgressions, and might therefore be mitigated by repentance. The Destroyer was also the Healer, and would answer the prayers of those who called on Him.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-18.htm">Lamentations 2:18</a></div><div class="verse">Their heart cried unto the Lord, O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night: give thyself no rest; let not the apple of thine eye cease.</div>(18) <span class= "bld">Their heart.</span>—The possessive pronoun does not refer to any immediate antecedent, but points, with a wild abruptness, to the mourners of Zion. Yet more boldly their cry is an appeal to the “wall” of Zion (comp. <a href="/lamentations/2-8.htm" title="The LORD has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion: he has stretched out a line, he has not withdrawn his hand from destroying: therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished together.">Lamentations 2:8</a>, and <a href="/isaiah/14-31.htm" title="Howl, O gate; cry, O city; you, whole Palestina, are dissolved: for there shall come from the north a smoke, and none shall be alone in his appointed times.">Isaiah 14:31</a>), to take up its lamentation, as though it were a human mourner.<p><span class= "bld">Like a river.</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">like a torrent.</span><p><span class= "bld">The apple of thine eye.—</span>Literally, “the <span class= "ital">daughter,” </span>as in the English phrase, the “pupil” of the eye.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-19.htm">Lamentations 2:19</a></div><div class="verse">Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the watches pour out thine heart like water before the face of the Lord: lift up thy hands toward him for the life of thy young children, that faint for hunger in the top of every street.</div>(19) <span class= "bld">In the beginning of the watches</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e.,</span> of each watch, so that the lamentation was continued throughout the night.<p><span class= "bld">Lift up thy hands.</span>—The wall is still addressed in its character as a mourner, beholding the children dying of hunger and lifting up her hands as in despairing supplication for them.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-20.htm">Lamentations 2:20</a></div><div class="verse">Behold, O LORD, and consider to whom thou hast done this. Shall the women eat their fruit, <i>and</i> children of a span long? shall the priest and the prophet be slain in the sanctuary of the Lord?</div>(20) <span class= "bld">To whom thou hast done this</span>—<span class= "ital">i.e.,</span> not to a heathen nation, but to the people whom Jehovah Himself had chosen.<p><span class= "bld">Shall the women eat their fruit.</span>—Atrocities of this nature had been predicted in <a href="/leviticus/26-26.htm" title="And when I have broken the staff of your bread, ten women shall bake your bread in one oven, and they shall deliver you your bread again by weight: and you shall eat, and not be satisfied.">Leviticus 26:26</a>; <a href="/deuteronomy/28-57.htm" title="And toward her young one that comes out from between her feet, and toward her children which she shall bear: for she shall eat them for want of all things secretly in the siege and narrow place, with which your enemy shall distress you in your gates.">Deuteronomy 28:57</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/19-9.htm" title="And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they shall eat every one the flesh of his friend in the siege and narrow place, with which their enemies, and they that seek their lives, shall straiten them.">Jeremiah 19:9</a>. They were, indeed, the natural incidents of a besieged city reduced to starvation, as in the case of Samaria (<a href="/2_kings/6-28.htm" title="And the king said to her, What ails you? And she answered, This woman said to me, Give your son, that we may eat him to day, and we will eat my son to morrow.">2Kings 6:28</a>), and the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans (Jos., <span class= "ital">B. J. </span>v. 12), and had been witnessed, as the words show, in that by the Chaldæans. (Comp., as to the famine, <a href="/context/ezekiel/4-16.htm" title="Moreover he said to me, Son of man, behold, I will break the staff of bread in Jerusalem: and they shall eat bread by weight, and with care; and they shall drink water by measure, and with astonishment:">Ezekiel 4:16-17</a>; <a href="/ezekiel/5-16.htm" title="When I shall send on them the evil arrows of famine, which shall be for their destruction, and which I will send to destroy you: and I will increase the famine on you, and will break your staff of bread:">Ezekiel 5:16</a>.)<p><span class= "bld">Shall the priest . . .</span>—Stress is laid on this as being the next element of horror. The very Holy of Holies was profaned with the blood of the priests and prophets of Jehovah.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-21.htm">Lamentations 2:21</a></div><div class="verse">The young and the old lie on the ground in the streets: my virgins and my young men are fallen by the sword; thou hast slain <i>them</i> in the day of thine anger; thou hast killed, <i>and</i> not pitied.</div>(21) <span class= "bld">The young and the old . . .</span>—The thoughts of the mourner turn from the massacre in the sanctuary to the slaughter which did its dread work in every corner of the city.<p> <div class="versenum"><a href="/lamentations/2-22.htm">Lamentations 2:22</a></div><div class="verse">Thou hast called as in a solemn day my terrors round about, so that in the day of the LORD'S anger none escaped nor remained: those that I have swaddled and brought up hath mine enemy consumed.</div>(22) <span class= "bld">Thou hast called . . .</span>—Better, <span class= "ital">Thou hast summoned, as for a solemn feast-day. </span>(Comp. <a href="/lamentations/1-15.htm" title="The LORD has trodden under foot all my mighty men in the middle of me: he has called an assembly against me to crush my young men: the LORD has trodden the virgin, the daughter of Judah, as in a wine press.">Lamentations 1:15</a>.) In “terrors round about” we have a characteristic phrase of Jeremiah’s (<a href="/jeremiah/6-25.htm" title="Go not forth into the field, nor walk by the way; for the sword of the enemy and fear is on every side.">Jeremiah 6:25</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/20-3.htm" title="And it came to pass on the morrow, that Pashur brought forth Jeremiah out of the stocks. Then said Jeremiah to him, The LORD has not called your name Pashur, but Magormissabib.">Jeremiah 20:3</a>; <a href="/jeremiah/20-10.htm" title="For I heard the defaming of many, fear on every side. Report, say they, and we will report it. All my familiars watched for my halting, saying, Peradventure he will be enticed, and we shall prevail against him, and we shall take our revenge on him.">Jeremiah 20:10</a>). The LXX., followed by some commentators, gives the rendering, “<span class= "ital">Thou hast summoned </span>. . . <span class= "ital">my villages,” </span>but on no sufficient grounds.<p><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers<br /><br />Text Courtesy of <a href="//biblesupport.com" target="_top">BibleSupport.com</a>. 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