Lamentations 3 · איכה

I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of his wrath.

He has led me, and brought me into darkness, but not into light.

Surely he is turned against me; he turns his hand against me all the day.

He has made my flesh and my skin to waste away; he has broken my bones.

He has built a mound against me, and has beset me round about at head and hell.

He has set me in dark places, as those who are long ago dead.

He has hedged me about, so that I cannot get out: he has made my chain heavy.

Even when I cry and call for help, he stops up my prayer.

He has enclosed my ways with hewn stone, he has made my paths crooked.

He is to me like a bear lying in wait, and like a lion in secret places.

He has turned aside my ways, and pulled me in pieces: he has made me desolate.

He has bent his bow, and set me as a mark for the arrow.

He has caused the arrows of his quiver to enter into my reins.

I am become a derision to all my people; and their song all the day.

He has filled me with bitterness, he has sated me with wormwood.

He has also broken my teeth with gravel stones, he has pressed me down into the ashes.

My soul is far removed from peace: I have forgotten prosperity.

And I said, My strength and my hope are perished from the Lord.

Remember my affliction and my misery, the wormwood and the gall.

My soul has them still in remembrance, and is bowed down within me.

This I recall to my mind, therefore I have hope:

that the Lord’s steadfast love has not ceased, and that his compassions do not fail.

They are new every morning: great is thy faithfulness.

The Lord is my portion, says my soul; therefore I will hope in him.

The Lord is good to those who wait for him, to the soul that seeks him.

It is good that a man should quietly hope for the salvation of the Lord.

It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth.

Let him sit alone and keep silence, because he has taken it upon him.

Let him put his mouth in the dust; perhaps there may be hope.

Let him offer his cheek to him who strikes him; let him take his fill of insult.

For the Lord will not cast off for ever:

but though he cause grief, yet will he have compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love.

For he does not willingly afflict or grieve the children of men.

To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,

to turn aside the right of a man before the face of the most High,

to subvert a man in his cause, the Lord approves not.

Who is he that says, and it comes to pass, when the Lord commands it not?

Out of the mouth of the most High do not both good and evil come?

Why then does a living man complain, a man for the punishment of his sins?

Let us search and try our ways, and turn back to the Lord.

Let us lift up our heart with our hands to God in the heavens.

We have transgressed and have rebelled: Thou hast not pardoned.

Thou hast covered with anger, and pursued us: Thou hast slain, Thou hast not pitied.

Thou hast covered thyself with a cloud, so that prayer should not pass through.

Thou hast made us offscouring and refuse in the midst of the people.

All our enemies have opened their mouths wide against us.

Fear and the pit are come upon us, desolation and destruction.

My eye runs down with rivers of water for the breach of the daughter of my people.

My eye trickles down, and ceases not, without any intermission,

till the Lord look down, and behold from heaven.

My eye affects my soul because of all the daughters of my city.

They chased me sore, like a bird, those who hate me without cause.

They have cut off my life in the dungeon, and have cast stones upon me.

Waters flowed over my head; then I said, I am cut off.

I called upon Thy name, O Lord, out of the nethermost pit.

Thou hast heard my voice: hide not Thy ear at my sighing, at my cry.

Thou didst draw near in the day that I called upon Thee: Thou didst say,

Fear not. O Lord, Thou hast pleaded the causes of my soul; Thou hast redeemed my life.

O Lord, Thou hast seen my wrong: judge my cause.

Thou hast seen all their vengeance and all their devices against me.

Thou hast heard their insult, O Lord, and all their devices against me;

the lips of those who rose up against me, and their muttering against me all the day.

Behold their sitting down, and their rising up; I am their song.

Render to them a recompense, O Lord, according to the work of their hands.

Give them sorrow of heart; Thy curse be on them!

Pursue them in anger and destroy them from under the heavens of the Lord.