The Big Idea
Notes written by Dr. Lessing from Concordia St. Paul
Learning to Love Lamentations
Reed Lessing | MDiv, STM, PhD
Concordia University, St. Paul
The Edwin F. and Esther L. Laatsch Chair of Old Testament Studies
Director of the Center for Biblical Studies
Director of the Pre-Seminary Program
Bloodshed and famine and terror and weeping,
Death all around me because of my sin:
Lord, I deserve it; Thy wrath, I have earned it;
Thy anger burns, because faithless I’ve been.
Great is Thy faithfulness! Great is Thy faithfulness!
On Easter morning, Thy true heart I see.
Though Thou afflict me, Thy purpose is mercy:
Great is Thy faithfulness, Lord, unto me.
Introduction
Michelangelo, the Italian High Renaissance artist, included Jeremiah as one of his seven Old Testament prophets in this 1510 painting on the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. Michelangelo doesn’t give us any historical background or context. It’s just Jeremiah on the ceiling of a church.
Fast-forward 120 years when, in 1630 Rembrandt van Rijn, a Dutch artist, gave us this painting. He called it Jeremiah Lamenting the Destruction of Jerusalem. Talk about historical background and context!
The blurry background of the burning Temple in Jerusalem spans the length of the painting. Isn’t that the way sorrows go? They’re all-consuming. They dominate the entire canvass of our lives. What was it for you? A ministry? A marriage? A friendship? A church? Your finances? Your faith? Your health?
And Rembrandt’s Jeremiah is alone. All alone. Completely alone. Isn’t that how we feel when it all goes up on flames?
Do you see the prophet’s right hand? Neither do I. What’s he hiding? I don’t know. I’ll tell you what I do know. I know that sorrows tempt us to hide.
Tell people what actually happened? Be open? Be honest? Be vulnerable? Are you kidding me? What tempts us to hide? Let me spell it out for you. S-H-A-M-E. Shame.
Rembrandt’s Jeremiah isn’t looking at us straight in the eye. We know. Oh God, we know. We hang our head with our eyes fixed on the ground. Living in the shadows of shame.
What’s with the liturgical vessels that Rembrandt included in the bottom middle of the painting? When Solomon’s temple went up in smoke Rembrandt wants us to think that the prophet was able to salvage something—something that helped him remember the glories of the past.
What did you salvage? A picture? A ring? A song? A text? A piece of clothing?
What book is the prophet leaning on? You probably know. That would be the Torah. The Word of God. The Bible—especially Ex 34:6. It’s the key to everything in Lamentations.
But for now? What are we to make of Jeremiah’s clothing? Are these the clothes of a sixth century BC Judean prophet from Anathoth—Jeremiah’s hometown? Hardly! The fur-lined garment was typical of 17th century European clothing, Rembrandt’s own time.
The painter’s point? Jeremiah fits Rembrandt’s day. Jeremiah fits any day. Jeremiah’s sorrows fit our day.
Poetry in Lamentations
Introduction
A father dies in a car accident; a woman has breast cancer; parishioners force a pastor to leave his church. In the wake of these types of life-altering setbacks, ordinary language is inadequate. When faced with tremendous reversals people look to poetry—with its metaphors, ambiguity, and openness—to express their pent-up feelings.
Why write poetry when everything has turned upside down? When God is absent? When darkness settles over the land? Words—however feeble—must be composed. Silence must not win the day.
Lamentations is this kind of poetry. It is Jeremiah’s response to Yahweh’s judgment and Judah’s unimaginable grief. The book overflows with words forged in the fires of disaster. Why did the prophet employ poetry instead of prose? Poetry’s rhythm and structure—along with its symbolic speech—does not offer simple solutions or quick closure. Poems do not rush towards resolution; instead, they are open-ended, gentle, and affirming. Poetry’s metaphors allow for ambiguity and a change in perception. They open up new ways of seeing.
When faced with disaster most theologians compose books that wrestle with a good God and an evil world. They define terms. Set forth propositions. Doctrine steps into the chaos and guides the way. When trauma seizes people, pastors, for their part, compose and deliver sermons that attempt to make sense of things. Others might author an article or a short booklet—mapping out six or seven action items.
Acrostic Poems
Introduction
God’s promises to Noah, Abraham, and David were in tatters. Israel’s history had taken a U-turn and was now in reverse. The loss was total—kings, priests, prophets. The temple went up in smoke. The people? Exiled. The capital city? Demolished. The future? What future?
What was left? Nouns. Verbs. Adjectives. Participles. Language. The Hebrew language. Jeremiah still had the fundamental glue that binds cultures and societies together. Words. But not any words would work. The prophet decided to employ acrostic poems as these would announce his allegiance to a traditional Israelite form of communication.1 Claus Westermann provides this definition of acrostic poems: “Individual lines of the poems are sequentially introduced by words beginning with letters which follow the order of the letter in the Hebrew alphabet.”2 These poems provided much needed order and structure for Judahite survivors. “Grass withers. A flower fades. But the Word of our God will stand forever.” (Is 40:8)
Lamentations begins (1:1a) and continues (2:1a; 4:1a, 2a) with the scream, “How could it be?” In each case, however, Jeremiah adds language—indeed, he employs the Hebrew alphabet vis-à-vis four acrostic poems in Lamentations 1–4. (Sometimes the term “abecedarius” is employed). Though not obvious in translations, the prophet structures his first four poems using a pattern based upon the Hebrew alphabet’s twenty-two letters—ordering his verses sequentially—from aleph (א) to taw (ת).
Lamentations’ tight acrostic unity from chapter to chapter is unique in the OT. It is “somewhat startling to discover that a book that portrays such radical disorientation should be one of the most ordered books in the Old Testament.”3
Although Lamentations 3 has three times the number of verses than the other chapters in Lamentations— BHS, along with the versions and English translations, assign a verse to each line—creating a sixty-six-verse chapter. The number of cola in Lamentations 3, however, is one short of chapters one and two because of the four-lined stanzas in 1:7 and 2:19.
Lamentations 4 follows the design of chapters one and two—albeit with only two-line stanzas. Chapter five, like chapter four, has two cola per stanza and twenty-two stanzas, but it is not an acrostic.4 It is an “alphabetic poem,” as its twenty-two cola reflect the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. While there have been some attempts to find a hidden acrostic scheme in chapter five (e.g., Philippe Guillaume5), there is little to recommend this approach.
Why Does Lamentations Employ Acrostic Poems?
Lamentations takes us into the vortex of Israel’s darkest moment. It is the most emotionally chaotic book in the Bible. By using acrostic poems, though, Jeremiah also composes the Bible’s most ordered book. How can this be?
The prophet expresses the depths of his people’s misery. He also gives them a way to organize it. Delbert Hillers captures the prophet’s two-fold strategy, suggesting that the book’s allows people “to remember and contemplate their loss—not coolly, not without emotion—but without unbearable and measureless grief.”6 The acrostic poems in Lamentations thus suggest that suffering is a journey. There is a beginning and there is an end. We are to travel through pain—not get stuck in it. “Sorrow and suffering are not infinite.”7 Even when we are in the aleph (א) stanza we know that tau (ת) will come. Fluant lacrimae, sed eadem et disinant. “Let the tears flow but let them also cease.” Evil does not deserve constant preoccupation for the rest of our lives. “Ministry to the sufferer must establish the significance of what is suffered; it must not concede its ultimacy.”8
Jeremiah employs four acrostic poems. Would not one suffice? Shed a tear then get on with it. Weep for a moment then move into the future. Why rehearse the hurt? Because resolution from trauma does not happen quickly. Israel lamented thirty days after Aaron died (Num 20:29) and thirty days when Moses died (Deut 34:8). Is this the best use of time—especially when you are trying to get somewhere as important as the promised land? The four-fold use of acrostics demonstrates that broken hearts are not quickly healed. It is a lengthy process.
Trauma, by its nature, tends to get people stuck in circularity. It is not helpful, however, to talk about it endlessly. A few find that they get attention—indeed, they become more important in their own eyes—by rehearsing the tragedy for the rest of their lives. Lamentations does not let us do that. Jeremiah gives us five chapters, not one-hundred and fifty, like the Psalter. “Grief can know no end, yet if must be held within certain bounds for life to continue.”9
Acrostics, therefore, demonstrate more than aesthetic beauty. They function pastorally, providing stability amid instability, order amid massive disorder. Eugene Peterson writes:
Evil is not inexhaustible. It is not infinite. It is not worthy of a lifetime of attention. Timing is important. If a terminus is proposed too soon, people know that their suffering has not been taken seriously and conclude that it is therefore without significant. But if it goes on too long … [it may become] a crippled adjustment to life which frustrates wholeness.10
When going through grief and loss we need to avoid two extremes. The first is to allow the experience to overwhelm us. We do not go through the valley of the shadow of death; instead, we build a house in the valley and live there for the rest of our lives. The second extreme is to rush towards resolution too quickly. We want to show others that we are in control and everything now is “just fine.” When we do not allow grief and anger to surface it comes out in other ways that are destructive—to us and the people we love. Peterson observes,
One of the commonest ways to deal with another’s suffering is to make light of it, to gloss it over, to attempt shortcuts through it. Because it is so painful, we try to get to the other side quickly. Lamentations provides a structure to guarantee against that happening.11
There are no shortcuts to healing;, from chapter to chapter, Lamentations’ acrostic poems reiterate several of the same motifs. Leslie Allen maintains, “Repetition is necessary, and never vain, for those who grieve.”12 Federico Villanueva’s observation is perfect, “An acrostic is a brilliant way of expressing pain while also imposing some form on it.”13
Lamentations 1
Overview
Lamentations 1 is a skillfully designed acrostic poem where words, images, and ideas come and go, then come again. The chapter contains two parts—each consisting of eleven letters/verses, 1:1–11 and 1:12–22. Generally speaking, the first half (1:1–11) comes in the third person; the second half (1:12–22) in the first. Jeremiah composed each verse with three cola—the seventh verse has four. (A four cola verse recurs in 2:19). The prophet duplicates motifs and themes in the first half and expands them in the second half; for instance, the cry for a comforter comes in 1:2b and 1:9b, then again in 1:16b, 17a and 21a. “This chapter assaults the eyes and ears of our imagination with both a weeping woman and destitute children.”14
It is tempting to read Lamentations 1 and look for a progression of thought and movement. However, the chapter’s poetry does not communicate in a linear way. Instead, Jeremiah employs offers a kaleidoscope of images. The parts make up the whole and the whole only becomes evident through the parts. Delbert Hillers contends that the poet’s goal,
… was not to write a poem moving to an obvious climax of action or thought, but rather to create one of essentially uniform tone, corresponding to the one appalling catastrophe and the unvarying misery that came with it and followed it. A man who has just lost a wife or a child cannot keep his mind off it, and that is how this poet writes, ever returning to the source of grief.15
Lam 1:1–11 sets forth the book’s major themes. They include loneliness, abandonment, the destruction of and desecration of the temple, guilt, and loss—all set within dirges, laments, and protests. More specifically, in 1:1–6 Jeremiah describes the city’s current condition while in 1:7–11 he reflects upon what brought about the horrid situation, with Zion’s first cry in the book coming in 1:9c. She then gives voice to her pain in 1:12–20 (with the exceptions of 1:15c and 1:17)—chronicling Yahweh’s judgments and rehearsing her deep hurt. Zion’s tone in these verses is less caustic and more submissive for “Yahweh he [is] righteous” (1:18a). At the end of the chapter, she addresses the nations (1:18–19) and then Yahweh (1:20–22)—petitioning him to punish her adversaries (1:21–22).
Jeremiah and Zion address the same event—Jerusalem’s destruction, but they do so from different angles. Jeremiah’s is more objective, describing what he sees—the death of a city. Zion, on the other hand, is more subjective, expressing her emotions—what it feels like when death surrounds you. to Combining the voices creates a broader perspective of what happened.
As the narrator, Jeremiah, describes events from a distance, a bird’s eye perspective.16 Conversely, Zion expresses herself vulnerably and personally—from “the ground,” so to speak. Initially, the narrator and Zion express different viewpoints as signaled by their use of different genres—Jeremiah the dirge and Zion the lament. As the chapter unfolds, though, each changes their frame of reference through speaking and listening to one another. There is not one dominant voice in the chapter, but two. Miriam Bier maintains,
Recognizing elements of both penitence and protest in Lam 1, interacting polyphonically within and across both the lamenters’ and Zion’s speech, and in chorus with great pain, is a more fruitful way to read in keeping with the text.17
Just like other OT dirges,18 1:1–11 is replete with thematic reversals which include: 1) once great among the nations, the city is now like a widow (1:1b); 2) the princess has become a slave (1:1c); 3) all her friends have become enemies (1:2c); 4) the once crowded roads are empty (1:4a); 5) all of Zion’s majesty is gone (1:6a); 6) all who honored Zion now despise her (1:8b); 7) unclean nations entered her holy place (1:10b); and 8) Zion traded her precious things (children) for food (1:11b). The city is abandoned, deserted, desolate, forsaken, isolated, and totally undone.
Why are Judah’s survivors personified as a woman throughout Lamentations 1? “The poet wants to show that Jerusalem is in the most horrendous condition conceivable, and for that he chooses the image of an abused woman.”19 The battered woman takes on several roles in the chapter. John Goldingay captures this multivalent understanding of Zion:
The city is like a princess who has been deposed, a wife who has been widowed, a flirt who has been let down, a mother who has lost her children, a daughter who has lost her honor, a girl who has been exposed, a menstruant who has failed to take responsibility for her bleeding.20
Three times in chapter one Zion pleads with God to look (1:9c; 1:11c; 1:20a). He remains silent—thus appearing distant and aloof. Zion asks passersby to see her pain (1:12a), but they do not notice. No one cares. No one comforts. No one stops to listen and love. “Traumatized people feel utterly abandoned, utterly alone, cast out of the human and divine systems of care and protection that sustain life.”21 They are more dead than alive.
1:1 Aleph
a עָ֔ם אֵיכָ֣ה׀ יָשְׁבָ֣ה בָדָ֗ד הָעִיר֙ רַבָּ֣תִי —“How could it be? She sits alone, the city [once] full of people.”
Forms of the interrogative pronoun אֵיכָ֣ה appear in funeral dirges (e.g., David employs אֵ֖יךְ when he laments the deaths’ of Saul and Jonathan [2 Sam 1:19, 25, 27]). Lam 1:1–11 thus exhibits the following features from a funeral dirge: 22 1) the opening cry, “how could it be?” (אֵיכָ֣ה); 2) the contrast between what once was (e.g., a queen sitting in splendor) to what now is (a lonely, comfortless widow); and 3) the qinah meter, though employed sporadically. Missing, though, is any notification that someone has actually died.
Leslie Allen renders אֵיכָ֣ה, with “how terrible that …”23 Delbert Hillers suggests, “How can it be that …?”24 Christopher Wright maintains, “It carries a sense of ‘How come? How can this possibly have happened?’”25 The interjection throbs with shock and despair. “Oh! Alas! Woe! Ah!” However English translations render אֵיכָ֣ה, it is much more than the ESV, NASB, and NRSV, “How.” This is overly bland. The cry אֵיכָ֣ה is more like an elongated Eykaaaah—erupting from a heart racked by ruin. The rabbinic Targum of Lamentations 1:1 likewise understands אֵיכָ֣ה to be a deep sigh, a mournful, visceral cry—equating it with God’s response to the Fall:
The third word in the book is the absolute noun בָדָ֗ד, “alone,” employed adverbially (GKC §118n). The once thriving and bustling city of Jerusalem was now a ghost town. Yahweh abandoned Zion in anger (Is 54:5–7). Zion’s angst of loneliness is accented in Lam 1:4a (“none come to the festival”), Lam 1:5c (“her children have gone away”), and Lam 1:6c (“they fled without power”). Zion sits by herself, much like a person with leprosy: “He will live alone (בָּדָ֣ד יֵשֵׁ֔ב), his dwelling outside the camp.” (Lev 13:46) The afflicted psalmist’s sentiments are similar: he feels, “Like a bird living alone (בּוֹדֵ֥ד) upon a roof.” (Ps 102:8 [EN 102:7])
To be בָּדָד, “alone,” normally connotes isolation and exclusion (e.g., Is 27:10; Jer 15:17; Mic 7:14). Abandonment is a typical grievance in OT laments (e.g., Pss 38:12 [EN 38:11]; 88:9, 19 [EN 88:8, 18]).
The city/woman laments that all אֹהֲבֶ֑יהָ, “her lovers”—or covenant allies—failed to extend comfort. While there is often a theological component to Israel’s compacts with foreign nations (e.g., 2 Ki 16:10–18), allies were expected to assist one another when another country attacked. Berlin writes, “A nation was obligated to mourn the loss of an ally, and to provide comfort to his survivors.”26 Because Jeremiah personifies Jerusalem, these “lovers” connote political relationships. Note, for instance, 1 Ki 5:15 (EN 5:1) כִּ֣י אֹהֵ֗ב הָיָ֥ה חִירָ֛ם לְדָוִ֖ד, “for Hiram became David’s lover/ally.”
In Lam 1:19a לַֽמְאַהֲבַי֙, “to my lovers,” also has this meaning, though the accent in this verse includes Judah’s infidelity to Yahweh. Deut 6:5 states, “And you shall love (וְאָ֣הַבְתָּ֔) Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Zion’s misplaced love lies at the heart of her downfall.
Antanaclasis is prominent in Lamentations—that is, a word that takes different shades of meaning. In this case, the verb אָהֵב comes in the Piel in Lam 1:19a where it connotes romantic lovers; a meaning that appears in Ezek 23:5, “Oholah became a prostitute while she was mine, and she lusted after her lovers (מְאַהֲבֶ֔יהָ) the warriors of Assyria.” The same Piel form and meaning of אָהֵב recurs in Ezek 23:9. Christopher Wright observes, “The lovers, in the language of the prophets, were the gods and governments of surrounding nations.”27 Note, also, this use of אָהֵב in Hosea: “She said, “I will go after my lovers” (מְאַהֲבַי֙, Hos 2:7 [EN 2:5]). “Lovers” here likewise refers to political alliances which Hosea condemns (e.g., Hos 7:11).
With the expression מִכָּל־אֹהֲבֶ֑יהָ, “from among all her lovers,” we meet the first of sixteen uses of כֹּל, “all,” in Lamentations 1; they come in thirteen separate verses.28 “Its negative repetition tolls the totality of Zion’s tragedy.”29 Paul House observes:
Lam 1:3 is replete with echoes from the book of Exodus. The first two links come in Lam 1:3a; עֳנִי, “affliction” and עֲבֹדָ֔ה, “servitude”—a Leitwort in Exodus where the root appears ninety-seven times. For עֳנִי see, e.g., Ex 3:7, 17; for עֲבֹדָה see, e.g., Ex 1:14; 2:23; 5:11; 6:6. Further, עֳנִי and עֲבֹדָה appear together in, e.g., Gen 15:13, Ex 1:11, 14; 2:23; 4:13; 6:6; Deut 26:6—all verses referring to Israel’s Egyptian enslavement.
The second connection with the exodus is in Lam 1:3b (כָּל־רֹדְפֶ֥יהָ הִשִּׂיג֖וּהָ, “all pursuing her have overtaken her”); see Ex 14:9; 15:9. The third comes in Lam 1:3c הַמְּצָרִֽים, “narrow straights,” a pun with the proper noun מִצְרַיִם, “Egypt”—mĕṣārîm and miṣrayim, respectively.30 The upshot? “The vassalage of Judah to Babylonia is likened to the enslavement in Egypt.”31 Further echoes of Israel’s Egyptian slavery appear in Lam 1:1c, 3c, 4c, 9b, c, 12a, b, c, 15b, 18b, 22a, b. There is, however, one monumental difference. Moses and his generation were saved. Lamentations does not end with that assurance (Lam 5:22). All is not lost, however. The Gospel comes in Isaiah 40–55 where the prophet announces that God will deliver Babylonian exiles just as he delivered Moses’ generation from Egypt.32
1:9 רְאֵ֤ה יְהוָה֙ אֶת־עָנְיִ֔י כִּ֥י הִגְדִּ֖יל אוֹיֵֽב׃ —“Look Yahweh at my affliction for [the] enemy has acted boastfully.” Literarily, Zion’s speech is prosopopoeia—when an abstract object speaks. “Comprehensive loss, excessive personal violation, public humiliation, and failure to understand why prompt Woman Zion’s oration.”33
Zion interrupts Jeremiah, going over his head and addressing Yahweh, “the father of orphans and defender of widows” (Ps 68:6 [EN 68:5]). Though it is a heart wrenching plea, the words are full of hope. The lady is not dead! “The very fact that Zion cries out her anger attests to a future for the two.”34
The imperative רְאֵ֤ה, “see,” does not imply Yahweh is blind; instead, it demands he act graciously toward his people.35 2 Ki 9:26 gets at the idea where Yahweh sees innocent people murdered and indicates that he is going to respond. Esther 8:6 is similar.
Zion’s command transforms the dirge in Lam 1:1–9b into a lament—albeit a short one with just two words, רְאֵ֤ה יְהוָה֙, “Look, Yahweh.”
1:20 Resh a רְאֵ֨ה יְהוָ֤ה כִּֽי־צַר־לִי֙ מֵעַ֣י חֳמַרְמָ֔רוּ —“Look Yahweh indeed [at] my distress; my insides churn.” Because Zion has lost her children, youths, priests, and elders, she turns to Yahweh, her afflicter (1:5b, 12c), hoping for comfort. Zion thus repeats her earlier petitions for Yahweh to look upon her (cf. 1:9c, 11c).
Not only is Zion spent physically; she is also emotionally wrung out. This is what trauma does; it often locates itself in our stomach or מֵעֶה, “belly, womb, gut(s), entrails, bowel(s), inner organs” (DCH).
The Pealal perfect verb חֳמַרְמָ֔רוּ derives from חמר I, “foam” (DCH) and appears in Ps 75:9 (EN 75:8), וְיַ֤יִן חָמַ֨ר, “foaming wine” as well as in Ps 46:4, (EN 46:3), יֶחְמְר֣וּ מֵימָ֑יו , “its waters foam.” It both cases, the verb describes deep restlessness. The Pealal stem repeats the verb’s last two letters and denotes “movement repeated in quick succession” (GKC §55e). In the OT, the expression מֵעַ֣י חֳמַרְמָ֔רוּ only comes again in Lam 2:11a when it describes Jeremiah’s response to Zion’s utter anguish.
b נֶהְפַּ֤ךְ לִבִּי֙ בְּקִרְבִּ֔י כִּ֥י מָר֖וֹ מָרִ֑יתִי—“My heart is turned over inside me, for I have certainly rebelled.” Zion’s feelings are off the charts. “The turning over of the heart, like the churning of the bowels, conveys emotional upset as a physiological process.”36 The verb הָפַךְ classically describes the overturning of Sodom and Gomorrah in e.g., Gen 19:21, 25, 39; Deut 29:22; Is 1:7, 9; Amos 4:11. Lam 4:6a associates Jerusalem with Sodom.
The Church and Emotions
Plato (c. 424 BC–348 BC) was possibly the first person to contrast emotion with rational thought.37 Emotions were, to a large extent, compulsive and uncontrollable forces. “In Plato, emotional appeals and persuasion were to be rejected in favor of ‘truth’ and ‘instruction.’”38 Feelings need to be ruled; they must never become rulers. Stoics followed Plato and continued his line of thought. Emotions have a negative impact upon reason.
And what about Stoics? They sought to eliminate all feelings. “To live by virtue and reason is by necessity to live without emotion.”39 Their goal was apatheia—an emotionless life. Greek stoics counseled people to suppress their emotions—indeed, extirpate them entirely. Influenced to Stoic thought, Philo (c. 20 BC–c. 50 AD) uses the term πάθος over four-hundred times in his writings. He always views it as a negative force that we must control.40
Early Christian theology leaned heavily upon Plato and the Stoics and therefore argued that emotions are not helpful for life in Christ and so must be mastered.41 The ideal was apatheia; literally “no passion.” Christians through the centuries have followed suite. Emotions are “unruly instincts erupting with blind and selfish force” and “wild animals that must be domesticated and controlled.”42 Note, for example, that St. Gregory (540–604 AD) in his Pastoral Rules understands the great weeping in Lam 3:48 as being prompted by repentance when it is, in fact, weeping over Zion’s suffering.43 Indeed, there is a propensity among the Church Fathers to interpret tears in Lamentations as repentant tears. For instance, Ambrose (c. 339–397 AD) held that Lam 1:2a, 16a; 2:11a only illustrate repentance.44 To be sure, there is a time for repentant tears in Lamentations (e.g., Lam 3:40–42) however the early church displays discomfort with other types of laments.
Leaders understood sin as giving in to passions and salvation as right thinking, right doctrine, and right living. Revealing is the fact that in the Middle Ages theologians considered anger to be one of the Seven Deadly Sins. Reason reigned supreme. And feelings? They are unimportant due to their subjectivity. They are too difficult to analyze, quantify, or explain. Christians, therefore, must ignore and distain their emotions.
Since the Enlightenment, the church’s life and mission has continued this way of thinking. The pristine logos abolishes any need to take the Neanderthal pathos seriously. Both the Industrial and Information Revolutions have furthered this trend; facts count for everything, feelings count for little or nothing.
Traditionally, then, a non-cognitive approach has driven biblical studies, thus leading to a downplaying—or in some cases—staunch denunciations of emotions, both in God and in the believer’s life. Gal 5:24 are the marching orders for our emotional life. “But those who are in Christ Jesus crucify the flesh with its passions and its desires” (τοῖς παθήμασιν καὶ ταῖς ἐπιθυμίαις).
Does Paul really want us to kill our feelings? Ignore them? Stuff them? How could he write about our lamenting and groaning in Rom 8:22, 23, 26 and teach that we are to crucify our feelings?
Yet Eli lives on. Remember Eli? Eli thought Hannah’s emotions were out of place—especially near the tabernacle. My! He thought she was drunk (1 Sam 1:14). Eli was clueless when it came to caring for Hannah and her feelings. How often have we been like Eli? Conversely, there are people in Scripture who demonstrate a vibrant and healthy emotional life—Moses, Miriam, David, Jeremiah, Mary, Paul, Peter, John, Jesus. Solomon talks about the importance of our inner self: “Above everything else, guard your heart for it is the wellspring of life.” (Prov 4:23) Why?
Repressed emotions become toxic and pollute our hearts.45 Bottled up pain not only trivializes our own brokenness. It also downplays the brokenness in others. “We callously disregard their suffering because it frightens us too much or because we do not perceive our connections to them.”46 When confronted with uncomfortable feelings in others the temptation is to turn up the TV, change the subject, or offer trite slogans and theological jargon. Our goal? At all costs, do not let things get overly emotional. This is the air we breathe. Megan Boler states the problem well:
Shunned, silenced, and excluded, refused entry into the hallowed halls, emotions have been on the margins of academe for hundreds of years, while the cherished son—reason—has had pride of place and free rein in the master’s house.47
Does the church sometimes value emotions too much? Do we let them control us? Do we let feelings dictate faith? Do we sometimes trust emotions more than God’s Word? Yes. Yes. Yes. And yes. Does this mean emotions are evil, wicked, and should be suppressed at all costs? Not at all.48
Are the choices either a focus on our emotional life or our rational life? Is it either our heart or our head? The decision is not an either/or. It is a both/and—with Holy Scripture directing how to express both.
Divine Emotions in the Old Testament
Theology (what we say about God) impacts anthropology (what we say about people). If God has no emotions, then the goal for people is to become stoic-like, passionless, and devoid of feelings. Is this the biblical God? Not even close. Jesus weeps over Lazarus (Jn 11:35) and Jerusalem (Lk 19:41); and feels great dread in Gethsemane (e.g., Lk 22:44). And Yahweh? He feels heart-piercing sorrow (Gen 6:6), deep pain (Ex 3:7), and the affliction of his people (Is 63:9). And he laments, “My people have forgotten me, days without number” (Jer 2:32) Matthew Elliot maintains: “God’s emotions are always correct, righteous and moral because he is always correct, righteous and moral.”49
Yahweh does not view the pain permeating Lamentations with detached objectivity. He is not aloof. There is more to Yahweh than rational reflection, critical analysis, and blazing judgment. He has great passion and emotion. The Triune God is holy, sovereign, and utterly removed from us. Yet, at the same time, he is imminent, personal, and relational. Jürgen Moltmann writes: “A God who cannot suffer is poorer than any human. For a God who is incapable of suffering is a being who cannot be involved.”50
This has not always been the church’s teaching. Dennis Ngien observes, “Virtually all the early church fathers took it for granted [that God could not suffer], denying God any emotions because they might interrupt his tranquility.”51 Influenced by Stoicism, the church taught that divine perfection denotes perfect reason devoid of feelings.
Beginning with Abraham Heschel (1907–1972), both Jews and Christians began to argue against seeing God as an Aristotelian unmoved-mover. Heschel differentiated between passion and divine pathos.52 Passion is losing control, being overcome and overwhelmed by feelings. Conversely, pathos entails God’s willingness to relate to his creation wholistically—with both thoughts and emotions. Thus, Yahweh is not an emotionless chess player who moves pieces on a board. Neither is he a detached scientist watching an experiment blow up. Yahweh is a jilted Lover, a frustrated Father, a covenant partner whose heart breaks over his wayward people.
Note, for example, Judg 10:11–13—a record of God’s frustration with Israel where he says, “I will deliver them no more.” (Judg 10:13) Yet Judg 10:16 states, “He became impatient over the misery of his people.” Yahweh’s heart is disposed towards love. The verb עָצַב I, “grieve” (DCH) describes God’s feelings when he surveyed the world just before unleashing the flood (Gen 6:6) as well as when Israel rebelled against him in the wilderness (Ps 78:41; Is 63:10). Terrance Fretheim maintains:
God’s grief does not entail being emotionally overwhelmed or embittered by the barrage of rejection. Through it all, God’s faithfulness and gracious purposes remain constant and undiminished.53
Yahweh’s suffering with his people is one of the hallmark truths in the burning bush theophany. The end of Exodus 2 ends with the cryptic phrase, “and God knew” (וַיֵּ֖דַע אֱלֹהִֽים, Ex 2:23). God knew what? Ex 3:7 provides the answer, straight from Yahweh’s heart, “Indeed, I know his [Israel’s] pain” (כִּ֥י יָדַ֖עְתִּי אֶת־מַכְאֹבָֽיו). In this context, the verb “know” (יָדַע) denotes more than “know about.” Instead, it means “experience.” Fretheim comments:
God is thus portrayed not as a king dealing with an issue at some distance, nor even as one who sends a subordinate to cope with the problem, nor as one who issues an edict designed to alleviate the suffering. God sees the suffering from the inside.54
Indeed, he does. Yahweh’s Messenger—the pre-incarnate Christ—is in the burning bush, a symbol for Israel’s suffering in Egypt, thus demonstrating solidarity with his people in their pain.
A similar idea occurs in Judg 2:18. “For Yahweh was moved to compassion (יִנָּחֵ֤ם) because of their groaning.” The context in Judges 2, though, is different from that of Exodus 3. God’s connection with lingering grief in the burning bush is not related to Israel’s sin, while during the days of the judges Israel’s groaning is directly tied to the nation’s rebellion.
Another example of divine vulnerability and openness to hurt comes in Hos 11:8a where Yahweh states, “My heart changes (נֶהְפַּ֤ךְ) within me; my compassions grow warm (נִכְמְר֥וּ נִחוּמָֽי).” The second line of this verse intensifies the first. Yahweh’s tender compassions are aroused. His heart grows tender as he moves from Law to Gospel, with his emotions boiling to the point where they redirect his course of action. Francis Andersen and David Noel Freedman comment on Hos 11:8: “A tumult of emotions is occurring, not just a clash of ideas.”55
Compare God’s heart with that of Joseph’s, “His compassion grew warm (נִכְמְר֤וּ רַחֲמָיו֙) for his brother and he sought a place to weep” (Gen 43:30). Also note the woman of the living son, early in Solomon’s reign, “Her compassion grew warm (נִכְמְר֣וּ רַחֲמֶיהָ֮) for her son.” (1 Ki 3:26)
“Anthropomorphism” is the watchword for those who downplay texts attributing human emotions to Yahweh. For instance, H.H. Rowley describes them as similes and metaphors, “mere accommodations to human speech, or vivid pictures used for their psychological effect rather than theological significance.”56 Claus Westermann echoes these sentiments:
The meaning of such talk about a God who laments and mourns lies not in its saying
something about God in himself but about his relationship to his people. It enables those who are afflicted to hold on to an incomprehensible God.57
There is a better explanation. Instead of embracing the idea that emotional descriptions of God are anthropomorphic—human ideas projected on God—the reverse is true. We have emotions because God made us in his image and likeness (Gen 1:26–27). Accordingly, it is better to believe that Yahweh truly has feelings. There is no need to force philosophical constructs upon texts by invoking terms like “metaphor” or “anthropomorphism.” Israel’s rich emotional life derived from Yahweh, who has a vast array of emotions. Scott Ellington insightfully relates this to the book of Lamentations: “Israel’s prayer of lament must die stillborn before the platonic god, for such a god has no heart to be broken, no passions to be stirred, and no love to demand of it change.”58
Lamentations 2
Overview
While two voices again appear in an acrostic poem—Jeremiah and Daughter Zion—there are differences between chapters one and two. Unlike Lamentations 1, where the speakers talk back and forth—with the prophet accounting for slightly more than half of the chapter—most of Lamentations 2 records Jeremiah’s words (2:1–19) and we only hear Zion at the end (2:20–22). Additionally, while Lamentations 1 refers to Zion’s sin four times, chapter two only mentions sin once—in 2:14b (compare 1:8a, 14a, 18a, 22b). And chapter two’s major motif is the Day of the LORD.
Through it all Zion does not lose faith. She is much like the defiant Job who still clings to God.
Chapter two is also unique in that it magnifies Babylon’s destruction while laying the responsibility squarely at Yahweh’s feet. The accusation? He is an uncompassionate Combatant who went to war against—of all people—his people. Thus, in Lamentations 2, the speakers’ emphasis shifts from confession and shame to dissent and protest—because of God’s anger unleashed against Zion, a motif that begins (2:1a) and ends the chapter (2:22b). Lamentations 2, then, is the most passionate and daring challenge in the book, accusing God of not only allowing, of not only orchestrating, but of planning and participating in Jerusalem’s demise. Thus, in contrast with chapter one, chapter two is much more antagonistic towards Yahweh. He is likened to an enemy (2:3b, 4a, 5a) who works in consort with Babylon (2:7b)—Judah’s archenemy.
Sinaitic covenant curses in Deut 28:49–68 provide the theological backdrop to the monstrosities of warfare described in Lamentations 2. Moreover, Lelsie Allen observes, “This severe material is meant to be read against the backdrop of pre-exilic prophetic literature, as an endorsement of its claims.”59 The prophets’ announcements of impending doom found their target. Their oracles of judgment came true. This implies, however, that messages of grace will also come true (e.g., Deut 30:1–10). A glimmer of hope appears in Lam 3:23 with the announcement of new morning mercies.
While there are places in Lamentations 1 where Jeremiah suggests implicitly that God’s punishments did not fit Judah’s crimes, both the prophet (e.g., 1:5b) and Zion (e.g., 1:20b) agree that Yahweh acted justly. This is not the case in chapter two where we learn about Zion’s demise (2:1–10), Jeremiah’s intense emotions (2:11–13), and Zion’s scathing recriminations toward Yahweh (2:20). Chapter one confesses that God is in the right (1:18a). Chapter two demonstrates that it does not always feel or look that way.
At the beginning of the book, Jeremiah stands distant from Daughter Zion—blaming her for Jerusalem going up in smoke. Now, in chapter two, the prophet shows his tender side, increasingly aligning himself with Zion. Nancy Lee observes, “While the two poets in Lam 1 carried on an indirect dialogue, in Lam 2 two poets engage one another directly.”60 Note, for instance, 2:13, 18, 19. Lee continues: “Not only is he performing the role of comforting a mourner in the dirge context; as a prophet he is also filling the gap where one expects a divine oracle of salvation offering comfort that has yet to materialize.”61
Lamentations 2 begins like a funeral dirge (אֵיכָה֩, 2:1a).62 It also exhibits features from Israel’s laments, such as accusation against Yahweh and complaints about enemies.63 Lam 2:1–8 preserves the dirge-like feature of contrasting the before and after status of the deceased. At the same time, these verses are like a lament as they accuse Yahweh for it all. Todd Linafelt comments on the mixing of these genres: “Language of elegy is progressively transformed into the language of lament, coming to a culmination in the second half of the chapter.”64 Claus Westermann aptly summarizes the chapter:
Lamentations 2 has two parts: 2:1–10 and 2:11–22. Jeremiah’s emotional engagement with Zion in 2:11 begins the second half. Thus, Adele Berlin maintains, “The poem moves from objective observer to subjective sufferer.”65 The feminine noun אֶ֔רֶץ, “ground,” comes in 2:1b, 2c, 9a, 10a, and 21a—binding the chapter together. The motif of “the Day of the LORD”—coming in 2:1c and 2:22b likewise unites Lamentations 2. The rest of the poem describes the day in 2:1a, c, 2b, 3a, 4c, 6c.66
The book of Jeremiah casts a long shadow over Lamentations 2. The prophet shows great sorrow over Jerusalem’s devastation (Lam 2:1–10; cf. Jeremiah 39, 52); sheds tears (Lam 2:11–13; cf. Jer 8:18–9:3); indicts false prophets (Lam 2:14; Jer 23:9–40); and like a priest (Jer 1:1) invites people to pray (Lam 2:17–19).
2:11 Kaph This is the first time Jeremiah speaks about himself in the book; he will continue in this vein through Lam 2:13. The prophet also weeps in Jer 8:23; 13:17; 14:17.
The term מֵעַ֔י, “my internal organs”—a plural noun with a first-person singular suffix—here denotes extra-ordinary emotions. In some contexts, מֵעֶה means a woman’s womb (e.g., Gen 25:23; Ruth 1:11; Is 49:1); hence the phrase חֳמַרְמְר֣וּ מֵעַ֔י may evoke the idea of a woman in the pains of childbirth. Compare Zion’s description of herself in Lam 1:20a, “my stomach churns” (מֵעַ֣י חֳמַרְמָ֔רוּ). Zion’s wailing has become Jeremiah’s wailing (cf. Jer 4:19). For the Pilel perfect form of חמר see the textual note on Lam 1:20a.
b נִשְׁפַּ֤ךְ לָאָ֙רֶץ֙ כְּבֵדִ֔י עַל־שֶׁ֖בֶר בַּת־עַמִּ֑י כְּבֵדִ֔י—“My liver-bile was poured out on the ground over the breaking of the daughter of my people.” The term כְּבֵדִ֔י literally denotes “my liver,” yet by metonymy, here it means “bile”—a digestive fluid produced by the liver. This is how the NAB and ESV render the word.67 A bile reflux occurs when fluid backs up in the stomach and into the esophagus; hence, as outrage and shock overtake him, Jeremiah becomes so sick to his stomach that he vomits. The suffering of Zion’s children (Lam 2:11c) triggers the prophet’s strong emotional response.
Note these connections. The prophet’s bile “is poured out” (Lam נִשְׁפַּ֤ךְ, 2:11b) because the children’s lives “are poured out” (בְּהִשְׁתַּפֵּ֣ךְ, Lam 2:12c).68 The verb שָׁפַךְ, “pour out,” also tethers the prophet to Zion (cf. Lam 2:4c; 4:1b, 11a, 13b). Compare Job 16:13, “He [God] pours out to the ground my gall [a bitter secretion of the liver] (יִשְׁפֹּ֥ךְ לָ֝אָ֗רֶץ מְרֵרָֽתִי).
2:11 God invites us to listen to those whose hearts are broken, to empathize with their pain, “to weep with those who weep” (Rom 12:15; cf. 1 Cor 12:26).69 This is Jeremiah in Lam 2:11. It is time to cry (cf. Eccl 3:4); to demonstrate to Zion that he knows about lacrimae rerum, “the tears of things.”
In the first ten verses of Lamentations 2, Jeremiah mostly functions as a third party, describing the disastrous impact of the Day of the LORD upon Zion. With 2:11, however, the chapter shifts gears. The prophet changes from a neutral observer and begins seeing things Zion’s way. Her weeping shook the prophet “from his marbled numbness.”70 Jeremiah turns from relating only with his mind and starts addressing Zion with his heart. “His [Jeremiah’s] conversion results from being able to let her unspeakable reality into his being. When he does that, everything changes.”71 The outcome? A meshing of hearts; a communion of spirits; a mingling of tears and deep sighs between Jeremiah and Zion—Judah’s beleaguered survivors. “The scream of Zion has, almost literally, become the scream of the poet.”72 The prophet’s eyes cloud with tears; his voice chokes with sorrow.
Jeremiah “walks a mile in her shoes” and begins to identify with Zion’s deep hurt. No longer willing to keep his emotions in check, the prophet changes from an onlooker and objective observer to a participant.73 He made a choice; not to move away from Zion’s emotions but instead to enter into them. He sees. Jeremiah identifies with Zion’s pain from the very bowels of his being. He vomits because of the intensity of his emotions. Zion had been alone (1:1a). She is alone no longer.
Tears bring us back to life. Tears awaken us out of our numbed stupor. Tears are God’s gifts. Calm and cool heads have a place; but calm and cool head do not work in every place. There are times and places when tears help us recover our humanity and open our hearts to God and others. They cleanse our spirits and release tension, fear, and anxiety. God preserves our tears and records them in a book (Ps 56:9 [EN 56:8]). Lamentations is such a book—for Daughter Zion and for us.
What finally prompted the prophet to engage Zion emotionally? It was not the ruined city or torched center of worship. It was the sight of children—children dying in the streets—that brought Jeremiah to weep like Zion (Lam 1:2a, 16a, 20a-b) and have a churning stomach like hers (Lam 1:20a). He saw the suffering children and began sobbing uncontrollably. Jeremiah does not “heal the wound of my people lightly” (cf. Jer 6:14; 8:11). “The recitation of facts without the accompanying emotions is a sterile exercise, without therapeutic effect.”74
To say that Jeremiah is now all in would be an understatement. Although he can do little to change Zion’s circumstances he can allow her story to impact his. “His altered attitude could hardly be more remarkable in view of his cool, unengaged stance in chapter 1. Now Zion’s pain affects him so deeply that it becomes his as well.” 75 A helpful friend enters into the world of the hurting. Eugene Peterson writes:
Everyone who has been ill, or in grief, or hurt, has experienced another’s attempts to help—and knows how frequently the attempts are bungled. In a hospital bed, depressed, and in pain, we are not helped by the bright, plastic cheerfulness of a pastor or friend who tells us to cheer up for “everything is going to be ok.”76
If we do not find a competent comforter we end up in one of two ditches. First, we may fake it, just to remain in the church—presenting a false front to God and others. Second, we may give up the faith, concluding that no one in the congregation can help us. This is why Martin Luther affirms that comforters are some of God’s greatest gifts; mutuum colloquium et consolationem fratrum. In his fourth article on the Gospel in the Smalcald Articles (1537) the Reformer writes:
We will now return to the Gospel, which not merely in one way gives us counsel and aid against sin; for God is superabundantly rich [überschwenglich] in His grace. First, through the spoken Word by which the forgiveness of sins is preached in the whole world; which is the peculiar office of the Gospel. Secondly, through Baptism. Thirdly, through the holy Sacrament of the Altar. Fourthly, through the power of the keys, and also through the mutual conversation and consolation of brethren, Matt. 18, 20: Where two or three are gathered together, etc.
Summary
The shame and despair of Zion in chapter one morph into anger and accusations in chapter two—a poem that moves from grieving the loss of architecture (2:1–9a) to grieving the loss of people (2:9b–22). At the heart of Lamentations 2, though, is divine justice and not—as some argue—divine abuse.77 “The Day of the LORD” frames the chapter (2:1c, 22b) and is its guiding theological and literary idea. Delbert Hillers observes:
The main point of this chapter [Lamentations 2] is that it was Yahweh himself who destroyed the city and people, and the writer seldom strays very far from this idea. Even when Zion herself finally appears and appeals to God, her words are not so much a prayer for help as a helpless restatement of the principal theme.78
Divine wrath and indignation fall against Yahweh’s covenant-breaking people. While God is the source of Judah’s (2:1–9), he is also their solution (2:19b).
Part of surviving any disaster is to convince others of your plight. Zion does this remarkably well—gaining Jeremiah to her side slowly but surely in Lamentations 2. “Both the lamenter and Zion reflect a more and more protesting stance of accusation across the chapter.”79 Thus, the two voices—that of the prophet and the woman—are more aligned than they are in chapter one.
Lam 2:22 is the last time we directly hear from Zion in the book. Jeremiah mentions her, but only in passing (4:3b, 6a, 10b, 22b). Why do Zion’s words end so abruptly? While there are unresolved issues, there is some closure for Zion. She has a comforter in Jeremiah. Becoming absorbed in her story, he listens, advocates, encourages, and pays attention.80 In chapter three Jeremiah more closely identifies with Zion’s devastation.
Lamentations and Divine Wrath
Introduction
What is Yahweh’s chief response to people in the book of Lamentations? Claus Westermann provides the answer: “The wrath of God is the theme most frequently mentioned in conjunction with reference to actions on the part of God.”81 The book is chalk-full of God’s anger and hot indignation, connecting Jerusalem’s suffering with divine wrath. The collapse was not simply the result of Babylonian aggression (1:12–13, 15, 22; 2:1–9, 22; 3:1–18; 4:16).
Lam 2:1–9 is one the most violent sections in the book. “At hardly any other place in the whole of the Old Testament is there so much talk about the wrath of God.”82 This section goes as far as to announce that divine indignation even led to the demise of Jerusalem’s Temple, priests, and kings, even though these were all chosen by him (Lam 2:6–7). Yahweh gives full vent to his anger and pours it out like water (Lam 4:11a). He even becomes like an enemy (Lam 2:4a-b, 5a). Ulrich Berges aptly concludes, “There is no other book of the Hebrew Bible where the wrath and the violence of Jhwh are depicted in such gloomy colors.”83 We might balk at these texts that announce divine wrath—believing they are inconsistent with divine love. Lech Stachowiak is typical, maintaining,
This way of speaking is, of course, metaphorical; it would be quite impossible in view of the loving assent of Yahweh to his creation to transfer human hatred in the real sense of the term.84
Is this true? Does Lamentations understand divine anger only in symbolic ways while speaking of God’s love in literal ways? Should we take the book’s texts that announce mercy and grace at face value, and dismiss the others? What does the rest of the OT have to say about God’s indignation and fury?
God’s Wrath in the Old Testament
Israel’s authors and theologians have much to say about divine wrath—in fact, 72.5% of the 714 references to anger in the OT apply to Yahweh.85 And most of these are connected to his people breaking the Sinaitic covenant.86 Bruce Baloian studied 380 verses related to divine anger and places it in two categories: 1) people mistreating people, 2) pride, syncretism, and idolatry.87
The most frequent verb associated with anger in the OT is חרה (93 times), while אַף is its most common noun. Another often repeated word is חֵמָה, “rage”—appearing in 118 OT verses, with ninety of them referring to Yahweh.88
Divine ire is like fire (Lam 2:4c; Jer 4:4), rushing water (Is 30:27; Jer 7:20), and a blazing oven (Ps 21:10). While Ex 34:6 announces God’s forbearance, Ex 34:7 states that he does not leave the guilty unpunished. Johann Keil and Franz Delitzsch comment on these verses:
But in order that grace may not be perverted by sinners into a ground of wantonness, justice is not wanting even here with its solemn threatenings, although it only follows mercy, to show that mercy is mightier than wrath, and that holy love does not punish till sinners despise the riches of the goodness, patience, and long-suffering of God.89
Yahweh, when wronged, does not immediately seek retribution. While planning to refine Israel through their suffering he asks, “What else can I do?” (Jer 9:9 [EN 9:8]). It is only after he has sent prophets and been exceedingly patient, that Yahweh lowers the boom. He seeks life, not death (Ezek 18:23–32). Thus, when ira dei falls upon Israel, they have been judged “not with the strict and icy indifferent of a judge, but with the pain and the anger of one who suit for a personal surrender has been rejected.”90
Divine wrath “has its roots in an awareness of the wounded love of YHWH.”91 This comports with Gen 6:6, a verse that chronicles God’s great remorse and heart-piercing anguish over his creation of humanity, while in the next verse he says, “I will blot out man from the face of the earth.” (Gen 6:7) Christopher Wright maintains: “God’s anger is saturated with God’s grief and soaked in tears both human and divine.”92
God’s indignation arises slowly. One of Yahweh’s chief characteristics is that he is “slow to anger” (Ex 34:6; Num 14:18; Neh 9:17; Pss 86:15; 103:8; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; Nah 1:3). He therefore gives Amorites living in Canaan four hundred years to repent (Gen 15:13–16). He sends prophets to the northern and southern kingdoms and waits centuries before driving people out of the promised land. Then there is Nineveh who gets forty days to repent (Jonah 3:4). Through it all, Yahweh is willing to relent if anyone turns away from their wickedness (Jer 18:7–8).
Amos 4:6–12 is instructive. These verses announce both Yahweh’s penultimate wrath that he pours out in time as well as his ultimate wrath to be manifest at the end of time. The goal of the former is to produce repentance, while the goal of the latter is to condemn those who are unrepentant. Amos documents five plagues and each ends with the refrain, “But you did not return to me, declares Yahweh.” (Amos 4:6, 8, 9, 10, 11) Having come to the end of his rope, Yahweh announces final doom, “Prepare to meet your God.” (Amos 4:12)
Throughout the OT, authors announce that God’s anger arises because of human sin. Frequently, his wrath is “provoked” (כָּעַס, Hiphil; e.g., Deut 9:18; Jug 2:12; 1 Kgs 14:9; Jer 11:17). God’s animosity thus is not natural—he must be incited to become wrathful (cf. Deut 32:21; Ps 106:29; Is 65:3). Leslie Allen maintains, “In the Old Testament, anger is by no means a permanent attribute of God but an event-orientated term that describes an intermittent reaction.”93
Consequently, Yahweh does not judge “out of the blue” or suddenly “fly off the handle.” Prophets announce the talionic nature of God’s anger, i.e., “as you have done it will be done to you.” And the OT never describes Yahweh, believing Israelites, or righteous nations with the word חָמָס, “violence”—a term reserved for law-breaking, wicked, and unbelieving human beings who flaunt creation’s moral order.
While Israel’s creed (e.g., Ex 34:6–7; Joel 2:13–14; Jonah 4:2) maintains that Yahweh is slow to anger, “his anger lasts but a moment” (Ps 30:6 [EN 30:5]; cf. Is 54:7–8). He does not stay angry forever (Ps 103:9; Is 57:16; Jer 3:12; Micah 7:18). Terrance Fretheim observes:
These references to God’s wrath are coherent only if placed along a timeline, so that one can speak of delay, a time of provocation, a time of momentary execution, and a time when such wrath comes to an end.94
Divine displeasure is historical. It begins within history and ceases when history concludes.
The OT accents the imbalance between Yahweh’s judgment and grace. The Gospel outlasts the Law one thousand to one (Deut 7:9–10). His anger lasts for a moment, his favor lasts a lifetime (Ps 30:6 [EN 30:5]). The day of vengeance pales in comparison to the year of favor (Is 61:2). Yahweh quickly gets over his wrath. It is intense, but temporary. His mercy endures forever (Psalm 136). He may become angry, but he is love (1 Jn 4:8, 16).
The Day of the LORD
Yahweh’s wrath against his enemies—either Israel and/or the nations—manifests itself most vividly when he appears in judgment on “the Day of the LORD.” The phrase declares God’s battle against the forces of evil. Thus, the day is synonymous with “the Day of Jezreel” (Hos 2:2 [EN 1:11]), the Day of Midian” (Is 9:3), “the day of Egypt” (Ezek 30:9), and “the Day of Jerusalem” (Ps 137:7). These refer military action; hence “the day of Yahweh” is another way to say, “the battle of Yahweh.”
While a number verses in Lamentations attribute military loss and destruction to Yahweh, specific references to the Day of Yahweh only appear in four places—1:12c, 21c, 2:21c, and 22b.95 Zion speaks in all four verses. Lam 1:12c; 2:21c, and 22b describe a past event. On the other hand, 1:21c implies a future day of judgment for Zion’s enemies.96
Although the day of the LORD frames the second part of chapter one (1:12c; 1:21c), the theme works as an inclusio for all of chapter two: “in the day of his anger” (2:1c) and “in the day of your anger” (2:21c)—along with “in the day of Yahweh’s anger” (2:22b). In chapter three Jeremiah recounts the Day as falling upon him (e.g., 3:3), while chapters four and five depict the aftermath of divine judgment. “The day” thus looms over the entire book, casting its ominous shadow at every turn. Much of Lamentations’ vocabulary comes from “the Day of the LORD” visions that appear in, e.g., Isaiah 13 and Amos 5:18–20. Note, for instance, these connections:
Lack of light (Is 13:10; Amos 5:18, 20; Lam 2:1a; 3:2, 6)
Suffering of children (Is 13:18; e.g., Lam 2:12; 4:2)
Women abused (Is 13:16; Lam 1:10a-b; 5:11)
Sodom (Is 13:19; Lam 4:6a)
Wild animals (Is 13:21–22; Amos 5:19; Lam 3:10; 5:18)
Lamentations interprets the Day of the LORD through the lens of God’s covenant curses expressed in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28. That is, it came about as a result of the vassal (Israel) rebelling against her suzerain (Yahweh). In the ancient Near East this resulted in the suzerain launching a military campaign to reassert control over his vassal.97 It follows that a number of sections in Lamentations depict Yahweh as the person behind Zion’s suffering (1:12–20; 2:1–8; 3:1–18, 42–47; 4:1–12). The book makes it clear. The Babylonian breaching of Jerusalem’s walls in 587 BC was nothing less than the Day of the LORD.
Gerhard von Rad argued that the idea had its origins in Israel’s holy wars, hence it originally meant the moment when Yahweh defeated his enemies in battle.98 The opposite is also true. Yahweh could fight against Israel. This comes across clearly in places like Joshua 7, 1 Samuel 4–7, and the book of Lamentations. W.L. Moran says these texts exhibit “Anti-Holy-War.”99
Since the Day is synonymous with God’s battle, the metaphor likens Yahweh to a warrior—beginning in Ex 15:3. A case in point comes in Is 29:1–4, an oracle about God going to war against Jerusalem and attacking her towers and raising siegeworks.100 In Lamentations, along with wielding a bow in Lam 2:4a and 3:11–12, Yahweh has a net to capture his enemy (Lam 1:13b).
There are differences, though, between Israel’s prophetic announcements of Yahweh’s Day and its appearance in the book of Lamentations. For example, Lamentations does not include the prophets’ motif of cosmic upheaval (e.g., Is 13:10; Zeph 1:2–3). Another divergence is that Lamentations describes divine judgment in first-person speech (that of a female and male), while in the prophets Yahweh speaks through his spokesmen. In this way, Lamentations personalizes the day much more than the prophets. Moreover, while prophetic literature frequently specifies Israel’s sin that brought on the day of judgment, Lamentations is much more general, stressing the city’s suffering.101 Finally, prophets depict the “Day” as full of divine fury and judgment, while Lamentations also emphasizes its aftermath—distress and death. Nevertheless, Yahweh quickly comes to restore the relationship with Zion.
For a short time (בְּרֶ֥גַע קָטֹ֖ן) I abandoned you and in great compassion I will gather you. In overflowing wrath I hid my face for a moment (רֶ֙גַע֙) from you. And in everlasting steadfast love I will have compassion on you. (Is 54:7–8)102
When we couple the prophetic understanding of the Day of the LORD with its usage in Lamentations, we see that there are several “days” of divine warfare envisioned in the Bible.103 Prophetic texts composed before 587 BC depict Yahweh’s day as immanent—coming soon. Lamentations, however, states that the day has come (Lam 1:21c) and describes its aftermath. This is not, however, the end of the theme—both Lam 1:21c–22 and Lam 4:21–22 pray for the nations to taste a “Day” for themselves. In the NT, Paul employs “the Day of the Lord” motif to depict the end of this evil age and the beginning of paradise restored (e.g., Phil 1:6; 1 Thess 5:2).
From another perspective, though, “the Day of the LORD” is a past event. On Good Friday God acted not only as the Judge but also the one subjected to divine judgment; the Breaker as well as the One Broken. “In Christ God experienced human suffering, not simply as a divine sympathizer who stands beside us, but as a human who suffers with, as, and for us.”104
The OT is replete with this good news, beginning with the Proto-Evangelium in Gen 3:15 where Moses announces that the Woman’s Offspring will suffer in his combat with the Serpent. “It was Yahweh’s desire to crush him.” (Is 53:10) Hence, it is God who commands the sword to strike the Shepherd (Zech 13:7), with the term “sword” functioning as a metonym for a violent death (e.g., Jer 14:15; Amos 7:9, 11). Commenting on Mt 26:31 (cf. Mk 14:27), R.T. France writes:
That so exalted a figure should nonetheless be struck down, and indeed by the sword of God himself, expresses in a remarkable way the paradox of a Messiah who is to be killed in accordance with the will of God declared in the scriptures.105
Christ gave his life as a ransom for many (Mt 20:26; Mk 10:45) and became a curse for us (Gal 3:13). These song lyrics are most apt: “Till on that cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was satisfied. For ev’ry sin on him was laid. Here in the death of Christ I live.”106
Reflections on God’s Wrath
Because the Day of the LORD emphasizes God’s wrath and judgment, it might be tempting to conclude that an angry God is an imperfect God.107 Upon reflection, though, not to show rage and indignation at evil would exhibit Yahweh’s deficiency.
How, therefore, does the church explain divine indignation?108 The first approach argues that God does not get angry; instead, people experience wickedness and evil then wrongly interpret it as God’s wrathful judgment. From the human perspective God pours out rage, yet such biblical language is anthropomorphic. It only appears that God acts this way. John Cassian (c. 360–c. 425 AD) wrote that God “is a stranger to all perturbations.”109 The divine feels no anger whatsoever.
The second approach takes the Bible’s talk of divine ire seriously; that is, God gets angry but does not sin by doing so. His indignation is not akin to a person losing his temper. According to this view, “God becomes angry not out of vice, but for the sake of healing us.”110 Terrance Fretheim writes:
That the same terms are used for both human and divine anger shows that God’s anger is considered analogous to that of human beings. In any assessment of such an ‘anthropomorphic metaphor’ for God, it is important to claim both a ‘yes’ and a ‘no’ with respect to the human analogue.111
Both Yahweh and people get angry, yet Yahweh’s anger is always a perfect expression of his justice. It is never irrational or unreasonable. God will not remain detached or neutral in the face of evil. Lactantius (250–c. 325 AD) argues this in De Ira Dei:
He who loves the good, by this very fact hates the evil; and he who does not hate the evil, does not love the good; because the love of goodness issues directly out of the hatred of evil, and the hatred of evil issues directly out of the love of goodness. No one can love life without abhorring death; and no one can have an appetency for light, without an antipathy to darkness.112
Yahweh’s anger is not mercurial or capricious—though it may appear that way. “God is not an executioner who can walk away from the judgment exacted, thinking, ‘I only did my duty.’”113 Divine rage materializes because he loves the world. Walter Kaiser writes:
God’s anger is never explosive, unreasonable, or unexplained. It is rather His firm expression of real displeasure with our wickedness and sin. Even in God it is never a force or a ruling passion; rather it is an instrument of His will. And His anger has not, thereby, shut off His compassion to us.114
Paul puts it this way: “Behold, then the kindness and severity of God.” (Rom 11:22) Divine severity and wrath, though very much a part of God’s nature, are not his chief characteristics. His judgment and indignation intend to drive people into the arms of his mercy.
Conclusions
Divine love and wrath are compatible. In fact, it is natural to become angry when we love someone dearly.115 Therefore, it is not helpful to define fury as retaliation, revenge, momentary insanity, or loss of self-control. While this may be true of some anger, it is not the case with every expression of anger—especially God’s whose rage is never unreasonable or unexplainable. Yahweh is able to be angry and not sin (cf. Eph 4:26).
In Christ, God intensifies both divine love and divine judgment. His teachings about loving our enemies, turning the other cheek, and going the extra mile are absolutely important. But so are his words of retribution and condemnation. He promises to drown evildoers in the depths of the sea (Mt 18:6). Christ also drove out money-changers from the temple (Jn 2:15); destroyed unbelieving Israelites in the wilderness (Jude 5); and threatened to kill people in Thyatira if they persisted in following a Jezebel-like prophetess (Rev 2:23). At the end of time, John compares Christ’s return to a rider on a white horse who judges and makes war (Rev 19:11). He will rule the nations with an iron scepter (Rev 2:26–27; cf. Ps 2:9). Divine vengeance appears not only in Deut 32:25 but also in Rom 12:19. In fact, Jesus announces vengeful judgment in Lk 4:19 and did not shrink from announcing punishment against unrepentant cities (e.g., Mt 11:23–24; 24:37–39; Lk 10:13–15).
This is also the apostolic message; God curses all enemies of the cross (Phil 3:18) for his wrath is against every form of evil and wickedness (Rom 1:18). While Paul pens 1 Corinthians 13, in the same letter he calls down a curse to all who do not love Jesus (1 Cor 16:22). His imprecations appear again in Gal 1:8–9. The apostle believes that God will repay Alexander the coppersmith who did him great harm (2 Tim 4:14). Peter oversees the deaths of Annanias and Sapphira (Acts 5:7–11) and tells Simon the magician, “May your silver perish with you” (Acts 8:20). And in vivid imagery, John envisions Babylon’s judgment and doom (Revelation 18).
We experience anger from sinful and imperfect people whose rage may be neurotic, uncontrollable, and without reason. Rarely do we encounter healthy, mature expressions of anger. But this is our God. He takes sin seriously because he takes people seriously. C.S. Lewis wrote,
It appears, from all the records, that though He has often rebuked us and condemned us, He has never regarded us with contempt. He has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexorable sense.116
Ubi amor, ibi dolor, “where there is love, there is pain.”
When God sees atrocities; when he witnesses deception and deceit; when he watches the high and mighty snuff out the poor and lowly; if he does not respond with judgment then he is not a loving God. But he who created the world and called it “very good” (Gen 1:31) springs to action when people distort and destroy his creation. Yahweh is not a benevolent deity who sees evil and merely shakes his fist. Instead, he actively judges and eradicates everything that is malevolent and vile.
The malnourished, mutilated, and violated bodies, appearing throughout the book of Lamentations, foreshadow God’s suffering in Christ when the Savior’s body underwent unparalleled torment and hell—to save us from such a fate. “Therefore, since being justified now through his blood how much more will we be saving through him from wrath.” (Rom 5:9)
To rescue us from the full fury of “the Day of the LORD,” Jesus drank from the cup of divine fury (Mt 26:39; Lk 22:42). This was not a cup of suffering or a cup of sorrow or martyrdom. Jesus drained the cup of God’s wrath.117 Thus, he cries out to God, “Why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46 = Mk 15:34). The answer to this question is simple, yet forever mysterious. Why did the Father turn his face away from Jesus? Because the Savior was bearing sin as well as the wrath of his Father—all out of abiding mercy for the world. “What wondrous love is this, that caused the Lord of bliss, to bear the dreadful curse for my soul, for my soul. To bear the dreadful curse for my soul?”118
Lamentations 3
Introduction
While Lamentations 1–2 depict suffering mostly from a woman’s viewpoint—with Zion’s widowhood, rape, and childlessness—chapter three looks at the city’s demise from a man’s perspective. Diane Bergant calls Lamentations 3 “a kind of collage of horror.”119 It features military imagery with its horrid brutality, barbarity, and burning. The chapter presents suffering from different angels.
Yet all is not lost. Lam 3:22–39 bursts forth with light, and hope, and joy. Walter Kaiser comments: “Like a pool of light in the midst of the thickest darkness, this chapter rises above all others in the hope and consolation it offers.”120 Ad astra per aspera— “through adversity to the stars.”
Delbert Hillers maintains that chapter three “is the high point of the book, central to it in more than an external or formal way.”121 Alan Mintz believes that Lamentations 3 is the “monumental center” of the book.122 Roland Meynet discusses this aspect of Hebrew literature:
Instead of developing its argumentation in a linear way, in the Graeco-Roman fashion, to a conclusion which is the point of resolution of the discourse, it is organized most of the time in an involutive manner around a center which is the focal point, the keystone, through which the rest finds cohesion. The center of a concentric construction most of the time presents certain specific characteristics: it is often of a different shape and genre than the rest of the text, it is very often a question, or at least something which is problematic, which in all cases is enigmatic.123
Acrostic Features in Lamentations 3
Chapter three differs from Lamentations 1, 2, and 4 in that its alphabetic patterns continue in all three cola in each stanza—making a triple acrostic. There are three aleph (א) cola, three beth (ב), three gimel (ג) cola and so on. Conversely, chapters one, two, and four only pair the first colon of their stanzas with successive letters in the alphabet. By employing the same letter in all three cola, Lamentations 3 displays a more accelerated feeling with more of a beat and rhythm. “The more intensive acrostic form and the new way of numbering bear witness to a special role the third poem has in the book.”124 Only Psalm 119 exceeds Lamentations 3 in acrostic elaborateness.
Jeremiah’s sufferings (3:1–16)
3:1 Instead of the expected אֵיכָה, “How could it be?” in 1:1a and 2:1a, the first word of Lamentations 3, אֲנִ֤י, “I,” signals that chapter is profoundly personal. The first-person speech throughout the chapter is like other lengthy speeches in Job, Proverbs, and Ecclesiastes.
While Lamentations 1–2 portrays what happens to women and children at the time of war (e.g., widowhood, sexual violence), chapter three describes what happens to men (e.g., shot at, imprisoned). We might liken the strongman to a war veteran telling his tale.
Judah’s princes fled like deer (1:6b); some were crushed, others were exiled (1:15). Priests and prophets were collateral damage (2:20c), while some became a community pariah (4:13–16). Finally, the king was captured (4:20a). Who was left? Jeremiah. The prophet’s story comes in Lamentations 3. “His view is personal but at the same time representative of the people.”125
In Lam 2:11 Jeremiah changes from third person to first person speech, therefore the first-person lament that begins chapter three is not an outlier or a one-off. The prophet exhorts Zion to lament (Lam 2:18–19) and she does (Lam 2:20–22). It makes sense, then, that Jeremiah proceeds to “practice what he preaches” by pouring his own heart out to Yahweh—something he does throughout his book (e.g., Jer 4:10; 6:10–11; 11:18–20; 12:1–4; 15:10, 15–18; 17:14–18; 18:18–23; 20:7–18). “It is as though, having failed to get Lady Zion to say anything more herself by the end of chapter 2, he now speaks up for her, identifying with her suffering as something he too has shared.”126 Chapter three, therefore, significantly overlaps literarily, theologically, and historically with chapters one and two.
Lamentations 3 describes Jeremiah’s and Zion’s pain. The chapter is both personal and corporate. The one and the many share the same traumatic experiences. The prophet’s acute suffering enables him to become a wounded healer. “Without coming to grips with our own despair, losses, and anger, we cannot gain our full humanity, unleash our blocked passions, or live in genuine community with others.”127
The idea of a wounded healer first appears in Gen 3:15 and is further defined in Isaiah’s Fourth Servant Song—especially Is 53:5 (cf. 1 Pet 2:24). Carl Jung writes of a counselor, “It is his own hurt that is the measure of his power to heal.”128 Our trauma and torment can be a bridge into the hearts and lives of others who have experienced deep loss. Henri Nouwen authored a book titled The Wounded Healer. This is Jeremiah.
Jeremiah’s Despair (3:17–20)
3:17 “Beaten, broken, imprisoned, mauled, shot, mocked, trampled … reeling under such a battery of injuries the Man reaches the point of total despair.”129 Lam 3:1–17 is much like a lament psalm with one substantial difference—Jeremiah does not invoke Yahweh’s name. Where else can he go, then, but inward. In 3:17–18 the prophet transitions from detailing the enemy’s attacks to what they have done to his soul.
Beginning with 3:17 and going through 3:21 there are five verbs that accent recalling and remembering: “I forgot” (3:17), “I thought” (3:18), “remember” (3:19), “you will certainly remember” (3:20), and “I will call to mind” (3:21). As such, 3:17–21 serves as a transition from despair to the most hopeful section in the book—3:22–39.
3:18 Up to this point, Lamentations 3 is much like Ps 77:2–10 (EN 77:1–9). Both sets of texts sound like Job 10:1: “I will indeed speak in the bitterness of my life.” (cf. Job 7:11) There is much to complain about.
Throughout Lam 3:1–17 God casts Jeremiah into the darkness, makes his flesh and skin waste away, breaks his bones, feeds him weariness and wormwood, walls him in, does not listen to his prayers, and makes his paths crooked and bent. God shoots arrows at the prophet, fills him with bitterness, shoves his face into the dirt, and makes him eat gravel. And now? Jeremiah is at the end of his rope (3:18). “A future without hope is bleak indeed—no future at all.”130 Jeremiah is demoralized. Life has become a poisoned drink and he is forced to drink all of it—every last drop.
Post-traumatic stress disorder paralyzes survivors of warfare—when flashbacks and nightmares show up uninvited and unsolicited. “To have lived through, and witnessed, the final chocking fires of Jerusalem and the blood-soaked slaughter or capture of its starved inhabitants must have been an ineradicable and soul-destroying memory.”131 What are Jeremiah’s options at this point? Abandon all hope or invoke Yahweh’s name. Thank God he chooses the later. It will make all the difference in the world.
Although we suspect that Yahweh is the referent of the third-person masculine singular pronominal suffix “his” in, for instance, “his wrath” (עֶבְרָתֹֽו, 3:1)—along with all of the third-person singular verbs—the end of 3:18 identifies Jeremiah’s assailant. Lam 3:18, functions much like God’s disclosure of himself to Jacob during the patriarch’s all-night wrestling match at the Jabbok River (Gen 32:23–33 [EN 32:22–32]). It was not until morning broke that Jacob realized he was contending with God. What turns Jeremiah’s life around? The last word in Lam 3:18—Yahweh.
It takes great faith to utter the divine name in the midst of a lament. By saying, “Yahweh,” Jeremiah turns the corner.132 Incipit vita nova, a new life begins. Hope is on the horizon. How do we know? The prophet’s first word in 3:19 is a cry for Yahweh to remember and, since the exodus, Israelites know that when God remembers he acts (e.g., Ex 2:24). “Yahweh’s name is a strong tower (מִגְדַּל־עֹ֭ז); the righteous man runs to it and is safe.” (Prov 18:10)
3:19 Jeremiah establishes common ground with Zion; both lived through Babylon’s sack of Jerusalem. The prophet now prays Zion’s prayer—picking up with her impassioned “see, look” (1:9c, 11c, 20a; 2:20a) with an imperative of his own, “remember.” Having traversed these dark valleys, Jeremiah now climbs the Mt. Everest of Lamentations (3:22–39). To do so, he employs 3:19–21—a bridge to move from deep despair to buoyant trust. Lam 3:19–21 therefore share words from both 3:1–18 and 3:23–24: “affliction” in 3:1a and 3:19a; “wormwood” in 3:5b and 3:19b; and “hope” in 3:21b and 3:24b.
3:20 Jeremiah recalled his ordeal with great angst. This is what the infinitive absolute fronting the finite verb announces (זָכֹ֣ור תִּזְכֹּ֔ור, “acutely remembers”). It also expresses the prophet’s confidence that Yahweh will remember—indeed, he will come to the aid of his beleaguered prophet.
3:21 The ruin could not have been more complete. Jeremiah experienced physical torment (3:1–16) and social scorn (3:14), along with grave depression (3:17–20). He had lost all hope. Yahweh closed the door on his prayers (3:8), bringing him into the depths of despair (3:18). Deep pain continues in 3:20, yet in another bold step of faith Jeremiah dares to hope (3:21). What happened? Jeremiah’s circumstances did not change. His viewpoint did.
Yes, Jerusalem’s fall was epic. Yes, the Babylonian onslaught was incomprehensible. Yes, the events would be seared on Jeremiah’s mind for the rest of his life. Yet the prophet is defiant. Yahweh is still on his throne (cf. 5:19). “The Man does not just happen to remember something. He makes it come back into his conscious thinking, so as to change his whole perspective.”133 Instead of allowing his situation to dictate his future, Jeremiah decides to embrace the truth of God’s Word. He refuses to live only by what he can see and feel.
Feelings and emotions are important, yet they do not always consider all the facts. Jeremiah, at this point in his poem, bets the farm on the facts—the facts of Yahweh’s covenant faithfulness.
Then what happened? Nothing changed. Everything changed. Jeremiah’s external realities stayed the same. Conquest, hardship, and loss still engulfed his community. Nevertheless! The prophet’s inner life of faith and hope came alive. “Darkness covers the earth and thick darkness the people; but Yahweh will arise upon you.” (Is 60:2) Jeremiah’s clouds begin to lift. A new morning has arrived! In spite of what was going on around him, God changed what was going on in him. God renewed the prophet’s heart. There is hope.
After remembering his past (3:19–20), Jeremiah makes a conscious decision not to stay there. In doing so, the prophet makes one of the greatest turn-arounds in the Bible. He changes from letting his feelings of anguish and misery rule the day to the Yahweh’s reliable promises. Jeremiah’s faith became based upon God’s objective promises in Holy Scripture.
The prophet literally says, “I will bring back my mind” (אָשִׁ֥יב אֶל־לִבִּ֖י). “A pendulum swings: the absence of God, the killing darkness, the Hand that withholds and pummels—these yield to the Presence, the Consolation.”134 Harry Ellison adds these insights on Lam 3:21: “The ‘hope’ that the writer expresses here is not created by denying or minimizing suffering and misery. Rather, these are transformed when the mind is turned to God.”135
The Pentateuch’s catechetical emphasis lays the foundation for this faith (e.g., Ex 12:27; 13:8, 14, 16; Deut 6:20–25). It was incumbent upon parents to teach their children about the exodus and Sinai, manna and water, and the promise of land flowing with milk and honey. The clarion call is always, “Remember!” (cf. Deut 8:11–20)
When every earthly support gives way, God’s Word, centered in Christ Jesus, always stands. Indeed, it stands forever (Is 40:8; 1 Pet 1:25). No doubt, God planned to uproot, tear down, destroy, and overthrow; but there would be building and planting (Jer 1:10). Divine judgment is penultimate. Grace and goodness and the Gospel are ultimate. Gerald Sittser’s testimony echoes that of Jeremiah’s: “I did not go through pain and come out the other side; instead I lived in it and found within that pain the grace to survive and eventually grow.”136
Jeremiah’s confession of faith (3:22–39)
3:22 Jeremiah—and all of us too often—try to read reality through a pinhole in a fence. The chet (ח) stanza (3:22–24) is like a wide aperture, opening up for us new vistas of God’s mercy. When the storms of life knock us down and threaten to engulf us, we need a solid anchor, a steady ballast, to keep afloat. It arrives in 3:22. “Events that seemed charged with a killing complexity, a labyrinthine illogic, inducing near despair—at last these are relieved.”137
God’s shining light, however, does not appear out of the blue. It is connected to what Jeremiah “brings back to mind” in Lam 3:21. And what is that? Israel’s creed—God’s gift after the golden calf apostacy. What does Yahweh do after his people break the First Commandment? Scold? Shame? Berate? Reject? Condemn? Turn his back on the whole wretched mess? No. He cries out, “Yahweh! Yahweh!” (Ex 34:6) This is the first and the last time in the OT when God himself repeats “Yahweh.” By revealing his name Yahweh pledges fidelity and forgiveness for rebel sinners—come what may.
Within Ex 34:6–7, God’s loyal and reliable covenant love (חֶסֶד) exists side-by-side with his slow burning anger (אֶ֥רֶךְ אַפַּ֖יִם). Yet, because Yahweh’s Gospel characteristics come first—and are more numerous—they become Israel’s hope and confidence, even in the nation’s darkest days. Mercy always triumphs over judgment. In fact, the confession in Ex 34:6–7 is so full of the Gospel that the creed appears again, with slight variations, in sixteen other passages (Num 14:8; Deut 4:31; Pss 78:38; 86: 5, 15; 103:8; 111:4; 112:4; 116:5; 145:8; Joel 2:13; Jonah 4:2; Hab 1:3; Neh 9:17, 31; 2 Chr 30:9). “Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more.” (Rom 5:20)
We must interpret Lamentations, then, through the lens Ex 34:6–7. If Yahweh gave Israel grace at Sinai after the golden calf debacle, he will do it again for Jerusalem in the sixth century BC.138
“Steadfast-covenant love” (חֶסֶד) is the key word linking Lam 3:22 and Ex 34:6–7—the only word used more than once in Israel’s creed. It is also the only word modified by an adjective, “abounding.” Nothing will ever nullify this divine commitment. “Because of Yahweh’s covenant mercies (חַֽסְדֵ֤י יְהוָה֙) we are not consumed.” (Lam 3:22) Jeremiah’s confession does not come after God visited and restored his people. It comes before. It comes before there was any hope or any sign of new life. Hebrews 11 calls this faith.
Jeremiah, Zion, and Judean exiles were living through Israel’s worst nightmare. In 597 BC Nebuchadnezzar imprisoned Jehoiachin (2 Ki 24:10–12). Attacking soldiers captured Zedekiah, Judah’s last king, in 587 BC (Lam 4:20a). Then, at Riblah, Nebuchadnezzar slaughtered his sons and blinded Zedekiah (2 Ki 25:6–7). The divine oath to the house of David appeared to have ended (Ps 89:39–52 [EN 89:38–51]). “Appeared” is the key adverb in the last sentence.
Yahweh pledges to renew and expand his promises to David that include the weak, the weary, and the worn-down refugees in Babylon. The “with you” (לָכֶם֙) in Is 55:3 is grammatically plural. Yahweh democratizes his everlasting covenant with the house of David. “God’s capacity for kindness, compassion, and forgiveness is immense.”139 And this mercy includes everyone who believes the Seed promise (e.g., Gen 3:15; 22:17–18; cf. Gal 3:16); thus, David’s offspring will be multiplied (Jer 33:22). Yahweh’s promises go from the one to many. Brevard Childs writes, “The promise is no longer tied to David and assigned to the past, but is renewed as a present, active reality.”140
Thus, Ps 89:29–38 (EN 89:28–37) are pivotal for post-exilic Judeans. In spite of unfaithfulness and idolatry God’s pledge to David still stands—fulfilled after the exile when Evil-merodach, king of Babylon, released Jehoiachin from prison (2 Ki 25:27–30=Jer 52:31–34) and consummated in Christ Jesus.
Experiences, emotions, and sufferings may look like they have the last word. Not so. Yahweh’s covenant fidelity holds in the midst of life’s darkest moments. Lam 3:1–20 looks at life from an earthly perspective. Lam 3:22 looks at life from a heavenly perspective, making it not one viewpoint in the book. And it is more than a moment of calm in the storm. Instead, Lam 3:22 provides the only sure foundation when life’s hurricanes beat and batter, rant and rage. “God’s covenant fidelity and integrity remain intact no matter how things may seem.”141 Yahweh delights in ḥesed (חָפֵ֥ץ חֶ֖סֶד, Micah 7:18).
Although “amen,” “hosanna,” “shalom,” and “Hallelujah” appear in English dictionaries, it is unfortunate that ḥesed (חֶסֶד) does not. There simply is not an English word or phrase that captures its rich meaning. “Steadfast love,” “mercy,” “loving-kindness,” “graciousness,” and “goodness” are valiant attempts—but all fall short. In fact, every endeavor is like trying to catch Niagara Falls in a thimble.
Hesed is connected to Yahweh’s acts of salvation in history. It is not the stuff of myths and gnostic enlightenment. Neither it is a mystical trance or an escape into a world of make-believe—a sort-of Shangri-La. No. Hesed is rooted in history. Adam’s fall. Abram’s journeys. The exodus escape. Torah at Sinai. Conquest and kings. Gethsemane and Galilee. Crucifixion and resurrection. “Suffered under Pontius Pilate … the third day he rose again from the dead.”
What is hesed? It is shorthand for Yahweh’s unconditional, whatever it takes, commitment to his covenant promises. It is Yahweh rolling up his sleeves and pushing heaven and earth for the sake of his people. It is a shepherd leaving ninety-nine for the sake of the one; the father running toward his wayward child, then dancing to the music. It is God giving his Son for the life of the world. If we must settle on one word for ḥesed then it would be Jesus.
Beginning with Lam 3:22, and continuing through the end of the chapter, Jeremiah describes his highs and his lows. The highs are really high and the lows (again!) are really low. So who is the “real” Jeremiah? The man of great faith or the man of intense despair? Both. The prophet is simul justus et peccator—sinner and saint at the same time. The same feature appears in the book of Job, Psalm 73, Romans 7, and elsewhere. Robin Parry observes:
Consequently, like the man [Jeremiah] the “Hallelujah!” of praise marks the Christian life, but so too does the “Alas!” of lament with its focus on or present sufferings, and the “Maranatha!” of hope, with its focus on our deliverance yet-to-come.142
3:23 After everything he has experienced, how can Jeremiah write these words? How can he pen this in light of all the pain catalogued—not only in 3:1–18—but throughout the book that bears his name? Where does his hope come from? Terrance Fretheim writes, “In the midst of the great gulf between the past and the future, the only hope is in a certain kind of God.”143
In what must have been the longest night of his life, the prophet dares to see a small glimmer of light. Its name? Hesed. Bolstered by this hope the prophet leaves his chaos and loss, steps out of the darkness, and walks into the light of a brand-new day. A fresh batch of morning mercies greets him—and us—with every sunrise. “Great is thy faithfulness, morning by morning new mercies I see.”144 It is because of the morning—Easter dawn—that we lift our crushed hearts in song to Jesus, crucified, yet risen indeed. “Strength for today and bright hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine, with ten thousand beside!”145
Yes, God’s mercies are new every morning—now. But Lamentations 3 does not deny the “not yet.” A glimmer of light is dawning, but the sun is not fully up. Redemption is peeking around the corner but it has not made its full appearance. “The one who began a good work in you will complete it on the day of Christ Jesus.” (Phil 1:6) The new creation has arrived (2 Cor 5:17). It has not arrived in all its splendor. “Any propensity to run too quickly to ‘the end of the story’ would preclude the necessary and urgent presence of the expression of pain in the text at hand.”146
Thus, if we fail to read Lamentations carefully we might arrive at this simplistic message; confess your sin, admit that God’s judgment is just, and all will be well—after all “his mercies are new every morning” (3:23). But we must not privilege this verse and ignore the book’s more jarring sections (e.g., 1:20–22; 2:20–22; 3:59–66; 5:1).
What is true for Jeremiah is true for the faithful. While we walk in newness of life (Rom 6:4) we also know the lament, “What a wretched man I am.” (Rom 7:24) Indeed, we groan with all creation (Rom 8:22–23a) as we await the final daybreak, “our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies” (Rom 8:23b).
3:33 How are we to take 3:33 in light of the claim that Yahweh rejected his altar and his sanctuary (2:7a)? How can Jeremiah say that Yahweh does not afflict from his heart when his statements in 2:8a, 17a assert just the opposite, that God acted willfully, intentionally, and with a plan in hand to ravage daughter Zion? Johan Renkema maintains,
Here in the middle of the third song and simultaneously—at the literary structural level—in the centre of the five songs as a whole, we find the very basis for all the sighs and laments, prayers and pleadings, hopes and expectations we have encountered so far from the poets and their sympathisers: they know that all of this does not conform to the essence of God.147
Yahweh does not bring grief from his heart—that is, from the centermost part of his emotions and decisions. “His judgments are not the way he wants to relate to humanity but are his response to human sin.”148
God not only has a mind. He has a heart.149 To advance the idea that Yahweh is emotionless is to gut the OT of its message. He is far from being indifferent. For instance, Yahweh laments, “For the shattering of the daughter of my people I am shattered; I mourn, and dismay has seized me.” (Jer 8:21) He cries out, “Who will make my head waters, and my eyes a fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the slain of the daughter of my people.” (Jer 9:1) While we might think that Jeremiah speaks here, elsewhere in the book Yahweh most often employs the terms “my people” (e.g., Jer 8:7, 11; 9:7; 15:7; 23:22) and “the daughter of my people” (e.g., Jer 8:19, 21; 9:1). His heart is full of compassion (Hos 11:8). “No matter how necessary YHWH’s judgment against Israel is, he does not carry it out willingly because it does not belong to his nature to do so.”150
Yahweh’s feelings, however, are not like those of the pagan deities that surrounded Israel; these mythological gods were violent and irrational. However, Yahweh is also not like the Stoic god who feels nothing. “The Bible speaks unashamedly of Yahweh’s passion, presenting him as an intense and passionate Being, fervently interested in the world of humans.”151 Francis Anderson and David Noel Freedman write:
Just as there is an important and unbridgeable distance between Yahweh and the gods of Canaan, or those of Mesopotamia or Egypt or Greece or Rome, so there is at least an equal or greater distance from an Aristotelian unmoved mover, or even a Platonic Idea. The biblical God is always and uncompromisingly persona: he is above all a person, neither more nor less.152
The kaph (ך) stanza answers this question: How can we endure setbacks and deep disappointment? Submit to divine discipline because it does not last forever (3:31). Embrace God’s Gospel characteristics that are super-abounding (3:32). “If God prefers not to punish, then the hope remains that he will return to compassion, which 3:22 and 3:32 strong imply is the substance of his heart.”153
The life-giving truth of Lam 3:33 is that God’s judgment and wrath are his opus alienum.154 Yet many Christians think that the God of the OT is concerned primarily with judgment and indignation; that Yahweh is an “eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth” (cf. Ex 21:24) kind-of deity. Additional adjectives used to describe this God include remote, cold, stern, vindictive, callous—sometimes even ruthless. The Apostle’s Creed states that the Father is “almighty,” and leaves it at that. Little wonder that numerous people believe Jesus is a much-needed corrective to the OT. To the contrary. Lam 3:21–33 states that history in the hands of a sovereign and saving God who works through Law and Gospel to display his loving purposes for the sake of the world.
Lamentations and New Testament Laments
Introduction
It looks like laments play only a small part in the NT. After all, there is nothing equivalent to lament psalms, or the books of Job and Lamentations. The typical OT cry, “How long?” occurs only once, in Rev 6:10, while “Why?” appears a handful of times, famously in Mt 27:46 and Mk 15:34. And even this, the most tragic event—Christ’s crucifixion—becomes God’s means to defeat sin, death, evil, and Satan. The darkness of Good Friday gives way to the eternal light resurrection victory. What is there to lament?
The early church raises a lament in Acts 4:23–30 as believers include these words from Ps 2:1 in their prayer, “Why do the nations rage and the peoples meditate on nothing?” When Stephen was stoned to death, reverent men buried him and “made great lament” (κοπετὸν μέγαν, Acts 8:2). When Dorcas died “the widows wept” (αἱ χῆραι κλαίουσαι) and displayed the tunics and clothing she had made (Acts 9:39). And Jesus? He shows solidarity with those saddened at Lazarus’ death (Jn 11:33, 35) as well as at Jerusalem’s immanent destruction (Lk 19:41–44). Noting these, and a number of other laments in the NT, at the end of the twentieth century scholars began to examine how OT laments impact the NT—a pursuit that continues to blossom well into the twenty-first century.155
Matthew
Matthew includes laments, both early in his gospel, in the middle, as well as toward the end. The first one describes Bethlehem’s mothers agonizing over King Herod’s ruthless decree to slaughter their sons. Matthew uses the words of inconsolable Rachel to express this sorrow: “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great wailing; Rachel weeping for her children. She refuses to be comforted because they are no more.” (Mt 2:18=Jer 31:15) Rachel—a literary figure here—refuses to theologize, spiritualize, ignore, deny, or explain her horror. She rejects the notion of putting the past behind her and getting on with life. Instead, Rachel looks death straight in the eye and lets it shake her to the core. Her honest brokenness reflects those who grieve over Herod’s senseless slayings in Bethlehem.
Contrast Rachel with Mary’s song in Lk 1:46–55, where joy and gladness permeate the virgin’s celebration. Kathleen Billman and Daniel Migliore point out,
Even though the church has often remembered Mary but forgotten Rachel, the two belong together in the prayer and practice of Christian faith. Together they remind us that the danger of praise without lament is triumphalism, and the danger of lament without praise is hopelessness.156
The Canaanite woman is much like Rachel (Mt 15:21–28). Her prayer includes these common features in OT laments: 1) an address, 2) a complaint, 3) a plea, 4) a confession of faith, and 5) divine silence. The woman’s resilience and persistence comport with several of Israel’s protest/lament prayers—especially Zion’s in Lamentations 1–2. “The very boldness of the woman’s stance before Jesus has its roots in Israel’s bold stance before God in the laments.”157
Rachel and the Canaanite woman prepare us for the greatest lament in Matthew’s gospel—the Savior’s cry of dereliction on Good Friday when the Father cast him into the utmost caldron of distress. “My God. My God. Why have you forsaken me?” (Mt 27:46) Additional elements from Psalm 22 appear on Good Friday; mocking bystanders (e.g., Mt 27:27–31), thirst (Jn 19:28), and enemies casting lots for Christ’s garments (Jn 19:23–24).
Matthew also pens these words of Jesus: “Blessed are those who mourn for they shall be comforted.” (Mt 5:4) Nicolaus Wolterstorff’s comments are insightful: “The Mourners are those who have caught a glimpse of God’s new day, who ache with all their being for that day’s coming, and who break out into tears when confronted by its absence.”158 Jesus does not eliminate laments from our lives; instead, he invites us to join him in crying over a lost and dying world.
While tears are welcome in the kingdom of God, weeping and wailing are not Matthew’s first or last word. His gospel begins with the son of David, the Son of God, coming into the world. It ends with this same Son bursting the bonds and death and rising from the dead. Christ’s incarnation and resurrection provide buoyant hope for all who lament.
Romans
Is there a place for laments in Paul’s theology? Yes, especially in Romans. “The echoes of OT lament resounding throughout the letter [Romans] indicate Paul sees the experience of those justified by faith in Christ commiserate with OT lamenters.”159 Shame is a prominent theme in OT laments—a motif that comes up in Lamentations a number of times (Lam 1:21b; 2:16; 3:46, 61–63; 5:1b). Shame also appears in Roman’s programmatic statement, “For I am not ashamed (Οὐ γὰρ ἐπαισχύνομαι) of the Gospel.” (Rom 1:16) Shame rears its ugly head when Christian hope runs into the wall of experience—the life of the cross.160
Shame is one reason Paul cites Hab 2:4 in Rom 1:17. Set in the larger context of Babylonian invasions in the late seventh and early sixth century BC, Habakkuk employs distinctive lament questions, “How long” (Hab 1:2) and “Why” (Hab 1:3). Channing Crisler argues, “Since OT lament plays such a significant role in the thematic statement, it stands to reason that it will have a prominent role in the rest of Romans as well.”161
Laments direct Romans as follows.162 First, OT lamenters instruct believers in Christ on how to weather suffering and setbacks without becoming ashamed of the Gospel. Isaiah cries out (Rom 9:27) and Elijah appeals to God (Rom 11:2). Second, the Paul’s catena of OT laments in Rom 3:1–20 employs the Law—instructing the faithful how to lament their sin and turn to the Gospel, announced in Rom 3:21–28. Third, the use of a lament in Rom 15:3 points the baptized to endure insults and hardships instead of justifying and defending themselves. Lastly, while “the righteousness of God” (δικαιοσύνη θεοῦ) assures Christians of a forgiven standing before the Father, for Christ’s sake, there is still a hiddenness and mystery to how God is working all things together for good (Rom 8:28; 11:33–36). This “leads to lament which leads to hope and praise.”163 In every situation, God’s answer to laments is singular—the power of the Gospel. J.C. Beker summarizes the apostle’s approach to misery and death:
Paul is not an idealist when it comes to the reality of suffering; neither is he a spiritualist who comforts people with the thought that because of Christ’s cross suffering can and should be spiritualized, interiorized, or neglected if only we take a properly heavenly perspective and look with Platonic eyes away from this transient and corrupted world. Moreover, Paul is not a person who counsels mature resignation in the face of suffering as if it is a necessary and endemic ingredient of created life.164
Paul’s laments cry out for God to hasten his eschatological triumph when Christ returns. On that day, the Father will deliver all who call to him. They will not be put to shame. Note, for instance, God’s answer to the Pauline lament in Rom 7:24, “what a wretched man I am” with this assurance, “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” (Rom 8:1)
In Rom 8:22, 23, 26 the apostle connects creation, the elect, and the Spirit through the terms συστενάζω (“I groan”) and στεναγμοῖς (“groaning”). Cristler observes, “‘Groaning’ speaks to the intensity of the lamenters’ pain, but also their enduring hope that God would hear them.”165 Thus, Rom 8:18–30 outlines Paul’s theology of lament.
The apostle begins this section of his epistle by affirming that we cannot compare the present suffering with coming glory (Rom 8:18). He then discusses creation’s suffering and its hopeful lament (συστενάζει, Rom 8:22). Believers who have the first-fruits of the Spirit join in lamenting and groaning (συστενάζει, Rom 8:23). God does not leave us alone when we are praying in the dark. The Holy Spirit prays for us with “groanings too deep for words” (στεναγμοῖς ἀλαλήτοις, Rom 8:26).166 When pressed to the extreme, we pray Christ’s Abba prayer (Mk 14:36; Rom 8:15)—confident that as we suffer like Jesus we will be glorified with him (Rom 8:17). James Dunn maintains that our groaning is meant,
To emphasize believers’ involvement in the eschatological travail of creation … The point needs to be emphasized that the Spirit does not free from such tension, but actually creates or at least heightens that tension and brings it to more anguished expression.167
The new world has arrived in Christ and the Spirit, but this does not remove the sadness and sorrow of the old world. Just like Jesus in Gethsemane, the Father affirms us in our baptism as we wait for the vindication of our resurrection (Rom 8:23). Amid this agony and anguish, Paul bids us to utter another cry—the cry of hope. This mocks our sensibilities. Will God really renew all things? Will the barren hills sprout again with grass? Will the mountains break forth into singing and the trees clap their hands? Will my body of death be resurrected into an indestructible life? This kind of groaning connects us with our pain and the pain of the world. Robin Parry observes:
The Spirit’s groaning, while a participation in creation’s groaning, also transforms it. It is a hope-infused groaning which looks to the future with confidence. The Spirit can enable our groaning to become a participation in his groaning. That is to say, Spirit-transformed groaning is still an expression of pain at the current situation, but it is not an expression of hopelessness.168
Paul’s adversative, “but” (ἀλλά) in Rom 8:37 announces that the elect are not rejected like sheep to the slaughter (Rom 8:36). This statement comes from Ps 44:23 (EN 44:22)—the only OT lament from an innocent suffering community. What is Paul doing? He employs a lament to answer God’s apparent condemnation of the elect. In contrast to the book of Lamentations’ emphasis on covenant unfaithfulness as the reason for suffering, Christians suffer because of covenant faithfulness—just like the community praying Psalm 44, who is righteous and yet suffering. By engaging this psalm, Paul affirms the connection between the church—persecuted and even facing death—and innocent Israelites. Both OT and NT believers, “are super-triumphant” (ὑπερνικῶμεν) through God who loves us (Rom 8:37). Paul’s interplay of suffering and hope affirms God’s resolute commitment to bring life out of death—indeed resurrection and eternal life through Jesus Christ. “For in this hope we are saved.” (Rom 8:24)
Creation’s “labor pains” correspond to believers inward groans—those who have the first fruits of the Spirit (Rom 8:22–23). Living between Christ’s first and second advents, we live in lament, longing for the interlude to end. Unlike the book of Lamentations, protests and accusations do not drive our groaning. It is born instead from hope, a longing for God’s still-to-be-completed work. “Lament is not a severing of relationship with God, but takes place precisely within that relationship.”169
While the renewed creation is on its way, present circumstances are still painfully real. Governments are still corrupt. Loved ones still die. Injustice abounds. Sin rages on. Where is God in all of this? How much longer until Christ returns in glory? Yes, we can see the dawn in the eastern sky. The night has begun to yield to the first rays of a new days (Rom 13:12). Yet the sun has not arrived in all its brilliance and beauty. Laments are for this in between time—a time of waiting and anticipation, along with agony and deep longing. Robin Parry summarizes Paul’s teaching about lament in Romans 8 with these words:
This lament is not the voice of faithless, hopeless rebels who have given up on God and blaspheme him to his face. It is not the morbid moaning of miserable and weak Christians who need to pull themselves together. It can be a faithful, Spirit-inspired way of engaging with our covenant Lord and in his own feelings towards the world.170
Lamentations 4
Overview
We might think that after the sound and fury of Lamentations 1 and 2, followed by Jeremiah’s encouraging and insightful words in chapter three, that Lamentations 4 will record Yahweh’s gracious intervention. “All’s well that ends well.” That is not what happens. Chapter four does not present a quick fix that leads to a happy conclusion.
While chapter three includes the book’s Gospel crescendo (3:22–35), chapter four reverts to the motifs of anger, despair, and grief—doing an about-face from Jeremiah’s confident assertions. Lamentations 4 is an abbreviated forty-four cola acrostic: not sixty-six like the previous three chapters. This indicates that the book is moving towards denouement, like the qinah meter, it limps toward the end.171 Chapter five abandons the acrostic format—though not altogether—as it still employs twenty-two cola, thus corresponding to the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. The book ends not with a bang but a whimper. Allan Mintz comments on Lamentations 4–5:
Together, the concluding chapters represent a relaxing of the rhetorical tension and complexity of the earlier chapters, consolidating their gains and moving them toward a liturgical conclusion.172
The viewpoint of chapter four is of someone who witnessed the siege and fall of Jerusalem and who now lives its post-destruction world. His chief thrust is to recount the extreme terror of it all.
Because healing from a major trauma is a lengthy process, Jeremiah gives people ample room to relive their sorrow and rehash their deep losses. While the prophet changes roles from a proclaimer in chapter three to a reporter in chapter four, there is no doubt that he still feels their pain. Three times he invokes the expression “the daughter of my people” (Lam 4:3b, 6a, 10b; cf. Lam 2:11b; 3:48).
Adversity does not end because of Jeremiah’s breakthrough confession in 3:22–39. “Hope may lie in the future, but the present is unrelieved agony—and it must be voiced and heard.”173 Survivors are so despondent that they do not ask for anything. Prayers are absent. Dirge-like laments are very much present. Hope for reversal hangs by a thread. This is what life looks like when the empire labels you “collateral damage.”
The invading army left behind those who are economically unproductive; people too frail, too young, or too old—the feeble who have no value in the eyes of the state. Let them languish and die a slow, God-forsaken death. Babylonian engines of war abandoned civilian casualties who must live among killers in the killing fields. And the children? Oh, the children!
Hence, while Lamentations 2 depicts Zion’s architectural destruction, Lamentations 4 describes the intense misery of the city’s people. Together, both sections depict a decimated community. Recovery from such a massive destruction would be a long, protracted affair.
The first word “how could it be?” (אֵיכָה֙)—along with the chapter’s pattern of reversal—introduces a dirge.174 Yet Lamentations 4 also includes lament-like features, making it a mixed composition. The chapter portrays the disparity between Jerusalem’s storied past and its painful present—more than any other poem in the book.
Color plays a significant role in the chapter’s portrayal of suffering. The gold dims (4:1a); the high and mighty in their colorful clothing scrounge among the garbage for food (4:5b); government officials with snow-like skin, coral-like bodies, and sapphire-like beauty become blacker than soot (4:7–8a). “As the famine progresses, the colors are erased from the picture and all that remains is dullness and blackness.”175 Abnormalities became normal. Babylon transformed Jerusalem—more accurately, deformed the city—in unthinkable ways.
Everything has Grown Dim (4:1–10)
4:1 The days of Solomon were intoxicating. Everything glistened and gleamed. There were resources galore—houses filled with ivory, exotic luxuries, and there was ample silver and gold (cf. 1 Ki 10:14–25). Over the centuries Judah waxed and waned, but most of the wealth stayed intact; that is, until Babylon began knocking on the door. Then it all went up in flames. The Day of the LORD crushed Judah and Jerusalem.176 Darkness, death, and disgrace permeated everything.
Babylon exploited Jerusalem’s citizens leaving everything completely undone. As is frequent in a time of war, bystanders became expendable. “They had been as precious as gold and jewels, but now their value is dissipated, gone, reduced to the equivalent of mere-dirt.”177 Invaders treated Judeans with contempt and scorn. Death stalked unchallenged through the streets of Jerusalem, lurking around the next corner.
“Gold has grown dim; the pure gold has changed.” Pure gold does not deteriorate or lose its luster. Christopher Wright comments, “The ‘impossible’ metaphor may in itself be hinting at the shockingly impossible nature of what had happened to Judah and Jerusalem.”178 Such is the nature of an OT dirge—total loss.
4:2 Lam 4:1 leaves us wondering, what does the gold refer to? The Ark of the Covenant? The cherubim facing each other on the atonement cover? Jerusalem’s financial treasures? And what about the holy stones? Do they indicate the precious gems on the high priest’s breast-plate? Lam 4:2 clarifies things—in a disturbing way.
The stones stand for people (cf. 1 Pet 2:5). Occupying forces treat the city’s gold and fine stones, its citizens, like throwaway paper plates and plastic cups—cultural equivalents to “earthen pottery” in Jeremiah’s day. Judeans were expendable. If Babylonians assign them no value—contrary to how Yahweh views them (e.g., Pss 72:14; 116:15; Is 43:4)—the future is dark indeed.
The cherished? Discarded. The priceless? Worthless. The blessed? They are utterly cursed. Jeremiah 19—a prophetic sign act—depicts this dramatic downgrade vis-à-vis a smashed pot. “I will smash this people and this city, as one smashes a potter’s vessel.” (Jer 19:11; cf. Is 30:14). Yahweh, the Potter (Gen 2:7; Is 29:16; 45:9; 64:8), has become the Pot Breaker, shattering the work of his hands (cf. Lam 1:15b; 2:9a, 11b, 13c; 3:4, 47, 48).
Jerusalem’s Fall and Zedekiah’s Capture (4:17–20)
4:17 Lam 4:17–20 is one of the most vivid sections in the book. It begins and ends abruptly. The passage retells Jerusalem’s invasion and downfall, comporting with the historical events narrated in 2 Kgs 25:4–7. Claus Westermann comments on its peculiarity: “This interspersed segment is a motif characteristic of neither the communal lament nor the dirge.”179
Lam 4:17 transitions from concern for the maladies of the prophets and priests to Judah’s faulty political alliances, along with king Zedekiah’s capture. Much like 3:40–47, 4:17, with its first-person plural forms, prevents readers from objectifying the nightmare as if it happened only to others—thus laying the foundation for the community’s response in chapter five. “From one perspective this is a bridging device that embraces the community before it takes over the speaking.”180
With everything in Lamentations 4 that precedes this verse, it comes as no surprise that people are desperate for help as they engage in useless watching for a useless salvation. Both Jer 34:21–22 and 37:5–11 state that Judeans not once, but twice, expected Egypt to come to their defense.
The land of the Nile played to type. It failed God’s people—again. Isaiah captures the idea. “But Egypt’s help is fleeting and empty.” (Is 30:7) Hope in Egypt is always misplaced hope—disastrously so. Yahweh pledges that the Egyptian king, Pharaoh Hophra, will pay dearly for his treachery against Judah (Jer 44:30).
Judahites needed a remedial lesson in OT history. Did their ancestors not live as slaves in Egypt? Did Pharaoh Shishak not attack Jerusalem during the days of Rehoboam (1 Ki 14:25; 2 Chr 12:2–9)? Did Isaiah not utter not one, but woe-oracles against those who go down to Egypt and trust in its pharaoh (Is 30:1–2; 31:1)? Did he not liken Egypt to “a broken reed for a staff”? (Is 36:6) Did Pharaoh Necho not slay king Josiah at the battle of Megiddo (2 Ki 23:28–30; 2 Chr 35:20–24)? And in his day, did Jeremiah not warn the people that Egypt would fail them (Jer 37:5–10)? How tragic, then, are the words of Lam 4:17.
4:18 It was every man for himself. Jer 52:7–8 states the bare facts—hordes of enemy soldiers breached Jerusalem’s walls and flooded into the city. Lam 4:18–19 poetically describes the upheaval.
“Our end” … “our end.” The cry in Lam 4:18 accents the community’s overwhelming sorrow. All hope had perished (cf. 3:18). Can it get any worse than mothers eating their own children (4:10)?
Yet Judah’s “end” (Lam 4:18b) is not the end. The end is never the end—not when Yahweh is involved (cf. Lam 3:18). Jeremiah repeatedly announces that “building and planting” (Jer 1:10)—the Gospel—is Yahweh’s final word (Jer 4:27; 5:10, 17; 30:11; 46:28). Thus, Zedekiah’s capture is not the end of the Davidic monarchy. Jehoiachin rises from the ashes (2 Ki 25:27–29 = Jer 52:31–34) and God’s promises to the house of David marches on (2 Samuel 7 = 1 Chronicles 17). There may be death but there is also resurrection. There is darkness but there is also the dawn of a new day. There is Golgotha but there is Galilee—where the disciples saw their risen Lord. New morning mercies hold in life’s darkest midnight hours (Lam 3:23).
4:19 Jerusalemites waited with hope, but it was all in vain (Lam 4:17). Captors were determined to keep prisoners from walking in the streets (Lam 4:18a). They were “swifter than eagles” (Lam 4:19a) and chased Judeans up mountains and into the wilderness (Lam 4:19b). “Like birds of prey, their pursuers fall with incalculable speed and precision upon their quarry.”181 There was no escape. There was no place to hide. Invaders rounded up survivors like cattle. For the historical details, see 2 Ki 25:3–7= Jer 52:7–11.
Lam 4:18–19 describe Babylonians feverishly hunting people down. Jeremiah could relate—literally. In 3:52–54 enemies also pursued, caught, and threw him into a watery pit. The prophet then cried out, “I am cut off.” Jeremiah called on Yahweh’s name (3:55) who heard his voice (3:56), came near, and said, “Do not fear” (3:56). Since God did it for Jeremiah he will do it for Judahites.
4:20 The book of Lamentations describes the loss of Jerusalem’s populace, the city’s celebrated buildings, Solomon’s temple, and now the monarchy—the final nail in the coffin. Davidic promises looked like a chopped-up, burned-out tree (Is 6:13). Occupying forces captured Zedekiah; sentenced, blinded, shackled, and led him into exile. And just like that, the monarchy ended. “What future could there possibly be for a people without their city, their temple, their king and (as it must have seemed) without their God?”182
Davidic kings were invincible—or so Judeans thought. By divine decree, the Davidide became Yahweh’s son (Ps 2:7). Would Zedekiah be this messiah? Would he usher in the glories and victories of Israel’s ancient longings? Not even close. Imagine shock waves rippling through Jerusalem. “Our king has been captured!” Although 2 Chr 36:13 states that Nebuchadnezzar made Zedekiah “swear an oath by God,” Judah’s last monarch quickly rebelled against the Babylonians and hardened his heart toward Yahweh.183 Divine promises appeared forever negated.
How could this be? What happened to God’s pledge in 2 Sam 7:16 where he says to David, “Your house and your kingship shall forever be secure … your throne shall be established forever”? With Zedekiah blinded and deported, his sons arrested and slaughtered, and not even a puppet king on Judah’s throne, everything looked over, done, finished, foreclosed forever.
The Babylonians seized Zedekiah and that was that. We can hear the pathos in Psalm 89. The prayer begins by celebrating God’s eternal steadfast-love, faithfulness, and covenant with David who is Yahweh’s “firstborn” and “the most exalted king in the world” (Ps 89:28 [EN 89:27]). Reflecting Ps 2:7, Ps 89:27 (EN 89:26) affirms that God is even David’s “Father.” After extoling these divine commitments to the house of David, Ps 89:39 (EN 89:38) adds a startling “but now.” The poem’s mood suddenly shifts to blame Yahweh for everything gone wrong. God rejected his oath to the house of David; renounced his covenant; and defiled the royal crown (Ps 89:39–40 [EN 89:38–39)]. Cities lie in ruins and there are no more Davidic kings (Ps 89:41–46 [EN 89:40–45). The prayer ends entreating God to reverse his curse and restore David’s dynasty. While Lam 4:20 ends with Zedekiah’s capture, the chopping down of the royal tree (Is 6:13) was not God’s final act. From the burned-out stump comes a new Davidide (Is 11:1)—Jesus our Lord (Mt 1:1).
Zedekiah’s capture (2 Kgs 25:6–9 = Jer 52:6–9; cf. Jer 39:1–10) prefigures Christ’s betrayal and arrest in Gethsemane.184 Lamentations, therefore, has been theologically dated on “the Holy Saturday of Israel’s life, caught between exilic death at the hands of Babylon and the desperate, though fragile, hope for resurrection.”185 What follows in Lam 4:21–22 is Jeremiah’s promise of salvation that portends Christ’s victory over death and the grave—as well as his final advent when as a Bridegroom he will return—bringing with him the New Jerusalem—to claim his Bride, the church (Rev 21:2).
To review: Lamentations 4 explores the theme of radical reversal, of the impossible becoming possible, e.g., tarnished gold, parents not feeding their children, the rich eating trash, healthy bodies emaciated, a fortress city invaded and conquered, despicable prophets and priests, and a captured king. Lam 4:21–22, however, turns the tables again with a stunning Gospel promise. How could it be any different with Yahweh?
Lamentations and Surviving Trauma
Introduction
Men carrying machine guns load women and children into trucks, drive them to a mass grave, then riddle their bodies with bullets. Godless governments trap citizens in abject poverty with no way out. Infants are frantic for formula, orphans are longing for a home, young mothers are trafficked as sex slaves, and entire countries are on the brink of economic collapse.
When we consider all the evil—the pornography industry, the ideology of terror, rampant greed, the enduring impacts of alcoholism—it is tempting to hang our heads in frustration, shrug our shoulders, and get on with life as best we can. Overwhelming evidence shows that pillaging weeds of unrighteousness are winning the day.
Our response? Tune out. Numb out. Check out.
Is there a better way? Yes. Lamentations. While the historical context of the book is the immediate aftermath of 587 BC, Kathleen O’Connor maintains, “The power of its poetry can embrace the sufferings of any whose bodies and spirits are worn down and assaulted, whose boundaries have shrunk, who are trapped, and who face foreclosed futures.”186
Lamentations and Trauma Studies
One popular view on working through trauma comes from Elizabeth K_ü_bler-Ross and her 1969 book On Death and Dying. She made famous this five-point process following loss: 1) denial and isolation, 2) rage and anger, 3) bargaining, 4) depression, and 5) acceptance.187 Kübler-Ross advanced this model based upon her study on how bereaved people coped with the loss of loved ones. She did not ground it upon empirical research.188 Originally Kübler-Ross intended her taxonomy to describe steps for people facing their own death but it quickly morphed into a process on how to cope with any kind deep trauma. Note, for instance, that Paul Joyce follows Kübler-Ross’ paradigm in his outline of Lamentations: chapter one, denial and isolation; chapter two, anger; chapter three, bargaining; chapter four depression; and chapter five acceptance.189
Dalit Rom-Shiloni doubts that reactions to trauma are so linear.190 Others agree that it is dubious to think people experience the stages of grief in such a strictly sequential manner.191 Moving beyond K_ü_bler-Ross, in 1980 the American Psychiatric Association added the term “post-traumatic stress disorder” (PTSD) to its diagnostic manual.192 Kathleen O’Connor describes trauma with these words:
It so overwhelms the capacities of victims to take in, that the violence cannot be absorbed as it is happening. Traumatic violence comes as a shocking blow, a terrifying disruption of normal mental processes, distorting reality, even as it becomes the only reality.193
PTSD describes combat veterans, battered women, rape survivors, and abused children. It characterizes people ruled by tyrants—tyrants who rule nations and tyrants who rule families. “Long after the danger is past, traumatized people relive the event as though it were continually recurring in the present. They cannot resume the normal course of their lives, for the trauma repeatedly interrupts.”194
Those with PTSD become frozen in time. Memories become indelibly etched in their minds—they replay the nightmare repeatedly. They rehash traumatic moments not only in their thinking, but even in their dreaming. “Even though I am here, I know that the smallest thing—a song, a sound, a smell—can send me back there.”195
Trauma destroys people’s capacity to tell their story. They have snapshots and memories—even smells and tastes—but they cannot put them together. It is a bunch of mumbo-jumbo.
Selective amnesia appears as the only way to function. “Hear, say, and speak no evil.” Those suffering with PTSD draw a curtain between the past and the present. Insidiously, perpetrators encourage—and in some cases insist—on secrecy and silence. When this fails, they launch attacks against the credibility of the victim. “She had it coming!” “How could you believe his story?” “What an exaggeration!” “They’re making this up!” Powerful forces render victims voiceless, unable to talk about their pain. There is a term for this—shellshocked.
As part of a growing interest in interdisciplinary work, late in the twentieth century trauma studies entered the field of the OT.196 Quite naturally, the book of Lamentations—among other OT books like Jeremiah and Ezekiel—are now frequently identified as “trauma literature.”197 Why is the focus so much on Lamentations?
The book replays memories of cannibalism (2:20b; 4:10), famine (e.g., 1:11a-b; 2:12b; 4:4–8), rape (1:10a-b; 5:11), the complete dismantling of a city (2:1–10) and her people (e.g., 4:1–10). Other symptoms of PTSD include the lack of consolation and comfort (1:2b, 9b, 16b, 17a, 21a) and overwhelming grief (e.g., 1:22c; 5:15).
Survivors were shocked (1:1a; 2:1a; 4:1a, 2b), isolated (e.g., 1:1a; 2c), had memories of better days (1:7a-b), and felt deep shame (1:8a-b). They were stuck in silence (2:10a), bargaining (2:18–19; 3:40–42), anger (2:20), denial (3:39), weeping (3:48–51), and blaming (4:12–13; 5:7). Warfare brutalizes people while numbing and deadening their hearts. “A single traumatic event can occur almost anywhere. Prolonged, repeated trauma, by contrast, occurs only in circumstances of captivity.”198 And Babylonians had Judeans right where they wanted them—completely subjected.
But the empire could not take away Jeremiah’s pen. The prophet gives meaning to pain, words to replace silence, and he resurrects personal agency. “Medically, the binding up of the mental wounds caused by suffering is every bit as important as healing the sufferer’s physical wounds.”199
Jeremiah encourages us not to deny the past; nor to get stuck in it; instead, he invites us to work through our past. “Sharing the traumatic experience with others is a precondition for the restitution of a sense of a meaningful world.”200 But how? Trauma often prevents survivors from constructing a story about their experiences. They might have “snapshots” of moments, feelings, smells, tastes, sounds, but they are unable to put them together into a sequence that would explain what happened to them and why. “[Trauma] stops the chronological clock and fixes the moment permanently in memory and imagination.”201
Judith Herman suggests that,
Recovery unfolds in three stages. The central task of the first stage is the establishment of safety. The central task of the second stage is remembrance and mourning. The central task of the third stage is reconnection with ordinary life.202
None of this happens in a linear manner. The general development, though, is from fear to security, from denial to acceptance, from stigmatized detachment to community connections. Describing feelings is important in every stage. “Finding a language for pain is one of the needs of those afflicted.”203
Often distress silences speech. It robs us of words. When we do not talk through trauma, we become slaves to emotions we neither understand nor can control. However, by giving us words that echo our feelings, Lamentations becomes our way out of despondence and despair. The book’s words are God’s words given to heal and make us whole. “Yhwh does not command shutting up when we feel let down.”204 We can cry out to God in agony. We do not need to hide from God. We can scream in anger to God, against God, and finally with God, who in Jesus shares our laments and sorrows. “We must allow the film to roll, and dare to watch it.”205
Through the ages, Lamentations has helped the faithful survive disasters by giving them a way to express shock and sadness. The book summons us to express our pent-up frustrations and put them on the table in a safe and loving environment. In doing so, negative emotions begin to lose their power and, little by little, we find that we can, in fact, deal with our trauma. “Lamentations can melt frozen and numbed spirits.”206
Naming the Pain
Denial dismisses pain. It puts on a happy face. It saddles up and keeps on riding. This was Judah’s response to Babylon’s impending invasion (Jer 5:21; 6:14; 8:11). Scott Ellington maintains:
So strong is the need to hold on to a stable rendering of reality that the one suffering may even be willing to commit intellectual, moral, and emotional suicide in order to preserve an ordered world, regardless of its flaws.207
Living in the land of make-believe creates even more angst and anguish. Choosing fiction over reality never works—but that does not keep us from trying to beat the odds. We avoid facing the music, getting honest, and naming our pain. Herman writes, “The typical response to atrocity and trauma is to banish them from consciousness. Certain violations of the social contract are too terrible to allow them to come to consciousness or to be uttered aloud.”208
Denial finds a million ways to cope with painful memories—overeating, overdrinking, overworking, overexercising, overspending. Nicolaus Wolterstorff writes:
To voice suffering, one must name it—identify it. Sometimes that is difficult, even impossible. The memories are repressed so that the suffering is screened from view. Or one is aware of it, in a way; but naming it, identifying it for what it is, would be too painful, too embarrassing.209
Lamentations refuses to whitewash what happened. The book spells out Judah’s demise in great detail. Following Jeremiah’s lead, we can name our pain; lament our loss; face our failures; and refuse to live in denial. Truth begins to surface. The past begins to loosen its iron grip. “Laments are the beginning of action, a rejection of passivity, and so they can invert despair.”210 Jeremiah’s five poems expose wounds to the healing power of the Gospel.
This is Daughter Zion’s experience. She finds her voice, slowly at first (Lam 1:9c; 11c)—then with a fury, she emerges full of words (Lam 1:12–15b, 16, 18–22; 2:20–22). In chapter five, first-person speech cascades like a mountain river during a spring thaw. F.W. Dobbs-Allsopp maintains:
For those who come to Lamentations hurting and struck dumb by suffering’s cruel ravages, not only do they find comfort in the knowledge that they do not suffer alone, but they also find, unbidden, a language for their suffering.211
It is liberating to allow suppressed emotions and voices to surface; to tell our story—the good, the bad, and the ugly. It may seem paradoxical, but we need to experience grief in order to alleviate grief. The thought feeling the pain of our past may seem daunting, but through Lamentations we come to realize that this is the balm that heals our ruptured souls. Kathleen O’Connor writes, “Lamentations can be a resource for the work of reclaiming our humanity, for breaking through our denial, personal and social, and for teaching us compassion.”212 The book helps us step out of shaming shadows and into the light of God’s love in Christ Jesus.
We may think we are finished with our past, but our past is not finished with us. Lynn Caine writes about grieving widows: “Until they can talk, they have not really started on the road to recovery.”213 Lamentations expresses and values our wounds and empowers us—like Daughter Zion and Jeremiah—to give free reign to the pain bottled up inside. June Dickie maintains: “Lament can facilitate physiological healing in the brain, allowing toxic memories to be properly processed and stored in the past, no longer to intrude as disturbing flashbacks.”214 God accepts us when we are angry, upset, and drenched with tears.
There is no other way forward. Only the truth sets us free. Lamenting “enables individuals and communities to break with the past without forgetting it.”215 And if we do not? “Pain kept from speech, pushed underground and denied, will turn and twist and tunnel like a ferret until it grows in those lightless spaces into a violent, unrecognizable monster.”216 Is that putting it too strongly? Not at all. “When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all the day.” (Ps 32:3)
To survive, people need language. By retelling the trauma survivors are able to integrate it, process it, and move on from it. “It is not the experience of loss that becomes the defining moment of our lives … It is how we respond to loss that matters.”217 And if we do not narrativize our feelings? The event becomes toxic. It is not a memory, it is an ongoing nightmare.
Telling stories is how Lamentations moves us from trauma to healing. “Voiced hurt already contains the seeds of life revived and resurrected.”218 Learning about sorrow is a significant factor in healing from the past building resilience to survive future heartbreaks.
Conclusions
Trauma happens. It happens to us all. “Why? Why did he leave me? Why did she have to die so young? Why did I lose all that money? Why does my job continue to cause me so much anxiety? Why? Why? Why?”
When traumatized, it is almost impossible to remain calm and clearheaded. It is even more difficult to find words that describe what happened. Yet to reclaim our future, we need to verbalize our past. “The ordinary response to atrocities is to banish them from consciousness. Certain violations of the social compact are too terrible to utter aloud: this is the meaning of the word unspeakable.”219
If we are going to lament we need to give up the idea that we need to get over our losses as quickly as possible. Our faulty thinking goes like this. “If I can learn the right coping skills, follow these ten steps, pull this lever, push that button, then my pain will subside in no time.”
Biblical laments look at this with great pessimism. Jeremiah calls purveyors of quick healing quacks and fakes (cf. Jer 6:14; 8:11). He rejects superficial solutions. By writing Lamentations, the prophet insists that we take the past seriously. Dig it up. Remember it well. First things first. Shattering then hope. Weeping then joy. Death then resurrection. Emmanuel Katongole and Chris Rice maintain:
To the extent that we are not shattered, we do not hope. There is in lament a desperation—even more, a demand—for something deeper, something beyond, something new. Those who are not easily consoled have entered a place of restlessness. They’ve opened their hands to accept a different vision. They are now ready to receive a better hope.220
This is the way of Jesus. He welcomes honesty. “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Mt 5:4) The Greek word, translated “mourn,” suggests a sorrow that begins in the heart, takes possession of the entire person, and is outwardly manifested. This is far from superficial and sentimental sorrow.
The only healthy way to address pain is to go through it_._ “I walk through the valley of the shadow death.” (Ps 23:4) God pours out immeasurable comfort and consolation on those who mourn—on people who walk through their sorrows. “Remembering and telling the truth about terrible events are prerequisites both for the social order and for the healing of individual victims.”221
There is something very godly about acknowledging our deep distress. In Gen 6:6 God the Father looks at the sin of the world in Noah’s day, and his heart is grieved. In Lk 19:41, Jesus approaches Jerusalem and weeps over the city. In Eph 4:30 Paul writes sin grieves the Holy Spirit.
When we are tempted to appear super-Christian or super-pastor—a façade that will surely fail us—the book of Lamentations invites us to be honest, to be human. “Cast your burden upon Yahweh and he will sustain you.” (Ps 55:23 [EN 55:22])
Lamentations 5
Overview Lamentations 4 depicts the Babylonian siege of Jerusalem and its aftermath. Chapter five describes in fuller detail the hell of those who were left to live under the empire’s heavy boot. “The body of the chapter can best be read as a portrait of occupation and the deprivation, humiliation, and frustration that accompany it.”222 Jeremiah 39–43 details these miserable years following the initial shock of Jerusalem’s demise.
Judeans not deported to Babylon lived in social, political, religious, and political chaos. It became the longest of nights. “Physical necessities, personal safety, honor, and human dignity—all have buckled and collapsed along with the city’s buildings and walls.”223
In chapters one and two, daughter Zion enables individual sufferers to give voice to their torment. This keeps people from feeling subsumed into a larger faceless and nameless corporate totality. Now, in Lamentations 5, the book swings its pendulum the other way—assuring sixth-century Judahites that they do not suffer alone.224 Jeremiah reaches his goal. The people pray. Yahweh does not immediately answer their prayer. He does, however, finally respond with resplendent Gospel promises in Isaiah 40–55.225 Jeremiah, then, functions like Elihu, whose poetic discourse brings Yahweh and Job together (Job 32–38).
While survivors protest in Lamentations 1–4, the book ends with repentance and supplication—the shortest and least acrostic chapter in the book.226 It does not sequentially follow the Hebrew alphabet like Lamentations 1–4. Elaine James observes, “By abandoning the form, the poem refuses the closure that the alphabetic acrostic implies.”227 Jeremiah leaves so much unresolved at the end of the book. The land is still in the possession of the enemy (5:2) children and mothers are still destitute (5:3), Babylonian oppression is still wreaking havoc (5:8), starvation is still raging (5:10), women are still getting raped (5:11), and both the old (5:12, 14) and the young (5:13) are still distained. “Still” is the dreadful adverb.
Also distinguishing Lamentations 5 from the book’s first four chapters is that, while the latter talk about Yahweh, chapter five speaks directly to Yahweh. Moreover, Lamentations 5 is half as long as chapter four and a third as long as chapters one, two, and three. Neither does chapter five display the qinah (lament, 3 + 2) meter; its cola tends to balance with one another (3 + 3)—the normal meter in Hebrew poetry where the second colon furthers and intensifies the first. Moreover, unlike the book’s first four chapters, in chapter five there are no direct accusations towards Yahweh and only one voice speaks—the community’s. Finally, Lamentations 5 is the most consistent chapter in the book, expressing just one genre—communal lament. These distinctions prompted a handful of ancient versions to differentiate the chapter from the rest of the book. Several copies of the LXX and Vulgate begin the chapter with “A Prayer” or “A Prayer of Jeremiah.”
Lamentations’ acrostics end with chapter five—although it displays twenty-two lines, one for each letter of the Hebrew alphabet. As more characteristic Hebrew parallelism increases, the unbalance and enjambment, so prevalent in Lamentations 1–4, decreases. Chapter five is also much more like standard communal laments in, e.g., Psalms 44, 60, 74, 79, 80, and 83. Additionally, Lamentations 5 is the only chapter in the book that begins with a prayer.228 It also ends in a prayer addressed to Yahweh (5:21–22).
Taken together, all these differences between Lamentations 1–4 with Lamentations 5 announce the book’s conclusion—thus reflecting Moses’ five books, Genesis–Deuteronomy. And, just as Moses’ death (Deuteronomy 34) is not Israel’s end, neither is Lamentations 5. A new day will most certainly dawn (Lam 3:23).
Of the 134 Hebrew words in Lamentations 5, thirty-four are first-person plural (נוּ) forms. “The grammar of survival requires pronouns.”229 Lamentations was composed to be a public prayer and included into corporate worship. It is not a book reserved for prayer closets.
Commentary
A Cry to Yahweh (5:1)
5:1 Lamentations 4 is the only chapter in the book that does not directly address Yahweh. That changes immediately in chapter five with its first two words, “Remember, Yahweh.” Lamentations 5 also ends with an address to Yahweh (5:19).230 What is behind the chapter’s expressions of pain? Babylon conquered Jerusalem—the main gist of Lamentations 1–4. And now? The perpetrators of evil occupy the city.
Jeremiah and Zion (the community) join in prayer.231 They are stronger together than they are separately. Dobbs-Allsopp maintains, “The possibility of survival imagined within Lamentations is one that can only ultimately happen in the midst and through the agency of Others, of community.”232 God made us in his image (Gen 1:26), therefore just as the Father, Son, and Spirit form a community, so he intends people to live life with others. This is truer when we walk through a season of suffering. Judith Herman writes:
The core experiences of psychological trauma are disempowerment and disconnection from others. Recovery, therefore, is based upon the empowerment of the survivor and the creation of new connections.233
Lam 5:1—with its command “remember”—does not imply that Yahweh is oblivious to his people’s plight, though they believe he has been acting this way. Lam 3:44 exhibits the same dilemma, describing Yahweh as wrapped in a cloud so no prayer can pass through to him. “To ask God to remember a distressful situation is to ask God to remedy it.”234
There are three imperatives in Lam 5:1, “remember,” “take note,” and “see.” Consider these texts from the book of Exodus. “God heard their groans and God remembered his covenant.” (Ex 2:24). “God saw the sons of Israel and God knew.” (Ex 2:25) What should we make of these connections? Jeremiah places his community’s story within the exodus story. And the exodus story says, “God knew.” God knew what? Moses urges us to keep reading. The answer comes when Yahweh says, “I know his (Israel’s) pains” (Ex 3:7) God then summons Moses to save the Hebrew slaves from Egypt’s iron fist. By Exodus 14 they are free. This is how God delt with Egypt. This is how God will deal with Babylon. So go ahead, pray boldly for deliverance and salvation are on the way.
The NT describes broken and hurting people who, in like manner, command Jesus to heal their diseases and defects (e.g., Mt 9:27; 15:22; 17:15; 20:30–31; Mk 10:47–48; Lk 17:13; 18:39). Without exception, the Savior responded with compassion and restoration.
The prayer in Lam 5:1 ends with a plea for Yahweh to “see our disgrace.” Enemies asked rhetorically, and with great glee, “Where is their God?” (Ps 79:10) Further mention of scoffing and shaming at this time in Israel’s history comes in, e.g., Pss 74:10, 18, 22; 79:12. Belittling runs rampant throughout Lamentations (e.g., Lam 1:7d; 2:15–16; 3:61; 4:21a)—engulfing Judean survivors and bringing them to their knees.235 They complain both about their loss of status and their feelings of shame (e.g., Pss 79:4; 89:42, 51 [EN 89:41, 50]; 123:3, 4).
5:19 Lam 5:18 mourns the loss of Zion, and with it the loss of Yahweh’s presence. Everything is hopeless. It looked like Israel’s God lost to Marduk and the Babylonian pantheon. Nevertheless! There is hope! How so? The first two words of 5:19, “You Yahweh.” The differences between 5:18 and 5:19 are astounding. God is still God. Christopher Wright maintains:
From the lowest point of Israel’s degradation—the desolation and defilement of Mount Zion (God’s address on earth, as it were), we are catapulted to the highest place in (or rather beyond) the universe—the enduring throne of God.236
Yahweh affirms Solomon’s temple. It was his idea. However, Yahweh was not bound to his temple. He could not be tied down to one place. “‘Do I not fill heaven and earth?’ declares Yahweh.” (Jer 23:23) He is both the God of the heavens above and on the earth below (Deut 4:39; Josh 2:11; 1 Ki 8:23). While God’s earthly temple lays in ruins, his heavenly temple is still intact. From there he remains enthroned as King of the Universe. “The temple may be destroyed but God’s throne is indestructible.”237 Nothing can knock Yahweh off his royal seat, “from generation to generation” (Lam 5:19). God is not only in control. He has his people’s plight under control.
With 5:19–22 we come to the book’s conclusion—the tone is both hopeful and uncertain. “The ending of Lamentations is not one of giving up on God, nor of the triumph of despair. Equally, it is not one of resolution. The book ends with a plea for restoration.”238
5:21 “Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me.” (Ps 51:12 [EN 51:10]). The emphasis in Lam 3:40 is for people to turn to Yahweh (cf. Deut 4:29–30; 30:2–3). Just the opposite comes in Lam 5:21. The plea is for Yahweh to turn to his people (cf. Zech 1:3).
Abandoned by lovers and friends (Lam 1:2b-c, 19a) the Judean remnant echoes these words: “I will return to my first husband for it was better for me then than now.” (Hos 2:9 [EN 2:7]). Yahweh empowers Israel’s return—indeed, he allures his people and speaks upon their heart (Hos 2:16 [EN 2:14]).
Yahweh hid his face because of his people’s evil deeds (Jer 33:5; Micah 3:4). Their iniquities built a wall that separated them from their God (Is 59:2). Judean survivors anguish over the lack of divine presence because of their sin (e.g., Pss 44:24 [EN 44:23]; 74:1, 10; 89:47 [EN 89:46]). Like Job (Job 19:25), Asaph (Ps 73:25), Habakkuk (Hab 3:17–19), and Paul (Rom 8:38–39), Lam 5:21 affirms that having Yahweh is enough. He is more than enough.
Lam 5:21 announces that if the people are going to turn around, God must take the initiative. And according to Deut 30:6, he will. “Yahweh your God will circumcise your heart and the heart of your offspring, so that you will love Yahweh your God with all your heart and with all your soul, that you may live.” If the relationship is to continue its up to Yahweh.
5:22 The Judean remnant had come to the end of their rope. Paradoxically, though, this is where healing begins—for them and for us. Admitting that we are powerless puts us in the right place—the place where renewed hope is born. “A broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” (Ps 51:19 [EN 51:17]) “Yahweh is close to the brokenhearted and saves those crushed in spirit.” (Ps 34:19 [EN 34:18]).
Throughout Lamentations, emotions are expressed. Complaints aired. Tears shed. Protests conveyed. Cries shouted. Petitions prayed. And God? He is “quick to listen, slow to speak” (James 1:19) We do not often connect this verse to Yahweh, yet he is the world’s perfect listener. For five chapters God refuses to interrupt, correct, impede, shame, or scold. He lets his people have their say.
But we still expect Yahweh to say something—anything. Instead, Lamentations presents one of the most abrupt endings in Holy Scripture. “Even if you have totally rejected us; [and] you are angry with us greatly.” This conclusion is right up there with Is 66:24 (the corpses of evil doers are an abhorrent to all flesh), Jonah 4:11 (God questions Jonah and the prophet does not respond), as well as Acts 28:31 (Luke does not tell us what happened in Paul’s appeal to Caesar).
Lam 5:22 is one of the most jarring—indeed, one the of most difficult—verses in the Bible. It is an end without an ending. Nothing is resolved. Alan Minz writes, “The prayerful turning to God at the close of Lamentations represents, after all that has passed, a remarkable achievement; but it remains starkly unilateral.”239
In other OT laments, God responds (e.g., Psalms 60, 108). He directly addresses Jeremiah when the prophet weeps (Jer 11:18–12:6; 15:10–21). Then there is Job. Yahweh shows up in the storm (Job 38:1) and fires off ninety questions (Job 38:2 – 41:26 [EN 41:34]). Job becomes the speechless one, not God. But in the book of Lamentations? Nothing. Not a word. Kathleen O’Connor observes, “God does not speak, does not respond, does not heal, does not ‘see.’”240 Heaven is hushed. The divine does not speak. Lamentation is, by design, an open text.241
Though we overhear Yahweh’s voice in Lam 3:57, “Do not be afraid,” he never says anything directly in Lamentations. Why does he stay silent? Why not speak in the storm like Job 38:1—with a spectacular show of power and wisdom? Why not answer similar to Isaiah 65 when he responds to the lament in Is 63:7–64:11 (EN 64:12)? Lamentation’s divine silence is shocking. It is shocking, not only in light of OT laments that Yahweh often answers, but also when we look at Mesopotamian city laments, where deities often respond to people’s cries. Note, for instance, the god Enlil “speaks a friendly word” in “The Lamentation over the Destruction of Sumer and Ur” ANET, 619). Even in Mesopotamian city-laments pagan gods answer and restore ruins.242
Yahweh’s refusal to talk at the end of Lamentations comports with Christ’s lament in Gethsemane (e.g., Mt 26:36–46; Mk 14:26–31). Divine abandonment escalated at the cross and the Savior’s cry of dereliction (e.g., Mk 15:34). Jesus knows all about the utter angst of God’s silence. As C.S. Lewis writes, there are times when God is “so very absent a help in times of trouble.”243
Lamentations ends open-ended as it waits—indeed, longs—for God to speak. And he does! Oh my! He does! Isaiah 40–55 rings forth with Gospel affirmations.244 “‘Comfort, comfort my people,’ says your God. Speak upon the heart of Jerusalem and call out to her, ‘Truly her servitude/warfare is finished, truly her iniquity is paid for, truly she received from Yahweh’s hand double for all her sins.’” (Is 40:1–2) At last, the longed for comfort (Lam 1:2b, 9b, 16b, 17a, 21a) arrives.
Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55
Introduction
The literary term for Lamentations’ abrupt ending is called a “gap.”245 The expression refers to a “lack of information about the world. It is an event, motive, causal link, character trait, plot structure or law of probability contrived by a temporal displacement.”246 A gap invites readers to ponder how to complete it. When we come to the end of Lam 5:22, we should not rush to fill its gap. Rebekah Eklund observes:
Reading books for their own narrative integrity is a good practice. Just as we shouldn’t leap too quickly to the ‘hope and praise’ stage of a lament, we should resist the temptation to allow Isaiah to resolve all of Lamentations’ pain too neatly. Listen respectfully and in solidarity with the wounded and outraged voices of Lamentations’ victims. Sit awhile in silence with them.247
Responding to Lam 5:22 the next day might be too fast, yet this is how the Jewish ti__š’â bĕ’ āb liturgy reacts. In the worship rite that mourns the atrocities of 587 BC, the following morning a lector reads Is 40:1, “Comfort, comfort, my people”—thus linking Lamentations with Isaiah 40–55.248
There is no doubt that Yahweh will acknowledge Zion’s prayers. He has spoken in the past. He will keep speaking in the future. This is a central teaching in the book of Lamentations. Yahweh issued orders and commands in former days which Jeremiah reiterates (Lam 1:17b, 18a, 21c; 2:17a-b; 3:37–38). Also note these illusions and echoes of earlier OT texts that are ongoing; Zion’s beauty (Lam 2:15c; cf. Pss 48:2 [EN 48:1]; 50:2), the Day of the LORD (Lam 1:12c, 21c; 2:1c, 21c; cf. Is 2:6–22; Amos 5:18), as well as Israel’s creed (Lam 3:22–23; cf. Ex 34:6). The point is clear. “The grass withers and flower fades, but the Word of our God stands forever.” (Is 40:8) Yahweh will speak again.
How can we be so sure? Israel’s God has a proven record when it comes to answering laments. He responded to Israel’s first lament (Ex 2:23–25) with the exodus (Exodus 14); to David’s plaint (Ps 22:2–22 [EN 22:1–21]) with songs of deliverance (Ps 22:23–32 [EN 22:22–31]): and to Job’s protests (Job 3–37) with a stunning theophany in the storm (Job 39–41:26 [EN 41:34]).
What about the tears, cries, and protests in the book of Lamentations? “You [Yahweh] will arise and you will have mercy on Zion for [it is] time to show her favor; the appointed time has come.” (Ps 102:14 [EN 102:13]) The appointed time is after the exile and the appointed author is Isaiah—specifically, chapters forty through fifty-five in his book.
Though chronologically earlier than Lamentations, Isaiah 40–55 explodes with divine mercy and favor. Lamentations Rabbah 36.2—a Jewish Midrash—puts it this way: “All the severe prophecies that Jeremiah prophesied against Israel were anticipated and healed by Isaiah.”
The influence runs from Isaiah to Lamentations. Jeremiah composed Lamentations with Isaiah in hand.249
Isaiah’s vocabulary, quotations, connections, echoes, and allusions in chapters 40–55 are too numerous to be coincidental. “Viewed against Zion’s literary history, Second Isaiah’s poems of Zion come alive as a sequel to her story in Lamentations.”250 Yahweh responds to the enormity of Zion’s pain with empathy, tenderness, and deep compassion.
Beginning with Lam. Rab. 1:21, Jewish readers of the OT have identified textual connections between Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55. Their liturgical readings before and after ti__š’â bĕ’ āb highlight Isaiah 40–63. Three Sabbath readings that lead up to ti__š’â bĕ’ āb are Jer 1:1–2:3, 2:4–28, and Is 1:1–27— called the haftaroth of rebuke. The haftaroth of consolation for the seven Sabbaths after the holiday derives from Isaiah 40–63.251 Elsie Stern describes the liturgy as follows: “After six weeks of proffered (and implicitly rejected) consolation, Israel, speaking through the prophetic texts, accepts divine consolation (Is 61:10).”252
Within the Christian faith, Max Löhr was an early proponent of the links between Isaiah 40–55 and the book of Lamentations.253 Norman Gottwald furthered the discussion.254 Todd Linafelt writes, “To imagine a healing, a restoration, that is rooted in the rhetoric of destruction found in Lamentations is to imagine a rhetoric of survival that matches it in intensity. The poetry of Second Isaiah takes for itself exactly this task.”255 Patricia Tull-Willey likewise sees connections, especially between Is 49:1–54:17 and all five chapters of Lamentations.256
This literary feature is termed intertextuality, a term coined by Julia Kriseva who maintained that, “Any text is constructed as a mosaic of quotations; any text is the absorption and transformation of another.”257 Richard Hayes calls intertextuality, “the imbedding of fragments of an earlier text within a later one.”258 Texts, and textual fragments, reappear as quotes, allusions, and echoes. In her classic work, Susan Handelman maintains, “Texts echo, interact, and interpenetrate.”259 These are apt descriptions for how Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55 interact with each other.
Yahweh Comforts Zion
The repeated plaint in Lamentations 1 is that Zion has no comforter (Lam 1:2b, 9b, 16b, 17a, 21a). The entire book throbs with pain as its poems fear that Yahweh has abandoned his people. Typical are these words in Lam 5:20: “Why did you forget (תִּשְׁכָּחֵ֔נוּ) us forever? (Why) do you abandon (תַּֽעַזְבֵ֖נוּ) us for length of days?” Is 49:14 echoes these sentiments as the prophet quotes Zion, “Yahweh abandoned me (עֲזָבַ֣נִי); the Lord has forgotten me (שְׁכֵחָֽנִי).” Similarly, Is 54:11 describes Zion as “afflicted, storm-tossed, and not comforted (לֹ֣א נֻחָ֑מָה).”
Could Yahweh ever forget Zion? Not on your life! He launches into a restoration project with a two-fold command of comfort (Is 40:1). The promise recurs in Is 49:13; 51:3, 12, 19; 52:9; 54:11. Yahweh does not deny Zion’s sorrow. Neither does he side-skirt the issue or argue that the Babylonian onslaught was not that bad. Yes, there was wrath, but all the more there is abounding mercy. Robin Parry writes:
The emphasis in Lamentations on pain, sorrow, groaning, desolation, bereavement, wrath, and death is balanced in Isaiah with its emphasis on compassion, comfort, redemption, joy, and salvation.260
Yahweh’s response to Zion’s feelings of abandonment is clear, “Does a woman forget (הֲתִשְׁכַּ֤ח) her nursing child, so that she has no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these forget (תִשְׁכַּ֔חְנָה), yet I will not forget you (אֶשְׁכָּחֵֽךְ).” (Is 49:15) Yahweh did dissert Zion—but only for a moment (Is 54:7). Now, however, in everlasting love he has compassion on her (Is 54:8). “While Zion spoke much in Lamentations and YHWH was silent, in Second Isaiah Zion speaks little and YHWH proves positively loquacious.”261
Zion’s Children
In Lamentations, Jeremiah only employs the marriage metaphor once (Lam 1:1b). Why? Because Zion’s greatest sorrow is the loss of her children. “Is any pain like my pain?” she cries out in despair (Lam 1:12b). Babylonians marched her descendants into exiled (Lam 1:5c) and executed others with a sword (Lam 1:20c; 2:21a-b). Children died in the city squares (Lam 2:11c) and upon the bosoms of their mothers (Lam 2:12). The enemy destroyed some (2:22c), while desperate mothers cannibalized others (2:20b; 4:10). Pictures of dead offspring and distraught mothers permeate the book.
Voices throughout Lamentations call for God to avenge this barbarity (Lam 1:21–22; 3:58–66; 4:21–22). In Isaiah 47 Yahweh pledges to do just that—judge those responsible. God will punish the Babylonians and vindicate his people. Carlene Mandolfo writes, “The violence she (Babylon) has perpetrated against Zion will redound upon her, she will be stripped naked and shamed (Is 47:3)—familiar language from Jeremiah and Ezekiel.”262 Just as Zion sat silently on the ground in dust (Lam 2:10a) so will Babylon (Is 47:1, 5)—leaving her naked and exposed (Is 47:3), just like Zion (Lam 1:8b). God will answer Zion’s prayer (Lam 1:21–22) when Babylon suffers the same fate (Lam 1:1, 16–18)—becoming a widow and losing her children (Is 47:8–9).
Is 49:14–26 moves the plan forward—not only recording Zion’s loss (Is 49:14, 21, 24), but also Yahweh’s pledge to bring her children back (Is 49:12). While the loss of offspring is an agonizing ordeal throughout Lamentations (Lam 1:5, 20; 2:11–12, 20–22; 4:3–4, 10), Isaiah envisions not only children returning but also their multiplication (Is 49:17–18, 20–22). Zion will look around and stunned, wonder where all the children came from (Is 49:21). The remnant will rebound and there will not be enough room for everyone (Is 54:1; cf. Is 60:4; Zech 10:10). New life—with its ensuing population explosion—will necessitate a building program. “Zion’s role now has changed from a parent fighting tooth and nail for the survival of her children to a parent welcoming back children who have in fact survived.”263
Zion in Isaiah 51–52
Yahweh’s comfort for Zion continues into chapters 51–52. Isaiah 51 describes the restoration of Zion’s mourning roads (Lam 1:4a), for joy and gladness will replace sorrow and sadness (Is 51:11). While pursuers “overtook” (נָשַׂג) Zion (Lam 1:3c), leading Judah’s priests to groan (אָנַח, Lam 1:4b), this yields to gladness “overtaking” (נָשַׂג) returnees while sorrow and “groaning” (אֲנָחָה) will flee away (Is 51:11).
Is 51:17–23 furthers Lam 4:21b, where the cup of Yahweh’s judgment passes from Zion to Zion’s tormentors—the Edomites. Further, since “Edom” in Lam 4:21a represents both the nation as well as all the enemy nations, Babylon, too, will face divine wrath. The punished God poured out on Judah will be poured out on all of his people’s adversaries.
Though a brief oracle, Is 52:1–2 addresses several themes in Lamentations 1–2. The triple imperative addressed to Zion, “awake, awake, clothe yourself” (עוּרִ֥י עוּרִ֛י לִבְשִׁ֥י, Is 52:1), is similar to Jeremiah’s double imperative to Daughter Zion (ק֣וּמִי רֹ֣נִּי, “arise, cry out,” Lam 2:19a). God’s statement that Jerusalem is “a holy city” and that “the uncircumcised and the unclean will never again come into you” (Is 52:1) addresses the city’s uncleanness (Lam 1:9a) as well as the atrocity of rape in Lam 1:10a-b and 5:11. The euphemistic “enter” (בּוֹא) in Lam 1:10b describes illicit sexual penetration. And now? “Never again shall the unclean and uncircumcised enter you (יָבֹא־בָ֥ךְ).” (Is 52:1) Additionally, the gift of “beautiful garments” (בִּגְדֵ֣י תִפְאַרְתֵּ֗ךְ, Is 52:1) rectifies Zion’s nakedness in Lam 1:8b.
Also note this connection. Lam 2:1–10 describes Daughter Zion’s downward spiral into the dust and dirt, while Lam 1:14a depicts the city grieving over a yoke of transgressions placed on her neck. Yahweh’s response? “Shake yourself from the dust and arise … loosen the bonds from your neck” (Is 52:2).
The Suffering Servant
“Yahweh has forsaken me; the Lord has abandoned me.” (Is 49:14) This bitter plaint comes after God’s consolation throughout Isaiah 40–48. Daughter Zion is just as comfortless as she is in Lamentations 1. What does Yahweh do? He doubles down on Gospel—demonstrating both solidarity with Zion and salvation for Zion vis-à-vis his Suffering Servant.
The nation of Israel is God’s Servant in Is 49:3, but in Is 49:5–6 the Servant becomes an individual who takes upon himself Israel’s missional role. The first servant needs the Second Servant. And this Substitute Servant does what Israel was never able to do—be a radiant light to the nations (Is 49:6).
The most important connections between Isaiah 40–55 and Lamentations are the descriptions of Jeremiah (Lam 3:1–18) that foreshadow this Suffering Servant. Connections between Lamentations 3 and Isaiah’s Fourth Servant Song (Isaiah 52:13–53:12) are as follows. Both,
-
Suffer in silence (Lam 3:28; Is 53:7)
-
Are rejected (Lam 3:46, 53, 60–63; Is 53:3)
-
Are stricken (Lam 3:30; Is 53:4)
-
Are afflicted and crushed (Lam 3:33–34; Is 53:4–5)
-
Suffer the perversion of justice (Lam 3:53, 55; Is 53:8)
-
Are cut off (Lam 3:54; Is 53:8)
-
Are buried (Lam 3:53, 55; Is 53:9)
-
Parallel Daughter Zion in a number of ways
-
Are linked to Christ (the man in Lamentations 3 is a type of Christ while the Suffering Servant is Christ)
The chief difference, however, is that Jeremiah was not innocent in an absolute way. The Servant, Christ Jesus, was without sin (Heb 4:15), making his suffering vicarious for the sin of the world. And Christ not only sympathizes with suffering and weakness (Heb 4:15) but also carries our evil and sin to the cross (1 Pet 2:24).
Zion and Isaiah 54
Isaiah states that Zion is a “herald of good news” (Is 40:9) who will announce the advent of Yahweh as a Warrior (Is 40:10) and a good Shepherd (Is 40:11). This is an overview of chapters 40–55. It is only after the obedient Servant has suffered and died (Is 50:4–9; 52:13–53:12) that God fully restores Zion (chapter 54). “In chapter 54 the rhetoric of salvation meant to court Zion reaches a crescendo.”264
Jesus embodies Zion’s exile (Is 53:9) then Yahweh glorifies him (Is 53:10b–12)—thus guaranteeing Zion’s glorification and salvation as detailed in Isaiah 54. Patricia Tull-Willey summarizes these connections: “In each, the story line moves from abuse, shame, despair, and recrimination to promise, vindication, fulfillment, and exaltation.”265
A handful of themes in Isaiah 54 also intersect with Lamentations 1–2. These include widowhood, the loss of children, divine anger, as well as a ruptured and restored marriage. Yahweh speaks to “the one without comfort” (Is 54:11) and pledges to enact an urban restoration program (Is 54:11–17). Kathleen O’Connor summarizes Zion’s about-face:
She is a figure of healing, transformed from a devastated, shamed, and abandoned woman to a central member of the family with her children bursting out around her and her husband loving and protecting her. She is the future; her new life is already imagined. Capital city, monarchical center, and divine dwelling place, her revivification and restoration lures the exiled people homeward. Her bitterness is turned to song, her despair to joy, her somnolence to awakeness.266
The book of Lamentations concludes with Zion feeling utterly abandoned (Lam 5:20, 22). Yahweh affirms this, but also says it was only “for a brief moment” (Is 54:7). His final word? “You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you will break forth into singing, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands.” (Is 55:12)
Conclusions
In Isaiah 40–55, Zion is Yahweh’s herald (Is 40:9), a city (Is 44:26–28; 49:16–17; 52:1), a child (Is 49:15), a bride (Is 49:18), childless (Is 49:21), almost a divorcee (Is 49:21; 50:1), a slave (Is 50:1), and a widow (Is 54:4). Yes, Zion went through the flames cleansing judgment. Yes, Yahweh loves her and restores her. And yes, his Gospel promises will never end (Is 54:8).
After Babylon, Yahweh will lift up valleys, lower hills, level uneven ground, and make the rough places a plain (Is 40:4). Like a master civil engineer, he will tear down mountains to make roads and build highways (Is 49:11). God will make “a way in the sea and a path in mighty waters” (Is 43:16). He will spare nothing to bring his captives back to an Eden-like promised land (Is 51:3). “If the book of Lamentations ends with the absence of God and the absence of Zion’s children, Second Isaiah ends with the full (one might even say overfull) restoration of both.”267
Isaiah 40–55 triumphantly reverses the curses in Lamentations. Yahweh is the consummate Shepherd who gathers lambs in his arms and carries them in his bosom (Is 40:11); turns barren heights into pasture, protects them from scorching wind and heat, while leading his people to springs of water (Is 49:9–10); who, even though they continue like sheep to go astray, became a Lamb led to the slaughter to account them righteous by grace through faith (Is 53:5, 7, 11).
The book of Lamentations invites us to make Zion’s story our story; to weep over our losses, allow God to redeem them, and then boldly announce these words to the world. “Those who sow in tears will reap with shouts of joy.” (Ps 126:5)
1 James maintains, “To use an acrostic is to call attention to one’s membership in a community marked by shared language and shared commitments (An Invitation to Biblical Poetry, 94).
2 Westermann, Lamentations, 98.
3 Webb, Five Festal Garments, 60.
4 Though not acrostic poems, Psalms 33, 38, and 103 also consist of twenty-two lines—suggesting that they completely cover their subject matter.
5 Guillaume, “Lamentations 5: The Seventh Acrostic.”
6 Hillers, Lamentations, 5. Stackhouse concurs: “Pastorally the acrostic intimates that pain and suffering are not endless—that as much as there is an alpha there is also, in hope, an omega point” (“Confession and Complaint,” 207). O’Connor comments, “Lamentations’ alphabetic devices are deeply symbolic. They expose the depth and breadth of suffering in conflicting ways. The alphabet gives both order and shape to suffering that is otherwise inherently chaotic, formless, and out of control… It tries to force unspeakable pain into a container that is familiar and recognizable even as suffering eludes containment” (Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 13).
7 Peterson, Five Smooth Stones, 100.
8 Peterson, Five Smooth Stones, 101.
9 Owens, “Personification and Suffering in Lamentations 3,” 77.
10 Peterson, Five Smooth Stones for Pastoral Work, 97. Mandolfo writes, “Tight structure may provide some order and boundary to devasting grief” (Daughter Zion Talks Back to the Prophets, 72).
11 Peterson, Five Smooth Stones, 97.
12 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 56. He adds, “For those who grieve, but not for their regular hearers, the old story is ever new, always filling their consciousness and needing to be told once more, as intensely as it was the first time. Patience is the prime virtue that empathy requires” (p. 59).
13 Villanueva, Lamentations, 17.
14 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 57.
15 Hillers, Lamentations, 79.
16 More often than not, OT prose narrators stand outside the story, describing events from a distance. This, however, is not Jeremiah’s posture; this becomes obvious in 2:11. Bier calls the narrator in Lamentations 1, “a participating speaker in the poetry,” pointing out that “the opening אֵיכָ֣ה connotes world of pain, immediately removing his speech from any objective domain” (“Perhaps There is Hope,” 43).
17 Bier, “Perhaps There is Hope,” 76.
18 For a discussion on OT dirges, see pages xxx–xxx.
19 Berlin, Lamentations, 9.
20 Goldingay, Lamentations, 45. Berlin maintains, “These ideas are not contradictory, but they generate a cognitive and emotional tension that is in play throughout the chapter” (Lamentations, 49).
21 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 52.
22 For a discussion on dirge genre, see pp. xxx–xxx.
23 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 35. Hood comments on the cry evident in אֵיכָ֣ה, “that sound which is both inhuman and guttural and the most human sound a person can make: the sound of grief” (Hood, Comfort, 150).
24 Hillers, Lamentations, 80. Berlin writes, “It is an exclamation of despair that marks a sudden change from a glorious past to the degraded present” (Lamentations, 49).
25 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 59.
26 Berlin, Lamentations, 50.
27 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 61.
28 Renkema observes that this totality, along with the acrostic structure of Lamentations 1, announces Jerusalem’s complete disaster (Lamentations, 307).
29 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 58.
30 Berlin, Lamentations, 51. Dobbs-Allsopp observes, “The expectation of deliverance that hovers spectrally in the name ‘Egypt’ is literally, mimetically overwritten in the word ‘distress’” (Lamentations, 16).
31 Berlin, Lamentations, 51. Isaiah likens Judah’s return from Babylon as a new Exodus (e.g., Is 43:16–21).
32 See Reflections on Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55, pp. xxx–xxx.
33 Hens-Piazza, Lamentations, 4.
34 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion Talks Back to the Prophets, 75. “In one respect, complaint is the lifeblood of the biblical notion of covenant: it ensures that the relationship is alive, dynamic, and open. Here faith is real, contested, actively negotiated” (Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 38).
35 Parry writes, “When the speakers in Lamentations call on YHWH to see, we must not suppose that they think that God does not know about the situation—after all, he himself inflicted it! What is being requested is that YHWH pay attention to it by acting to remove it” (Lamentations, 53). God’s seeing, then, implies his Gospel response (e.g., Lk 1:48).
36 Berlin, Lamentations, 59.
37 Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 19, 58–59.
38 Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 59.
39 Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 77.
40 Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 134.
41 See the discussion in McClure, Emotions, 46–54.
42 Plutchik, “Landscapes of Emotion,” 20.
43 NPNF², 12:60.
44 Concerning Repentance, NPNF², 10:351.
45 Ellington observes, “When the pressure has become sufficiently intense, unaddressed pain bursts forth, often in highly destructive ways, sweeping away all restraining structures” (Risking Truth, 21).
46 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 92.
47 Boler, “Feminist Politics of Emotions and Critical Digital Pedagogies,” 1491.
48 Saunders helpfully documents how Martin Luther processed his emotions and the emotions of others in Martin Luther on Mental Health.
49 Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 111.
50 Moltmann, The Crucified God, 222.
51 Ngien, “The God Who Suffers,” 38. Elliott gives these reasons for why the Church Fathers’ taught this way regarding God’s impassibility: “First, was the emotional and irrational behavior of pagan gods which they wanted to deny for God and, second, the influence of Later Platonism on early Christian thinking. They wanted the philosophers to recognize Christianity as a strong and logical philosophy in its own right” (Faithful Feelings, 224).
52 Heschel was instrumental in bringing divine pathos into the forefront of theological reflection, especially through his book The Prophets (1962). (Its German predecessor Die Prophetie was published in 1936). In an oft-quoted comment that contrasts Heschel and Aristotle, Rothschild says that Heschel’s God is “not the Unmoved Mover but the Most Moved Mover” (Between God and Man, 25). Schlimm evaluates Heschel—along with two OT theologians who have followed him—Brueggemann and Fretheim—in “Different Perspectives on Divine Pathos.”
53 Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 111.
54 Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 128.
55 Andersen and Freedman, Hosea, 589.
56 Rowley, The Faith of Israel, 75.
57 Westermann, “The Role of the Lament in the Theology of the Old Testament,” 38. Calvin is typical when he writes, “Wherefore, as when we hear that God is angry, we ought not to imagine that there is any emotion in him, but ought rather to consider the mode of speech accommodated to our sense” (Institutes, 1.17.12).
58 Ellington, Risking Truth, 58.
59 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 68.
60 Lee, The Singers of Lamentations, 160.
61 Lee, The Singers of Lamentations, 161.
62 For a discussion on dirges in the OT, see pp. xxx–xxx.
63 For a discussion on laments in the OT, see pp. xxx–xxx.
64 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 42.
65 Berlin, Lamentations, 67.
66 See the discussion on “the Day of the LORD,” on pages xxx–xxx.
67 See Smith, “The Heart and Innards in Israelite Emotional Expressions.”
68 Mintz, Ḥurban, 28. “The linkage is significant because it signals a reversion to the rhetoric of personhood. As long as the poet has been lamenting the ruin of the Judean state and its institutions he has kept firm control over his voice. The breakdown comes only when the monumental height of the song is undercut by the sight of children suffering” (p. 28).
69 Grund-Wittenburg writes, “Empathetic relationships help to make sure that a person’s own world of experience exists as a clear picture in the world of experience of someone else” (“‘Yes, I Know Their Pain’ [Exodus 3:7],” 148).
70 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 101.
71 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 109.
72 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 52.
73 Berrigan puts it this way: “Better a tardy change of heart, than a heart of stone intact amid the rubble” (Lamentations, 60).
74 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 177.
75 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 37.
76 Peterson, Five Smooth Stones, 117. Villanueva’s advice is similar: “Sometimes, instead of being a help to us, they gossip about us and turn what we shared with them against us. They become our enemies. That is why we need to be careful with whom we share our laments. We need people like the poet of Lamentations who is willing to listen to us and cares deeply for us” (Lamentations, 67).
77 Boase, for instance, contends that God treated Zion unfairly (The Fulfillment of Doom?, 190). She and others (e.g., O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 34; Mandolfo, “Lamentations,” 238) point out that there is only one instance where sin comes up in chapter two (2:14b)—thus justifying their view that the poem indicts Yahweh for reprehensible actions.
78 Hillers, Lamentations, 103.
79 Bier, “Perhaps There is Hope,” 99.
80 Schreiter maintains, “What we may lack in empathy or parallel experience we can make up in attention” (Reconciliation, 72).
81 Westermann, Lamentations, 223.
82 Westermann, Lamentations, 149. Parry puts it this way: “God’s anger permeates the entirety of Lamentations, though its intensity glows white hot in chapter 2” (Lamentations, 193). Salters likewise maintains that in Lamentations 2 divine wrath is “overflowing and excessive” (Jonah and Lamentations, 117).
83 Berges, “The Violence of God in the Book of Lamentations,” 34. Westermann’s comments are similar: “Only in this one book of the Bible is the wrath of God spoken of with such intensity and the mercy of God with such reticence” (Lamentations, 231).
84 Cited in Elliott, Faithful Feelings, 109.
85 Baloian, Anger in the Old Testament, 99.
86 Baloian, Anger in the Old Testament, 72.
87 Baloian, Anger in the Old Testament, 73.
88 Schlimm, From Fratricide to Forgiveness, 198.
89 Keil and Delitzsch, The Pentateuch, 2:241.
90 Eichrodt, Theology of the Old Testament, 2:427.
91 Renkema, Lamentations, 157.
92 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 90.
93 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 70. He also observes, “Just as divine anger is not one of God’s attributes but an event-oriented reaction to human wrongdoing, so judgment is an inevitable but not all-defining work of God. It is marked by relativity and contingency, not permanence” (A Liturgy of Grief, 107–08). Eichrodt’s comments are comparable: “Unlike holiness and righteousness, wrath never forms one of the permanent attributes of the God of Israel; it can only be understood as, so to speak, a footnote” (Theology of the Old Testament, 1.262). It is, according to Is 26:20, God’s alien work. The Gospel is his proper work.
94 Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 42.
95 Gottwald was the first to develop a sustained argument that the Day of the LORD idea connects Lamentations with earlier prophetic texts (Studies in the Book of Lamentations, 63–89, 111–18). His primary perspective was the Deuteronomic trajectory that includes Deuteronomy through 2 Kings, along with the book of Jeremiah. Everson is one of the few scholars to consider the book of Lamentations in his discussion on the Day of the LORD (“The Days of Yahweh,” 331).
96 Boase observes, “Parallel wording and chiastic structure within the unit suggests, if only by implication, that Zion’s hope is for the enemy to experience a future day of Yahweh against them” (The Fulfillment of Doom?, 131). The “day” is not only Yahweh’s battle against his people; it also includes the nations (e.g., Isaiah 13–23; Jeremiah 46–51; Ezekiel 25–31; Amos 1:3–2:3).
97 Compare this passage from the Annals of Ashurbanipal: “Whenever the inhabitants of Arabia asked each other: ‘On account of what have these calamities befallen Arabia?’ (they answered themselves:) ‘Because we did not keep the solemn oaths (sworn by) Ashur, because we offended the friendliness of Ashurbanipal” (ANET, 300).
98 von Rad, “The Origin of the Concept of the Day of Yahweh,” 103. Associated with this motif is, “In the religious thought of both Israel and the ancient Near East, the nation’s defeat is also the defeat of its god(s), an evidence of the deity’s weakness or absence, just as, to the contrary, a military victory expresses the victory of the people’s deity over the enemy and their god(s)” (Rom-Shiloni, Voices from the Ruins, 177). An example from Israel includes Ex 12:12; from the broader world of the ancient Near East, see Is 37:10–13=2 Ki 19:10–13.
99 Moran, “The End of the Unholy War and the Anti-Exodus,” 333.
100 For further study, see Miller, The Divine Warrior in Early Israel.
101 Boase observes, “The priority given to the expression of lament distinguishes Lamentations from the related prophetic literature” (The Fulfillment of Doom?, 138).
102 For links between Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55, see pp. xxx–xxx. Fretheim observes: “But while God may give them up, God does not finally give up on them. Into the midst of those suffering judgments God returns” (The Suffering of God, 126).
103 Everson, “The Days of Yahweh,” 336.”
104 Parry, Lamentations, 204.
105 France, The Gospel of Matthew, 998.
106 In Christ Alone.
107 This is not only a theological problem for the OT; note that in his letters Paul features divine wrath (e.g., Rom 1:18; 2:5, 8; 3:5; 9:22; Eph 2:3; 5:6; Col 3:6; 1 Thes 2:16).
108 This follows Parry, Lamentations, 194–95.
109 Cassian, Institutes of the Coenobia, book 8, ch. 4 (NPNF², 11:258).
110 Novatian, A Treatise Concerning the Trinity, ch. 5, ANCL 5.
111 Fretheim, “Theological Reflections on the Wrath of God in the Old Testament,” 6.
112 As noted by Heschel, The Prophets, 2:82.
113 Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 136.
114 Kaiser, Grief and Pain in the Plan of God, 63
115 Baloian summaries the issue: “Yahweh can be angry solely because of human cruelty, or He can be angry exclusively because of the idolatry, rebellion, or pride of human beings. That Yahweh can be angry because of human disregarding their common sense of justice demonstrates that he cares about how humans treat humans. He is not only concerned about His cult and its maintenance. He is concerned about the lives of human beings and whether justice takes place among them. This concern is not merely a passive interest” (Anger in the Old Testament, 73).
116 Lewis, The Problem of Pain, 29.
117 See Raabe’s discussion in Obadiah, 206–54.
118 LSB 543.
119 Bergant, Lamentations, 83. Dobbs-Allsopp concurs: “The play of pronouns, and the overlapping and interweaving of couplets and stanzas, is not developed in any overtly logical or systematic way. Instead, the poet heaps metaphor upon metaphor, drawing images, as it were, from whatever realm imaginable” (Lamentations, 111).
120 Kaiser, Grief and Pain in the Plan of God, 81.
121 Hillers, Lamentations, 122.
122 Mintz, “The Rhetoric of Lamentations and the Representation of Catastrophe,” 10. Of note is that when Jews sing Lamentations on the eve of the Ninth of Av, chapter three’s tune is different from the book’s other chapters.
123 Meynet, Rhetorical Analysis, 175.
124 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 87.
125 Berlin, Lamentations, 7.
126 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 106.
127 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 131.
128 Jung, The Practice of Psychotherapy, 116.
129 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 109.
130 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 109.
131 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 110.
132 Stanza one of the hymn “In God, My Faithful God” (LSB 745) puts it this way: “In God, my faithful God, I trust when dark my road; Great woes may overtake me, yet He will not forsake me, my troubles He can alter; His hand lets nothing falter.”
133 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 111.
134 Berrigan, Lamentations, 71.
135 Ellison, “Lamentations,” 720.
136 Sittser, A Grace Disguised, 37.
137 Berrigan, Lamentations, 76.
138 Goldingay calls Ex 34:6–7, “a moment of horrifying waywardness, horrifying chastisement, but manifest mercy” (Lamentations, 138).
139 House, “Outrageous Demonstrations of Grace,” 49.
140 Childs, Isaiah, 435.
141 House, Lamentations, 415.
142 Parry, Lamentations, 127.
143 Fretheim, The Suffering of God, 27. Fretheim continues, “It might be suggested that Israel knows God as this kind of God only because of what God has done in its history” (p. 27).
144 LSB 809, stanza 1.
145 LSB, 809, stanza 3.
146 Thomas, “Holy Scripture and Hermeneutics,” 19.
147 Renkema, Lamentations, 408. Gottwald goes as far as to maintain that this verse “is the high watermark in Lamentation’s understanding of God” (Studies in the Book of Lamentations, 99).
148 Parry, Lamentations, 106.
149 See the discussion on divine emotions on pp. xxx–xxx.
150 Renkema, Lamentations, 410.
151 Baloian, Anger in the Old Testament, 380.
152 Anderson and Freedman, Amos, 642.
153 House, Lamentations, 418.
154 Goldingay describes it this way: “There are things we do that come from who we really are and things we do because a situation requires us to act in a certain way, and so it is with God” (Lamentations, 145).
155 Eklund provides a summary of NT laments in Jesus Wept.
156 Billmann and Migliore, Rachel’s Cry, 4.
157 O’Day, “Surprised by Faith,” 294.
158 Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son, 85.
159 Crisler, Reading Romans as Lament, 44. He maintains that lament echoes appear in Rom 1:16–17; 3:1–20; 7:7–8:1–4; 8:18–39; 9:1–5; and 15:1–16 (p. 4). See also Seifrid’s analysis of Romans 9–11, where he maintains, “Paul’s opening lament [9:1–5] provides the conceptual framework for the entire discourse, including the hymn of praise [11:33–36], which, according to the pattern of the psalms of lament, reaffirms the hope of the promises, contrary to all outward appearances” (“Romans,” 638).
160 Crisler argues this point in Reading Romans as Lament, 46–48.
161 Crisler, Reading Romans as Lament, 64. He adds, “The divine answer cited from Habakkuk 2:4 becomes determinative for Paul’s subsequent reflection on how the gospel answers the suffering and cries of distress experienced by the righteous” (p. 65).
162 Crisler, Reading Romans as Lament, 198–201.
163 Crisler, Reading Romans as Lament, 200.
164 Beker, “Suffering and Triumph in Paul’s Letter to the Romans,” 112–13.
165 Crisler, Reading Romans as Lament, 120.
166 LSB, 501 describes the Spirit’s groaning this way: “And so the yearning strong, with which the soul will long, shall far out-pass the pow’r of human telling. No soul can guess His grace till it becomes the place wherein the Holy Spirit makes His dwelling.”
167 Dunn, Romans 1–8, 417.
168 Parry, Lamentations, 205.
169 Parry, Lamentations, 216.
170 Perry, “The Trinity and Lament,” 160.
171 O’Connor observes, “The poem expresses diminishment, a shriveling of feelings, a closing of horizons” (Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 58).
172 Mintz, Ḥurban, 22.
173 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 129.
174 For a discussion on OT dirges, see pp. xxx–xxx.
175 Berlin, Lamentations, 104.
176 For a discussion on the Day of the LORD, see pp. xxx–xxx.
177 Westermann, Lamentations, 201.
178 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 131. O’Connor agrees: “For gold to tarnish means the inconceivable has happened” (Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 61).
179 Westermann, Lamentations, 203.
180 Allen, A Liturgy of Grief, 138.
181 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 67.
182 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 144.
183 See Kopilovitz, “From Vassal to Empire,” 240–43.
184 Linking Zedekiah’s suffering with that of Christ’s, Parry provides this Christological interpretation: “The violence of the enemy is engraved on the subjugated and broken body of the Messiah, and yet in the act of being overcome by evil the evil is itself overcome by nonviolence. A subversive, cruciform element is introduced in the reception of the text” (Lamentations, 190). For additional Christological connections in Lamentations, see pp. xxx–xxx.
185 Parry, “Prolegomena to Christian Theological Interpretations of Lamentations,” 410.
186 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, xiv.
187 Kübler-Ross, On Death and Dying, 10–33.
188 Konigsberg, The Truth about Grief and Bonanno, The Other Side of Sadness.
189 Joyce, “Lamentations and the Grief Process,” 308–20.
190 Rom-Shiloni, Voices from the Ruins, 93.
191 Reimer nuances Kübler-Ross’s view in, “Good Grief? A Psychological Reading of Lamentations.”
192 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 33. She states that PTSD happens when events consist of “physical violation or injury, exposure to extreme violence, or witnessing grotesque death … When neither resistance nor escape is possible, the human system of self-defense becomes overwhelmed and disorganized” (p. 34).
193 O’Connor, Jeremiah, 3.
194 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 37. Dickie concurs: “Trauma … disrupts the way memories are processed, preventing them from being stored in long-term, ‘past-time’ memory” (“Biblical Lament Intersects with Psychotherapy as a Means of Healing the Effects of Trauma,” 19).
195 Hood, Comfort: A Journey through Grief, 156. Faulkner writes, “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” (Requiem for a Nun, 51).
196 See Garber, “Trauma Studies.” Sawyer notes, “The use of trauma studies as a
framework for interpreting biblical texts encompasses a broad range of topics and incorporates
different methods” (“Deutero-Isaiah’s Daughter Zion as Survival Literature,” 104).
198 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 74.
199 Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 35.
200 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 70.
201 Langer, Holocaust Testimonies, 174–75.
202 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 155.
203 Parry, Lamentations, 206. Soelle writes, “If people cannot speak about their affliction they will be destroyed by it” (Suffering, 76).
204 Goldingay, Old Testament Theology, 3:210. Davis writes, “We cannot have an intimate relationship with someone to whom we cannot speak honestly” (Getting Involved with God, 8).
205 Fumia, A Piece of My Heart, 104.
206 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 131.
207 Ellington, Risking Truth, xii.
208 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 7.
209 Wolterstorff, “If God Is Good and Sovereign, Why Lament?”, 43.
210 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 129.
211 Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 35. He also maintains that the book’s poems, “individually and collectively, facilitate a recovery of voice that is life giving and life sustaining” (p. 134). Hillers concurs, “People live on best after calamity, not by utterly repressing their grief and shock, but by facing it, and by measuring its dimensions” (Lamentations, 4).
212 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, xiv.
213 Caine, Widow, 140. Gravitz and Bowden observe, “No pain is so devastating as the pain of a person refuses to face, and no suffering is so lasting as suffering left unacknowledged” (Recovery, 37).
214 Dickie, “Biblical Lament Intersects with Psychotherapy as a Means of Healing the Effects of Trauma,” 23.
215 Ackermann, “On Hearing and Lamenting,” 55.
216 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 95.
217 Sittser, A Grace Disguised, 9.
218 Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 149.
219 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 1.
220 Katongole and Rice, Reconciling all Things, 89.
221 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 1.
222 Berlin, Lamentations, 116.
223 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 71.
224 Heim maintains: “When disaster strikes a whole community, pain is elevated to a different and more complex level. It needs to find an expression that is both individual and corporate in order to help individuals express their own personal pain while at the same time addressing the agony experienced by the other members of the community” (“The Personification of Jerusalem and the Drama of Her Bereavement in Lamentations,” 130).
225 Connections between Lamentations and Isaiah 40–55 are discussed on pp. xxx–xxx.
226 O’Connor calls Lamentations 5 “alphabetic” as it has twenty-two verses—the same number of consonants in the Hebrew alphabet (Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 70).
227 James, An Invitation to Biblical Poetry, 100.
228 Earlier prayers appear in 1:9c, 11c, 20; 2:20; 3:23b, 41–45; 55–66.
229 Felstiner, Paul Celan, 152.
230 Westermann observes, “Framing a song of lamentation by elements of petition, as is being done here, means that the element of petition is being given determinative significance for the whole composition” (Lamentations, 213).
231 Bier maintains, “Given the strong correspondence with Zion’s pleas in Lam 1, the community implied by the CV [communal voice] can be understood as the same as that of which Zion was the representative figure, the people of Jerusalem/Judah” (“Perhaps There is Hope,” 166).
232 Dobbs-Allsopp, Lamentations, 135.
233 Herman, Trauma and Recovery, 133.
234 Bergant, Lamentations, 126.
235 Dobbs-Allsopp comments, “By voicing the community’s shame and embarrassment, the poem not only calls attention to this dimension of suffering, but also names and authorizes these feelings, valorizes them alongside the hurt of physical pain, and thus offers gestures of articulation that for those unable to name what they feel inside may be experienced as consoling and liberating” (Lamentations, 143).
236 Wright, The Message of Lamentations, 158.
237 Berlin, Lamentations, 125.
238 Parry, Lamentations, 154.
239 Mintz, Ḥurban, 41.
240 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 84.
241 For a discussion of “open” versus “closed” textual approaches, see Umberto Eco, The Role of the Reader, 3–40, 47–56, 175–99.
242 Dobbs-Allsopp, Weep O Daughter of Zion, 92–94.
243 Lewis, A Grief Observed, 5.
244 Boase observes, “This text makes conscious links with Lamentations, and within Second Isaiah the silent voice of Yahweh is finally heard.” (The Fulfillment of Doom?, 208). See Tull, Remember the Former Things: The Recollection of Previous Texts in Second Isaiah.
245 Perry and Sternberg analyze the idea of a “gap” in the OT (“The King Through Ironic Eyes, The Narrator’s Devices in the Biblical Story of David and Bathsheba and Two Excurses on the Theory of the Narrative Text).”
246 Steinberg, The Poetics of Biblical Narrative, 235. He gives a fuller definition of the technique: “This gap-filling ranges from simple linkage of elements, which the reader performs automatically, to intricate networks that are figured out consciously, laboriously, hesitantly, and with constant modifications in the light of the additional information disclosed in later stages of reading. Even genres considered far from sophisticated literary technique demand such gap-filling” (p. 186).
247 Eklund, Practicing Lament, 14. Parry offers similar counsel: “The canonical context calls on the worshipping community to refuse it the last word, but at the same time the canonical form warns the community against prematurely collapsing the ‘no comfort’ into the ‘comfort’” (“Wrestling with Lamentations in Christian Worship,” 184).
248 The deuterocanonical book 1 Baruch 4:5–5:9 provides robust Gospel answers to Lamentations as well.
249 Tiemeyer’s critical position is representative. “The author of Isaiah 40–55 reuses vocabulary and themes from Lamentations in order to establish a link to the former text” (“Lamentations in Isaiah 40–55,” 56).
250 O’Connor, Lamentations and the Tears of the World, 142.
251 Sommer—an observant Jew—has argued for tight connections between the corpora— highlighting a handful of direct allusions between Is 51:17–22 and Lam 2:13–19 (A Prophet Reads Scripture, 127–30).
252 Stern, “Lamentations in Jewish Liturgy,” 90.
253 Löhr, “Der Sprachgebrauch es Buches der Klagelieder,” 42–43, 44, 47, 48.
254 Gottwald, Studies in the Book of Lamentations, 44–55.
255 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 63.
256 Tull-Willey, Remember the Former Things, 265.
257 Kristeva, Desire in Language, 66. Her understanding of intertextuality emanated from her engagement with the Russian formalist, Mikhail Bakhtin (1895–1975) who argued that texts interact with other texts due to social, economic, geographical, and/or historical interaction.
258 Hays, Echoes of Scripture in the Letters of Paul, 14. He offers several tests for hearing echoes: they include 1) the availability of the echoed text, 2) volume, the number of echoes 3) thematic coherence between the two texts 4) historical plausibility the readers of the echoes would understand what the author was doing 5) history of interpretation, do other scholars see similar patterns? and 6) satisfaction, that is, do the echoes illuminate the latter text?
259 Handelman, The Slayers of Moses, 47.
260 Parry, Lamentations, 234–35.
261 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 79.
262 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion Speaks Back to the Prophets, 106.
263 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 79.
264 Mandolfo, Daughter Zion Talks Back to the Prophets, 115.
265 Tull-Willey, Remember the Former Things, 222.
266 O’Connor, “‘Speak Tenderly to Jerusalem,’” 294.
267 Linafelt, Surviving Lamentations, 80.