Lamentations 5 is the fifth (and the last) chapter of the

Book of Lamentations The Book of Lamentations ( he, אֵיכָה, , from its incipit meaning "how") is a collection of poetic laments for the destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. In the Hebrew Bible it appears in the Ketuvim ("Writings") as one of the Five Megill ...

in the

Hebrew Bible The Hebrew Bible or Tanakh (;"Tanach"
'' Old Testament of the Christian

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...

, part of the Ketuvim ("Writings").

Text

The original text was written in

Hebrew language Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

. This chapter is divided into 22 verses. The fifth chapter (''fifth elegy''), though having 22 stanzas (the number of letters in the

Hebrew alphabet The Hebrew alphabet ( he, אָלֶף־בֵּית עִבְרִי, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is an abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewi ...

) just as the first four, is not alphabetical and its lines are shorter than those of the others, which are longer than are found in other Hebrew poems. Each line contains twelve syllables, marked by a cæsura about the middle, dividing them into two somewhat unequal parts. This chapter serves as an ''epiphonema'', or a closing recapitulation of the calamities treated in the previous chapters/elegies.Jamieson, Robert; Fausset, Andrew Robert; Brown, David. '' Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown's Commentary On the Whole Bible''
"Lamentations 5"
1871. This last chapter of the book is called "the Prayer of Jeremiah" in some Greek copies, and in the Latin

Vulgate The Vulgate (; also called (Bible in common tongue), ) is a late-4th-century Latin translation of the Bible. The Vulgate is largely the work of Jerome who, in 382, had been commissioned by Pope Damasus I to revise the Gospels u ...

, Syriac, and Arabic versions. Gill, John
''Exposition of the Entire Bible''. "Lamentations 5".
Published in 1746-1763.

Textual versions

Some early witnesses for the text of this chapter in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

are of the

Masoretic Text The Masoretic Text (MT or 𝕸; he, נֻסָּח הַמָּסוֹרָה, Nūssāḥ Hammāsōrā, lit. 'Text of the Tradition') is the authoritative Hebrew and Aramaic text of the 24 books of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) in Rabbinic Judaism. ...

, which includes

Codex Leningradensis The Leningrad Codex ( la, Codex Leningradensis [Leningrad Book]; he, כתב יד לנינגרד) is the oldest complete manuscript of the Hebrew Bible in Hebrew, using the Masoretic Text and Tiberian vocalization. According to its colopho ...

(1008). Fragments containing parts of this chapter were found among the

Dead Sea Scrolls The Dead Sea Scrolls (also the Qumran Caves Scrolls) are ancient Jewish and Hebrew religious manuscripts discovered between 1946 and 1956 at the Qumran Caves in what was then Mandatory Palestine, near Ein Feshkha in the West Bank, on the ...

, i.e., 5Q6 (5QLam^a; 50 CE) with extant verses 1‑13, 16‑17. There is also a translation into

Koine Greek Koine Greek (; Koine el, ἡ κοινὴ διάλεκτος, hē koinè diálektos, the common dialect; ), also known as Hellenistic Greek, common Attic, the Alexandrian dialect, Biblical Greek or New Testament Greek, was the common supra-reg ...

known as the

Septuagint The Greek Old Testament, or Septuagint (, ; from the la, septuaginta, lit=seventy; often abbreviated ''70''; in Roman numerals, LXX), is the earliest extant Greek translation of books from the Hebrew Bible. It includes several books beyond ...

, made in the last few centuries BCE. Extant ancient manuscripts of the Septuagint version include

Codex Vaticanus The Codex Vaticanus ( The Vatican, Bibl. Vat., Vat. gr. 1209), designated by siglum B or 03 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering), δ 1 ( von Soden), is a fourth-century Christian manuscript of a Greek Bible, containing the majority of the Greek Old ...

(B;

\mathfrak

^B; 4th century),

Codex Alexandrinus The Codex Alexandrinus (London, British Library, Royal MS 1. D. V-VIII), designated by the siglum A or 02 (in the Gregory-Aland numbering of New Testament manuscripts), δ 4 (in the von Soden numbering of New Testament manuscripts), is a manu ...

(A;

\mathfrak

^A; 5th century) and

Codex Marchalianus Codex Marchalianus designated by siglum Q is a 6th-century Greek manuscript copy of the Greek version of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh or Old Testament) known as the Septuagint. The text was written on vellum in uncial letters. Palaeographically it ...

(Q;

\mathfrak

^Q; 6th century).

Verse 1

: ''Remember, O , what is come upon us:'' :: ''consider, and behold our reproach.'' * "Remember": The last chapter opens with a call to the Lord not to overlook the pleas in the previous lamentations (, , ; ; ).

Verse 8

:''Servants have ruled over us:'' :''there is none that doth deliver us out of their hand.'' "Servants", or "slaves" in the Revised Standard Version and the

Jerusalem Bible ''The Jerusalem Bible'' (JB or TJB) is an English translation of the Bible published in 1966 by Darton, Longman & Todd. As a Catholic Bible, it includes 73 books: the 39 books shared with the Hebrew Bible, along with the seven deuterocanonica ...

, refers to " Chaldean officials".

Verse 21

: ''Turn thou us unto thee, O Lord,'' :: ''and we shall be turned;'' : ''renew our days as of old.'' * "Turn": the word that is also used in ; has been in multiple messages from Jeremiah for his people to go back to God (; ; ; ; ; ).The Nelson Study Bible. Thomas Nelson, Inc. 1997. . pp. 1330-1331. * "Renew our days as of old": a request for "restoration" (compare ; ; ; ).

Verse 22

KJV The King James Version (KJV), also the King James Bible (KJB) and the Authorized Version, is an English translation of the Christian Bible for the Church of England, which was commissioned in 1604 and published in 1611, by sponsorship of K ...

: : ''But thou hast utterly rejected us;'' :: ''thou art very wroth against us.''

NKJV The New King James Version (NKJV) is an English translation of the Bible. The complete NKJV Bible was published in 1982 by Thomas Nelson, now HarperCollins. The NKJV is described by Thomas Nelson as being "scrupulously faithful to the origin ...

: : ''Unless You have utterly rejected us,'' :: ''And are very angry with us!''

Verse 22 in Hebrew

Masoretic text (from right to left) : כי אם־מאס מאסתנו :: קצפת עלינו עד־מאד׃ Transliteration: : - , :: . In many manuscripts and for Synagogue use, Lamentations 5:21 is repeated after verse 22, so that the reading does not end with a painful statement, a practice which is also performed for the last verse of

Isaiah Isaiah ( or ; he, , ''Yəšaʿyāhū'', "God is Salvation"), also known as Isaias, was the 8th-century BC Israelite prophet after whom the Book of Isaiah is named. Within the text of the Book of Isaiah, Isaiah himself is referred to as "the ...

, Ecclesiastes, and

Malachi Malachi (; ) is the traditional author of the Book of Malachi, the last book of the Nevi'im (Prophets) section of the Tanakh. According to the 1897 ''Easton's Bible Dictionary'', it is possible that Malachi is not a proper name, as it simply mean ...

, "so that the reading in the Synagogue might close with words of comfort".Skinner, J.
Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
on Isaiah 66, accessed 1 July 2019

Notes

References

Sources

* * * * * *

External links

Jewish

Lamentations 5 Hebrew with Parallel EnglishLamentations 5 Hebrew with Rashi's Commentary

Christian

Lamentations 5 English Translation with Parallel Latin Vulgate
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