ALAS FOR THE CITY.
Lamentations 1:1-6.
LAMENTATIONS 1:1. The opening word could be rendered, “Alas!” The translation “How” introduces an exclamation, but also has an element of questioning in it. We might say, “How come?”
The verb “she sits” introduces “the city” as feminine, so perhaps we could construct a rendering: “Alas, she sits solitary, the city that was full of people.”
The city sits solitary, dwelling apart like a leper. No longer under the protection of the LORD, her people are scattered from her. She that was once “great among the nations” is now mourning like a widow. She that was a “princess” among the provinces is now reduced to a mere vassal of Babylon, her many people mostly now either killed or deported.
LAMENTATIONS 1:2. The deserted city sits alone, weeping, with no-one to console her. She had sought protection from her “lovers” - other nations and their ‘gods’- but they had all failed her. Those she might have expected to be “friends” are now become enemies. Her political alliances all at last fell through, as the surrounding nations sided with Babylon against Judah.
LAMENTATIONS 1:3. Israel had once known “affliction” and “great servitude” in Egypt. Then, after the exodus, her pursuers had been overthrown in the sea, and she had found “rest” in the promised land. But now, scattered among the heathen nations, she “finds no rest.” She is overtaken by her “persecutors.”
LAMENTATIONS 1:4. The personification of the city intensifies: here she is called “Zion,” after the mountain upon which Jerusalem is built. The amazing thing here is that even the “ways,” or roads of the city are mourning, empty of both commercial travellers and pilgrims. The “gates,” too, are “desolate” with no-one passing through, no trading; and no administration of justice (such as would traditionally take place in the gates).
The absence of the hustle and bustle of the temple rituals causes any of her remaining “priests” to “sigh.” The temple is gone. The sacrifices have probably ceased, many of the priests themselves having been killed or carried away. “Her virgins are afflicted,” with nothing to look forward to, as far as they knew, but more misery. Zion herself is “in bitterness,” battered, burned, and ruined; her temple razed to the ground.
LAMENTATIONS 1:5. How has all this happened? What caused the fall of Jerusalem? Well, her “adversaries” are now ‘the head and not the tail’ (cf. Deuteronomy 28:44); her “enemies” are now “prospering” at her expense. However, as Jeremiah warned, it is the hand of God behind the Babylonian invasion. HE is afflicting her “for the multitude of her transgressions” and THAT is why “her children are gone into captivity before the enemy.”
This is what we might call her ‘spiritual adultery’ (cf. Lamentations 1:8a; Lamentations 1:18a). Israel was supposed to be, was covenanted to be, espoused to the LORD. Yet her alliances with the nations around her, and their ‘gods,’ proved her to be disloyal to Him, her husband.
LAMENTATIONS 1:6. The city is now called “Daughter Zion.” Once a princess, now all majesty and beauty are departed from her. King Zedekiah and his men of war fled by night. The Babylonians captured King Zedekiah, and his army scattered. The king’s sons (princes) were slain before his eyes (cf. 2 Kings 25:4-7).
Where is JESUS in all this?
Jesus was alone, solitary, when He went to the Cross to die for our sins (Matthew 27:46).
Jesus wept over Jerusalem in anticipation of yet another destruction of the city, and another scattering of her people (Luke 19:41).
Jesus’ friends deserted Him in His hour of need (Mark 14:50), and His enemies mocked Him (Luke 22:63).
Thank the Lord that Jesus would one day fulfil a new ‘exodus’ through His death (Luke 9:31), to deliver us from a much greater servitude, and to lead us into our final ‘rest’ (Hebrews 4:9)!
Jesus was handed over BY GOD to be put to death at the hands of wicked men (Acts 4:27-28). There was no other way for our salvation (cf. John 3:16).
FINALLY, ‘Is it nothing to you all ye that pass by?’ READ Lamentations 1:12.
So, ‘is it nothing to you’ that Jerusalem thus suffered under the Babylonians in 587 B.C., and again in 73 A.D. under the Romans?
Is it nothing to you that the Jewish people were scattered to the ends of the earth?
Is it nothing to you that JESUS suffered as He did, ‘sorrow’ upon ‘sorrow,’ ‘afflicted’ on our behalf by the ‘fierce anger’ of ‘the LORD?’
‘How shall we escape if we neglect so great salvation?’ (Hebrews 2:3).
