Lamentations 1:21

They have heard that I sigh: there is none to comfort me: all mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done it: thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(21) They are glad that thou hast done it . . .—Historically the words refer to the conduct of nations like the Edomites, as described in Psalm 137:7.

Thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called.—Better, proclaimed. By some commentators the first verb is taken as a perfect, “Thou hast brought,” and the “day” is that of vengeance upon Judah. With the rendering of the Authorised version the clause coheres better with that which follows, and the “day” is that of the punishment of the exulting foes.

Benson Commentary

Lamentations 1:21-22. They have heard that I sigh — The nations contiguous to me, Egypt and others, that before pretended to be my friends and allies, have been no strangers to my bitter afflictions, which have forced sighs from me; but there is none to comfort me — None of them can or will relieve my distress, but abandon me as in a desperate situation. They are glad that thou hast done it — They have even expressed gladness at the calamities that have befallen me; and they please themselves with the thought that thou our God, of whose favour and protection we used to boast, shouldst forsake us, and give us up as a prey to our enemies. Thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, &c. — The day when thou wilt execute thy judgments upon the Babylonians, and our other enemies and false friends, will certainly come at the time thou hast determined for that purpose. “We have here again the like turn of phrase as in the first line of this period; for the meaning evidently is, that the enemies of Jerusalem would in the end find little cause for their triumph, since the same Almighty Being, who had caused her evil day to come, had declared that, after a while, they should also suffer the like fate. Thou that hast brought the day [of adversity upon me] hast pronounced, that they shall become even as I.” — Blaney. Let all their wickedness come before thee — Let it appear that though thou hast chastened us for our sins, our enemies have still greater ones to answer and be punished for.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

1:12-22 Jerusalem, sitting dejected on the ground, calls on those that passed by, to consider whether her example did not concern them. Her outward sufferings were great, but her inward sufferings were harder to bear, through the sense of guilt. Sorrow for sin must be great sorrow, and must affect the soul. Here we see the evil of sin, and may take warning to flee from the wrath to come. Whatever may be learned from the sufferings of Jerusalem, far more may be learned from the sufferings of Christ. Does he not from the cross speak to every one of us? Does he not say, Is it nothing to you, all ye that pass by? Let all our sorrows lead us to the cross of Christ, lead us to mark his example, and cheerfully to follow him.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

They have heard ... - Or, "They heard that I sigh," that I have "no comforter."

Thou wilt bring the day ... - literally, thou hast brought "the day thou hast proclaimed, and they shall be like unto me." The day of Judah's punishment was the proof that the nations now triumphing over Jerusalem's fall would certainly be visited.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

21. they are glad that thou hast done it—because they thought that therefore Judah is irretrievably ruined (Jer 40:3).

the day … called—(but) thou wilt bring on them the day of calamity which thou hast announced, namely, by the prophets (Jer 50:1-46; 48:27).

like … me—in calamities (Ps 137:8, 9; Jer 51:25, &c.).

Tau.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

The nations contiguous to me, Egypt, &c., those that before courted me, as pretended friends, have been no strangers to my bitter afflictions, that have brought forth sighs from me; but there is none of them can or will comfort me, but give me over as in a desperate case. The Edomites, Ob 1, &c., and Moabites, and other heathen nations, with whom I have had hostility, they are glad at the great misery that hath befallen me. But thou hast declared thy pleasure for their destruction also, and hast by me proclaimed it, Jeremiah 49:1, and thou shalt in that day bring them into as sad a condition as the church of the Jews are now in. As they seldom in themselves feel those miseries which they have felt and compassionated in others; so men hardly escape their own share at last in those evils which they have rejoiced to see brought upon God’s people.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

They have heard that I:sigh: there is none to comfort me,.... That is, the nations, as the Targum; the neighbouring ones, those that were her confederates and allies; the same with her lovers, as before, as Aben Ezra observes; these being near her, knew full well her sorrowful and distressed condition, being as it were within the hearing of her sighs and groans; and yet none of them offered to help her, or so much as to speak a comfortable word to her:

all mine enemies have heard of my trouble; not only her friends, but foes; meaning the Tyrians, Edomites, Moabites, and Ammonites, and as the following description of them shows; for it must design others from the Chaldeans, that were the immediate cause of it:

they are glad that thou hast done it; brought all this ruin and destruction on Jerusalem, which could never have been done, if the Lord had not willed it; and at this the above mentioned nations rejoiced; see Ezekiel 25:3; there being a considerable stop on the word glad, it may be rendered, as by some, "they are glad; but thou hast done it" (n); not they, but thou; and therefore must be patiently bore, and quietly submitted to, it being the Lord's doing:

thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called; the time of, he destruction of, he Chaldeans, who had the chief hand in the ruin of the Jewish nation, and of those that rejoiced at it; which time was fixed by the Lord, and proclaimed and published by his prophets, and would certainly and exactly come, as and when it was pointed out: some (o) take it to be a wish or prayer, that God would bring it, as he had declared; though others interpret it in a quite different sense, "thou hast brought the day" (p); meaning on herself, the determined destruction; so the Targum,

"thou hast brought upon me the day of vengeance; thou hast called a time upon me to my desolation:''

and they shall be like unto me; in the same distressed, desolate, and sorrowful condition, being brought to ruin and destruction; which afterwards was the case of the Chaldeans, and all the other nations.

(n) "laetati sunt; sed tu fecisti", Grotius. (o) "Utinam induceres diem", so some in Vatablus. (p) "adduxisti diem", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus; "induxisti aut inducis", Vatablus.

Geneva Study Bible

They have heard that I sigh: there is none to comfort me: all mine enemies have heard of my trouble; they are glad that thou hast done it: thou wilt bring the day that thou hast called, and they shall be like unto me.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

21. The second and third lines are metrically irregular, as failing to fulfil the conditions of the “limping rhythm” of the Ḳinah. (See Intr. p. 321 f.) Löhr accordingly transposes “They are glad … done it” and “Thou wilt bring … proclaimed.”

They have heard] This verb has perhaps been assimilated to the “have heard” of the next line. If so, by a very slight change in MT., we get an imperative, Hear thou. Cp. the imperative “Behold” at the commencement of Lamentations 1:20.

Thou wilt bring] lit. Thou hast brought (a prophetic perfect). The day here spoken of is the day of retribution for Judah’s enemies. Cp. Jeremiah 25:17-26, in which passage Jerusalem and the neighbouring nations are all united in the same figure, as drinking in common of the cup of God’s wrath. For the use of “day” in the sense of destined time Greenup quotes Chaucer, Channones Yemannes Tale, II. I5 f.

The arrangement of the second and third lines of the v. in MT. is metrically irregular. Löhr is probably right in transposing two clauses, and thus reading,

“All mine enemies have heard of my trouble, thou hast brought the day that thou didst proclaim;

They are glad that thou hast done it, let them be like unto me.”

He thus makes “the day” to be that of Judah’s fall as foretold by the prophets, and makes the last clause expressive of a wish. It has also been suggested that for “Thou wilt bring” we should read the imperative, Bring thou.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 21. - Thou wilt bring. The Hebrew has, "Thou hast brought;" it is the perfect of prophetic certitude, which represents an event certainly foreseen as if it had already taken place. Ewald, however, takes this to be the precative, a variety of the perfect which certainly exists in Arabic, but has not been quite satisfactorily shown to exist in Hebrew (see Driver, 'Hebrew Tenses,' § 20 [13]. The day that thou hast called; i.e. foretold by the prophets (comp. Jeremiah 25:17-26). But very probably we should read, with the Septuagint," Thou wilt bring the day; thou wilt call the fit time." Lamentations 1:21

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

Since neither comfort nor advice is to be found with men, Jerusalem makes her complaint of need to God the Lord. "See, Jahveh, that I am distressed. My bowels glow." חמרמרוּ, the passive enhancing form, from חמר, is found, besides, only in Lamentations 2:11, where the clause before us is repeated, and in Job 16:16, where it is used of the countenance, and can only mean to be glowing red; it is scarcely legitimate to derive it from חמר, Arab. h[mr, to be made red, and must rather be referred to Arab. chmr, to ferment, rise into froth; for even in Psalm 55:9 חמר does not mean to be red, but to rise into froth. מעים, "bowels," are the nobler portions of the internal organs of the body, the seat of the affections; cf. Delitzsch's Biblical Psychology (Clark's translation), p. 314ff. "My heart has turned within me" is an expression used in Hosea 11:8 to designate the feeling of compassion; but here it indicates the most severe internal pain, which becomes thus agonizing through the consciousness of its being deserved on account of resistance to God. מרו for מרה, like בּכו ekil, Jeremiah 22:10; Jeremiah 30:19, etc. Both forms occur together in other verbs also; cf. Olshausen, Gram. 245, h [Ewald, 238, e; Gesen., 75, Rem. 2]. But the judgment also is fearful; for "without (מחוּץ, foris, i.e., in the streets and the open country) the sword renders childless," through the slaughter of the troops; "within (בּבּית, in the houses) כּמּות, like death." It is difficult to account for the use of כּ; for neither the כ of comparison nor the so-called כveritatis affords a suitable meaning; and the transposition of the words into sicut mors intus (Rosenm׬ller, after Lצwe and Wolfsohn) is an arbitrary change. Death, mentioned in connection with the sword, does not mean death in general, but special forms of death through maladies and plagues, as in Jeremiah 15:2; Jeremiah 18:21, not merely the fever of hunger, Jeremiah 14:18; on the other hand, cf. Ezekiel 7:15, "the sword without, pestilence and hunger within." But the difficulty connected with כּמּות is not thereby removed. The verb שׁכּל belongs to both clauses; but "the sword" cannot also be the subject of the second clause, of which the nominative must be כּמּות, "all that is like death," i.e., everything besides the sword that kills, all other causes of death, - pestilences, famine, etc. כּ is used as in כּמראה, Daniel 10:18. That this is the meaning is shown by a comparison of the present passage with Deuteronomy 32:25, which must have been before the writer's mind, so that he took the words of the first clause, viz., "without, the sword bereaves," almost as they stood, but changed וּמחדרים into בּבּית כּמּות, - thus preferring "what is like death," instead of "terror," to describe the cause of destruction. Calvin long ago hit the sense in his paraphrase multae mortes, and the accompanying explanation: utitur nota similitudinis, quasi diceret: nihil domi occurrere nisi mortale (more correctly mortiferum). Much light is thrown on the expression by the parallel adduced by Kalkschmidt from Aeneid, ii. 368, 369: crudelis ubique Luctus, ubique pavor, et plurima mortis imago.

From speaking of friends, a transition is made in Lamentations 1:21 to enemies. Regarding the explanation of Rosenmller, audiverunt quidem amici mei, a me implorati Lamentations 1:19, quod gemens ego...imo sunt omnes hostes mei, Thenius observes that it introduces too much. This remark is still more applicable to his own interpretation: "People (certainly) hear how I sigh, (yet) I have no comforter." The antithesis introduced by the insertion of "yet" destroys the simplicity of arrangement among the clauses, although C. B. Michaelis and Gerlach also explain the passage in the same manner. The subject of the words, "they have heard," in the first clause, is not the friends who are said in Lamentations 1:19 to have been called upon for help, nor those designated in the second clause of Lamentations 1:21 as "all mine enemies," but persons unnamed, who are only characterized in the second clause as enemies, because they rejoice over the calamity which they have heard of as having befallen Jerusalem. The first clause forms the medium of transition from the faithless friends (Lamentations 1:19) to the open enemies (Lamentations 1:21); hence the subject is left undefined, so that one may think of friends and enemies. The foes rejoice that God has brought the evil on her. The words 'הבאת וגו, which follow, cannot also be dependent on כּי ("that Thou hast brought the day which Thou hast announced"), inasmuch as the last clause, "and they shall be like me," does not harmonize with them. Indeed, Ngelsbach and Gerlach, who assume that this is the connection of the clause "Thou hast brought," etc., take 'ויהיוּ כ adversatively: "but they shall be like me." If, however, "they shall be," etc., were intended to form an antithesis to "all mine enemies have heard," etc., the former clause would be introduced by והם. The mere change of tense is insufficient to prove the point. It must further be borne in mind, that in such a case there would be introduced by the words "and they shall be," etc., a new series of ideas, the second great division of the prayer; but this is opposed by the arrangement of the clauses. The second portion of the prayer cannot be attached to the end of the verse. The new series of thoughts begins rather with "Thou hast brought," which the Syriac has rendered by the imperative, venire fac. Similarly Luther translates: "then (therefore) let the day come." C. B. Michaelis, Rosenmller, Pareau, etc., also take the words optatively, referring to the Arabic idiom, according to which a wish is expressed in a vivid manner by the perfect. This optative use of the perfect certainly cannot be shown to exist in the Hebrew; but perhaps it may be employed to mark what is viewed as certain to follow, in which case the Germans use the present. The use of the perfect shows that the occurrence expected is regarded as so certain to happen, that it is represented as if it had already taken place. The perfects in Lamentations 3:56-61 are taken in this sense by nearly all expositors. Similarly we take the clause now before us to mean, "Thou bringest on the day which Thou hast proclaimed (announced)," i.e., the day of judgment on the nations, Jeremiah 25, "so that they become like me," i.e., so that the foes who rejoice over my misfortune suffer the same fate as myself. "The day [which] Thou hast proclaimed" has been to specifically rendered in the Vulgate, adduxisti diem consolationis, probably with a reference of the proclamation to Isaiah 40:2. - After this expression of certainty regarding the coming of a day of punishment for her enemies, there follows, Lamentations 1:22, the request that all the evil they have done to Jerusalem may come before the face of God, in order that He may punish it (cf. Psalm 109:15 with Lamentations 1:14), - do to them as He has done to Jerusalem, because of her transgressions. The clause which assigns the reason ("for many are my sighs," etc.) does not refer to that which immediately precedes; for neither the request that retribution should be taken, nor the confession of guilt ("for all my transgressions"), can be accounted fore by pointing to the deep misery of Jerusalem, inasmuch as her sighing and sickness are not brought on her by her enemies, but are the result of the sufferings ordained by God regarding her. The words contain the ground of the request that God would look on the misery (Lamentations 1:20), and show to the wretched one the compassion which men refuse her. לבּי is exactly the same expression as that in Jeremiah 8:18; cf. also Isaiah 1:5. The reason thus given for making the entreaty forms an abrupt termination, and with these words the sound of lamentation dies away.