Lamentations 4:1-12

The Punishment of Zion Accomplished

4¹ How is the gold become dim! how is the most pure gold changed!
The stones of the sanctuary are poured out at the head of every street. ² The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold,
How are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter! ³ Even the jackals draw out the breast, they nurse their young ones:
The daughter of my people has become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness. ⁴ The tongue of the sucking child cleaves to the roof of his mouth for thirst:
The young children ask bread, and no man breaks it to them. ⁵ Those who did feed delicately are desolate in the streets:
Those who were brought up in scarlet embrace dunghills. ⁶ For the iniquity of the daughter of my people is greater than the sin of Sodom,
That was overthrown as in a moment, and no hands were laid on her. ⁷ Her nobles were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk;
They were more ruddy in body than rubies, their polishing was as of sapphire. ⁸ Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets:
Their skin cleaves to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick. ⁹ Those who are killed with the sword are better than those who are killed with hunger;
For these pine away, stricken through, for want of the fruits of the field. ¹⁰ The hands of the pitiful women have boiled their own children;
They were their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people. ¹¹ Yahweh has accomplished his wrath, he has poured out his fierce anger;
He has kindled a fire in Zion, which has devoured its foundations. ¹² The kings of the earth didn’t believe, neither all the inhabitants of the world,
That the adversary and the enemy would enter into the gates of Jerusalem.