Lamentations 1:19

Lam 1:19 I called for my lovers, [but] they deceived me: my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city, while they sought their meat to relieve their souls.

Ver. 19. I called for my lovers, but they deceived me.] My confederates, idols, and other sweethearts, never yet true to any that trusted them. See Jer 22:20; Jer 30:14.

My priests and mine elders, &c.] What then became of poor folk? and how gracious was God to Jeremiah in the provision made for him by the king, who yet loved him not!

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Lam_1:19-22

I called for my lovers, but they deceived me.

Deceitful helpers

1. It is an increase of sorrow to be disappointed of their help by whom we looked to be delivered out of our troubles.

2. God often maketh our friends, that love us unfeignedly, utterly unable to do us any good in our distress.

3. The misery of that people must needs be great, whose rulers can neither hold themselves nor others.

4. Gods plagues do often overtake the great ones, as well as others.

5. Gods people may come to the extremest beggary that can be in this life.

(1) Outward things are no part of their felicity, which is purchased for them by Christ Jesus.

(2) God will now and then show Himself the preserver of His people, when all means do fail. (J. Udall.)

Behold, O Lord; for I am in distress.--

Prayer in distress

1. We must not give over, but continue in prayer, though we be not heard in that we entreat for. God hath commanded us to pray without ceasing, and set no time when we shall be heard.

2. God seeth all things; but we must with lamentation lay open our miseries before Him.

(1) Mercy is denied to them that hide their sins.

(2) Forgiveness is granted upon a free confession.

3. We then pray most earnestly when we feet most sensibly the burden of that we would be rid of, and the want of that we would have.

4. There is no rest or quietness within us, when God presseth us with the weight of our own sins.

5. The godly do always, in the due consideration of their sins, aggravate them against themselves in greatest measure.

(1) They see best into their own offences.

(2) They measure them by the heavy anger of God, deserved by the same (Luk_18:13).

6. The things that are ordained for our greatest good in this life, do turn to our greatest harm when our sins provoke Gods anger to break forth against us. (J. Udall.)

There is none to comfort me.

Comfortless

1. It is the duty of all men to comfort the afflicted, and not to add to their miseries (Mat_25:40; Jam_1:27; 1Co_12:26; Heb_13:3).

(1) We owe this duty one to another.

(2) No misery can befall another, but when God will it may light upon ourselves.

2. It is the property of the wicked to rejoice at the miseries of the godly, with whom they should mourn (Psa_69:12; Psa_137:3; Jdg_16:25).

(1) They are affected as their father the devil, who rejoiceth in nothing but the calamity of mankind.

(2) Their hatred maketh them glad when any evil lighteth on the righteous.

3. We are the fittest scholars to learn Gods Word and make right use of it, when afflictions are upon us.

(1) In prosperity we forget God and ourselves also.

(2) We are in our corrupt nature as naughty children that will not learn except they be well whipped.

(3) In afflictions we can more easily consider of our estate, both present, past, and to come.

4. Every tittle of Gods Word shall be accomplished in due season (Mat_5:18).

5. Though the troubles of the righteous be many, yet arc not the elect to be discerned from the reprobate by affliction.

6. It greatly easeth the godly in their afflictions to consider that their foes shall be destroyed (Rev_18:20).

7. The punishments that Gods people sustain in this life are sure tokens that the wicked shall be plagued, howsoever they escape for a time. (J. Udall.)

Thou wilt bring the day that Thou hast called.--

The day that right all wrongs

In that day--

1. God shall no longer be shut out of His own world.

2. Christ shall no longer be denied and blasphemed.

3. Evil shall no longer prevail.

4. Error shall give place to truth.

5. The saints shall no longer be maligned. (H. Bonar, D. D.)

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The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Lam 1:19 is not a continuation of the direct address to the nations, to whom she complains of her distress, but merely a complaint to God regarding the sorrow she endures. The perfects קראתי, רמּוּני, are not preterites, and thus are not to be referred to the past, as if complaint were made that, in the time of need, the lovers of Jerusalem forsook her; they rather indicate accomplished facts, whose consequences reach down to the present time. It was not merely in former times, during the siege, that Jerusalem called to her friends for help; but even now she still calls, that she may be comforted by them, yet all in vain. Her friends have deceived her, i.e., shamefully disappointed her expectations. From those who are connected with her, too, she can expect neither comfort nor counsel. The priests and the elders, as the helpers and advisers of the city, - the former as representing the community before God, and being the medium of His grace, the latter as being leaders in civil matters, - pined away ( ,גּועexspirare; here, to pine away through hunger, and expire). כּי is a temporal particle: "when they were seeking for bread" to prolong their life ('השׁיב נ as in Lam 1:11). The lxx have added καὶ οὐχ ευ, which Thenius is inclined to regard as a portion of the original text; but it is very evidently a mere conjecture from the context, and becomes superfluous when כּי ne is taken as a particle of time.

Keil & Delitzsch — Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1861–1891) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API. (Old Testament only.)

1:19 I begged my allies: Egypt had a great deal of interest in Judah because Judah controlled the only good route to the north. However, Egypt turned her back on Judah when Babylon attacked Jerusalem (Jer 37:5-11). • When there was little rain in the fall and spring in Palestine, a summer without rain could destroy crops and cause a food shortage. The food supply also ran out under the prolonged siege of a city (Jan 588–July 586 BC), and many people starved to death (2 Kgs 25:2-3; cp. Jer 37:21).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

That is, they died for hunger.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

lovers-- (Lam 1:2; Jer 30:14).

elders--in dignity, not merely age.

sought . . . meat--Their dignity did not exempt them from having to go and seek bread (Lam 1:11).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 19. I called for my lovers] My allies; the Egyptians and others.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Here the people of God complain in the person of a woman, as we have before seen, that in their calamity they were left destitute of every comfort. And it is a circumstance which increases grief, when no one is present to shew any kindness to the miserable; for it is no small alleviation of sorrow, when friends offer their kind services, and as far as they can, endeavor to mitigate the severity of the evil.

The Church of God now says, that she was so forsaken by friends as to be left alone to pine away in her mourning and sorrow. There may, however, be here an allusion to shameful and impure connections; for by this term, friends, the Spirit often points out the Egyptians as well as others in whom the Israelites had foolishly trusted; for in this manner, we know, they had turned aside from conjugal fidelity. God had bound them to himself, that they might acquiesce in his favor alone; and so to acquiesce was their spiritual chastity. Rightly, then, does Scripture compare both the Egyptians and the Assyrians to harlots, whenever the Israelites sought aid from them. But as this explanation seems too refined, I am content to view what is said simply as a complaint., that the people of God, though looking in all directions, yet could find no comfort in the world. I cried, she said, to my friends; they deceived me.

It is then added, My priests and mine elders expired in the city. Had they been slain in battle, it would have been no wonder; for they who go against an enemy, go as it were to meet death. But God’s people here deplore a more grievous evil, that the priests died in the city, not through the enemies’ sword, but through famine, which is as it were the extreme of evils. It is then said, that the priests as well as the elders perished through famine, because they could not find food. And when it is said that they sought food to refresh the soul, there is a contrast to be understood between ordinary food and a remedy for the famine; for we naturally seek food whenever we feel hungry; but the Prophet refers here to something more than this, even that the priests and the elders sought food, because long abstinence urged them; and it was very sad, that the priests, who excelled in honor, and also the elders, were thus reduced to want. Had such a thing happened to the common people, it would not have been so wonderful; for the long siege of the city had consumed all their provisions. But when the priests, and those who had wealth, were thus oppressed with hunger, we may conclude that the want which the Prophet wished to describe was extreme. It follows, —

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(19) I called for.—Better, to. The “lovers,” as in Lam_1:2, are the former allies of Judah.

My priests and mine elders.—The pressure of the famine of the besieged city is emphasised by the fact that even these, the honoured guides of the people, had died of hunger. On the phrase that follows, see Lam_1:11. A conjectural addition, at the end of the verse, “and found not,” is supplied in the LXX and Syriac versions; but rhetorically there is more force in the aposiopesis, the suggestive silence, of the Hebrew.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

19. my lovers] See on Lam_1:2.

meat to refresh their souls] See on Lam_1:11. The LXX add (but unnecessarily, and with injury to the metre), and found it not.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

I called for my lovers, but they deceived me,.... Either her idols, with whom she had committed spiritual adultery, that is, idolatry; but these could not answer her expectations, and help her: or the Egyptians, that courted her friendship, and with whom she was in alliance, and in whom she trusted; and these, in the times of her distress, she called upon to make good their engagements, but they disappointed her, and stood not to their covenant and promises, but left her to stand and fall by herself; this Jerusalem said, according to the Targum, when she was delivered into the hands of Nebuchadnezzar; but these words, "they deceived me", it makes to be the Romans, that came with Titus and Vespasian, and built bulwarks against Jerusalem:

my priests and mine elders gave up the ghost in the city; or died in the city of Jerusalem; not by the sword of the enemy, but through famine; and so, in the Arabic language, the word (i) signifies to labour under famine, and want of food, and perish through it; and if this was the case of their priests that officiated in holy things, and of their elders or civil magistrates, what must be the case of the common people?

while they sought their meat to relieve their souls; or "fetch (k) them back"; which were just fainting and dying away through hunger; and who did expire while they were begging their bread, or inquiring in one place after another where they could get any, either freely or for money.

(i) "esurivit et fame ac inedia laboravit", Golius, col. 556. (k) "et reducerent animam suam", Montanus.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

I called for ... - Rather, to “my lovers.”

While they sought their meat - literally, “for they sought food for themselves to revive their souls.” Complete the sense by adding, “and found none.”

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Me. Egypt attempted to relieve Juda, to no purpose, ver. 2. (Calmet) --- It could not, or at least did not, prove of any service to the Jews, chap. ii. 18. (Worthington)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

I desired help of my allies and confederates who courted my friendship and alliance in any prosperity, but they failed mine expectation, none of them either would or could succour me. My misery was such through the famine, that not only my common people, but those of the best rank in the city, magistrates and priests, fainted as they went along the street seeking bread to satisfy their hunger.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

19. I called for, etc. — Rather, I called to, my lovers.

Priests and… elders — The men to whom the people should have recourse in times of trouble: the former as representing the community before God, and being the medium of his grace; and the latter as the leaders in civil matters. Even these have pined away while they sought (in vain) their meat to relieve their souls.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For my lovers; render, to my lovers (see on ver. 2).

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Deceived - They did not answer my expectation.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

I called to my lovers Heb. לַמְאַהֲבַי, to those who make themselves appear as lovers.

[but] they deceived me e.g., the children of Ishmael, who went forth toward the exiles when the captors were leading them on the road nearby, as if they were compassionate toward them. And they brought them various kinds of salty foods and inflated skin flasks. They [the Jews] thought that these were [flasks of] wine, so they ate and became thirsty and wished to drink, and when they untied the flask with their teeth, the air entered their intestines and they died. This is what Scripture says (Isa. 21:13f.): “In the forest in Arabia you shall lodge, etc. Bring water toward the thirsty! The inhabitants of the land of Tema came before the wanderer with bread.”

to revive their souls so that they should revive their souls.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.