Lamentations 2:15

15. They hiss and wag their head] expressions denoting amazement mixed with contempt. Cp. Jer_18:16; 2Ki_19:21; Job_27:23; Psa_22:7; Zep_2:15.

that men called] These words (as Löhr, following J. D. Michaelis, points out) should for metrical reasons be omitted.

The perfection of beauty, the joy etc.] Cp. for both phrases Psa_48:2, and for the former one Psa_50:2 and (of Tyre) Eze_27:3; Eze_28:13. They were possibly current phrases used by Psalmists and this writer independently.

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.

Lam 2:15 All that pass by clap [their] hands at thee; they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem, [saying, Is] this the city that [men] call The perfection of beauty, The joy of the whole earth?

Ver. 15. All that pass by thee clap.] See Lam 1:17.

Is this the city?] God’s palace upon earth, the porch of paradise, &c., as they said of Jezebel when she lay torn with dogs, Is this that Jezebel?

“ O quantum haec Niobe, Niobe mutatur ab ills? ”

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_2:15

An that pass by clap their hands at thee.

Deriding the distressed

1. God is wont to whip His children for their sins, by the multitude of unbelievers that hate the truth (Isa_10:5-6; Jer_25:9; Exo_1:13-14).

2. It is a property of a wicked heart, to insult over the distressed, whom we should pity and relieve (Psa_35:15; Psa_79:4; 2Sa_16:7-8; Mat_27:39).

3. The wicked seeing the godly afflicted, take occasion thereby to blaspheme God and His truth (Psa_74:10; Psa_74:18; 2Ki_18:30; 2Ki_18:35; 2Ki_19:12).

4. There only is true joy and excellency where Gods truth is rightly preached, and His name called upon (Psa_50:2; Eze_47:8-9; Eze_47:12). (J. Udall.)

Exultation over the fallen

Men are always ready to remind the fallen of the days of prosperity. It is hard to pass by a man who is thrown down without telling him what he might have been, what he once was, and how foolishly he has acted in forsaking the way in which he found prosperity and delight. We must expect this from all men. It is not in their nature to heal our diseases, to comfort our sorrows, to sympathise with us in the hour of desolation. The Psalmist complained, Thou makest us a by-word among the heathen, a shaking of the head among the people. Wonderful things had been spoken of Zion in the better days. In proportion to our exaltation is our down throwing. Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is mount Zion, etc. Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined. How great is His goodness! and how great is His beauty! But all this will go for notching where there has been moral apostasy, spiritual disobedience, or spiritual idolatry. Decoration is vanity. All that men can do in the beautifying of their lives is as rottenness if the heart itself be not in a healthy condition. Add to the bitterness of self-remorse the triumphant exultation of enemies who pass by, and say whether any humiliation can be deeper or more intolerable. Where, then, is hope to be found? In heaven. The God whom we have offended must be the God who can forgive us. Do not let us seek to placate our enemies, or turn their triumphing into felicitation: we have no argument with them; not a word ought we to have to say to such mockers; we must acquaint ourselves with God, and make ourselves at peace with heaven, and if a mans ways please the Lord, the Lord will make that mans enemies to be at peace with him. (J. Parker, D. D.)

The call to prayer

This is not the first occasion on which the elegist has shown his faith in the efficacy of prayer. But hitherto he has only uttered brief exclamations in the middle of his descriptive passages. Now he gives a solemn call to prayer, and follows this with a deliberate full petition, addressed to God. This new and more elevated turn in the elegy is itself suggestive. The transition from lamentation to prayer is always good for the sufferer. The trouble that drives us to prayer is a blessing, because the state of a praying soul is a blessed state. Like the muezzin on his minaret, the elegist calls to prayer. But his exhortation is addressed to a strange object--to the wall of the daughter of Zion. This wall is to let its tears flow like a river. Browning has an exquisitely beautiful little poem apostrophising an old wall; but this is not done so as to leave out of account the actual form and nature of his subject. Walls can not only be beautiful and even sublime, as Mr. Ruskin has shewn in his Stones of Venice; they may also wreath their severe outlines in a multitude of thrilling associations. This is especially so when, as in the present instance, it is the wall of a city that we are contemplating. Such a wall is eloquent in its wealth of associations, and there is pathos in the thought of its mere age when this is considered in relation to the many men and women and children who have rested beneath its shadow at noon, or sheltered themselves behind its solid masonry amid the terrors of war. The walls that encircle the ancient English city of Chester and keep alive memories of medieval life, the bits of the old London wall that are left standing among the warehouses and offices of the busy mart of modern commerce, even the remote wall of China for quite different reasons, and many another famous wall, suggest to us multitudinous reflections. But the walls of Jerusalem surpass them all in the pathos of the memories that cling to their old grey stones. In personifying the wall of Zion, however, the Hebrew poet does not indulge in reflections such as these, which are more in harmony with the mild melancholy of Grays Elegy than with the sadder mood of the mourning patriot. He names the wall to give unity and concreteness to his appeal, and to clothe it in an atmosphere of poetic fancy. But his sober thought in the background is directed towards the citizens whom that historic wall once enclosed. Let us look at the appeal in detail. First the elegist encourages a free outflow of grief, that tears should run like a river, literally, like a torrent--the allusion being to one of those steep watercourses which, though dry in summer, become rushing floods in the rainy season. This introduction shews that the call to prayer is not intended in any sense as a rebuke for the natural expression of grief, nor as a denial of its existence. The sufferers cannot say that the poet does not sympathise with them. There may be a deeper reason for this encouragement of the expression of grief as a preliminary to a call to prayer. The helplessness which it so eloquently proclaims is just the condition in which the soul is most ready to cast itself on the mercy of God. The first step towards deliverance will be to melt the glacier. The soul must feel before it can pray. Therefore the tears are encouraged to run like torrents, and the sufferer to give himself no respite, nor let the apple of his eye cease from weeping. Next the poet exhorts the object of his sympathy--this strange personification of the wall of the daughter of Zion, under the image of which he is thinking of the Jews--to arise. The weeping is but a preliminary to more promising acts. The sufferer must be roused if he is to be saved from the disease of melancholia. He must be roused also if he would pray. True prayer is a strenuous effort of the soul, requiring the most wakeful attention and taxing the utmost energy of will. Therefore we must gird up our loins to pray just as we would to work, or run, or fight. Now the awakened soul is urged to cry out in the night, and in the beginning of the night watches--that is to say, not only at the commencement of the night, for this would require no rousing, but at the beginning of each of the three watches into which the Hebrews divided the hours of darkness--at sunset, at ten oclock, and at two in the morning. The sufferer is to keep watch with prayer--observing his vespers, his nocturns, and his matins, not of course to fulfil forms, but because, since his grief is continuous, his prayer also must not cease. Proceeding with our consideration of the details of this call to prayer, we come upon the exhortation to pour out the heart like water before the face of the Lord. The image here used is not without parallel in Scripture (see Psa_22:14). But the ideas are not just the same in the two cases. While the Psalmist thinks of himself as crushed and shattered, as though his very being were dissolved, the thought of the elegist has more action about it, with a deliberate intention and object in view. His image suggests complete openness before God. Nothing is to be withheld. The sufferer should tell the whole tale of his grief to God, quite freely, without any reserve, trusting absolutely to the Divine sympathy. The attitude of soul that is here recommended is in itself the very essence of prayer. The devotions that consist in a series of definite petitions are of secondary worth, and superficial in comparison with this outpouring of the heart before God. To enter into relations of sympathy and confidence with God is to pray in the truest, deepest way possible, or even conceivable. Even in the extremity of need, perhaps the best thing we can do is to spread out the whole case before God. It will certainly relieve our own minds to do so, and everything will appear changed when viewed in the light of the Divine presence. Perhaps we shall then cease to think ourselves aggrieved and wronged; for what are our deserts before the holiness of God? Passion is allayed in the stillness of the sanctuary, and the indignant protest dies upon our lips as we proceed to lay our case before the eyes of the All-Seeing. We cannot be impatient any longer; He is so patient with us, so fair, so kind, so good. Thus, when we cast our burden upon the Lord, we may be surprised with the discovery that it is not so heavy as we supposed. The secret of failure in prayer is not that we do not ask enough; it is that we do not pour out our hearts before God, the restraint of confidence rising from fear or doubt simply paralysing the energies of prayer. Jesus teaches us to pray not only because He gives us a model prayer, but much more because He is in Himself so true and full and winsome a revelation of God, that as we come to know and follow Him our lost confidence in God is restored. Then the heart that knows its own bitterness, and that shrinks from permitting the stranger even to meddle with its joy--how much more then with its sorrow?--can pour itself out quite freely before God, for the simple reason that He is no longer a stranger, but the one perfectly intimate and absolutely trusted Friend. (W. F. Adeney, M. A.)

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

Lam 2:15. All that pass by clap their hands at thee; they hiss, &c. — These were gestures of derision, whereby the enemies of the Jews expressed a satisfaction in their calamities; saying, Is this the city that men call The Perfection of beauty — Or, perfect in beauty, as Blaney renders כל לת יפי; The Joy of the whole earth — Such was the light in which the Jews had viewed Jerusalem, and such was the language in which they had been wont to speak of it. And it was at least a pardonable partiality in them, which led them to pass these encomiums upon it, and to suppose that all strangers would be equally delighted with its beauty as they themselves were. It was the metropolis of their nation, and the city their God had chosen to put his name there. There was his magnificent temple, and there the symbols of his divine presence, and the administration of the ordinances of his worship. Thither the whole nation resorted, according to his appointment, to celebrate their solemn feasts: and there those feasts were observed with all the magnificence of religious joy. It is no wonder, therefore, that they esteemed it the perfection of beauty, and a place in which the whole earth ought to delight.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

HOMILETICS

EXEGETICAL NOTES.—

(ם) Lam_2:15. Casual strangers on their travels felt glad at sight of desolated Jerusalem. They clap their hands at thee, all who pass by the way, and add scorn to gladness; they hiss and wag their head. They use sarcasm, Is this the city which they called the perfection of beauty, a joy to the whole earth? So the glorying of the Jews is turned into a reproach and shame.

(פ) Lam_2:16. A similar but wider view is presented than in the preceding verse. Not strangers, but all thine enemies, filled with mockery and exultation, have opened their mouth against thee. There is testimony in the Psalms as to how Orientals can belch out with their mouth. Abrupt utterances follow, and intimate how excited and impassioned they were. We have swallowed up. Hah! this is the day which we have expected, have found, have seen. Now at length we see what we sought, get what we wanted.

(ע) Lam_2:17. Whatever are the calamities suffered, whatever the taunts to which the people are exposed in their ruined condition, they have not come from the onslaught of ruthless foes, but from God, their own God. That was the final fact of the catastrophe which had overwhelmed them. It is not the generalisations, called “laws,” which make history what it is, but the will of “the living Lord.” He controls all existences, and His methods with them are always definite and consistent. Not one faileth. Jehovah has done that which he purposed; he has fulfilled his word which he commanded from the days of old. Compare Lev_26:14 ff; Deu_28:15 ff. He keeps His word. His order has been faithfully carried out in the overthrow of Jerusalem, and, giving entire power to boasting destroyers, he has exalted the horn of thine adversaries.

THE HEARTLESS TRIUMPH OF THE SCORNER

(Lam_2:15-17)

I. Expressed in aggravated taunts (Lam_2:15). The conquerors heap insult upon insult on the fallen city. They employ all the familiar signs expressive of contempt and derision. They clap their hands, they hiss, they wag their heads, and with a scornful curl of the lip they ask, “Is this the city that men call the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth?” Jerusalem had acquired a world-wide renown. It was the pride of the Jew, the dread of its subject tribes, the envy of surrounding nations. No city had been so signally honoured of Heaven; and now that it was prone in the dust, its foes united in a wild chorus of fiendish jubilation. How vividly does this verse remind us of the scene around the cross of the world’s Redeemer! (Mat_27:39-44; Mar_15:29-32; Luk_23:35-37). It is heartless and wicked to make sport of the miseries of others, and is a cruel aggravation of those miseries. The triumph of the wicked is short. Their hollow-ringing laughter is as “the crackling of thorns under a pot.” Their taunts and gibes fall back upon themselves. Our unkind words come home to roost.

II. Savagely exults in the havoc that has been ardently desired (Lam_2:16). The intensity of the enemy’s exultation is shown by the heaping up of unconnected words, with each of which its own proper object must be supplied. We have found what we sought, have seen what we looked for; our hopes and longings are all fulfilled.—Speaker’s Commentary. The enemies of Zion eagerly watched for her downfall, they earnestly desired it, they maliciously helped to bring it about; and now it had come, their maddened hilarity and scorn knew no bounds. The truly brave never exult over the defeat of their worst foes. They have often been known to weep over the devastation they have themselves created. It is inhuman to chuckle over the sufferings of others. It is a depth of demoralisation reached only by the cowardly and craven-hearted.

III. The fulfilment of Divine threatenings against national unfaithfulness (Lam_2:17). The ruin of Jerusalem, over which her adversaries so savagely rejoiced, was no accidental or unforeseen event. It was the fulfilment of the Divine purpose, of which Israel had been so often forewarned from the days of old. It was distinctly foretold that if Israel forsook Jehovah and lapsed into idolatry, they would be punished with all the miseries of a siege, ending in national overthrow (Lev_26:14-39; Deu_28:15-68). The contemptuous scorn of their enemies emphasised their punishment, and testified to the exactness with which the Divine threatenings against disobedience had been fulfilled. The Divine word, whether in threat or promise, never fails. God is unchangeably faithful both in mercy and in judgment.

LESSONS.—

1. The wicked ever gloat over the downfall of the good.

2. The gibes of the scorner are a bitter ingredient in the punishment of the unfaithful.

3. The taunts of the wicked have no power to injure the truly righteous.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

Lam_2:15, 16. The world’s treatment of its suffering Redeemer:

1. A wild tempest of unreasoning scorn, hatred, and exultation.

2. A mournful evidence of the intense acrimony of sin.

3. Does not prevent the unselfish working out of its sublime redemption.

Lam_2:17. The Divine threatenings of judgment: I. Unaffected by the lapse of time. “He hath fulfilled His word that He had commanded in the days of old.” II. Are carried out with relentless certainty. “He hath thrown down and hath not pitied.” III. Always finds agents willing to execute them. “He hath caused thine enemy to rejoice over thee; He hath set up the horn of thine adversaries.”

ILLUSTRATIONS.—Triumph premature. During the reign of Henry VIII., the Pope, angry at the English monarch’s resistance, called a council in Rome, at which it was resolved that the Emperor of Germany should invade England, and that Henry should be deposed. So rejoiced was the Papal party, that they illuminated Rome; cannons were fired, bonfires lighted, and great bodies of men paraded the streets shouting, “The Empire and Spain.” Already, in their eager expectation, England was a second Netherlands, a captured province under the regency of Catherine or Mary. How bitterly these expectations were overthrown history too well declares.

Scorn, not to be dreaded.

“Ridicule is a weak weapon when levelled at a strong mind;

But common men are cowards, and dread an empty laugh.

Betray mean terror of ridicule, thou shalt find fools enough to mock thee;

But answer thou their laughter with contempt,

And the scoffers will lick thy feet.”

—Tupper.

A scoffer non-plussed. On a certain occasion, in the presence of a vast and brilliant assemblage, a person more noted for his self-esteem than for his learning was speaking against the Christian religion in terms of the severest scorn and derision. The celebrated Dr. Belknap, overhearing the orator, stepped up to him and asked, “Well, sir, have you found a religion that is better?” The scoffer, considerably abashed by this unlooked-for question, was forced to acknowledge that thus far he had not. “Well,” responded the Doctor, “when you have, let me know, and I will join you in adopting it.” The rebuke was as wise as it was just.

Sarcasm destroys friendship. Life is full of paradoxes. There are some slight causes which will destroy the strongest friendship. Great causes will not always impair it. A sarcastic and disparaging speech made by a friend concerning his friend in his absence, and repeated by some mischief-maker, will invariably disturb friendship; while an angry altercation, or some injury to person or to property, will often leave friendship unharmed. When alienation begins, it increases at a very rapid rate. The rust spot multiplies apace. The mildew spreads quickly. The rift in the lute becomes longer and longer.—S. Martin.

The Redeemer’s sufferings unique. Did Christ then merely suffer as any other man has done? Suffering is a question of nature. The educated man suffers more than the uneducated man; the poet probably suffers more than the mathematician; the commanding officer suffers more in a defeat than the common soldier. The more life the more suffering, the billows of sorrow being in proportion to the volume of our manhood. Now Jesus Christ was not merely a man. He was man, and by the very compass of His manhood He suffered more than any mortal can endure. The storm may pass as fiercely over the shallow lake as over the Atlantic, but by its very volume the latter is more terribly shaken. No other man had come with Christ’s ideas; in no other man was the element of self so entirely abnegated; no other man had offered such opposition to diabolical rule. All these circumstances combine to render Christ’s sufferings unique, yet not one of them puts Christ so far away as to prevent us finding in His suffering unfailing solace and strength.—Dr. Parker.

Divine punishment certain. Those who made light of the invitation to the supper mentioned in the Gospel were shut out. The sceptical Pilate ended a miserable, hopeless life by suicide. The rich man went on living splendidly, giving banquets, pampering his body, until one day he died and was buried, and awoke in torment to know its reality at last. The people in Noah’s days lived securely and indifferent, “until the flood came and took them all away.” On the inhabitants of Sodom the sun was shining when Lot went out of the city; but the same day it rained fire and brimstone, and destroyed them all.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

clap . . . hands--in derision (Job 27:23; Job 34:37).

wag . . . head-- (Kg2 19:21; Psa 44:14).

perfection of beauty . . . joy of . . . earth-- (Psa 48:2; Psa 50:2). The Jews' enemies quote their very words in scorn.

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 15. The perfection of beauty] This probably only applied to the temple. Jerusalem never was a fine or splendid city; but the temple was most assuredly the most splendid building in the world.

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

The Prophet here reminds the Jews of the miseries by which they had been already in an extreme measure afflicted, so that these words seem redundant and somewhat unkind; for unseasonable is reproof when one lies down, as it were, worn out with evils. As this was the condition of the people, the Prophet ought not to have made more bitter their grief. But we have already referred to the reason for this, even because the Jews, though they mourned and were extremely sorrowful in their calamities, did not yet consider whence their evils came. It was therefore necessary that they should be more and more awakened; for it is but of little profit for any one to suffer evils, except he has regard to God’s judgment. We hence perceive the design of the Prophet, why he so much at large speaks of the miseries which were seen by all, and could not escape the notice of the Jews, who were almost overwhelmed with them; for it was not enough for them to feel their miseries, except they also considered the cause of them.

He then says, All who have passed by clapped their hands and hissed and moved the head, either in token of mockery, or of abhorrence, which is more probable. He then says, that they moved or shook the head at the daughter of Jerusalem, Is this the city of which they said, It is perfect in beauty, and the joy of the whole earth? I know not why some render כלילת, calibat, a crown; it comes, as it is well known, from כלל calal, which means fullness, or anything solid. He then says, that Jerusalem had been perfect in beauty, because God had adorned it with singular gifts; he had especially favored it with the incomparable honor of being called by his name. Hence Jerusalem was in a manner the earthly palace of God, that is, on account of the Temple; and further, it was there that the doctrine of salvation was to be found; and remarkable was this promise,

“From Sion shall go forth the law, and rite word of God from Jerusalem.” (Isaiah 2:3.)

God had also promised to Ezekiel, that this city would be the fountain and origin of salvation to the whole world. (Ezekiel 47:1-12.) As, then, Jerusalem had been adorned with so remarkable gifts, the Prophet introduces here strangers, who ask, “Could it be that a city so celebrated for beauty had become a desolation?”

He calls it also the joy of the whole earth; for God had poured there his gifts so liberally, that it was a cause of joy to all. For we delight in beautiful things; and wherever God’s gifts appear, we ought to have our hearts filled with joy. Some give a more refined explanation — that Jerusalem had been the joy of the whole earth, because men have no peace except God be propitious to them; and there God had deposited the testimony and pledge of his favor: and thus Jerusalem made glad the whole world, because it invited all nations to God. This, at the first view, is plausible; but it seems to me more refined than solid. I am, therefore, content with this simple view, that Jerusalem was the joy of the whole earth, because God had designed that his favor should appear there, which might justly excite the whole world to rejoice. It afterwards 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.

(15) All that pass by.—The triumphant exultation of the enemies of Zion came to add bitterness to her sorrows. They reminded her of what she had been in the past, and contrasted it with her present desolation.

The perfection of beauty . . .—Like phrases are used of Zion in Psa_48:2; Psa_50:2; of Tyre in Eze_27:3. Now that beauty was turned into squalor and desolation.

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

All that pass by clap their hands at thee,.... Travellers that passed by, and saw Jerusalem in ruins, clapped their hands at it, by way of rejoicing, as well pleased at the sight. This must be understood, not of the inhabitants of the land, but of strangers, who had no good will to it; though they seem to be distinguished from their implacable enemies in Lam 2:16,

they hiss and wag their head at the daughter of Jerusalem; by way of scorn and derision; hereby expressing their contempt of her, and the pleasure and satisfaction they took in seeing her in this condition:

saying, is this the city that men call the perfection of beauty,

the joy of the whole earth? a complete city, a most beautiful one for its situation; for its fortifications by nature and art; for its spacious buildings, palaces, and towers; and especially for the magnificent temple in it, and the residence of the God of heaven there, and that pompous worship of him there performed; on account of all which, and the abundant blessings of goodness bestowed upon the inhabitants, they had reason to rejoice more than all the men of the world besides; as well as they contributed many ways to the good and happiness of all nations; this is what had been said by themselves, Psa 48:2; and had even been owned by others; by the forefathers of those very persons that now insult over it. So the Targum,

"is this the city which our fathers that were of old said? &c.''

nor do they by these words deny, but rather own, that it had been what was said of it; but now the case was otherwise; instead of being a perfect beauty, it was a perfect heap of rubbish; instead of being the joy of the whole earth, it was the offscouring of all things.

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

Compare the scene round the cross of the Redeemer Mat 27:39.

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

This was according to God’s threatenings, 1Ki 9:8; Jer 18:16; 19:8. God had poured out all his blessings upon this people, whatsoever might adorn them, or make them happy, so as all people blessed the Jewish nation; but now the case was so altered, that all people scoffed at them, and hissed, and admired at the change which God had made.

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

15. Clap their hands — An expression of delight at the calamity of the people. They wag their head as did the Jews in derision of the crucified Christ.

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

Clap... hiss... wag their heads. Gestures of malicious joy (Job_27:23) or contempt. (Jer_19:8 Psa_22:7) The perfection of beauty; literally, the perfect in beauty. The same phrase is used in Ezekiel (Eze_27:3 Eze_28:12) of Tyro, and a similar one in Psa_1:2 of Zion.

The glory and the shame of Jerusalem.

Contrast with misery escaped heightens the joy of the rescued and the happy; and, on the other hand, contrast with bygone prosperity adds to the wretchedness of those who are fallen from high estate.

I THE BEAUTY AND RENOWN OF JERUSALEM IN ITS PROSPERITY. Into these many elements entered.

1. Its situation was superb. Nature pointed out the heights of Zion for a metropolis. Especially when beheld from the brow of Olivet the city impresses every traveller with admiration.

2. Its history and memorable associations. Won by the valour of David, adorned by the magnificence of Solomon, the home of heroes and of saints, this city possessed a fascination with which few cities of the earth could compare.

3. Its sacred edifice ranked alone, far above all the temples of the ancient world. Not that its architecture was commanding or beautiful in the highest degree; but. that its erection, its dedication, the presence of the Eternal, all lent an interest and a sacredness to the peerless building.

4. Its sacrifices and festivals, which were attended by hundreds of thousands of worshippers, were altogether unique.

II THE DISGRACE OF JERUSALEM. This appears:

1. From its ruinous and almost uninhabitable condition,

2. From the slaughter or dispersion of its citizens.

3. From its degradation from its proud position as the metropolis of a nation.

4. From the hatred, scorn, and insults of its triumphant enemies.

APPLICATION. There is a day of visitation which it behoves every child of privilege and mercy to use aright. To neglect that day is surely to entail a bitter overtaking by the night of calamity and destruction. T.

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

Strangers and enemies have, for the misfortune of Jerusalem, only expressions of scorn and delight over her loss. "Those who pass by the way" are strangers who travel past Jerusalem. To clap the hands together is not here a gesture betokening anger and disinclination (Num 24:10), but of delight over the injury of others, as in Job 27:23. שׂרק, to hiss, is an expression of scorn; see on Jer 19:8. The same is true as regards the shaking of the head; cf. Psa 22:8; Psa 109:25, etc.: the expression for this, in Jer 18:16, is הניד בּראשׁ. The exclamation, "Is this the city which they call 'perfect in beauty'?" is an expression of scornful astonishment. כּלילת יפי is substantially the same as מכלל יפי, Psa 50:2, where the expression is applied to Zion; in Eze 27:3 the same is said of Tyre. That Jeremiah had Psa 50:2 in his mind is shown by the apposition, "a joy of the whole earth," which is taken from Psa 48:3.

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.)

clap their hands ... hiss and shake their heads

These actions are used to mock and insult others. AT: "mock you by clapping their hands ... hiss and shake their heads" (See: Symbolic Action)

the daughter of Jerusalem

This is a poetic name for Jerusalem, which is spoken of here as if it were a woman. (See: Personification)

Is this the city that they called 'The Perfection of Beauty,' 'The Joy for All of Earth'?

This rhetorical question is used to express sarcasm. This question can be written as a statement. AT: "This city that they called 'The Perfection of Beauty,' 'The Joy for All of Earth,' is not so beautiful or joyful anymore!" (See: Rhetorical Question)

The Perfection of Beauty

"Perfectly Beautiful"

grind their teeth

This action shows a person's anger and that they are mocking others. (See: Symbolic Action)

We have swallowed her up

Here the people speak of destroying Jerusalem as if they were an animal swallowing its food. AT: "We have completely destroyed Jerusalem" (See: Metaphor)

We have lived to see it

This is an idiom. AT: "We have greatly desired to see it happen" (See: Idiom)

translationWords

Jerusalem

perfect

joy

adversary

mock

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

they hissed To blow with the mouth, siblir in Old French, to hiss, whistle. It is customary for a person to do this when he sees an important thing that was ruined.

the perfection of beauty All beauty was hers.

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.