Lamentations 3:42
in Lamentations 3“We have sinned and rebelled; You have not forgiven.”
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
We have transgressed and have rebelled; thou hast not pardoned.
KJV
We have transgressed and have rebelled: thou hast not pardoned.
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This verse in Lamentations 3
Commentary
5 notes on this verseNote, It becomes us, when we are in trouble, to justify God, by owning our sins, and laying the load upon ourselves for them. Call sin a transgression, call it a rebellion, and you do not miscall it. This is the result of their searching and trying their ways; the more they enquired into them the worse they found them.
This site's exposition
Let us examine and test our ways
on Lamentations 3:40-42
The single voice becomes a summons to the whole people: “Let us examine and test our ways, and turn back to the LORD”. The confession is stated plainly with its last clause kept: “We have sinned and rebelled; You have not forgiven”.
The record, by era
The Medieval Church1 voice
"We have transgressed and rebelled, and thou hast not forgiven." Here prayer begins, first accenting benevolence, second, the fault. Here is taken into account a benevolence of their own person and people, setting forth their harassments. First, afflictions of people are considered, second compassion. Regarding …
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
), Thou hast not pardoned. They had not the assurance and comfort of the pardon; the judgments brought upon them for their sins were not removed, and therefore they thought they could not say the sin was pardoned, which was a mistake, but a common mistake with the people of God when their souls are cast down and disquieted within them.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens
We have transgressed, and have rebelled,....
The words behind it
6 Hebrew wordsEvery Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.
| Hebrew | Sound | Meaning | Word study | In the Bible |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| נַ֤חְנוּ | nachnu | we | H5168 → | |
| פָשַׁ֙עְנוּ֙ | fasha'nu | we have transgressed | H6586 → | |
| וּמָרִ֔ינוּ | umarinu | and we have rebelled | H4784 → | 45 times |
| אַתָּ֖ה | ʾatah | you | H859 → | 1094 times |
| לֹ֥א | lo' | not | H3808 → | 5168 times |
| סָלָֽחְתָּ׃ ס | salacheta | you have forgiven | H5545 → |
נַ֤חְנוּwe
nachnuH5168 →
פָשַׁ֙עְנוּ֙we have transgressed
fasha'nuH6586 →
וּמָרִ֔ינוּand we have rebelled
umarinuH4784 →45 times
אַתָּ֖הyou
ʾatahH859 →1094 times
לֹ֥אnot
lo'H3808 →5168 times
סָלָֽחְתָּ׃ סyou have forgiven
salachetaH5545 →
A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.
The walk
8 stopsEach card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.
Through
Nehemiah 9:26But they were disobedient and rebelled against You; they flung Your law behind their backs. They killed Your prophets, who had admonished them to return to You. They committed terrible blasphemies.
it leads to
- 1 Kings 14:9
You have done more evil than all who came before you. You have proceeded to make for yourself other gods and molten images to provoke Me, and you have flung Me behind your back.
- Judges 2:11–12
And the Israelites did evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals.
- Nehemiah 9:18
Even when they cast for themselves an image of a calf and said, ‘This is your God who brought you up out of Egypt,’ and when they committed terrible blasphemies,
- Acts 7:52
Which of the prophets did your fathers fail to persecute? They even killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One. And now you are His betrayers and murderers—
- 1 Kings 18:4
for when Jezebel had slaughtered the prophets of the LORD, Obadiah had taken a hundred prophets and hidden them, fifty men per cave, providing them with food and water.)
- 1 Kings 14:9
Through
Zechariah 1:5Where are your fathers now? And the prophets, do they live forever?
it leads to
- 2 Peter 3:2–4
by recalling what was foretold by the holy prophets and commanded by our Lord and Savior through your apostles.
- Ecclesiastes 12:5
when men fear the heights and dangers of the road, when the almond tree blossoms, the grasshopper loses its spring, and the caper berry shrivels—for then man goes to his eternal home and mourners…
- Job 14:10–12
But a man dies and is laid low; he breathes his last, and where is he?
- 2 Peter 3:2–4
Where this verse is studied
About Lamentations

This page draws on John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible and Thomas Aquinas, Commentary on Lamentations.
