Lamentations 4:3
in Lamentations 4Even jackals offer their breasts to nurse their young, but the daughter of my people has become cruel, like an ostrich in the wilderness.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
Even the jackals draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones: The daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.
KJV
Even the sea monsters draw out the breast, they give suck to their young ones: the daughter of my people is become cruel, like the ostriches in the wilderness.
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This verse in Lamentations 4
Commentary
3 notes on this verseA commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
Sea monsters - Rather, jackals. Their young ones - “Their” whelps. The term is applied only to the young of dogs, lions, and the like.
This site's exposition
Even the sea monsters draw out the breast
on Lamentations 4:3-6
The sea monsters of verse 3, read by many of the older writers as jackals, nurse their young while the daughter of my people turns cruel as the ostriches of the wilderness, a bird Job 39 already named for abandoning her own eggs. Thirst cracks the tongue of nursing infants and starving children beg bread that no one breaks for them, while those bred to delicacy now embrace dunghills in the street. Verse 6 states the comparison the scene has been building toward: the punishment of the daughter of my people is greater than the sin of Sodom, which fell in a moment with no hand to prolong it, siege famine judged the slower and heavier judgment.
The record, by era
The Puritans and the Awakening1 voice
Cruel - The Jewish women are become cruel to their children, or forced to appear so, having through the famine no milk to give them, nor any thing to relieve them.
The words behind it
11 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| גַּם־ | gam- | also | H1571 → | 769 times |
| תַּנִּים֙ | tanin | jackals | H8577 → | |
| חָ֣לְצוּ | chaltzu | they draw out | H2502 → | |
| שַׁ֔ד | shad | a breast | H7699 → | |
| הֵינִ֖יקוּ | heiniku | they suckle | H3243 → | 33 times |
| גּוּרֵיהֶ֑ן | gureihen | young their | H1482 → | |
| בַּת־ | bat- | [the] daughter of | H1323 → | 588 times |
| עַמִּ֣י | ʾami | people my | H5971 → | 1873 times |
| לְאַכְזָ֔ר | leakhzar | [has become] <into> cruel | H393 → | |
| כַּיְעֵנִ֖ים | kaenim | like <the> ostriches | H3283 → | |
| בַּמִּדְבָּֽר׃ ס | bamidbar | in the wilderness | H4057 → | 270 times |
גַּם־also
gam-H1571 →769 times
תַּנִּים֙jackals
taninH8577 →
חָ֣לְצוּthey draw out
chaltzuH2502 →
שַׁ֔דa breast
shadH7699 →
הֵינִ֖יקוּthey suckle
heinikuH3243 →33 times
גּוּרֵיהֶ֑ןyoung their
gureihenH1482 →
בַּת־[the] daughter of
bat-H1323 →588 times
עַמִּ֣יpeople my
ʾamiH5971 →1873 times
לְאַכְזָ֔ר[has become] <into> cruel
leakhzarH393 →
כַּיְעֵנִ֖יםlike <the> ostriches
kaenimH3283 →
בַּמִּדְבָּֽר׃ סin the wilderness
bamidbarH4057 →270 times
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
Lamentations 2:20Look, O LORD, and consider: Whom have You ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the infants they have nurtured? Should priests and prophets be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
it leads to
- Jeremiah 19:9
I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and distress inflicted on them by their enemies who seek their lives.’
Reached by 3 separate paths from here.
- Lamentations 4:10
The hands of compassionate women have cooked their own children, who became their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
- Jeremiah 19:9
Through
Ezekiel 5:10As a result, fathers among you will eat their sons, and sons will eat their fathers. I will execute judgments against you and scatter all your remnant to every wind.’
it leads to
- Zechariah 2:6
“Get up! Get up! Flee from the land of the north,” declares the LORD, “for I have scattered you like the four winds of heaven,” declares the LORD.
- Deuteronomy 28:64
Then the LORD will scatter you among all the nations, from one end of the earth to the other, and there you will worship other gods, gods of wood and stone, which neither you…
- Leviticus 26:29
You will eat the flesh of your own sons and daughters.
- Zechariah 2:6
Through
Lamentations 4:10The hands of compassionate women have cooked their own children, who became their food in the destruction of the daughter of my people.
it leads to
- Lamentations 2:20
Look, O LORD, and consider: Whom have You ever treated like this? Should women eat their offspring, the infants they have nurtured? Should priests and prophets be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
- 2 Kings 6:26–29
As the king of Israel was passing by on the wall, a woman cried out to him, “Help me, my lord the king!”
- Isaiah 49:15
“Can a woman forget her nursing child, or lack compassion for the son of her womb? Even if she could forget, I will not forget you!
- Lamentations 2:20
About Lamentations
This page draws on Adam Clarke, Commentary on the Bible; Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament and John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament.