Lamentations 5:4
in Lamentations 5We must buy the water we drink; our wood comes at a price.
BSB
The same verse in ASV and KJV ▾
ASV
We have drunken our water for money; Our wood is sold unto us.
KJV
We have drunken our water for money; our wood is sold unto us.
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This verse in Lamentations 5
Commentary
8 notes on this verseWe have drunken our water for money - I suppose the meaning of this is, that every thing was taxed by the Chaldeans, and that they kept the management in their own hands, so that wood and water were both sold, the people not being permitted to help themselves. They were now so lowly reduced by servitude, that they were obliged to pay dearly for those things which formerly were common and of no price.
This site's exposition
We have become fatherless orphans
on Lamentations 5:3-4
Verse 3 states the plainest fact of famine and slaughter: “We have become fatherless orphans; our mothers are widows”. Verse 4 measures the loss in trade: “We must buy the water we drink; our wood comes at a price”, the barest needs now sold.
This site's exposition
buy the water
Albert Barnes sees the bitterness here: the water and the wood were the people's own, and now they come at a price. Adam Clarke reads a Chaldean tax. Isaiah 55:1 invites anyone who would drink to come and buy water with no money.
The record, by era
The Medieval Church1 voice
Here particular miseries are viewed which the people suffer. As stated: "We must pay for the water we drink," Namely, because of the people's slavery, and due to their affliction. As Verse 9 records: "We get our bread at the peril of our lives, because …
The Puritans and the Awakening2 voices
), We have drunk our water for money, and the saying is no longer true, Usus communis aquarum -- Water is free to all. So hardly did their oppressors use them that they could not have a draught of fair water but they must purchase it either with money or with work.
quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — leading-punctuation+unbalanced-parens
We have drunken our water for money,....
The Nineteenth Century2 voices
A commentator
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown1802–1910
Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)
Thus, "our" means the water which we need, the commonest necessary of life. our wood--In Judea each one could get wood without pay; in Babylon, "our wood," the wood we need, must be paid for.
A commentator
Albert Barnes1798–1870
Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869)
proposed
Better as in the margin cometh to us for price. The rendering of the the King James Version spoils the carefully studied rhythm of the original. The bitterness of the complaint lies in this, that it was their own property which they had to buy.
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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| מֵימֵ֙ינוּ֙ | meimeinu | water our | H4325 → | 581 times |
| בְּכֶ֣סֶף | bekhesef | for money | H3701 → | |
| שָׁתִ֔ינוּ | shatinu | we have drunk | H8354 → | |
| עֵצֵ֖ינוּ | ʾetzeinu | wood<s> our | H6086 → | 328 times |
| בִּמְחִ֥יר | bimchir | for a price | H4242 → | |
| יָבֹֽאוּ׃ | yavou | they come | H935 → | 2568 times |
מֵימֵ֙ינוּ֙water our
meimeinuH4325 →581 times
בְּכֶ֣סֶףfor money
bekhesefH3701 →
שָׁתִ֔ינוּwe have drunk
shatinuH8354 →
עֵצֵ֖ינוּwood<s> our
ʾetzeinuH6086 →328 times
בִּמְחִ֥ירfor a price
bimchirH4242 →
יָבֹֽאוּ׃they come
yavouH935 →2568 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
Isaiah 3:1For behold, the Lord GOD of Hosts is about to remove from Jerusalem and Judah both supply and support: the whole supply of food and water,
it leads to
- Ezekiel 4:16–17
Then He told me, “Son of man, I am going to cut off the supply of food in Jerusalem. They will anxiously eat bread rationed by weight, and in despair they will drink water…
Reached by 2 separate paths from here.
- Leviticus 26:26
When I cut off your supply of bread, ten women will bake your bread in a single oven and dole out your bread by weight, so that you will eat but not be satisfied.
- Ezekiel 14:13
“Son of man, if a land sins against Me by acting unfaithfully, and I stretch out My hand against it to cut off its supply of food, to send famine upon it, and to…
- Isaiah 1:24
Therefore the Lord GOD of Hosts, the Mighty One of Israel, declares: “Ah, I will be relieved of My foes and avenge Myself on My enemies.
- Jeremiah 38:9
“My lord the king, these men have acted wickedly in all that they have done to Jeremiah the prophet. They have dropped him into the cistern, where he will starve to death, for there…
- Ezekiel 4:16–17
Through
Deuteronomy 28:48you will serve your enemies the LORD will send against you in famine, thirst, nakedness, and destitution. He will place an iron yoke on your neck until He has destroyed you.
it leads to
- Jeremiah 28:13–14
“Go and tell Hananiah that this is what the LORD says: ‘You have broken a yoke of wood, but in its place you have fashioned a yoke of iron.’
- Jeremiah 44:22
So the LORD could no longer endure the evil deeds and detestable acts you committed, and your land became a desolation, a horror, and an object of cursing, without inhabitant, as it is this…
- Jeremiah 44:17–18
Instead, we will do everything we vowed to do: We will burn incense to the Queen of Heaven and offer drink offerings to her, just as we, our fathers, our kings, and our officials…
- Jeremiah 28:13–14
Where this verse is studied
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); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; 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.