Read on the fast day of Tisha B’Av, the lament in the book of Lamentations (in Hebrew Eicha or Alas, named after the first word of the text) is a rebuke. But who is the object of recrimination? Only on the face of it, Eicha is a pious book. It laments, in a deep way, the suffering of Israel which overwhelms what it can only uphold on the surface, which is the justice and mercy of God. Like Job, the poet pursues the cause of the people against an inscrutable God. The appeal to the justice of God is in the form of an appeal, not a statement of doxa. A single chapter puts on view the destruction of the city, the terrible suffering of the people, and the harsh and violent anger of God at the sin of the people. The confession of sin is an ironic, rhetorical feint. To grasp this, the reader must follow closely the entire train of the suit. By the end of every chapter, the dyadic relation between God and the people is twisted around the presence of a hostile third party. Directed at the enemy, the poet turns the misery of a human community against the anger of divine violence. When the poet addresses God in the second person, it is in the harsh reflection of a mirror image. You are God and my heart is sick. At the end of every chapter, the poet will have flipped the onus back onto God, who after all is God. Setting out to shame God, the poet, the Bible, rejects divine violence in the name of a suffering people.
Chapter 1: How solitary the city, alone and empty because the LORD has afflicted her. For her many transgressions; Her infants have gone into captivity Before the enemy (v.1, 5). About her own misery, the enemy, Fair Zion complains, See, O LORD, my misery; How the enemy jeers (v.9)! But The LORD is in the right, For I have disobeyed Him. Hear, all you peoples, And behold my agony (v.19). And now, at the end of the chapter, this swerve turns on the enemy whose crimes are brought before God in the form of a rebuke.Let all their wrongdoing come before You, And deal with them As You have dealt with me For all my transgressions. For my sighs are many, And my heart is sick (v.22).
Chapter 2, The Lord in His wrath Has shamed Fair Zion (v.1). In a confrontational mode, fair Zion insists, See, O LORD, and behold, To whom You have done this! Alas, women eat their own fruit, Their new-born babes! Alas, priest and prophet are slain In the Sanctuary of the Lord (v.20)! uUpsetting the balance in the relation between God and the people, the presence of the foe makes their suffering incomphrensible. You summoned, as on a festival, My neighbors from round about. On the day of the wrath of the LORD, None survived or escaped; Those whom I bore and reared My foe has consumed. (V.22)
Chapter 3, On a personal note, I used to hate The Man of Sorrows for his macho piety. He is introduced as if to offset the female figure of Fair Zion; but his complaints are no less bitter and are a complement to hers. He is the suffering man broken by God. His piety only appears conventional. Holding out hope in God’s tender mercies, he quotes himself: “The LORD is my portion,” I say with full heart; Therefore will I hope in Him. The LORD is good to those who trust in Him, To the one who seeks Him, etc. But pain breaks this confident pity. God’s failure to forgive sin violates a deeply helped norm of biblical faith. We have transgressed and rebelled, And You have not forgiven. You have clothed Yourself in anger and pursued us, You have slain without pity. You have screened Yourself off with a cloud, That no prayer may pass through V. 40-:. We have transgressed and rebelled, And You have not forgiven. You have clothed Yourself in anger and pursued us, You have slain without pity. You have screened Yourself off with a cloud, That no prayer may pass through. And then, finally, the Man of Sorrow flips the curse back onto the enemy V.59-60: Give them, O LORD, their deserts According to their deeds. Give them anguish of heart; Your curse be upon them! Oh, pursue them in wrath and destroy them From under the heavens of the LORD! (v. 64-6)
Chapter 4 Alas! The gold is dulled, Debased the finest gold! The sacred gems are spilled At every street corner (v.1). The LORD vented all His fury, Poured out His blazing wrath; He kindled a fire in Zion Which consumed its foundations. The kings of the earth did not believe, Nor any of the inhabitants of the world, That foe or adversary could enter The gates of Jerusalem (v.11-12). In shock, the chapter turns its attention in the final verses to the enemy. Rejoice and exult, Fair Edom, Who dwell in the land of Uz! To you, too, the cup shall pass, You shall get drunk and expose your nakedness. Your iniquity, Fair Zion, is expiated; He will exile you no longer. Your iniquity, Fair Edom, He will note; He will uncover your sins (v.21-2).
Chapter 5 Remember, O LORD, what has befallen us; Behold, and see our disgrace (v.1)! Woe to us that we have sinned! Because of this our hearts are sick, Because of these our eyes are dimmed Because of Mount Zion, which lies desolate; Jackals prowl over it (v.16-18). The poet in the concluding words of Eicha puts the entire moral onus of the lament back on God, who after all is God, not a suffering human. But You, O LORD, are enthroned forever, Your throne endures through the ages. Why have You forgotten us utterly, Forsaken us for all time? Take us back, O LORD, to Yourself, And let us come back; Renew our days as of old! For truly, You have rejected us, Bitterly raged against us. Take us back, O LORD, to Yourself, And let us come back; Renew our days as of old! (19-22)
