Chapter 3

Jeremiah Shares Israel’s Affliction

1 I am the man who has aseen affliction

Because of the rod of His wrath.

2 He has driven me and made me walk

In adarkness and not in light.

3 Surely against me He has aturned His hand

Repeatedly all the day.

4 He has caused my aflesh and my skin to waste away,

He has bbroken my bones.

5 He has abesieged and encompassed me with bbitterness and hardship.

6 In adark places He has made me dwell,

Like those who have long been dead.

7 He has awalled me in so that I cannot go out;

He has made my 1bchain heavy.

8 Even when I cry out and call for help,

He ashuts out my prayer.

9 He has ablocked my ways with hewn stone;

He has made my paths crooked.

10 He is to me like a bear lying in wait,

Like a lion in secret places.

11 He has turned aside my ways and atorn me to pieces;

He has made me desolate.

12 He abent His bow

And bset me as a target for the arrow.

13 He made the 1arrows of His aquiver

To enter into my 2inward parts.

14 I have become a alaughingstock to all my people,

Their mocking bsong all the day.

15 He has afilled me with bitterness,

He has made me drunk with wormwood.

16 He has abroken my teeth with bgravel;

He has made me cower in the cdust.

17 My soul has been rejected afrom peace;

I have forgotten 1happiness.

18 So I say, “My strength has perished,

And so has my ahope from the Lord.”

Hope of Relief in God’s Mercy

19 Remember my affliction and my 1wandering, the awormwood and bitterness.

20 Surely amy soul remembers

And is bbowed down within me.

21 This I recall to my mind,

Therefore I have ahope.

22 The Lord’s alovingkindnesses 1indeed never cease,

bFor His compassions never fail.

23 They are new aevery morning;

Great is bYour faithfulness.

24 “The Lord is my aportion,” says my soul,

“Therefore I bhave hope in Him.”

25 The Lord is good to those who await for Him,

To the 1person who bseeks Him.

26 It is good that he awaits silently

For the salvation of the Lord.

27 It is good for a man that he should bear

The yoke in his youth.

28 Let him asit alone and be silent

Since He has laid it on him.

29 Let him 1put his mouth in the adust,

Perhaps there is bhope.

30 Let him give his acheek to 1the smiter,

Let him be filled with reproach.

31 For the Lord will anot reject forever,

32 For if He causes grief,

Then He will have acompassion

According to His abundant lovingkindness.

33 For He adoes not afflict 1willingly

Or grieve the sons of men.

34 To crush under His feet

All the prisoners of the 1land,

35 To 1deprive a man of ajustice

In the presence of the Most High,

36 To 1adefraud a man in his lawsuit—

Of these things the Lord does not 2approve.

37 Who is 1there who speaks and it acomes to pass,

Unless the Lord has commanded it?

38 Is it not from the mouth of the Most High

That 1aboth good and ill go forth?

39 Why should any living 1mortal, or any man,

Offer acomplaint 2in view of his sins?

40 Let us aexamine and probe our ways,

And let us return to the Lord.

41 We alift up our heart 1and hands

Toward God in heaven;

42 We have atransgressed and rebelled,

You have bnot pardoned.

43 You have covered Yourself with aanger

And bpursued us;

You have slain and chave not spared.

44 You have acovered Yourself with a cloud

So that bno prayer can pass through.

45 You have made us mere aoffscouring and refuse

In the midst of the peoples.

46 All our enemies have aopened their mouths against us.

47 aPanic and pitfall have befallen us,

Devastation and destruction;

48 My 1aeyes run down with streams of water

Because of the destruction of the daughter of my people.

49 My eyes pour down aunceasingly,

Without stopping,

50 Until the Lord alooks down

And sees from heaven.

51 My eyes bring pain to my soul

Because of all the daughters of my city.

52 My enemies awithout cause

Hunted me down blike a bird;

53 They have silenced 1me ain the pit

And have 2bplaced a stone on me.

54 Waters flowed aover my head;

I said, “I am cut off!”

55 I acalled on Your name, O Lord,

Out of the lowest pit.

56 You have aheard my voice,

“bDo not hide Your ear from my prayer for relief,

From my cry for help.”

57 You adrew near when I called on You;

You said, “bDo not fear!”

58 O Lord, You ahave pleaded my soul’s cause;

You have bredeemed my life.

59 O Lord, You have aseen my oppression;

bJudge my case.

60 You have seen all their vengeance,

All their aschemes against me.

61 You have heard their areproach, O Lord,

All their schemes against me.

62 The alips of my assailants and their whispering

Are against me all day long.

63 Look on their asitting and their rising;

bI am their mocking song.

64 You will arecompense them, O Lord,

According to the work of their hands.

65 You will give them 1ahardness of heart,

Your curse will be on them.

66 You will apursue them in anger and destroy them

From under the bheavens of the Lord!