Bible Strands
Lamentations 1:1
How lonely lies the city, once so full of people! She who was great among the nations has become a widow. The princess of the provinces has become a slave.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The text addresses the fallen city of Jerusalem at the moment of its desolation, contrasting its former prosperity with its current state of ruin.
The words — The Hebrew יָשְׁבָה (ya.she.Vah) literally renders "she sits," paired with בָדָ֗ד (va.Dad) meaning "alone," to depict the city's sudden, desolate stillness.
The thread — This motif of a once-great city sitting destitute echoes Isaiah 3:26, where Zion's gates mourn and its inhabitants sit on the ground, while the contrast with past imperial dominance recalls the territorial scope described in 1 Kings 4:21 and Ezra 4:20.
Why it lands — The passage demands a clear-eyed assessment of how national privilege and population density can collapse into isolation and bondage, leaving the reader to confront the reality of divine judgment without evasion.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
How doth the city sit solitary, that was full of people! how is she become as a widow! she that was great among the nations, and princess among the provinces, how is she become tributary!
Cross-references
- Isaiah 3:26 And the gates of Zion will lament and mourn; destitute, she will sit on the ground.
- 1 Kings 4:21 And Solomon reigned over all the kingdoms from the Euphrates to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt. These kingdoms offered tribute and served Solomon all the days of his life.
- Ezra 4:20 And mighty kings have ruled over Jerusalem and exercised authority over the whole region west of the Euphrates; and tribute, duty, and toll were paid to them.
- Revelation 18:16 saying: “Woe, woe to the great city, clothed in fine linen and purple and scarlet, adorned with gold and precious stones and pearls!
- Isaiah 54:4 Do not be afraid, for you will not be put to shame; do not be intimidated, for you will not be humiliated. For you will forget the shame of your youth and will remember no more the reproach of your widowhood.
- 2 Kings 23:35 So Jehoiakim paid the silver and gold to Pharaoh Neco, but to meet Pharaoh’s demand he taxed the land and exacted the silver and the gold from the people, each according to his wealth.
- Isaiah 22:2 O city of commotion, O town of revelry? Your slain did not die by the sword, nor were they killed in battle.
- Lamentations 5:16 The crown has fallen from our head. Woe to us, for we have sinned!
- Zephaniah 2:15 This carefree city that dwells securely, that thinks to herself: “I am it, and there is none besides me,” what a ruin she has become, a resting place for beasts. Everyone who passes by her hisses and shakes his fist.
- 2 Kings 23:33 And Pharaoh Neco imprisoned Jehoahaz at Riblah in the land of Hamath so that he could not reign in Jerusalem, and he imposed on Judah a levy of a hundred talents of silver and a talent of gold.