Bible Strands
Lamentations 3:15
He has filled me with bitterness; He has intoxicated me with wormwood.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The speaker, the afflicted voice of Lamentations 3, addresses God while recounting a period of intense public mockery and physical devastation. This declaration occurs immediately after describing being made a laughingstock and before detailing the sensation of teeth ground to gravel.
The words — The text uses הִשְׂבִּיעַנִי (hisbiʿA.ni), meaning "He has surfeited me," and בַמְּרוֹרִים (ba.me.ro.rim), meaning "with bitter things," to describe being forced to consume excessive bitterness. It then employs הִרְוַנִי (hi.rva.ni), "He has made drink me," paired with לַעֲנָה (la.a.nah), "wormwood," to depict forced intoxication with a substance known for its acrid taste.
The thread — This imagery of forced consumption of bitterness and wormwood parallels God’s judgment in Jeremiah 9:15 and the personal lament of Ruth 1:20. It also aligns with Job 9:18, where divine action overwhelms the speaker with bitterness rather than allowing rest.
Why it lands — The passage demands recognition that suffering is portrayed not as accidental misfortune but as a deliberate, overwhelming imposition. It requires the reader to acknowledge the physical and emotional weight of divinely permitted affliction without softening its severity.
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
He hath filled me with bitterness, he hath made me drunken with wormwood.
Cross-references
- Jeremiah 9:15 Therefore this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: “Behold, I will feed this people wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink.
- Ruth 1:20 “Do not call me Naomi,” she replied. “Call me Mara, because the Almighty has dealt quite bitterly with me.
- Job 9:18 He does not let me catch my breath, but overwhelms me with bitterness.
- Psalms 60:3 You have shown Your people hardship; we are staggered from the wine You made us drink.
- Isaiah 51:17 Awake, awake! Rise up, O Jerusalem, you who have drunk from the hand of the LORD the cup of His fury; you who have drained the goblet to the dregs—the cup that makes men stagger.
- Jeremiah 23:15 Therefore this is what the LORD of Hosts says concerning the prophets: “I will feed them wormwood and give them poisoned water to drink, for from the prophets of Jerusalem ungodliness has spread throughout the land.”
- Jeremiah 25:15 This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, said to me: “Take from My hand this cup of the wine of wrath, and make all the nations to whom I send you drink from it.
- Jeremiah 25:27 “Then you are to tell them that this is what the LORD of Hosts, the God of Israel, says: ‘Drink, get drunk, and vomit. Fall down and never get up again, because of the sword I will send among you.’
- Lamentations 3:19 Remember my affliction and wandering, the wormwood and the gall.