Guest Post: Looking at Lamentations, Part 1

Today’s post is by Benjamin Giffone. This is part 1 of his thought-provoking essay on Lamentations.

It’s an honor to be a guest at Everyday Liturgy.  I am a postgraduate student in Old Testament at the University of Stellenbosch, and right now I’m in the middle of my thesis on the book of Lamentations.  When I tell people that I’m studying Lamentations, they say, “Oh”—and then move on to some other topic.  It’s unsaid, but I know they’re thinking: “Why in the world would you study such a depressing book?”

But I think there’s a lot to be gained from studying Lamentations—more than just an interesting dissertation.  Difficult books like Lamentations, and Ecclesiastes, and Job, and the psalms of lament—these are all treasures of God’s Word that the modern Western church has largely neglected, or at least undervalued.

Over the last two years, I’ve spent quite a bit of time researching the historical background of Lamentations, as well as the ways in which Lamentations has been interpreted in Jewish and Christian communities through the centuries.  In this two part essay, I propose some ways in which Lamentations can enrich the liturgy and life of the church.

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If we had to choose one event in the Old Testament that we would say is the most important, the most historically and theologically crucial moment in Israel’s history, I think the destruction of the Jerusalem temple would win the contest.  At that moment, all of God’s promises to Abraham, to Moses, to David, to Israel, were all thrown into doubt.  YHWH had abandoned his temple and allowed it to be desecrated by enemies.  The Davidic king was taken into exile, never to be heard from again.  Many people were killed or starved; those who survived fled to Egypt, or lived in slavery in the smoldering ruins of Judah.  Everything they’d ever known was gone, and everything they’d believed in was now called into question.

Lamentations is a set of five poems that commemorate and reflect upon this terrible catastrophe.  Amidst the descriptions of horrors almost too terrible to speak about, and the expression of shock, pain, anger and despair, these poems ask whether it’s possible to make sense of it all.

Sometimes the poets place the blame on the nation of Judah for its many sins:

Her adversaries have become the head; her enemies prosper.
For YHWH has afflicted her because of her many transgressions;
Her children have gone, captive before the foe. (1:5)

Jerusalem sinned greatly; therefore she became unclean. (1:8a)

In other passages the poets blame the enemies, the Babylonians who invaded Judah:

The adversary has stretched out his hand over all her precious things;
For she saw the nations enter her sanctuary,
Of which you commanded that they must never enter your assembly. (1:10)

The last two verses of chapter 4 even blame Judah’s cousins, the Edomites, who supported the Babylonian invasion rather than lending aid to their distant relatives:

Exult and be glad, Daughter of Edom, you who live in the land of Uz.
To you also the cup will pass; you will be drunk and stripped naked.
Your punishment will end, Daughter of Zion; he will not prolong your exile.
He will attend to your sin, Daughter of Edom, and expose your sin. (4:21-22)

But most often, Lamentations places the blame squarely on YHWH’s shoulders.  Consider chapter 2, starting in verse 1:

How the Lord in his anger has beclouded the daughter of Zion!
He has cast down from heaven to earth the splendor of Israel;
he has not remembered his footstool in the day of his anger.

The Lord has swallowed up without mercy all the habitations of Jacob;
in his wrath he has broken down the strongholds of the daughter of Judah;
he has struck down to the ground in dishonor the kingdom and its rulers.

He has cut down in fierce anger all the horn of Israel;
he has withdrawn from them his right hand in the face of the enemy;
he has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob, consuming all around.

He has bent his bow like an enemy, with his right hand set like a foe;
and he has killed all who were pleasant to the eye;
in the tent of the daughter of Zion he has poured out his fury like fire.

The Lord has become like an enemy; he has swallowed up Israel;
he has swallowed up all its palaces; he has laid in ruins its strongholds,
and he has multiplied in the daughter of Judah mourning and lamentation.

He has laid waste his booth like a garden, laid in ruins his meeting place;
YHWH has made Zion forget festival and Sabbath,
and in his fierce indignation has spurned king and priest.

And on and on…  YHWH’s barrage against Israel seems to have no end.  Even while acknowledging Israel’s sin, the poets ask whether YHWH has gone too far: “Look, O LORD, and see! With whom have you dealt thus? Should women eat  the fruit of their womb, the children of their tender care? Should priest and prophet be killed  in the sanctuary of the Lord?”  (2:20)  At the heart of Lamentations is the question of theodicy: God’s justice in allowing (and even causing) human suffering.  Perhaps the leadership of Israel, or even the entire adult population could be held responsible—but the children?  Are they to blame?  Do they deserve to starve or be slaughtered?

This is a shocking charge to level against God himself.  Is it right to question God’s justice or his sovereignty?  Some people would even say that it is proof that the God of the Bible is not loving and good, and so we shouldn’t pretend that he is a god worth worshiping and obeying.

In responding to these charges against God, some interpreters have appealed to Lamentations 3:21-24 as an expression of trust in God’s loving faithfulness:

This I take to heart and therefore I have hope:
YHWH’s covenant love is never exhausted, nor does his compassion ever end.
They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness.
“YHWH is my portion,” my soul says, “Therefore I will wait for him.”

Overall, chapter 3 is the most personal in Lamentations.  But these four verses are the only “hopeful” passage in the entire book!  Four short verses can’t possibly balance out the sheer volume of complaint, lament, appeal, protest that occurs in this book.  The very fact that a book of Scripture accuses YHWH of cruelty, and then devotes only four verses to his love and faithfulness, should give us pause.

And actually, the book ends without much hope.  For all the appeals and protests to YHWH, YHWH never speaks in the book of Lamentations.  The reader is left to wonder if that small seed of hope in 3:21-24 will ever bear fruit.  The book ends with this plea:

Restore us to yourself, YHWH, that we may return; renew our days as of old,
Unless you have utterly rejected us and are exceedingly angry with us. (5:21-22)

That last verse is so unbearable as an ending, that to this day when Lamentations is read in the Jewish synagogue, 5:21 is repeated one more time after 5:22 is read.  Is there any hope at all?  What more could YHWH do for Israel?  Will he bring more punishment, more pain, more suffering?

Benj continues his discussion tomorrow…