A Lament for the Princes of Israel

¹And you, xtake up a lamentation for the princes of Israel, ²and say:

What was your mother? yA lioness!

Among lions she crouched;

in the midst of young lions

she reared her cubs.

³And she brought up one of her cubs;

zhe became a young lion,

aand he learned to catch prey;

he devoured men.

⁴The nations heard about him;

bhe was caught in their pit,

cand they brought him with hooks

to the land of Egypt.

⁵When she saw that she waited in vain,

that her hope was lost,

dshe took another of her cubs

and made him a young lion.

⁶He prowled among the lions;

he became a young lion,

and he learned to catch prey;

he devoured men,

⁷and seized1 their widows.

He laid waste their cities,

and the land was appalled and all who were in it

at the sound of his roaring.

⁸eThen the nations set against him

from provinces on every side;

fthey spread their net over him;

bhe was taken in their pit.

⁹With hooks ethey put him in a cage2

and gbrought him to the king of Babylon;

they brought him into custody,

that his voice should no more be heard

on hthe mountains of Israel.

¹⁰Your mother was ilike a vine in a vineyard3

planted by the water,

jfruitful and full of branches

kby reason of abundant water.

¹¹Its strong stems became

rulers' scepters;

it towered aloft

among the thick boughs;4

it was seen in its height

with the mass of its branches.

¹²But the vine was plucked up in fury,

cast down to the ground;

lthe east wind dried up its fruit;

they were stripped off and withered.

As for its strong stem,

fire consumed it.

¹³mNow it is planted in the wilderness,

in a dry and thirsty land.

¹⁴nAnd fire has gone out from the stem of its shoots,

has consumed its fruit,

oso that there remains in it no strong stem,

no scepter for ruling.

This is pa lamentation and has become a lamentation.