Let all their wickedness come before You, and deal with them as You have dealt with me because of all my transgressions. For my groans are many, and my heart is faint.
Parallel translations
- WEB “Let all their wickedness come before you; Do to them as you have done to me for all my transgressions. For my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.
- KJV Let all their wickedness come before thee; and do unto them, as thou hast done unto me for all my transgressions: for my sighs are many, and my heart is faint.
- NKJV “Letall their wickedness come before You, And do to them as You have done to me For all my transgressions; For my sighs are many, And my heart is faint.”
- NASB “May all their wickedness come before You; And deal with them just as You have dealt with me For all my wrongdoings. For my groans are many and my heart is faint.”
- NLT “Look at all their evil deeds, Lord. Punish them, as you have punished me for all my sins. My groans are many, and I am sick at heart.”
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
She asks God to deal with her enemies' wickedness as he dealt with her, for her heart is faint. It commits final judgment of evil into God's hands.
Overview
Closing the chapter, Jerusalem entrusts the recompense of her enemies to God rather than taking vengeance herself, even as her own sighs are many and her heart faints. The prayer flows from confessed sin and weary grief, leaving justice to the LORD. This surrender of vengeance to God anticipates the New Testament call to leave wrath to him (Romans 12:19).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 13
- Jer 8:18My sorrow is beyond healing; my heart is faint within me.
- Rev 6:10And they cried out in a loud voice, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You avenge our blood and judge those who dwell upon the earth?”
- Ps 109:14–15May the iniquity of his fathers be remembered before the LORD, and the sin of his mother never be blotted out.
- Neh 4:4–5Hear us, O God, for we are despised. Turn their scorn back upon their own heads, and let them be taken as plunder to a land of captivity.
- Lam 1:13He sent fire from on high, and it overpowered my bones. He spread a net for my feet and turned me back. He made me desolate, faint all the day long.
- Jer 51:35May the violence done to me and to my flesh be upon Babylon,” says the dweller of Zion. “May my blood be on the dwellers of Chaldea,” says Jerusalem.
- Jer 18:23But You, O LORD, know all their deadly plots against me. Do not wipe out their guilt or blot out their sin from Your sight. Let them be overthrown before You; deal with them in the time of Your anger.
- Ps 137:7–9Remember, O LORD, the sons of Edom on the day Jerusalem fell: “Destroy it,” they said, “tear it down to its foundations!”
- Lam 5:17Because of this, our hearts are faint; because of these, our eyes grow dim—
- Isa 13:7Therefore all hands will fall limp, and every man’s heart will melt.
- Luke 23:31For if men do these things while the tree is green, what will happen when it is dry?”
- Jer 10:25Pour out Your wrath on the nations that do not acknowledge You, and on the families that do not call on Your name. For they have devoured Jacob; they have consumed him and finished him off; they have devastated his homeland.
- Eph 3:13So I ask you not to be discouraged because of my sufferings for you, which are your glory.
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Christ at the center
The weeping over a ruined city and the steadfast mercies that are new every morning point to the man of sorrows who wept over Jerusalem and whose mercy rises new from the grave.
How Lamentations 1:22 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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