Princes were hanged up by their hand: The faces of elders were not honored.
Parallel translations
- KJV Princes are hanged up by their hand: the faces of elders were not honoured.
- BSB Princes have been hung up by their hands; elders receive no respect.
- NKJV Princes were hung up by their hands, And elders were not respected.
- NASB Leaders were hung by their hands; Elders were not respected.
- NLT Our princes are being hanged by their thumbs, and our elders are treated with contempt.
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
Leaders were executed and the elders shown no respect by the conquerors. The whole social order of honor has been overturned.
Overview
Princes were hanged—likely impaled or hung in public shame—and the elders, who once commanded reverence, were dishonored. The reversal of every God-given structure of dignity marks the completeness of Judah's humiliation. Such overturning of honor points forward to the cross, where Christ bore shame for us so that He might raise the lowly and lift the humbled (Philippians 2:8-9).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- Lam 4:16Yahweh’s anger has scattered them; he will no more regard them: They didn’t respect the persons of the priests, they didn’t favor the elders.
- Isa 47:6I was angry with my people. I profaned my inheritance, and gave them into your hand. You showed them no mercy. You laid a very heavy yoke on the aged.
- Jer 39:6–7Then the king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah in Riblah before his eyes. The king of Babylon also killed all the nobles of Judah.
- Lam 2:20“Look, Yahweh, and see to whom you have done thus! Shall the women eat their offspring, the children that are dandled in the hands? Shall the priest and the prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
- Jer 52:10–11The king of Babylon killed the sons of Zedekiah before his eyes: he killed also all the princes of Judah in Riblah.
- Lam 2:10The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground, they keep silence; They have cast up dust on their heads; they have clothed themselves with sackcloth: The virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.
- Jer 52:25–27and out of the city he took an officer who was set over the men of war; and seven men of those who saw the king’s face, who were found in the city; and the scribe of the captain of the army, who mustered the people of the land; and sixty men of the people of the land, who were found in the middle of the city.
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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 5:12 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.