Matthew Henry on Lamentations 4:1-12
The elegy in this chapter begins with a lamentation of the very sad and doleful change which the judgments of God had made in Jerusalem. The city that was formerly as gold, as the most fine gold, so rich and splendid, the perfection of beauty and the joy of the whole earth, has become dim, and is changed, has lost its lustre, lost its value, is not what it was; it has become dross. Alas! what an alteration is here!
I. The temple was laid waste, which was the glory of Jerusalem and its protection. it is given up into the hands of the enemy. And some understand the gold spoken of (Lam 4:1) to be the gold of the temple, the fine gold with which it was overlaid (Kg1 6:22); when the temple was bu…
Read the whole note in the consoleJamieson-Fausset-Brown on Lamentations 4:8
blacker than . . . coal--or, "than blackness" itself (Joe 2:6; Nah 2:10).
like a stick--as withered as a dry stick.
Adam Clarke on Lamentations 4:7
Her Nazarites were purer than snow - נזיר nazir does not always signify a person separated under a religious vow; it sometimes denotes what is chief or eminent. It is applied to Joseph, Gen 49:26.
Blayney therefore translates here, Her Nobles.
"Her nobles were purer than snow, they were whiter than milk;
They were ruddier on the bone than rubies; their veining was the sapphires."
On which he remarks: - "In the first line the whiteness of their skin is described, and in the second, their flesh;" and as גזר gazar signifies to divide and intersect, as the blue veins do on the surface of the body, these are without doubt intended.
Milk will most certainly well apply to the whiteness of the skin;…
Read the whole note in the consoleJohn Gill on Lamentations 4:8
Their visage is blacker than a coal,.... Or, "darker than blackness"; or, "dark through blackness" (y); by reason of the famine, and because of grief and trouble for themselves and their friends, which changed their complexions, countenances, and skins; they that looked before as pure as snow, as white as milk, as clear as pearls, as polished as sapphire, now as black as charcoal, as blackness itself:
they are not known in the streets; not taken notice of in a distinguished manner; no respect shown them as they walk the streets, as used to be; nay, their countenances were so altered, and their apparel so sordid, as not to be known by their friends, when they met them in public:
their skin…
