Friday, June 17, 2011

Lamentations 2

The Facts (Chapter number: Verse)

Lamentations 2: God's Warning Fulfilled

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

The Lord has destroyed without mercy all the dwellings of Jacob; in his wrath he has broken down the strongholds of daughter Judah; he has brought down to the ground in dishonor the kingdom and its rulers.

He has cut down in fierce anger all the might of Israel; he has withdrawn his right hand from them in the face of the enemy; he has burned like a flaming fire in Jacob, consuming all around.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; he has killed all in whom we took pride in the tent of daughter Zion; he has poured out his fury like fire.

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

He has broken down his booth like a garden, he has destroyed his tabernacle; the LORD has abolished in Zion festival and sabbath, and in his fierce indignation has spurned king and priest.

The Lord has scorned his altar, disowned his sanctuary; he has delivered into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; a clamor was raised in the house of the LORD as on a day of festival.

The LORD determined to lay in ruins the wall of daughter Zion; he stretched the line; he did not withhold his hand from destroying; he caused rampart and wall to lament; they languish together.

Her gates have sunk into the ground; he has ruined and broken her bars; her king and princes are among the nations; guidance is no more, and her prophets obtain no vision from the LORD.

The elders of daughter Zion sit on the ground in silence; they have thrown dust on their heads and put on sackcloth; the young girls of Jerusalem have bowed their heads to the ground.

My eyes are spent with weeping; my stomach churns; my bile is poured out on the ground because of the destruction of my people, because infants and babes faint in the streets of the city.

They cry to their mothers, "Where is bread and wine?" as they faint like the wounded in the streets of the city, as their life is poured out on their mothers' bosom.

What can I say for you, to what compare you, O daughter Jerusalem? To what can I liken you, that I may comfort you, O virgin daughter Zion? For vast as the sea is your ruin; who can heal you?

Your prophets have seen for you false and deceptive visions; they have not exposed your iniquity to restore your fortunes, but have seen oracles for you that are false and misleading.

All who pass along the way clap their hands at you; they hiss and wag their heads at daughter Jerusalem; "Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of all the earth?"

All your enemies open their mouths against you; they hiss, they gnash their teeth, they cry: "We have devoured her! Ah, this is the day we longed for; at last we have seen it!"

The LORD has done what he purposed, he has carried out his threat; as he ordained long ago, he has demolished without pity; he has made the enemy rejoice over you, and exalted the might of your foes.

Cry aloud to the Lord! O wall of daughter Zion! Let tears stream down like a torrent day and night! Give yourself no rest, your eyes no respite!

Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the watches! Pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord! Lift your hands to him for the lives of your children, who faint for hunger at the head of every street.

Look, O LORD, and consider! To whom have you done this? Should women eat their offspring, the children they have borne? Should priest and prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?

The young and the old are lying on the ground in the streets; my young women and my young men have fallen by the sword; in the day of your anger you have killed them, slaughtering without mercy.

You invited my enemies from all around as if for a day of festival; and on the day of the anger of the LORD no one escaped or survived; those whom I bore and reared my enemy has destroyed.

My Comments

Seriously, why does God delight so in the threat of making parents eat their children? You would think cannibalism would be one of those things God is completely against. And yet, when it comes down to it, God is actually okay with putting people in situations where eating their children would be necessary (or just outright forcing them to eat their children, as it sometimes comes across) nor does God seem upset when it actually happens because of famine. In 2 kings, the only one really upset by the child cannibalism is the king himself. God says nothing on this subject. Again, God spends BOOKS on how bad it is to not be faithful to him and exactly how God will punish those who dare to turn to other gods before him, yet he is okay with forcing parents to eat their children as punishment and is completely silent when mothers are so hungry they actually turn to eating their children.

And why are only mothers mentioned in this particular cannibalism verse? Before, when cannibalism is being threatened as a punishment, it is implied that both parents may be forced to eat their offspring. Yet, here, the focus is placed specifically on the mothers. Also, to note, the only people in the Bible to actually commit cannibalism (thus far, anyway) have been women. What exactly that says, I don't know. Is it just women are really the only ones truly weak enough to eat their children without God pushing them to do it? Like, fathers would eat their children but only if God was pressing it upon them as a punishment and wouldn't do so otherwise. But those women, you gotta keep an eye on them. They start feeling a bit peckish and bam! You're down one kid. Is this just the Bible once again pointing to the inferior and weak nature of women/mothers?

Don't get me wrong, the Bible does show cannibalism in a bad light, it's not that just because God doesn't make it a commandment that that means the Bible thinks it's okay. When cannibalism is mentioned you can see that it's a bad thing that really shouldn't happen. That is not my beef. My beef is that, like human sacrifice, the Bible will SAY it's a wrong, evil, bad thing and yet God is still okay with using it. God SAYS he's very anti-human sacrifice and yet look what happened to Jephtha's daughter. Or even Jesus, for that matter, the bestest of all human sacrifices. It's the same with cannibalism. It's written in a non-positive light, and yet that has never stopped God from using it to punish or threaten his people, and it apparently doesn't even warrant an appearance or any ACTUAL punishment when it really happens. God only has time to punish those who cheat on him, okay? He SO doesn't have time to deal with mother's eating their children.

All I want is just a little actual morals to live by, here. I'm not asking for much. But so far the only real message that's coming across loud and clear is DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE EVEN LOOK AT ANOTHER GOD BESIDES YAHWEH OR HE WILL FUCK YOUR SHIT UP! If the Bible can't even get the pretty simple ideas of "don't sacrifice people" and "don't eat other people" across as well as it does the whole God adultery thing, then really I don't see how this even remotely comes close to being a codes of ethics and morals...

Monday: More Lamentations

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