Attributed commentary excerpt
Keil & Delitzsch on Lamentations 5:8
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Commentary on the Old Testament
C. F. Keil & F. Delitzsch · 19th-century historical commentary
Source: BibleWord.ai's local reference edition of this named work.
Further description of the miserable condition under which the congregation languishes. Lam 5:8. "Servants rule over us," etc. עבדים are not the Chaldean soldiers, who are in Kg2 24:10 designated the servants of Nebuchadnezzar (Pareau, Rosenmller, Maurer); still less the Chaldeans, in so far as they, till shortly before, had been the subjects of the Assyrians (Kalkschmidt); nor the Chaldean satraps, as servants of the king of Babylon (Thenius, Ewald); nor even "slaves who had been employed as overseers and taskmasters of the captives while on the march" (Ngelsbach); but the Chaldeans. These are called servants, partly because of the despotic rule under which they were placed, partly in the sense already indicated by C. B. Michaelis, as being those qui nobis potius, si pii fuissemus, servire debuissent, in accordance with the analogous designation of Jerusalem as a princess among the countries of the world, Lam 1:1. Lam 5:9 And in addition to this humiliation under dishonourable servitude, we can get our daily bread only at the risk of our life. Thus there is fulfilled to them the threatening in Deu 28:28, "Ye shall be servants among your enemies, in hunger and thirst, in nakedness and want of everything." בּנפשׁנוּ, "for the price of our soul," i.e., with our life at stake, we bring in our bread. The danger is more exactly described by what is added: "before the sword of the wilderness." By this expression are meant the predatory Bedouins of the desert, who, falling upon those that were bringing in the bread, plundered, and probably even killed them. The bringing of the bread is not, however, to be referred (with Rosenmller, Maurer, and Kalkschmidt) to the attempts made to procure bread from the neighbouring countries; still less is it to be referred (with Thenius, Ewald, and Ngelsbach) to the need for "wringing the bread from the desert and its plunderers;" but it refers to the ingathering of the scanty harvest in the country devastated by war and by the visitations of predatory Bedouins: הביא is the word constantly employed in this connection; cf. Sa2 9:10; Hag 1:6. Lam 5:10 The bread which we are thus obliged to struggle for, at the risk of our life, is not even sufficient to allay hunger, which consumes our bodies. נכמר does not mean to be blackened (Chaldee, Kimchi, C. B. Michaelis, Maurer), but in Gen 43:30; Kg1 3:26, and Hos 11:8, to be stirred up (of the bowels, compassion), hence to kindle, glow. This last meaning is required by the comparison with תּנּוּר, oven, furnace. This comparison does not mean cutis nostra tanquam fornace adusta est (Gesenius in Thes., Kalkschmidt), still less "black as an oven" (Dietrich in Ges. Lex.), because תּנּוּר does not mean the oven viewed in respect of its blackness, but (from נוּר) in respect of the fire burning in it. The meaning is, "our skin glows like a baker's oven" (Vaihinger, Thenius, Ngelsbach, Gerlach), - a strong expression for the fever-heat produced by hunger. As to זלעפות, glowing heat, see on Psa 11:6. Lam 5:11-12 With this must further be considered the maltreatment which persons of every station, sex, and age have to endure. Lam 5:11. Women and virgins are dishonoured in Jerusalem, and in the other cities of the land. Lam 5:12. Princes are suspended by the hand of the enemy (Ewald, contrary to the use of language, renders "along with" them). To hang those who had been put to death was something superadded to the simple punishment by death ( Deu 21:22.), and so far as a sham…
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