Lamentations 2:14

Nun

14 Your prophets saw visions for you that were empty and deceptive;^[a] they did not reveal your guilt and so restore your fortunes.^[b] They saw oracles for you that were empty and misleading.

Lamentations 2:14 Meaning and Commentary

Lamentations 2:14

Thy prophets have seen vain and foolish things for thee
Not the prophets of the Lord; but false prophets, as the Targum; which were of the people's choosing, and were acceptable to them; prophets after their own hearts, because they prophesied smooth things, such as they liked; though in the issue they proved "vain" and "foolish", idle stories, impertinent talk, the fictions of their own brains; and yet they pretended to have visions of them from the Lord; as that within two years Jeconiah, and all the vessels of the temple carried away by the king of Babylon, should be returned; and that he would not come against Jerusalem, nor should it be delivered into his hands; see ( Jeremiah 28:2-4 ) ; and they have not discovered thine iniquity:
they did not tell them of their sins; they took no pains to convince them of them, but connived at them; instead of reproving them for them, they soothed them in them; they did not "remove" the covering that was "over [their] iniquity" {u}, as it might be rendered; which they might easily have done, and laid their sirs to open view: whereby they might have been ashamed of them, and brought to repentance for them. The Targum is,

``neither have they manifested the punishment that should come upon thee for thy sins;''

but, on the contrary, told them it should not come upon them; had they dealt faithfully with them, by showing them their transgressions, and the consequences of them, they might have been a means of preventing their ruin: and, as it here follows, to turn away thy captivity;
either to turn them from their backslidings and wanderings about, as Jarchi; or to turn them by repentance, as the Targum; or to prevent their going into captivity: but have seen for thee false burdens, and causes of banishment;
that is, false prophecies against Babylon, and in favour of the Jews; prophecies, even those that are true, being often called "burdens", as the "burden of Egypt", and "the burden of Damascus" and the rather this name is here given to those false prophecies because the prophecies of Jeremiah were reproached by them with it, ( Jeremiah 23:33 ) and because these proved in the issue burdensome, sad, and sorrowful ones though they once tickled and pleased; and were the cause of the people's going into exile and captivity they listening to them: or they were "depulsions" or "expulsions" ^F23; drivings, that drove them from the right way; from God and his worship; from his word and prophets; and, at last, the means of driving them out of their own land; of impelling them to sin, and so of expelling them from their own country. The Targum renders it,

``words of error.''

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FOOTNOTES:

F21 (Knwe le wlg alw) "et non revelarunt [legmen] pravitati tuae impositum", Christ. Ben. Miehaelis.
F23 (Myxwdmw) (kai exwsmata) , Sept. "et expulsiones", Montanus, Vatablus, Calvin; "et ad depulsionem spectantium", Junius & Tremellius; "depulsiones, expulsiones", Stockius, p. 649.

Lamentations 2:14 In-Context

12 They cry out to their mothers: Where is the grain and wine? as they faint like the wounded in the streets of the city, as their lives fade away in the arms of their mothers.

13 What can I say on your behalf? To what can I compare you, Daughter Jerusalem? What can I liken you to, so that I may console you, Virgin Daughter Zion? For your ruin is as vast as the sea. Who can heal you?

14 Your prophets saw visions for you that were empty and deceptive; they did not reveal your guilt and so restore your fortunes. They saw oracles for you that were empty and misleading.

15 All who pass by [scornfully] clap their hands at you. They hiss and shake their heads at Daughter Jerusalem: Is this the city that was called the perfection of beauty, the joy of the whole earth?

16 All your enemies open their mouths against you. They hiss and gnash [their] teeth, saying, "We have swallowed [her] up. This is the day we have waited for! We have lived to see [it]."

Footnotes

• [a]. Ezk 13:8-16
• [b]. Dt 30:1-3; Jr 29:11-14; 30:1-3