Lamentations 2:10

10 Jod The elders of the daughter of Zion sat upon the ground and are silent: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth; the daughters of Jerusalem hung their heads down to the ground.

Lamentations 2:10 Meaning and Commentary

Lamentations 2:10

The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground, [and]
keep silence
Who used to sit in the gate on thrones of judgment, and passed sentence in causes tried before them; or were wont to give advice and counsel, and were regarded as oracles, now sit on the ground, and dumb, as mourners; see ( Job 2:13 ) ; they have cast up dust upon their heads;
on their white hairs and gray locks, which bespoke wisdom, and made them grave and venerable: they have girded themselves with sackcloth:
after the manner of mourners; who used to be clothed in scarlet and rich apparel, in robes suitable to their office as civil magistrates: the virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground:
through shame and sorrow; who used to look brisk and gay, and walk with outstretched necks, and carried their heads high, but now low enough. Aben Ezra interprets it of the hair of their heads, which used to be tied up, but now loosed and dishevelled, and hung down as it were to the ground.

Lamentations 2:10 In-Context

8 Cheth The LORD has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion; he has stretched out the line; he has not withdrawn his hand from destroying; therefore he made the rampart and the wall to lament; they were destroyed together.

9 Teth Her gates were thrown to the ground; he has destroyed and broken her bars; her king and her princes are carried off among the Gentiles; there is no law; nor have her prophets found vision from the LORD.

10 Jod The elders of the daughter of Zion sat upon the ground and are silent: they have cast up dust upon their heads; they have girded themselves with sackcloth; the daughters of Jerusalem hung their heads down to the ground.

11 Caph My eyes fail with tears; my bowels are troubled; my liver is poured upon the earth, for the destruction of the daughter of my people because the children and the sucklings faint in the streets of the city.

12 Lamed They said to their mothers, Where is the wheat and the wine? fainting as the dead in the streets of the city, pouring out their souls into their mothers’ bosom.