Lamentations 5:12

12 Our princes are being hanged by their thumbs, and our elders are treated with contempt.

Lamentations 5:12 Meaning and Commentary

Lamentations 5:12

Princes are hanged up by their hand
According to some, as Aben Ezra observes, by the hand of the servants before mentioned; however, by the hand of the Chaldeans or Babylonians; see ( Jeremiah 52:10 ) . Some understand it of their own hands, as if they laid violent hands upon themselves, not being able to bear the hardships and disgrace they were subjected to but I should rather think this is to be understood of hanging them, not by the neck, but by the hand, could any instance be given of such a kind of punishment so early used, and by this people; which has been in other nations, and in more modern times: the faces of elders were not honoured;
no reverence or respect were shown to elders in age or office, or on account of either; but were treated with rudeness and contempt.

Lamentations 5:12 In-Context

10 The famine has blackened our skin as though baked in an oven.
11 Our enemies rape the women in Jerusalem and the young girls in all the towns of Judah.
12 Our princes are being hanged by their thumbs, and our elders are treated with contempt.
13 Young men are led away to work at millstones, and boys stagger under heavy loads of wood.
14 The elders no longer sit in the city gates; the young men no longer dance and sing.
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