Lamentations 5:13

He said, “Woe to you lawyers also! For you load men with burdens that are difficult to carry, and you yourselves won’t even lift one finger to help carry those burdens.

Now therefore why do you tempt God, that you should put a yoke on the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear?

He said to Abram, “Know for sure that your offspring will live as foreigners in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them. They will afflict them four hundred years.

Joseph placed his father and his brothers, and gave them a possession in the land of Egypt, in the best of the land, in the land of Rameses, as Pharaoh had commanded.

Yahweh said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt, and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows.

The king of Egypt said to them, “Why do you, Moses and Aaron, take the people from their work? Get back to your burdens!”

You shall not see your brother’s donkey or his ox fallen down by the way, and hide yourself from them. You shall surely help him to lift them up again.

Yahweh will send on you cursing, confusion, and rebuke in all that you put your hand to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly, because of the evil of your doings, by which you have forsaken me.

Therefore I will give their wives to others and their fields to those who will possess them. For everyone from the least even to the greatest is given to covetousness; from the prophet even to the priest everyone deals falsely.

He has violently taken away his tabernacle, as if it were of a garden. He has destroyed his place of assembly. Yahweh has caused solemn assembly and Sabbath to be forgotten in Zion. In the indignation of his anger, he has despised the king and the priest.

Two women will be grinding at the mill: one will be taken and one will be left.

Bear one another’s burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ.

Now, behold, the cry of the children of Israel has come to me. Moreover I have seen the oppression with which the Egyptians oppress them.

The Philistines laid hold on him and put out his eyes; and they brought him down to Gaza and bound him with fetters of bronze; and he ground at the mill in the prison.

“This is what Yahweh says: ‘Behold, I will raise up evil against you out of your own house; and I will take your wives before your eyes, and give them to your neighbor, and he will lie with your wives in the sight of this sun.

and struck all the firstborn in Egypt, the chief of their strength in the tents of Ham.

Her gates shall lament and mourn. She shall be desolate and sit on the ground.

“I will make Jerusalem heaps, a dwelling place of jackals. I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.”

Yahweh of Armies says: “The children of Israel and the children of Judah are oppressed together. All who took them captive hold them fast. They refuse to let them go.

Arise, cry out in the night, at the beginning of the watches! Pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord. Lift up your hands toward him for the life of your young children, who faint for hunger at the head of every street.

For I see that you are in the poison of bitterness and in the bondage of iniquity.”

For even they who receive circumcision don’t keep the law themselves, but they desire to have you circumcised, that they may boast in your flesh.

and I have said to you, “Let my son go, that he may serve me;” and you have refused to let him go. Behold, I will kill your firstborn son.’ ”

The same day Pharaoh commanded the taskmasters of the people and their officers, saying,

The taskmasters of the people went out, and their officers, and they spoke to the people, saying, “This is what Pharaoh says: ‘I will not give you straw.

For I will go through the land of Egypt in that night, and will strike all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and animal. I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. I am Yahweh.

At midnight, Yahweh struck all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon, and all the firstborn of livestock.

The children of Israel traveled from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand on foot who were men, in addition to children.

I will send the wild animals among you, which will rob you of your children, destroy your livestock, and make you few in number. Your roads will become desolate.

The Egyptians mistreated us, afflicted us, and imposed hard labor on us.

You will betroth a wife, and another man shall lie with her. You will build a house, and you won’t dwell in it. You will plant a vineyard, and not use its fruit.

“In the days of Shamgar the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were unoccupied. The travelers walked through byways.

Please restore to them, even today, their fields, their vineyards, their olive groves, and their houses, also the hundredth part of the money, and of the grain, the new wine, and the oil, that you are charging them.”

“I removed his shoulder from the burden. His hands were freed from the basket.

He struck also all the firstborn in their land, the first fruits of all their manhood.

He struck the firstborn of Egypt, both of man and animal.

to him who struck down the Egyptian firstborn; for his loving kindness endures forever;

so the king of Assyria will lead away the captives of Egypt and the exiles of Ethiopia, young and old, naked and barefoot, and with buttocks uncovered, to the shame of Egypt.

Then you will call, and Yahweh will answer. You will cry for help, and he will say, ‘Here I am.’ “If you take away from among you the yoke, finger pointing, and speaking wickedly;

The voice of news, behold, it comes, and a great commotion out of the north country, to make the cities of Judah a desolation, a dwelling place of jackals.

“Judah mourns, and its gates languish. They sit in black on the ground. The cry of Jerusalem goes up.

Moreover he put out Zedekiah’s eyes and bound him in fetters, to carry him to Babylon.

Therefore my wrath and my anger was poured out, and was kindled in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem; and they are wasted and desolate, as it is today.’

“They have heard that I sigh. There is no one to comfort me. All my enemies have heard of my trouble. They are glad that you have done it. You will bring the day that you have proclaimed, and they will be like me.

The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground. They keep silence. They have cast up dust on their heads. They have clothed themselves with sackcloth. The virgins of Jerusalem hang down their heads to the ground.

Yahweh is a jealous God and avenges. Yahweh avenges and is full of wrath. Yahweh takes vengeance on his adversaries, and he maintains wrath against his enemies.

I will remove those who grieve about the appointed feasts from you. They are a burden and a reproach to you.

“Come to me, all you who labor and are heavily burdened, and I will give you rest.

There will be two grinding grain together. One will be taken and the other will be left.”

For it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us, to lay no greater burden on you than these necessary things:

and said to me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful, and multiply you, and I will make of you a company of peoples, and will give this land to your offspring after you for an everlasting possession.’

Therefore they set taskmasters over them to afflict them with their burdens. They built storage cities for Pharaoh: Pithom and Raamses.

In those days, when Moses had grown up, he went out to his brothers and saw their burdens. He saw an Egyptian striking a Hebrew, one of his brothers.

and all the firstborn in the land of Egypt shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sits on his throne, even to the firstborn of the female servant who is behind the mill, and all the firstborn of livestock.

If you see the donkey of him who hates you fallen down under his burden, don’t leave him. You shall surely help him with it.

Is it a small thing that you have brought us up out of a land flowing with milk and honey, to kill us in the wilderness, but you must also make yourself a prince over us?

the deer, the gazelle, the roebuck, the wild goat, the ibex, the antelope, and the chamois.

all the storage cities that Solomon had, the cities for his chariots, the cities for his horsemen, and that which Solomon desired to build for his pleasure in Jerusalem, and in Lebanon, and in all the land of his dominion.

Over the king’s treasures was Azmaveth the son of Adiel: and over the treasures in the fields, in the cities, and in the villages, and in the towers, was Jonathan the son of Uzziah;

then let my wife grind for another, and let others sleep with her.

for she has thrown down many wounded. Yes, all her slain are a mighty army.

They will pass through it, very distressed and hungry. It will happen that when they are hungry, they will worry, and curse by their king and by their God. They will turn their faces upward,

Pause and wonder! Blind yourselves and be blind! They are drunken, but not with wine; they stagger, but not with strong drink.

Even the youths faint and get weary, and the young men utterly fall;

Take the millstones and grind flour. Remove your veil, lift up your skirt, uncover your legs, and wade through the rivers.

Awake, awake! Stand up, Jerusalem, you who have drunk from Yahweh’s hand the cup of his wrath. You have drunken the bowl of the cup of staggering, and drained it.

Your sons have fainted. They lie at the head of all the streets, like an antelope in a net. They are full of Yahweh’s wrath, the rebuke of your God.

“Isn’t this the fast that I have chosen: to release the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and that you break every yoke?

The roads to Zion mourn, because no one comes to the solemn assembly. All her gates are desolate. Her priests sigh. Her virgins are afflicted, and she herself is in bitterness.

“The Lord has set at nothing all my mighty men within me. He has called a solemn assembly against me to crush my young men. The Lord has trodden the virgin daughter of Judah as in a wine press.

“I called for my lovers, but they deceived me. My priests and my elders gave up the spirit in the city, while they sought food for themselves to refresh their souls.

The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how they are esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

I will spread my net on him, and he will be taken in my snare. I will bring him to Babylon, and will enter into judgment with him there for his trespass that he has trespassed against me.

You shall eat fat until you are full, and drink blood until you are drunk, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you.

For they bind heavy burdens that are grievous to be borne, and lay them on men’s shoulders; but they themselves will not lift a finger to help them.

They laid their hands on him, and seized him.

Having blindfolded him, they struck him on the face and asked him, “Prophesy! Who is the one who struck you?”

he also will drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is prepared unmixed in the cup of his anger. He will be tormented with fire and sulfur in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb.