Introduction
II. THE DIVINE PUNISHMENT OF JERUSALEM (THE SECOND LAMENT) CH. 2
One of the striking features of this lament is its emphasis on God’s initiative in bringing destruction on Jerusalem and its people. Jeremiah saw Him as the One ultimately responsible for what had happened because He was angry over their sins. Many different words describing Yahweh’s hostility against His people appear in this chapter. This lament also describes in greater detail than chapter 1 the nature of the calamity that had befallen Judah.
"This second poem contains a new and more bitter lamentation regarding the fall of Jerusalem and the kingdom of Judah; and it is distinguished from the first, partly by the bitterness of the complaint, but chiefly by the fact that while, in the first, the oppressed, helpless, and comfortless condition of Jerusalem is the main feature,-here, on the other hand, it is the judgment which the Lord, in His wrath, has decreed against Jerusalem and Judah, that forms the leading thought in the complaint, as is shown by the prominence repeatedly given to the wrath, rage, burning wrath, etc. (Lamentations 2:1 ff.)." [Note: Keil, 2:381.]
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