A Lament for the Princes of Israel

1And thou, lift thou up a lamentation for the princes of Israel,

2And say, What thy mother? a lioness: between lions she lay down, in the midst of young lions she brought up her whelps.

3And she will bring up one of her whelps: it was a young lion, and it will learn to rend the prey eating man.

4And the nations will hear concerning him; in their pit he was taken, and they will bring him with hooks to the land of Egypt.

5And she will see that waiting her hope perished, and she will take one of her whelps setting him a young lion.

6And he will go about in the midst of the lions; he was a young lion, and he will learn to tear in pieces the prey, eating man.

7And he knew their palaces, and he laid waste their cities; and the land will be desolate and its fulness from the voice of his roaring.

8And the nations will give against him round about from the provinces, and they will spread their net upon him, being taken in their pit.

9And they will give him in a prison with hooks, and they will bring him to the king of Babel: they will bring him into fastnesses so that his voice shall no more be heard upon the mountains of Israel.

10Thy mother as a vine in thy blood, planted by the waters: she was fruitful and covered from much water.

11And there will be to her rods of strength to the rods of those ruling, and his stature will be lifted up between the thick boughs, and he will be seen in his height from the multitude of his branches.

12And she shall be plucked up in wrath, she was cast down to the earth, and the wind of the east dried up her fruit: the rods of her strength were broken and dried up, and the fire consumed them.

13And now being planted in the desert, in a land of dryness and thirst.

14And a fire will go forth from a rod of her branches; it consumed her fruit, and there was not in her a rod of strength, a rod to rule. It is a lamentation, and it shall be for a lamentation.