Lamentations 5:20

20 Why do you always forget us? Why do you forsake us so long?

Lamentations 5:20 in Other Translations

KJV
20 Wherefore dost thou forget us for ever, and forsake us so long time?
ESV
20 Why do you forget us forever, why do you forsake us for so many days?
NLT
20 Why do you continue to forget us? Why have you abandoned us for so long?
MSG
20 So why do you keep forgetting us? Why dump us and leave us like this?
CSB
20 Why have You forgotten us forever, abandoned us for [our] entire lives?

Lamentations 5:20 Meaning and Commentary

Lamentations 5:20

Wherefore dost thou, forget us for ever
Since thou art firm, constant, and unchangeable, and thy love and covenant the same. God seems to forget his people when he afflicts them, or suffers them to be oppressed, and does not arise immediately for their help; which being deferred some time, looks like an eternity to them, or they fear it will ever be so; at least this they say to express their eager desire after his gracious presence, and to show how much they prize it:

[and] forsake us so long time?
or, "to length of days" F4? so long as the seventy years' captivity; which to be forsaken of God, or to seem to be forsaken of him, was with them a long time.


FOOTNOTES:

F4 (Mymy Kral) "in longitudinem dierum", Pagninus, Montanus.

Lamentations 5:20 In-Context

18 for Mount Zion, which lies desolate, with jackals prowling over it.
19 You, LORD, reign forever; your throne endures from generation to generation.
20 Why do you always forget us? Why do you forsake us so long?
21 Restore us to yourself, LORD, that we may return; renew our days as of old
22 unless you have utterly rejected us and are angry with us beyond measure.

Cross References 2

  • 1. S Psalms 13:1; Psalms 44:24
  • 2. S Psalms 71:11
Scripture quoted by permission.  Quotations designated (NIV) are from THE HOLY BIBLE: NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION®.  NIV®.  Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica.  All rights reserved worldwide.