Then they sat down with him on the ground seven days and seven nights. Meanwhile, no one was speaking to him at all because they saw that his pain was severe.
because the palaces have been forsaken, the populated city is forsaken. The forts and towers shall be caves forever, a joy of wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks,
Come down, and sit in the dust, O virgin daughter of Babylon; sit on the ground; there is no throne, O daughter of the Chaldeans. For you shall no more be called tender and delicate.
Then I said, “Lord, how long?” And He answered: “Until the cities are laid waste without inhabitants, and the houses without man, and the land is utterly desolate,
Their widows will increase before Me more than the sand of the seas; I will bring against them, against the mother of a young man, a destroyer at noonday; I will suddenly bring down on her sorrow and terrors.
How lonely sits the city that was full of people! How she has become like a widow, who was once great among the nations! She who was a princess among the provinces has become a slave!
The roads to Zion mourn because no one comes to the solemn feasts. All her gates are desolate; her priests sigh, her virgins are afflicted, and she herself suffers bitterly.
The elders of the daughter of Zion sit on the ground in silence; they throw dust on their heads and gird themselves with sackcloth. The virgins of Jerusalem bow their heads to the ground.
The Lord has purposed to destroy the wall of the daughter of Zion. He has stretched out a line; He has not withdrawn His hand from destroying; therefore He caused the rampart and the wall to lament; they languished together.
Then all the officials of the sea shall come down from their thrones and lay away their robes and take off their embroidered garments. They shall clothe themselves with trembling. They shall sit on the ground and tremble every moment and be astonished at you.
They will dash you, and your children within you, to the ground. They will not leave one stone upon another within you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”