Lamentations 5:10
What does Lamentations 5:10 mean?
A plain-English look at Lamentations 5:10 in WEB alongside six other public-domain English translations, with cross-references and chapter context.
What Lamentations 5:10 means
Their skin, darkened and dry like an overheated oven, testifies to the ravages of famine. Starvation burns from within—fevers, dehydration, and wasting. The image shows how suffering writes itself on the body; you can see judgment’s heat in their faces. This is not poetic exaggeration but the honest look of a people scorched by hunger. They hold this condition before Jehovah, the God who once fed them with manna and promised abundance in the land. If He does not heal the land and their bodies, no one can. Lament gives words to visible affliction and asks God to notice what everyone else can already see.
Parallel translations
WEB
World English Bible · 2000Our skin is black like an oven, Because of the burning heat of famine.
KJV
King James Version · 1611Our skin was black like an oven because of the terrible famine.
ASV
American Standard Version · 1901Our skin is black like an oven, Because of the burning heat of famine.
BBE
Bible in Basic English · 1949Our skin is heated like an oven because of our burning heat from need of food.
YLT
Young's Literal Translation · 1862Our skin as an oven hath been burning, Because of the raging of the famine.
DRA
Douay-Rheims (Challoner) · 1752Our skin was burnt as an oven, by reason of the violence of the famine.
DBY
Darby Bible · 1890Our skin gloweth like an oven, because of the burning heat of the famine.
Context
After describing the danger of obtaining food, the prayer details the physical imprint of famine. Verse 10 keeps attention on human frailty, not only geopolitical loss. The next verses widen the lament to include sexual violence and dishonor to leaders, showing that the catastrophe has decimated dignity across society. Each sorrow added strengthens the case for divine restoration.
Cross references
Related passages from across Scripture, drawn from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge.
- Lamentations 4:8
Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets: Their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick.
- Psalms 119:83
For I am become like a wine-skin in the smoke; Yet do I not forget thy statutes.
- Lamentations 3:4
My flesh and my skin hath he made old; he hath broken my bones.
- Job 30:30
My skin is black, and fallethfrom me, And my bones are burned with heat.
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