All her people sigh,.... Not her priests only, Lamentations 1:4; but all the common people, because of their affliction, particularly for want of bread. So the Targum,
"all the people of Jerusalem sigh because of the famine;''
for it follows:
they seek bread; to eat, as the Targum; inquire where it is to be had, but in vain:
they have given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul: or, "to cause the soul to return" (x); to fetch it back when fainting and swooning away through famine; and therefore would give anything for food; part with their rich clothes, jewels, and precious stones; with whatsoever they had that was valuable in their cabinets or coffers, that they might have meat to keep from fainting and dying; to refresh and recruit their spirits spent with hunger:
see, O Lord, and consider; for I am become vile; mean, base, and contemptible, in the eyes of men, through penury and want of food; through poverty, affliction, and distress; and therefore desires the Lord would consider her case, and look with pity and compassion on her.
(x) להשיב נפש "ad reducendum animam", Montanus, Piscator.
All her people sigh,.... Not her priests only, Lamentations 1:4; but all the common people, because of their affliction, particularly for want of bread. So the Targum,
"all the people of Jerusalem sigh because of the famine;''
for it follows:
they seek bread; to eat, as the Targum; inquire where it is to be had, but in vain:
they have given their pleasant things for meat to relieve the soul: or, "to cause the soul to return" (x); to fetch it back when fainting and swooning away through famine; and therefore would give anything for food; part with their rich clothes, jewels, and precious stones; with whatsoever they had that was valuable in their cabinets or coffers, that they might have meat to keep from fainting and dying; to refresh and recruit their spirits spent with hunger:
see, O Lord, and consider; for I am become vile; mean, base, and contemptible, in the eyes of men, through penury and want of food; through poverty, affliction, and distress; and therefore desires the Lord would consider her case, and look with pity and compassion on her.
(x) להשיב נפש "ad reducendum animam", Montanus, Piscator.