"Look, O LORD, at my agony, at the anguish of my soul! My heart is broken in sorrow for my sins. There is murder in the streets; even indoors there is death.

Look, O LORD! Why are you punishing us like this? Women are eating the bodies of the children they loved! Priests and prophets are being killed in the Temple itself !

The thought of my pain, my homelessness, is bitter poison.

Remember now what you told Moses: 'If you people of Israel are unfaithful to me, I will scatter you among the other nations.

Remember, O God, my life is only a breath; my happiness has already ended.

Remember that you made me from clay; are you going to crush me back to dust?

Then I said, " LORD, you understand. Remember me and help me. Let me have revenge on those who persecute me. Do not be so patient with them that they succeed in killing me. Remember that it is for your sake that I am insulted.

O LORD, I have heard of what you have done, and I am filled with awe. Now do again in our times the great deeds you used to do. Be merciful, even when you are angry.

And he said to Jesus, "Remember me, Jesus, when you come as King!"

People passing by the city look at you in scorn. They shake their heads and laugh at Jerusalem's ruins: "Is this that lovely city? Is this the pride of the world?"

"You have heard them insult me, O LORD; you know all their plots.

They told me that those who had survived and were back in the homeland were in great difficulty and that the foreigners who lived nearby looked down on them. They also told me that the walls of Jerusalem were still broken down and that the gates had not been restored since the time they were burned.

I prayed, "Hear how they make fun of us, O God! Let their ridicule fall on their own heads. Let them be robbed of everything they have, and let them be taken as prisoners to a foreign land.

Our neighbors see what you did to us, and they mock us and laugh at us.

I am always in disgrace; I am covered with shame

How long, O God, will our enemies laugh at you? Will they insult your name forever?

Why have you refused to help us? Why do you keep your hands behind you?

The surrounding nations insult us; they laugh at us and mock us.

Lord, pay the other nations back seven times for all the insults they have hurled at you.

Don't forget how I, your servant, am insulted, how I endure all the curses of the heathen.

Your enemies insult your chosen king, O LORD! They insult him wherever he goes.

Be merciful to us, LORD, be merciful; we have been treated with so much contempt.

We have been mocked too long by the rich and scorned by proud oppressors.