Lamentations 2:20 is a raw cry of anguish in which the poet asks God to look at the horror of Jerusalem’s siege, a famine so severe that mothers have eaten their own children and priests and prophets have been killed in the temple itself. The verse is spoken by the author of Lamentations, a poet who speaks for the city of Jerusalem, and it is addressed directly to the LORD, who is urged to see what has happened to His people.
“Look, the LORD, and see to whom you have done thus! Should the women eat their offspring, the children that they held and bounced on their knees? Should the priest and the prophet be killed in the sanctuary of the Lord?
Lamentations 2:20 (WEB)
What Lamentations 2:20 Means
The verse opens with a command: “Look, the LORD, and see.” The speaker is not telling God something He does not know. Rather, the speaker is pleading for God to take in the full weight of the suffering, to stop looking away, and to respond. In everyday terms, it is the kind of plea a person makes when the pain is so large that they need someone else to witness it with them.
The second half of the verse names the unthinkable: mothers consuming the children they once rocked on their knees, and the killing of religious leaders in the very place where they should have been safe. The poet does not soften these images. They are meant to shock, because the siege has pushed Jerusalem past the boundaries of normal human life.
What the verse does not do is explain why this happened or offer comfort in its own sentences. It asks questions, and the questions hang in the air. It does not promise that the suffering will end or that God will act in a particular way. Its power lies in its honesty: it brings the worst of human experience directly before God without polishing it.
The Context of Lamentations 2:20
The book of Lamentations is a set of five poems written after the Babylonian army destroyed Jerusalem and the temple in 586 BC. Tradition has long linked the book to the prophet Jeremiah, though the text itself does not name its author. Its original audience was the surviving community in Judah and Jerusalem, people who had lost home, leadership, and much of their population.
Verse 20 sits within a longer passage, verses 17 through 22, in which the poet first describes God as the one who has carried out His judgment, then calls the city to weep day and night and to pour out its heart before the Lord. The plea in verse 20 is therefore part of a sustained prayer of grief. Read in that setting, the question “see to whom you have done thus” is not a challenge thrown at God in anger alone. It is part of a community’s effort to bring its catastrophe into God’s presence rather than hide it.
Key Phrases in Lamentations 2:20
Psalm 13:1-2
1 How long, the LORD? Will you forget me forever? How long will you hide your face from me? 2 How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart every day? How long shall my enemy triumph over me?
(WEB)
This psalm opens with the same kind of raw question, asking how long God will forget and hide His face. Reading it alongside Lamentations 2:20 shows that honest questioning of God in the midst of pain has a long history in Scripture and belongs to genuine faith.
Lamentations 3:22-23
22 It is because of the LORD’s loving kindnesses that we are not consumed, because his compassion doesn’t fail. 23 They are new every morning. Great is your faithfulness.
(WEB)
In the same book, the poet moves from the depths of grief toward a statement of God’s enduring mercy. Reading these verses together helps you see that lament does not end in despair but can move toward trust in God’s faithfulness.
A Short Prayer From Lamentations 2:20
Lord, I bring You what is heavy and hard to say out loud. Look at what I am carrying and see the depth of it, because I cannot pretend it is smaller than it is. Give me the courage to speak honestly before You, and the patience to wait for Your answer in the places where I do not yet understand.
Meet me in the pain I cannot fix on my own. Hold the people I love who are suffering alongside me, and show us that we are not forgotten. Amen.
