Lamentations 3:61

"Thou hast heard their reproach, O Jehovah,

and all their devices against me,

The lips of those that rose up against me,

and their device against me all the day.

Behold thou their sitting down and their rising up;

I am their song.

Thou wilt render unto them a recompense, O Jehovah,

according to the work of their hands.

Thou wilt give them hardness of heart,

thy curse unto them.

Thou wilt pursue them in anger,

and wilt destroy them from under the heavens of Jehovah."

"I am their song" (Lamentations 3:63). This line forces the conclusion that the enemies of these last verses were Jeremiah's own people, the Jews themselves, and not the Babylonians. The Babylonian conquerors were friendly to Jeremiah (See Vol. II of my commentary on the major prophets, Jeremiah, pp 437-440). The people who were singing taunt songs against the prophet were his own people.

A final word about the imprecations of these last verses. Yes, Jeremiah prayed for God's judgment against his enemies; and we reject the snide and self-righteous remarks that some writers have written against such imprecations. It never seems to enter the minds of current scholars that when Christians pray as their Saviour taught them, "Thy will be done"! that those words have exactly the same meaning as the imprecations of the prophet Jeremiah. When God's will is truly done, the wicked will indeed be punished. The notion that, "We sophisticated religious people of the 20th century have outgrown all the silly expectations that God is ever really going to punish anybody"! - that notion is a contradiction of everything in the Bible.