John Calvin Commentary Lamentations 1:13

"From on high hath he sent fire into my bones, and it prevaileth against them; He hath spread a net for my feet, he hath turned me back: He hath made me desolate and faint all the day." — Lamentations 1:13 (ASV)

The Prophet proceeds with the same subject: that God’s vengeance had raged most dreadfully against Jerusalem. But employing a metaphor, she says that fire had been sent to her bones. Those who interpret bones as fortified places weaken the Prophet's meaning. I take bones in their proper sense, as though it was said that God’s fire had penetrated into the innermost parts. This manner of speaking often occurs in Scripture. By bones, strength or valor is denoted. Hence, David sometimes deplored that his bones were vexed or troubled (Psalms 6:2). And Hezekiah said in his song:

As a lion he hath broken my bones (Isaiah 37:13).

In the same sense, the Prophet now says that fire had been sent by God, which ruled in her bones; that is, which not only burned the skin and the flesh but also consumed the bones. רדה, rede, also means to take away or to receive; but as the former rendering is most commonly taken, I am disposed to follow it—that fire ruled in her bones.

Another comparison is added: God had spread a net before her feet; and thus He had taken away every means of escape. She intimates (for it is Jerusalem who speaks) that she had been ensnared by God’s judgments, so that she was consigned to ruin, as though she had fallen into traps or snares.

It is stated in the third place that she was desolate all the day, so that she sorrowed perpetually. "All the day" means continually. It is then said that she sorrowed without end and beyond measure, because she had been turned back by God's nets, and her bones had been consumed by celestial fire.

For the expression from above, ממרום, memerumn, is emphatic, because the Prophet means that it was no common or human burning, as what is ascribed to God exceeds what is human or earthly.

It is, then, as though the Prophet had said that it had been such a vengeance as indicated the dreadful power of God, for it was the same as though God had thundered from heaven. We now perceive the meaning of the words.