John Calvin Commentary Lamentations 2:18

"Their heart cried unto the Lord: O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river day and night; Give thyself no respite; let not the apple of thine eye cease." — Lamentations 2:18 (ASV)

He does not mean that their heart really cried to God, for there was no cry in their heart; but by this expression he expresses the vehemence of their grief, as if he had said, that the heart of the people was oppressed with so much sorrow, that their feelings burst out into crying. For crying arises from extreme grief, and when anyone cries or weeps, he has no control over himself. Silence is a token of patience; but when grief overcomes one, he, as if forgetting himself, necessarily bursts out into crying. This is the reason why he says that their heart cried to Jehovah.

But we must observe, that the piety of the people is not here commended, as if they complained of their evils to God in sincerity and with an honest heart: on the contrary, the Prophet means that it was a common cry, often uttered even by the reprobate. For nature, in a manner, teaches this, that we should flee to God when oppressed by evils; and even those who have no fear of God exclaim in their extreme miseries, “God be merciful to us.” And, as I have said, such a cry does not flow from a right feeling or from the true fear of God, but from the strong and turbid impulse of nature; and thus God has from the beginning rendered all mortals inexcusable.

So then, the Prophet now says that the Jews cried to God, or that their heart cried. This cry was not because they looked to God as they should have done, or because they deposited their sorrows with him and cast them into his bosom, as the Prophet encourages us to do. Rather, it was because they found no remedy in the world — for as long as people find any comfort or help in the world, they are satisfied with that.

Why, then, was this crying to God? It was because the world offered them nothing in which they could acquiesce. For it is, as it were, indigenous to our nature (that is, corrupt nature) to look around here and there when any evil oppresses us. Now, when we find, as I have said, anything as a help — even an empty specter — to that we cling, and never raise up our eyes to God. But when necessity forces us, then we begin to cry to God. Then the Prophet means that the people had been reduced to the greatest straits when he says that their heart cried to God.

Afterward, he turns to the wall of Jerusalem and ascribes understanding to an inanimate thing. “O wall of Jerusalem,” he says, “draw down tears as if you were a river”; or, “as a river,” for both meanings may be admitted. But by stating a part for the whole, he includes under the word wall the whole city, as it is well known. And yet there is still a personification, for neither houses, nor walls, nor gates, nor streets could shed tears; but Jeremiah could not, except by this hyperbolical language, sufficiently express the extent of their cry. This was the reason why he addressed the very wall of the city and commanded it to shed tears like a river.

There seems to be some allusion to the ruins, for the walls of the city had been broken down as if they were melted. And then the Prophet seems to allude to the previous hardness of the people, for their hearts had been extremely stupefied. Since, then, they had never been flexible, whether addressed by doctrine, exhortations, or threatenings, he now by implication contrasts the walls of the city with them, as if he had said, “Until now no one of God’s servants could draw even one tear from your eyes, so great was your hardness; but now the very walls weep, for they dissolve, as if they would send forth rivers of waters. Therefore the very stones turn to tears, because you have until now been hardened against God and all prophetic instruction.”

Afterward, he adds, Spare not yourself, give not yourself rest day or night, and let not the daughter of your eye, or the pupil of your eye, cease (literally, be silent); but to be silent is metaphorically taken in the sense of ceasing or resting. He intimates that there would be — indeed, that there was now — an occasion for continual lamentation; and so he exhorted them to weep day and night, as if he had said that sorrow would continue without intermission, as there would be no relaxation regarding their evils. But we must bear in mind what we have said before: the Prophet did not speak this way to embitter the sorrow of the people. We indeed know that human minds are very tender and delicate when suffering evils, and then they rush headlong into impatience. But as they were not yet led to true repentance, he sets before them the punishment God had inflicted, so that they might thereby be turned to consider their own sins.