John Gill Commentary Lamentations 1:17

"Zion spreadeth forth her hands; there is none to comfort her; Jehovah hath commanded concerning Jacob, that they that are round about him should be his adversaries: Jerusalem is among them as an unclean thing." — Lamentations 1:17 (ASV)

Zion spreads forth her hands
Either as submitting to the conqueror, and imploring mercy; or rather as calling to her friends to help and relieve her. The Targum is, "Zion spreads out her hands through distress, as a woman spreads out her hands upon the seat to bring forth;" see (Jeremiah 4:31) . Some render the words, "Zion breaks with her hands" ^F6 ; that is, breaks bread; and Joseph Kimchi observes, that it was the custom of comforters to break bread to the mourner; but here she herself breaks it with her hands, because there was none to comfort her:

[and there is] none to comfort her ; to speak a word of comfort to her, or to help her out of her trouble; her children gone into captivity; her friends and lovers at a distance; and God himself departed from her; (See Gill on Lamentations 1:16);

the Lord has commanded concerning Jacob, [that] his adversaries
[should be] round about him ; that he should be surrounded by them, and carried captive, and should be in the midst of them in captivity: this was the decree and determination of God; and, agreeably to it, he ordered it in his providence that the Chaldeans should come against him, encompass him, and overcome him; and that because he has slighted and broken the commandments of the Lord; and therefore was justly dealt with, as is acknowledged in (Lamentations 1:18) . So the Targum, "the Lord gave to the house of Jacob commandments, and a law to keep, but they transgressed the decree of his word; therefore his enemies encompassed the house of Jacob round about:"

Jerusalem is as a menstruous woman among them ; reckoned filthy and unclean, abominable and nauseous; whom none cared to come near, but shunned, despised, and abhorred; as the Jews separated from the Gentiles, and would not converse with them; so neither now would the Chaldeans with the Jews; but treat them as the offscouring of all things.

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FOOTNOTES:

• F6: (hydyb Nwyu hvrp) "frangit Sion manibus suis", sub. "panem", Vatablus.