A Book Review from Books At a Glance
by Jeremy A. Menicucci
More work has been done on Lamentations since John Mackay (1948–2018) published his commentary on Lamentations in 2008, yet his commentary remains one of the top contributions to the field of Lamentations studies. Mackay was an internationally renowned O.T. scholar whose academic and pastoral prowess is seen in his careful attention to detail and adherence to the biblical text. His fidelity to the text is evident and allows the text to stand on its own, conveying the authoritative message of God’s word. As an overlooked scholar by many, it is important to highlight Mackay’s commentary on Lamentations so that more readers can be exposed to his beneficial exegetical insights.
Mackay begins his commentary by addressing historical issues. Readers unfamiliar with Lamentations’ background will find Mackay’s thorough, yet succinct introduction useful. He situates Lamentations within its Babylonian conquest context, giving a brief historical progression leading up to the third conquest in 586 B.C., the event that precipitated Lamentations’ composition. For Mackay, the author of Lamentations was a highly skilled poet, with Jeremiah as a plausible author, though he is not dogmatic about this. Lamentations’ structure and highly stylized poetry lend credibility to Mackay’s understanding of authorship. The poetry is highly technical, and the structure of the book lends credibility to single authorship. Lamentations’ chapters are alphabetic acrostics; chapter 5 is often considered a quasi-acrostic, matching the Hebrew alphabet’s length but lacking the initial letter for each verse. Mackay considers the acrostic structure, along the same lines as several other commentators, to be a stylistic choice that communicates suffering “from A–Z.” This structure emphasizes the total or complete nature of Judah’s suffering. Lamentations’ author wrote in the lament meter, which deviates from Hebrew poetry’s symmetrical nature. All five chapters are structured in such a way as to emphasize Judah’s historical experience, including the meter. Chapter five’s unexpected deviation from the alphabet probably captures the lament as a way to demonstrate the author’s grief even more.
For Mackay, the message of Lamentations focuses on the survivors as a means to enable them to cope with what has happened. Lamentations does not require an explanation for what happened; the people understand that now. Rather, Lamentations addresses “the needs of those who survived the collapse of Jerusalem as they struggled to cope with their interminable suffering and their intense grief” (21). The author of Lamentations gives expression to the people’s grief, verbalizing and externalizing what they feel. Doing so creates a path to recovery for Judah. Though Judah’s suffering is intense, and Lamentations seeks to ameliorate such grief, Mackay notes Lamentations’ insistence that Judah’s suffering is from the just wrath of God for their sin and rebellion. God warned Judah and repeatedly called her to repentance. In this way, the intense suffering is justified, and God’s actions are seen as right. Judah does not call God’s actions into question, but rather laments the apparent, perplexing severity with which they have been afflicted.
Lamentations studies have increasingly grown interested in the N.T. use of Lamentations. In this respect, Mackay was ahead of his time and sought to tie in N.T. connections as part of his application. He notes several ways in which Lamentations is alluded to in the N.T., comparing the Greek text of Lamentations 3:15 with Acts 8:23, Lamentations 3:45 with 1 Cor. 4:13, Lamentations 1:15 with Rev. 14:20 and 19:15, among many other parallels. Mackay believes that Lamentations’ purpose was to leave Judah’s future more open-ended and incomplete than the Judahites might have thought, which would explain the relative absence of Lamentations in the N.T. He primarily understood Judah’s future as incomplete with reference to the fact that Jesus had not come yet. Judah’s ultimate redemption would only be partial until then. Considerably more inner-biblical connections have been proposed since Mackay’s commentary, but his point about Judah’s future stands.
Judah’s experience provides ample application for readers today. Lamentations teaches us that God is serious about sin and serious about punishing it. While God will not punish us in the same way, the N.T. church learns from God’s punishment of Judah by way of church discipline. God’s people are perpetually reminded of the grief that sin causes and urged to repent. The book reveals God’s character and, according to Mackay, brings us to a close realization of what Jesus accomplished on the cross. Lamentations contains a dialectic between God’s wrath and his love, which is reconciled at the cross, where love and wrath meet for our eternal salvation coupled with God’s just punishment for our sin. Mackay does not view Lamentations as an allegory for the church, but he does see plenty of useful typological applications for us today.
Mackay helpfully breaks up each chapter of Lamentations into useful sections and provides a comprehensive outline for each chapter. At the end of each exegetical chapter, he offers helpful reflection points that allow readers to focus on salient features from each chapter. Beginning with chapter 1, he focuses on two main sections: Lamentations 1:1–11 (Grief Observed) and 12–22 (Grief Felt). Lamentations 1 focuses on Jerusalem personified as a woman, which Mackay highlights as a recent widow who is lonely and vulnerable. The chapter utilizes the voice of a narrator and the voice of Lady Zion. Both voices give expression to the experience of grief. With Jerusalem described as a widow, the reader is meant to feel a sense of pity, not just blame. Jerusalem’s devastation is comprehensive, which the reader recognizes, but the poet is quick to remind the reader of the reason for her destruction: she sinned. Lady Zion is shamed and requests sympathy from the Lord as she is overwhelmed with sorrow. She cannot find comfort in anyone but the Lord; she accepts what the Lord has done as righteous, and she cannot endure the misery any longer. The bleak atmosphere, according to Mackay, sets up anticipation for the hope offered in chapter 3.
Continuing the motifs of the first chapter, the second chapter elevates the experience by assigning the assault directly to the Lord. The alphabetic acrostic order is switched, which Mackay explains expresses a degree of disorder now. Mackay breaks chapter 2 up into three main sections: Lam. 2:1–10 (Grief Observed), 2:11–17 (The Poet’s Personal Distress), and 2:18–22 (Zion’s Plea). God’s wrath is magnified in this chapter by a suspended portrayal of God as the active agent. He plans, executes his plan, and shows no mercy on Jerusalem. The magnification continues as the author exposes the harsh treatment that the children endured. Despite the second chapter’s darkness, it establishes the reversal motif of Lamentations: the expectation of reversal is founded on God’s sovereignty over the people’s suffering.
Chapter 3 is the literary and theological center of Lamentations. The acrostic is retained, but intensified into three consecutive verses per letter, for a total of 66 verses. The increased length of the third chapter increases the number of divisions Mackay uses to four. He describes The Agony of Suffering (Lam. 3:1–24), Moving Out of Darkness (Lam. 3:25–39), Self-Examination and Complaint (Lam. 3:40–48), and Prayer Based on Past Experience (Lam 3:49–66). He describes Lady Zion as a personification of Jerusalem, but sees the man of Lam. 3 as a specific historical figure, with some possible identification with Jeremiah. The man recounts his own personal experience of suffering the tragedy, yet renewing his hope in the Lord. His account makes his experience paradigmatic for the survivors—as he stands in solidarity with their suffering—yet he exhorts them to renew their hope in the Lord. The center of the book greatly emphasizes the Lord’s steadfast love and faithfulness as the vehicle through which hope is received and vigor is renewed.
Moving on from the hope-filled sections in chapter 3, chapter 4 resumes mourning over the devastation. Many commentators see chapter 3’s hope as fleeting, and Lamentations ultimately expresses hopelessness. Mackay sees this differently, following Renkema’s overall chiastic structure. The outer chapters are bleak in order to form the chiasm and emphasize the hope in the central chapter. The acrostic pattern continues, resuming the 22-verse structure, but this time, each verse consists of two lines beginning with the same letter of the alphabet. Chapter 4 moves beyond past glory and even begins to progress past present suffering to the theological causes and the failures of placing hope in human means. This chapter also ends on a positive note: Judah’s punishment has been accomplished, and exile will not be permanent.
Modern commentators have speculated that each of Lamentations’ chapters were written at different times by different authors, arguing that there are distinct features in each chapter. The differences in chapter 5 may be seen as supportive of this. Chapter 5 deviates from both the alphabetic acrostic (though it continues with twenty-two verses), it deviates from the lament meter back to symmetrical meter, and contains greater degrees of synonymous parallelism. Only the community speaks this time. Despite these differences, Mackay holds that chapter 5 is literarily unified with the rest of the book. Rather than signaling exhaustion on the part of the poet, Mackay sees chapter 5’s poetics reflective of a communal complaint style. The chapter starts with an opening plea (5:1), followed by an expression of the community’s woes (5:2–18), and concludes with a petition of adoration and request (5:19–22). Verse 22 has garnered considerable controversy over the book’s future outlook, owing to the way it has been translated. Many commentators have suggested that the book’s conclusion hints at a belief that God had indeed abandoned Judah and they had no hope for forgiveness and restoration. Mackay rightly indicates that the chiastic structure of the book prohibits such a reading. He highlights the translation difficulties of the underlying Hebrew and concludes that the conditional use, “unless you have utterly rejected us,” is less likely as compared to an asseverative use, “indeed you have utterly rejected us,” or concessive, “although you have utterly rejected us.” Such readings appear more consistent with the message of Lamentations: the Lord did indeed utterly reject them and he was exceedingly angry with them.
So much can be commended about Mackay’s commentary based on his careful attention to detail and consistent exegesis. He rightly exegetes Lamentations in its historical background, drawing on its place in redemptive history. He maintains a healthy balance inherent in Lamentations between emphasizing God’s justice against sin and Judah’s horrific experience of it. The presence of theodicy is debated in Lamentations, but Mackay sees both God’s justice as explanatory, and the severity that the people’s experience under Babylon as in the realm of God’s sovereignty. Such a tension exists in Lamentations, but proper interpretations hold this tension in balance and rightly recognize that God can both be sovereign in his execution of justice, the degree of severity that Judah experienced, and the need to vindicate his people in light of their excesses. Mackay draws this out masterfully.
Important advances have been made in the study of Hebrew poetry that may cause Mackay’s work to seem dated. However, for any reader unfamiliar with Hebrew poetry, Mackay’s work will be a beneficial introduction. Mackay’s work focuses more on the structural level of interpretation and readers interested in deeper linguistic approaches may also find Mackay’s work limited. Lamentations has historically been an understudied book, which has caused higher critical issues to take time to infiltrate the book. As such, Mackay’s commentary, as a product of its time, was more focused on exegesis that, while conversant with higher critical issues, does not contain apologetic value against recent advances in higher critical tendencies. Still, readers may benefit from a strong foundation upon which to build.
Mackay helpfully connects Lamentations to the New Testament and situates it in its canonical context and initially relates the judgment to Christ, but his lack of Christological emphasis—especially in the third chapter—is surprising. Reading Lam. 3 Christologically can be seen as it describes a singular man bearing the wrath of God for the sins of the community (Lam. 3:1–3). This man undergoes an experience that sounds very reminiscent of a de-creation and death (Lam. 3:2–6). He is utterly spent, with his hope and endurance gone (Lam. 3:18). Indeed, he dwells with the dead (Lam. 3:6) and is consigned to a pit (Lam. 3:53, 55, commonly understood as death, Sheol, or a grave in the Old Testament; cf. Pss. 28:1; 88:3–6). Yet, God hears him, responds to him, draws near to him (Lam. 3:56–57), and the man is able to renew his hope in the Lord (Lam. 3:21–24). He calls the community to repentance and to return to the Lord (Lam. 3:40–42), who has gone from abuser (Lam. 3:1–16) to advocate (Lam. 3:58). Lam. 4:22 describes Judah’s punishment as accomplished after summarizing the “Anointed’s” consignment to a pit (Lam. 4:20), which seems to link the man of Lam. 3 with the Lord’s Messiah.
Mackay’s work contains plenty of beneficial exegesis and insights well beyond what space may allow for in this review. I have attempted to provide a general overview without reproducing his exegesis verbatim as a way to give the reader an idea of how to profit from studying his commentary, focusing on what seem to be his most salient arguments. Overall, Mackay’s work is a must-read for anyone wanting to learn more about the book of Lamentations. He approaches the text from a solid, conservative perspective and engages with the text in its context, applying historical grammatical considerations. His insights are timeless, and the reader will not be disappointed.
Jeremy A. Menicucci
Buy the books
LAMENTATIONS: A MENTOR COMMENTARY, by John L. Mackay