Lamentations 5:4
We give money for a drink of water, we get our wood for a price.
Bible in Basic English
In The King James Version
We have drunken our water for money; our wood is sold unto us.
In Context
3We are children without fathers, our mothers are like widows.
5Our attackers are on our necks: overcome with weariness, we have no rest.
Cross References
Deuteronomy 28:48For this cause you will become servants to those whom the Lord your God will send against you, without food and drink and clothing, and in need of all things: and he will put a yoke of iron on your neck till he has put an end to you.
Isaiah 3:1For the Lord, the Lord of armies, is about to take away from Jerusalem and from Judah all their support; their store of bread and of water;
Matthew Henry on Lamentations 5:2-17
An Appeal to God; Complicated Sorrows. ( b. c. 588.) 1 Remember, O Lord , what is come upon us: consider, and behold our reproach. 2 Our inheritance is turned to strangers, our houses to aliens. 3 We are orphans and fatherless, our mothers are as widows. 4 We have drunken our water for money; our wood is sold unto us. 5 Our necks are under persecution: we labour, and have no rest. 6 We have given the hand to the Egyptians, and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread. 7 Our fathers have sinned, and are not;… Read the whole commentary →