Fragments on Lamentations · §5 · Origen of Alexandria

The Lord wept over Jerusalem

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Drawing near to Jerusalem the Lord “wept and said: if you too had known the things unto your peace.” (Luke 19:41–42) “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those sent to her, how often I wanted to gather your children, as a hen gathers her own brood under the wings, and you were not willing.” (Matthew 23:37) (Luke 13:34)

Greek

Klagel. Jerem. 1 Überschr. Ἐγγίζων τῇ Ἱερουσαλὴμ ὁ κύριος >ἔκλαυσεν καὶ εἶπεν. εἰ ἔγνως καὶ σὺ τὰ εἰς εἰρήνην σου<. «Ἱερουσαλὴμ Ἱερουσαλή, ἡ ἀποκτείνουσα τοὺς προφήτας καὶ λιθοβολοῦσα τοὺς ἀπεσταλμένους πρὸς αὐτήν, ποσάκις ἠθέλησα ἐπισυνάξαοι τὰ | | τέκνα σου, ὅν τρόπον ἔρνις ἐπισυνάγει τὰ νοσσία ἐαυτῆς ὐπὸ τὰς πτέρυγας, καὶ οὐκ ἠθελήσατε.

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Origen on Lamentations: Jeremiah's grief for captive Jerusalem, read also as the soul taken captive by sin and set free by Christ.

Origen of Alexandria (c. 185–c. 254) was a Christian teacher in Alexandria and head of the catechetical school. This English is his fragments on Lamentations.

The full commentary is lost. What survives are short passages kept in later chains of quotations. He sets out the literal sense, the Hebrew form of the book, and its historical setting, and he compares the Greek translations.

A reader meets Jeremiah lamenting the fall of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem read both as the city and as the soul. Origen quotes Symmachus, Aquila, and Theodotion. He also cites Paul, David, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Habakkuk, Zechariah, and Daniel. He uses Septuagint book names and Psalm numbering.

EditionKlostermann, Origenes Werke III (GCS 6, 1901)

We have not yet re-checked this work against its source. We made this study translation with AI help. No scholar has yet certified it as faithful and complete. Open Greek on any section to see the source text. It is not a critical edition.

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