1 And you are to lift up a lamentation {kinah: formal dirge} over the princes of Israel {Yisra’el: covenant community}.
2 And you shall say, “What was your mother? A lioness {levi’ah: Powerful Female Lion}. She lay down among the lions; amid the young lions she reared {ribbetah: Intensively Nurtured} her cubs.”
3 And she raised one of her cubs {migureha: lioness’s offspring}; he grew into a young lion, learned to seize prey, and he devoured men {adam: mankind}.
4 The nations {goyim: Gentile peoples} heard of him; they captured him in their pit, and they hauled him with hooks {bakhachim: barbed hooks} to the land of Egypt.
5 When she saw that she had waited in vain and her hope {tikvah: hopeful anticipation} had perished, she took one of her cubs and made him a young lion {kefir: royal strength}.
6 And he moved about among lions {arayot: powerful beasts}; he became a young lion, learned to seize prey, and he devoured men {adam: human beings}.
7 And he knew {yada: took note of} their widows, and he laid waste their cities; the land and all its fullness {umeloah: inhabitants and produce} were appalled at the sound of his roaring.
8 Then the nations gathered against him on every side from the provinces {mimmedinot: administrative territories}; they cast their net over him, and he was caught {nitpas: seized by force} in their pit.
9 With hooks they cast him into a cage and brought him to the king of Babylon {bavel: Mesopotamian empire}; they confined him in strongholds so that his voice would no longer be heard on the mountains of Israel {yisrael: covenant people}.
10 Your mother was like a vine {gefen: cultivated plant} in your blood, set by the waters; she was fruitful {poriyah: abundantly productive} and richly branched, because of abundant water.
11 And she had strong rods {mattot: symbolic staffs of authority} for the scepters of rulers, and her stature {komato: elevated standing} rose above the thick branches; she was visible in her height because of her many branches.
12 She was uprooted in fury {chemah: intense anger} and cast down to the earth; the east wind dried up her fruit. Her strong rods were snapped off and withered; fire {esh: total destruction} consumed them.
13 And now she is planted in the wilderness, in a land of dryness {tsiyyah: complete desolation} and thirst {tzama: utter lack of water}.
14 And fire went out from a rod among her branches {badeyha: lineage representation}; it consumed her fruit, and in her there remained no staff of strength or scepter to govern. This is a lamentation {kinah: dirge poem}, and it has become a lamentation.