What Does Lamentations 2:7 Mean?
The Lord pushes away his altar, spurns his set-apart place, and gives the walls of her palaces into the hand of the enemy. They roar in the house of the LORD as on the day of appointed time.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
The Lord hath cast off his altar, he hath abhorred his sanctuary, he hath given up into the hand of the enemy the walls of her palaces; they have made a noise in the house of the LORD, as in the day of a solemn feast.THE KEY
The feast-like noise in the LORD’s house belongs to the enemy, so a familiar sacred sound can now mark occupation.
THE MEANING
When the place you regard as sacred is handed over, its defenses no longer protect it; the sound inside can resemble celebration while carrying the force of an enemy’s victory. The verse keeps the violation visible, including the shock of hearing a feast-like noise in the LORD’s house.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that being sacred guarantees immunity from rejection, desecration, or takeover.
THE ROOT
זָנַח
zānaḥ
GROWS FROM
זנח
z-n-ḥ
The root זנח (z-n-ḥ; zānaḥ) means to reject, spurn, or cast away.
“pushes away” in this verse is zānaḥ. The verb does more than describe an altar being removed: it names rejection. The same seed voices the question of whether that rejection lasts forever, so the verse’s claim carries the ache of an unresolved relationship.
ALSO GROWS
yiznaḥ: Will he reject or cast off.
יִזְנַח
Psalm 77:7 uses this form in the question, “Will the Lord cast off for ever?”
zānaḥtā: You have rejected or cast off.
זָנַחְתָּ
Psalm 44:9 uses it as a direct lament to God, letting the root name felt abandonment rather than physical removal alone.
הִסְגִּיר
hisgīr
GROWS FROM
סגר
s-g-r
The root סגר (s-g-r; sāgar) means to shut or close; in this form, it can mean to hand over or surrender.
The verb translated “given up” comes from the language of closing something in. Here, the walls are handed into another’s control, turning what once enclosed the palaces into a boundary that no longer protects them.
ALSO GROWS
sāgar: To shut or close.
סָגַר
This is the root’s basic action; it gives “given up” the underlying image of closing or confining.
wayyisgōr: And he shut in.
וַיִּסְגֹּר
In Genesis 7:16 this root describes the LORD shutting Noah in; here its causative form marks the palaces as surrendered to enemy control.
מִקְדָּשׁ
miqdāsh
GROWS FROM
קדש
q-d-sh
The root קדש (q-d-sh; qādash) means to set apart or mark as sacred.
“set-apart place” in this verse is miqdāsh. The sanctuary word carries the idea of being set apart. The verse’s sharpness is that the very place marked as sacred is now the object of abhorrence.
ALSO GROWS
qādōsh: Set apart; sacred.
קָדוֹשׁ
This adjective carries the sanctuary’s root idea of being marked as set apart.
qōdesh: A sacred or set-apart thing; sacredness.
קֹדֶשׁ
This noun shares the sanctuary’s root and makes the contrast plain: what is set apart is treated with abhorrence.
THE PATTERN
When a sacred space is surrendered, hostile power can occupy even its familiar signs and sounds.
Your enemies roar in the midst of your meeting place; they set their banners for signs.For there, those who took us captive asked us for the words of a song, and those who mocked us asked for joy, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.But throw out the court that is outside the temple, and do not measure it, for it is given to the nations, and they trample the set-apart city for forty-two months.THE THREAD
Does the Lord push away for the ages? Is he pleased no more?The same Hebrew verb, זָנַח (zānaḥ), meaning “reject” or “cast off,” stands at the center of both verses: here it names the altar’s rejection; there it becomes a question about whether rejection endures. The shared root lets this verse remain inside lament’s open question without making the damage disappear.
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