Lamentations 5:3 (WEB)

Passage

We are orphans and fatherless. Our mothers are as widows.

Nearby Context

Lamentations 5:1 Remember, Yahweh, what has come on us. Look, and see our reproach.

Lamentations 5:2 Our inheritance has been turned over to strangers, our houses to aliens.

Lamentations 5:3 We are orphans and fatherless. Our mothers are as widows.

Lamentations 5:4 We have drunken our water for money. Our wood is sold to us.

Lamentations 5:5 Our pursuers are on our necks. We are weary, and have no rest.

Study Lenses

The verse centers on "orphans", "fatherless", "mothers", and "widows". It is saying that the verse draws attention to "orphans" and "fatherless", so its meaning should be read from those terms before moving to application.

The nearby context moves from verse 2's "Our inheritance has been turned over to..." into verse 4's "We have drunken our water for money...", so "orphans" and "fatherless" belong inside that flow. In Lamentations context, the local focus is covenant, worship, and faithfulness.

A plain takeaway is to answer the verse's own emphasis on "orphans" and "fatherless" with trust shaped by these words, not by a vague optimism outside the passage.