Verse Lens · Expanded explanation
Lamentations 5:6 Explained in Context
Use this verse as a doorway into the larger passage—not as an isolated saying.
Verse 6. 6We have given the hand to the Egyptians, and to the Assyrians, to be satisfied with bread.
King James Version — public domain in the United States · Bible text and permissions
Quick Meaning
This verse says the community gave the hand to Egypt and Assyria for bread.
Read It With
- Lamentations 5:1-6
Read Lamentations 5:6 with 5:1-6. This verse says the community gave the hand to Egypt and Assyria for bread. The complete unit establishes this movement: The community asks God to remember its disgrace and describes dispossession, family vulnerability, commodified necessities, forced labor without rest, and desperate dependence on old regional powers for enough bread.
Why This Verse Appears Here
After the fourth poem announces a limit, the fifth immediately proves that loss and dependence remain unresolved and must still be brought before God. Within that movement, this verse says the community gave the hand to Egypt and Assyria for bread.
Follow the Context
- The community commands the LORD to remember, consider, and behold disgrace.
- Inheritance and houses pass to outsiders.
- People become fatherless and widow-like.
- Water, wood, rest, and bread are obtained under exploitation and desperate dependence.
Phrase-by-Phrase Explanation
“We have given the hand to the Egyptians”
In plain language: This verse says the community gave the hand to Egypt and Assyria for bread.
Survival bargains occur under unequal power and should not be mistaken for free consent.
Why it matters: The wording carries textual, theological, ethical, or pastoral risk requiring its complete unit and stated limits.
How certain? probableWhat This Verse Is Not Saying
This verse does not stigmatize Egyptians, Assyrians, refugees, or people who submit under pressure to obtain bread.
What Remains True
Survival bargains occur under unequal power and should not be mistaken for free consent.
How It Can Shape Life
- Support food security and avoid shaming desperate aid-seeking.
Teach It Back
Explain how Lamentations 5:6 contributes to Lamentations 5:1-6. Include the surrounding alphabet stanza, the stated uncertainty, and what this verse does not authorize.
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Continue in Context
The full thought-unit study remains the final contextual authority for this Verse Lens.
Read Lamentations 5:1-6 — Communal Prayer over Dispossession and Desperate DependenceSources used for this Verse Lens
How certain is this explanation? probable
Where care is needed
Giving the hand may mean submission, alliance, or seeking aid; the named powers' temporal force is debated.
These are the sources used directly for this lens. Language, grammar, disagreements, and the complete source shelf remain attached to the full thought-unit research record.
Biblical text
King James (Authorized) Version — eng-kjv2006
eBible.org and CrossWire Bible Society
USFM archive eng-kjv2006_usfm.zip; source files dated 2026-08-19; downloaded 2026-08-24; archive SHA-256 aec1b3b26c622fd3d963d2bbac963016b9513246ffbfa20da00bb100372ea007; normalized corpus SHA-256 09aef51d90488aa7b9722b3fd9a93f4b25f6bf2064c5fd798fb39673c300ddf2.
Supports: Exact displayed Scripture, paragraph markers, supplied-word markup, and canonical verse coverage.
Exact location: Lamentations 5:1-6, repository-pinned eng-kjv2006 USFM corpus
Open source ↗hebrew text and morphology
Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible: Lamentations
Open Scriptures
Open Scriptures, release 2.2
Supports: Masoretic Hebrew wording, morphology, alphabet sequence, person and number, repeated vocabulary, and translation questions.
Exact location: Open Scriptures MorphHB v.2.2, commit 6a5db284c715c18b239422e57bb89684e6a19f00, wlc/Lam.xml, OSIS Lam.5.1-Lam.5.6
Open source ↗translation and translator notes
NET Bible: Lamentations with translators' notes
Biblical Studies Press
Biblical Studies Press, 2006
Supports: Verse-level Hebrew, syntax, textual, acrostic, literary, historical, and translation notes.
Exact location: NET Bible Lamentations PDF, printed pp. 1575-1577, translation and notes on 5:1-6
Open source ↗