Their visage is blacker than a coal; they are not known in the streets: their skin cleaveth to their bones; it is withered, it is become like a stick.

LAMENTATIONS 4:8KJV
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Lamentations 4:8 (KJV)

What does Lamentations 4:8 mean?

Lamentations 4:8 describes how the people of Jerusalem have become so physically changed by suffering that they are unrecognizable, with skin darkened and clinging to their bones, looking dried out and lifeless like sticks. This verse paints a vivid picture of the extreme hardship and starvation faced during the siege of Jerusalem.

The speaker is traditionally understood to be the prophet Jeremiah, lamenting to God and the people about the devastation in Jerusalem after its fall to Babylon. The verse uses strong imagery to show the depth of the city’s suffering, focusing on how hunger and distress have altered people’s appearance beyond recognition.

The Hebrew behind Lamentations 4:8

  • "visage" (תֹּאַר, to'ar): This word refers to physical appearance or face. Here, it emphasizes how drastically the people’s looks have changed due to suffering.
  • "blacker" (חָשַׁךְ, chashakh): This word means "darker" or "blackened." It highlights the severity of their condition, possibly from exposure, illness, or malnutrition.
  • "coal" (שֶׁחֹר, shechor): This is a word for a very dark or black substance, like coal, intensifying the image of how dark their skin has become.
  • "cleaveth" (צָפַד, tsaphad): This verb means "to cling" or "stick." It gives a sense of how the skin is tightly stretched over bones, a sign of extreme emaciation.
  • "withered" (יָבֵשׁ, yavesh): This word means "dried up" or "withered," reinforcing the image of lifelessness and severe dehydration.
  • "stick" (עֵץ, etz): The comparison to a stick underlines how thin and lifeless the people have become, stripped of vitality.

Why Lamentations 4:8 matters

  • Lamentations 4:8 clears up any idea that the suffering in Jerusalem was minor; the language shows the people’s agony was visible and extreme.
  • The verse emphasizes the physical toll of the siege, not just emotional or spiritual pain, making the historical situation more real and relatable.
  • This description connects to the wider passage, which mourns the reversal of Jerusalem’s fortunes and the visible consequences of the city’s destruction.

Where else these words appear

“visage” Hebrew H8389 · used in 15 verses

  • Genesis 29:17 Leah was tender eyed; but Rachel was beautiful and well favoured.
  • Deuteronomy 21:11 And seest among the captives a beautiful woman, and hast a desire unto her, that thou wouldest have her to thy wife;
  • 1 Kings 1:6 And his father had not displeased him at any time in saying, Why hast thou done so? and he also was a very goodly man; and his mother bare him after Absalom.

“blacker” Hebrew H2821 · used in 18 verses

  • Exodus 10:15 For they covered the face of the whole earth, so that the land was darkened; and they did eat every herb of the land, and all the fruit of the trees which the hail had left: and there remained not any green thing in the trees, or in the herbs of the field, through all the land of Egypt.
  • Psalms 105:28 He sent darkness, and made it dark; and they rebelled not against his word.
  • Jeremiah 13:16 Give glory to the LORD your God, before he cause darkness, and before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains, and, while ye look for light, he turn it into the shadow of death, and make it gross darkness.

“known” Hebrew H5234 · used in 47 verses

  • Genesis 27:23 And he discerned him not, because his hands were hairy, as his brother Esau's hands: so he blessed him.
  • Ruth 2:19 And her mother in law said unto her, Where hast thou gleaned to day? and where wroughtest thou? blessed be he that did take knowledge of thee. And she shewed her mother in law with whom she had wrought, and said, The man's name with whom I wrought to day is Boaz.
  • Job 21:29 Have ye not asked them that go by the way? and do ye not know their tokens,

“withered” Hebrew H3001 · used in 67 verses

  • Genesis 8:7 And he sent forth a raven, which went forth to and fro, until the waters were dried up from off the earth.
  • Isaiah 15:6 For the waters of Nimrim shall be desolate: for the hay is withered away, the grass faileth, there is no green thing.
  • Jeremiah 51:17 Every man is brutish by his knowledge; every founder is confounded by the graven image: for his molten image is falsehood, and there is no breath in them.