Arise, cry out in the night: in the beginning of the watches pour out your heart like water before the face of the Lord: lift up your hands toward him for the life of your young children, that faint for hunger at the head of every street.
All Commentaries on Lamentations 2:19 Go To Lamentations 2
Thomas Aquinas
AD 1274
A manner of prayer is here taught, and about this two notations are proposed. First, the manner is taught, as to time. As expressed: "Arise, cry out in the night": that is, from sleep. "Cry out ": namely, praise the Lord God. Then: "in the night ": whence time is rather vacant and quiet, due to nighttime.
Also: "at the beginning of the watches". As vigils, or watches, within nighttime are so divided as to the guard of watchmen over the city. For, the Song of Solomon: 3:3 declares: "The watchmen found me, as they went about the city."
Now, there were four watches during the nighttime. The first watch: "Canticunium" (between cock-crowing and the dawn of day) is when the fire nightlamp is extinguished.
The second watch is termed: "Intempestum". It refers to the middle of the night. Such time is not opportune for action. For, among the ancients: "what is 'timely', is a opportunely'."
The third watch is called the "Crow", or song of the cock. Finally, the fourth watch Is: "Antehicanum". That is, at the first vigil or watch, or at the beginning of any of the four watches. For Isaiah claims: "My soul yearns for thee in the night, my spirit within me earnestly seeks thee." (Is: 26;9).
To devotion to one's heart Verse 19 declares: "pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord!" Namely, as one's heart liquifies thru love and devotion, as if once congealed, or frozen. As Psalm 42 (41):4 says: "These things I remember, as I pour out my soul".
Moreover, there is another sign of devotion as Verse 19 continues: "lift your hands to him". Because, as I Timothy 2:8 says: "I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling."
Second, the matter of prayer is viewed, as said: "for the lives of your children", That is, like to a separation of souls from bodies, as life itself in concerned.
Then, Verse 19 concludes: "at the head of every street." That is, like to the four ways of prayer that concur in one way. For, Chapter 2:11 Lamentations states: "because infants and babes faint in the streets of the city."
