The poem now names wrongs inflicted by people with power over others: prisoners crushed, rights denied, and legal cases corrupted. Jerusalem’s defeat had placed its survivors in that vulnerable position. These verses bring the conduct of those who control them before the Most High.
“To crush under foot all the prisoners of the earth,
to turn away the right of a man before the face of the Most High,
to subvert a man in his cause, the Lord doesn’t approve.” (Lamentations 3:34–36)
These three verses belong together. They name acts of oppression and then give the Lord's verdict upon them. The prisoners are crushed, a person's rights are denied, and his legal case is corrupted. Each description concerns someone whose welfare depends upon people with the power to harm him. The final words prevent us from treating that power as proof of God's approval.
The first image is especially severe because prisoners have already lost their freedom. They cannot leave, protect themselves through their own government, or meet their captors as equals. To crush them underfoot is to exploit their helplessness, treating a person already subdued as someone to humiliate or injure further. The image concerns the abuse of control rather than the mere fact that someone has been taken into custody.
Judah’s captives knew the helplessness of living under foreign power. Yet “all the prisoners of the earth” reaches beyond them to anyone whose captors exploit a defenseless position.
Israel's law had already taught the nation to care about people who lacked the power to protect their own interests. Deuteronomy 24:17–18 prohibited depriving the foreigner and the fatherless of justice and taking a widow's clothing as security for a debt. The command recalled Israel's slavery in Egypt and the Lord's deliverance. The people were to remember what it meant to live beneath someone else's power. Their rescue from oppression was supposed to shape the way they treated those who depended upon their justice.
Judah's history made this a painful accusation. Its prophets had repeatedly confronted leaders who exploited the poor and used public authority for private advantage. People who had denied others protection were now living without protection themselves. Yet this reversal did not turn the abuse of Judah's captives into righteousness. A guilty nation could experience deserved judgment while its conquerors committed further wrongs against it. The covenant's demands concerning justice did not disappear when the people who had violated them became victims of someone else's violence.
The second description concerns turning away a person's right. Someone has a claim that ought to receive fair consideration, but those with authority refuse to recognize it. The wrong lies in setting aside what is due to another person. His weakness, lack of influence, or unfavorable position becomes the reason his claim can be ignored.
This happens “before the face of the Most High.” Every earthly exercise of authority takes place beneath God's rule. A king may command an army and a judge may control a courtroom, but each acts in His presence. A victim with no effective human appeal can still bring the wrong before the One who judges rulers themselves.
Isaiah 10:1–2 condemned officials who wrote unjust decrees and deprived the needy of justice. They used the law to prey upon widows and the fatherless. The problem was more than individual dishonesty outside the system: those responsible for governing had made the system serve oppression. Micah 3 similarly addressed leaders who were supposed to know justice but instead exploited the people entrusted to them. Office increased their responsibility because their decisions affected those who depended upon them.
The third description makes the legal setting explicit. A person's “cause” is his case or dispute. To subvert it is to twist the process against him so that the result no longer reflects what is right. A hearing may take place and a verdict may be announced, yet the appearance of proper procedure cannot make a corrupt judgment just. The three accusations show how completely a vulnerable person can be trapped when those who injure him also control the means by which he might seek redress.
“The Lord doesn’t approve” gives His verdict upon the crushed prisoner, denied right, and corrupted case. The people who exercise power over others answer to the Most High for those acts. His rule includes judgment of the oppressor as well as the nation brought low.
Jeremiah 25:8–12 applies this distinction directly to Babylon. The Lord announced that He would bring Nebuchadnezzar against Judah and the surrounding nations because they had refused to hear His words. Yet the same passage announced Babylon's eventual punishment for its own iniquity. Being used in judgment did not place Babylon outside judgment. Its rulers remained answerable for the conduct by which they pursued and exercised their power.
Isaiah 10 develops the same truth through Assyria, which the Lord calls the rod of His anger. God used that empire against a rebellious people, but the Assyrian king sought conquest and destruction for his own purposes. Isaiah 10:7 distinguishes the ruler's intention from God's purpose, and verse 12 announces punishment upon his proud heart. The king could not claim that his military success made his arrogance righteous. The instrument remained beneath the authority of the one who used it.
“Who is he who says, and it comes to pass,
when the Lord doesn’t command it?” (Lamentations 3:37)
The question turns from the misuse of human authority to its limits. No ruler possesses a word that can determine history independently of the Lord. Nebuchadnezzar's commands had immediate and terrible consequences for Judah. He could move armies, remove rulers, and carry people into exile. Nevertheless, his apparent mastery of events did not make him the highest authority over them.
Speaking and commanding direct attention to God’s effective word. Through the prophets He had announced Jerusalem’s judgment, and the catastrophe confirmed the seriousness of what He had said. Babylon exercised power within the history over which the LORD ruled.
This confronted Judah's earlier refusal to listen. The people had received warnings but repeatedly preferred assurances of security. Political plans and confidence in Jerusalem's religious privileges could not make those warnings powerless. Even the king's decisions were to be measured by what God had actually said. Jeremiah 38:17, for example, offered Zedekiah a concrete path of obedience: surrender to the Babylonian officials, and his life would be spared and the city would not be burned. The Lord's authority made His instructions urgent; it did not make obedience pointless.
For the survivors, this means Babylon's victory cannot be read as the defeat of Israel's God. The conqueror may seem to possess the final word because he controls their immediate circumstances, but the Most High remains above him. That truth also restrains those who hold power: success offers no exemption from accountability, and present control gives no assurance of lasting security.
“Doesn’t evil and good come out of the mouth of the Most High?” (Lamentations 3:38)
The contrast here is between calamity and well-being. The word “evil” can describe a disastrous experience as well as morally wicked conduct; the context determines which sense is intended. Jerusalem's destruction, the promised blessings of the covenant, and the judgment announced by the prophets establish the subject here. The poet is acknowledging the Lord's authority to bring disaster as well as favorable circumstances.
The condemnation of oppression in verses 34–36 stands beside this declaration of authority over calamity. The LORD brought judgment upon Judah and also condemned the injustice committed by those who exercised power within it. The chapter holds both acts before the same Judge.
Isaiah 45:7 expresses the same authority through light and darkness, peace and calamity. The LORD declares His rule while speaking about Cyrus, a foreign ruler through whom He would accomplish His purpose. His word reaches the powers governing Israel’s future.
“The mouth of the Most High” links this verse to the command in verse 37. Disaster and well-being alike stand under the authority of His word.
“Why should a living man complain,
a man for the punishment of his sins?” (Lamentations 3:39)
The poet now directs attention toward those receiving judgment. The wrongs of their enemies are real, but those wrongs do not settle the question of their own responsibility. Judah had broken the covenant and rejected repeated correction. The survivors could not honestly insist that the nation had been judged without cause simply because Babylon was also guilty.
Verse 39 challenges the attempt to treat deserved punishment as proof that God has acted unjustly. Throughout the poem the speaker grieves, asks for mercy, and confesses wrongdoing. Here he calls the people to acknowledge the sins for which judgment came. The question prepares for the communal self-examination of verse 40.
“A living man” recalls the mercy already confessed in the chapter: the people have not been completely consumed. Those who remain alive still stand before the LORD with the opportunity to acknowledge their sins and seek Him. The question places their complaint within that continuing opportunity.
This gives the passage its demanding balance. Those exercising power must hear that the Lord sees the prisoner, the denied right, and the corrupted case. Those receiving the announced judgment must hear that their enemies' guilt does not cancel their own. Neither group can use the other's wrongdoing to avoid answering to the Most High. For Judah, an honest appeal for mercy can include grief over what has happened, protest against cruelty, and confession of sin. Bringing those things together allows the lament to become truthful prayer before the God who both judges and shows compassion.