Lamentations 2:16

פ (Pe) All your enemies gloated over you. ¹  They sneered and gnashed their teeth; they said, “We have destroyed ²  her! Ha! We have waited a long time for this day. We have lived to see it!” ³ 

Job 16:9,10; Ps 22:13; Ps 35:16; Ps 35:21; Ps 37:12; Ps 41:8; Ps 56:2; Ps 57:3; Ps 109:2; Ps 112:10; Ps 124:3; Isa 49:19; Jer 50:7,17; Jer 51:34; La 3:46; Eze 25:3,6,15; Eze 36:3; Ho 8:8; Ob 1:12-16; Zep 2:8-10; Ac 7:54

¹ tn Heb “they have opened wide their mouth against you.”

² tn Heb “We have swallowed!”

³ tn Heb “We have attained, we have seen!” The verbs מָצָאנוּ רָאִינוּ (matsa’nu ra’inu) form a verbal hendiadys in which the first retains its full verbal sense and the second functions as an object complement. It forms a Hebrew idiom that means something like, “We have lived to see it!” The three asyndetic 1st person common plural statements in 2:16 (“We waited, we destroyed, we saw!”) are spoken in an impassioned, staccato style reflecting the delight of the conquerors.