🐾 Hebrew term: “Alphabetic acrostic” · Hebrew alphabet: 22 letters (from ת ... א, aleph to tav).

📜 What Is an Acrostic?

In Hebrew poetry, an acrostic poem uses the letters of the Hebrew alphabet in order to begin each line or stanza. It’s a literary form that shows order, completeness, and devotion — the poet takes all the letters from A to Z (or rather, Aleph to Tav) and weaves them into a full expression of grief, praise, or prayer.

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Strong’s (Hebrew): H2617 · Transliteration: ḥesed · Hebrew: חֶסֶד · Pronounced: HEH-sed

Strong’s (Greek): G26 · Transliteration: agápē · Greek: ἀγάπη · Pronounced: ah-GAH-pay

🐾 “The steadfast love of the LORD never ceases; his mercies never come to an end; they are new every morning.” — Lamentations 3:22–23

📜 The Setting

Lamentations is a collection of five poems grieving the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. The city has been besieged, burned, and emptied; the temple is gone; survivors sit amid ruins. The speaker’s voice (traditionally linked to the prophet Jeremiah) weeps over “Daughter Zion” and wrestles with God’s justice, human sin, and the shocking loss of home and worship.