Our fathers sinned, and are no more; and we bear their iniquities.
The Prophet seems here to contend with God, and to utter that blasphemy mentioned by Ezekiel. For when God severely chastised the people, that proverb was commonly used by them, “Our fathers did eat a sour grape, and our teeth are blunted.” (Ezekiel 18:2.) Thus they intimated that they were unjustly and cruelly treated, because they suffered the punishment of others, when they themselves were innocent.
Is any afflicted? let him pray; and let him in prayer pour out his complaint to God, and make known before him his trouble. The people of God do so here; being overwhelmed with grief, they give vent to their sorrows at the footstool of the throne of grace, and so give themselves ease.
Commenting on Lamentations 5:1-16
Our fathers have sinned, and are not,.... In the world, as the Targum adds; they were in being, but not on earth; they were departed from hence, and gone into another world; and so were free from the miseries and calamities their children were attended with, and therefore more happy: and we have borne their iniquities; the punishment of them, or chastisement for them: this...