Alphabet threne structure and the turn from letter to spirit

In those times when great joy and cheerfulness were among them, they hastened to the feast, gathering Jews from every place to Mount Zion. Many of the gates, which had been built in Zion from all the regions, the word says, have been utterly destroyed; and the priests are groaning, clearly because they are unable to perform the priestly duties prescribed for the feasts and the other days—either because they have been led into captivity, or because there is no one coming to them who seeks their priestly services and demands their ministrations. Moreover, the virgins of Zion, it is said, are being led away, and it is evident that they are taken by the victorious enemies. As for reflection: of Zion, called the contemplative and theorizing power, there are many ways of the diverse doctrines, mystical and physical and ethical, and perhaps also logical, which lead to the understanding and contemplation of the things set before us. Therefore, when one, having lost the disciplined practice of these things, becomes confused, all these ways wander without being traveled, though a festival exists along the previously mentioned ways, when they are walked, examined, and, as I might say, tread upon in order; but they mourn when they are deserted, neither inquiring nor passing through, because those who walk have fallen away and been taken captive by the passions, dragged about toward worse things. Zion, possessing nothing sweet anywhere, endures bitterness by itself. One must not take the present bitterness as being upon some kind of anger. The clarity of the word is such as this: they wished to afflict, or were afflicting, the Jewish land before the times of the captivity.

But they did not prevail, even while God was defending the Jews, when they offered themselves as worthy helpers. Yet when they sinned and, in addition to not listening to the prophets, even killed them—the sons of Israel—then they were handed over, helpless, to those who oppressed them, so that their enemies became their heads, as Symmachus has declared, rulers. Others, perhaps, who were enemies while living among the oppressors, either by invention or by substance, prospered in prosperity, having become subject to those who oppress, namely, those who remain behind due to their sins, whom the Lord has humbled because of the multitude of their godless deeds, even those who have transgressed and done this to such an extent that not even mercy is left for their infants, but they are led away into captivity, driven by every oppressor. Beginning with those who started and rejoiced in the Lord’s handing them over to humility because of the abundance of their godless deeds—those who had made covenants with the holy oracles toward Him but did not keep them. The power of these words must be made clear to us: they examine who is the daughter of Zion, and in what she possesses her beauty; what is the pasture, which the rulers of the daughter of Zion do not possess, like sheep owners bewildered about grazing; and how these, deprived of strength, go forward against the face of the one who pursues. But we consider that the mountain of Zion is indeed the mother of the assembly within her, the daughter called Zion; and the beauty of the daughter of Zion is her possession, the garments she wears, which possession, taken in the time of pasturing, was seized by the enemies and went forth from them.

Of these, the world was, that is, it was carried off (for this is a more emphatic way of saying it went out), and the leaders of the synagogue, because the enemies pressed upon them and took them captive, being at a loss for their kin, could not find nourishment like sheep. Just as rams, driven and not fed, go weakly forward, yielding to the force of those pursuing them, so also the leaders, having become captives, being led away into the land of those who took them captive, went forward not in strength, in appearance to the pursuer. But for understanding, such a soul is the daughter of Zion; just as the daughter of righteousness is the righteous one, and the daughter of wisdom is the wise one, so (since Zion is the place of observation) the observant and theoretically investigating daughter might be called Zion. What, then, could I rightly consider as her beauty and worth, except the wealth of the holy doctrines of truth, examined together with wisdom? Therefore, when someone neglects, after having attained beauty and worth, both the continuity of these things and the increase of the divine wealth, the things that as yet the world has attained flow out and depart. But the leaders, those who have guided the word and have managed to attain the aforementioned beauty, like rams, the guides, not finding pasture for the flock, have established themselves in scarcity, having set aside the attention of those who could help them and the flock, so that I might say,