Lexicon :: Strong's H8242 - śaq

Now when they emptied their sacks, every man’s bundle of money [paid to buy grain] was in his sack. When they and their father saw the bundles of money, they were afraid.

Then David said to Joab and to all the people with him, “Tear your clothes, put on sackcloth, and mourn before Abner.” And King David walked behind the bier.

Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest [in the spring] until [the autumn] rain fell on them; and she allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on their bodies by day, nor the beasts of the field [to feed on them] by night.

But his servants said to him, “We have heard that the kings of the house (royal line) of Israel are merciful kings. Please let us put sackcloth around our [fn]loins and ropes on our necks [as symbols of submission], and go out to the king of Israel; perhaps he will spare your life.”

Now when Ahab heard these words [of Elijah], he tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and fasted, and he lay in sackcloth and went about dejectedly (mourning).

When king Hezekiah heard it, he tore his clothes and he covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house (temple) of the LORD.

Now on the twenty-fourth day of this month the Israelites assembled with fasting and in sackcloth and with dirt [fn]on their heads.

Now when Mordecai learned of everything that had been done, he tore his clothes [in mourning], and put on sackcloth and ashes, and went out into the center of the city and cried out loudly and bitterly.

“I have sewed sackcloth over my skin [as a sign of mourning]

And have defiled my horn (symbol of strength) in the dust.

You have turned my mourning into dancing for me;

You have taken off my sackcloth and clothed me with joy,

But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth (mourning garment);

I humbled my soul with fasting,

And I prayed with my head bowed on my chest.

When I made sackcloth my clothing [as one in mourning],

I became a byword [a mere object of scorn] to them.

Now it will come to pass that instead of the sweet fragrance of spices there will be [the stench of] rottenness;

Instead of a belt, a rope;

Instead of well-set hair, baldness;

Instead of fine clothes, a robe of sackcloth;

And branding [of captives by the scorching heat] instead of beauty.

In their streets they have wrapped themselves with sackcloth;

On their [flat] housetops and in their open squares

Everyone is wailing, dissolved in tears.

Therefore in that day the Lord GOD of hosts called you to weeping, to mourning,

To shaving the head and to wearing sackcloth [in humiliation].

And when King Hezekiah heard this, he tore his clothes and covered himself with sackcloth and went into the house of the LORD.

“I clothe the heavens with the blackness [of storm clouds]

And make sackcloth [of mourning] their clothing.”

“Is a fast such as this what I have chosen, a day for a man to humble himself [with sorrow in his soul]?

Is it only to bow down his head like a reed

And to make sackcloth and ashes as a bed [pretending to have a repentant heart]?

Do you call this a fast and a day pleasing to the LORD?

“For this reason, put on sackcloth [for mourning],

Lament (mourn with expressions of grief for the dead) and wail,

For the fierce anger of the LORD

Has not turned back from us.”

O daughter of my people [says Jeremiah],

Clothe yourself in sackcloth and wallow in ashes;

Mourn [aloud] as for an only son,

A most bitter cry [of sorrow and regret],

For suddenly the destroyer will come upon us [on both prophet and people].

“Wail, O [fn]Heshbon, for Ai [in Ammon] has been destroyed!

Cry out, O daughters of Rabbah!

Wrap yourselves with sackcloth and lament (cry out in grief),

And rush back and forth inside the enclosures;

For Malcam [your powerless god] will go into exile

Together with his priests and his princes.

The elders of the Daughter of Zion

Sit on the ground keeping silent;

They have thrown dust on their heads,

They have covered themselves with sackcloth.

The virgins of Jerusalem

Have bowed their heads to the ground.

“And they will make themselves [completely] bald for you

And wrap themselves in sackcloth;

And in bitterness of soul they will weep for you

With bitter mourning and wailing.

Wail like a virgin [bride] clothed with [fn]sackcloth

For the bridegroom of her youth [who has died].

Clothe yourselves with sackcloth

And lament (cry out in grief), O priests;

Wail, O ministers of the altar!

Come, spend the night in sackcloth [and pray without ceasing],

O ministers of my God,

For the grain offering and the drink offering

Are withheld from the house of your God.

“And I shall turn your festivals and feasts into mourning

And all your songs into dirges (funeral poems to be sung);

And I shall cause sackcloth to be put on everyone’s [fn]loins

And baldness on every head [shaved for mourning].

And I shall make that time like a time of mourning for an only son [who has died],

And the end of it shall be like a bitter day.

The people of Nineveh believed and trusted in God; and they proclaimed a fast and put on sackcloth [in penitent mourning], from the greatest even to the least of them.