Lamentations 4:2

Comparable. Literally, “weighed,” or “paid.” The reference is to the weighing out of precious metal as payment for a purchase (Gen. 23:16), a practice common before the use of coined money. The weighing of gold, rather than silver, in a transaction was an indication of the great value of the purchase. For examples of this practice see Ezra. 8:25, 26, 33; Job 28:15; Jer. 32:9; Zech. 11:12.

Esteemed. Heb. chashab, “to account,” “to regard,” or “to value.” This word, like the translated “comparable,” is also a commercial term used of recording a transaction (see 2 Kings 22:7).

Earthen pitchers. Pottery vessels were the commonest and cheapest utensils of ancient times. Many thousands of pottery fragments found by archeologists in ancient ruins testify to the commonness of earthenware. The thought of this verse is that the sons of Zion, whose value could only be measured in gold, have been set down in the account books of their enemies as almost worthless. A sad comment indeed on the low state to which Judah had fallen in the days of the prophet Jeremiah.