This verse is similar to Psalm 143.3: “he has made me sit in darkness like those long dead.” In the psalm the jailer is the psalmist’s enemy; here the jailer is God himself.

Made me dwell in darkness: darkness, as the completion of the unit will show, is a poetic term for Sheol, the place of the dead.

Like the dead of long ago refers to the condition in Sheol of those who have been there for a long time, slowly reduced to nothing. Good News Translation is poetic, with “in the stagnant darkness of death,” but this is not very close to the form of the original. It may be better to say, for example, “He has made me live in darkness, like the darkness where those long dead live.” In many languages there is no necessary connection between death and darkness. However, it is clear that the sufferer is still alive, and it is sometimes possible to say, for example, “He has made me live in a dark place like in the graves of those who died long ago.”

Quoted with permission from Reyburn, William D. A Handbook on Lamentations. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 1992. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .