The destruction of the Kingdom of Judah and the ensuing exile brought a compounding tragedy. It was not merely the loss of a homeland, but a forced journey characterized by relentless suffering, subjugation, and a profound lack of rest. The nation entered this displacement utterly depleted of the strength they once possessed [תורה תמימה]. Furthermore, the experience of exile for Judah was uniquely agonizing compared to other conquered peoples. When other nations are exiled, they tend to assimilate, freely eating and drinking with their captors, which softens the blow of their displacement. The Israelites, however, maintained their distinct dietary laws and separation. Because they could not partake in the food and wine of their captors, they experienced the full, unmitigated physical and psychological weight of their isolation [תורה תמימה, לחם דמעה].
The crushing poverty and hard servitude experienced by the exiles operated on multiple levels. Physically, it reflected the severe subjugation imposed by their Babylonian conquerors [רש״י, צאינה וראינה, ביאור שטיינזלץ]. This suffering was a continuation of their woes, as they had already endured deep poverty and oppression in their own land, only to be exiled into further agony [פלגי מים]. Their destitution was so absolute that the invading enemy found no spoils to plunder and consequently showed them no mercy [לחם דמעה].
Beyond the physical reality, these afflictions also explain the spiritual causes of the exile itself. Socially, the exile served as punishment for exploiting the vulnerable. The nation was held accountable for robbing the poor, withholding wages, ruthlessly taking collateral, and for the hard labor of subjugating Hebrew slaves, refusing to free them in the sabbatical year as commanded by the Torah [תורה תמימה, לחם דמעה, אלון בכות]. Religiously, their poverty was a spiritual one, marked by a lack of Torah study or a disregard for the commandment to eat the bread of affliction, or matzah, on Passover. Their excessive labor manifested as rampant idolatry in the streets, or as the bringing of numerous sacrifices that were entirely devoid of accompanying good deeds. An alternative perspective suggests that the punishment came precisely because the people exhausted themselves with excessive stringencies in optional religious matters, while simultaneously neglecting the most basic and essential commandments [תורה תמימה, לחם דמעה, ראשון לציון, אלון בכות, נחל אשכול].
As they settled among the nations, the exiles found no rest, a reality that commentators identify as an intentional divine paradox. Deep down, the people of Judah desired to settle, assimilate, and find tranquility among the gentiles. However, God actively prevented this so they would not lose their identity; had they found true comfort, they would never have yearned to return to the Land of Israel [תורה תמימה, לחם דמעה, ראשון לציון]. This perpetual restlessness was also driven by the practical boundaries of Jewish law that prevented complete assimilation, and it served as a measure-for-measure consequence for their historical failure to properly drive out the inhabitants of Canaan [לחם דמעה].
In their state of immense weakness, the nation was easily overtaken. They were so exhausted that even the frailest of pursuers, including the blind or lame, could easily catch them [פלגי מים, לחם דמעה], while historical enemies harboring old grudges seized the perfect opportunity to exact revenge [ביאור שטיינזלץ]. The exiles found themselves trapped in narrow, inescapable straits. Geographically, they were cornered in tight valleys between towering mountains with no way out, or captured right at the borders as they attempted to flee to neighboring kingdoms [רש״י, אבן עזרא, תורה תמימה, צאינה וראינה, ביאור שטיינזלץ]. Conceptually, the very sins they had committed formed invisible walls that blocked their escape [לחם דמעה]. However, the primary approach among commentators understands these straits as a reference to time rather than space. It points to the perilous three-week period during the summer, between the seventeenth of Tammuz and the ninth of Av, days historically fraught with strict divine judgment and disaster, when the enemy finally succeeded in bringing Israel to its knees [רש״י, תורה תמימה, צאינה וראינה, אלון בכות, לחם דמעה].