And cried when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, What city is like unto this great city!

And cried, seeing the place of her burning, saying: What city is like to this great city?

and cried, seeing the smoke of her burning, saying, What city is like to the great city?

and were crying, seeing the smoke of her burning, saying, What city is like to the great city?

stood afar off, and cried aloud when they saw the smoke of her burning. And they said, 'What city is like this great city?'

And crying out when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, What town is like the great town?

and exclaimed as they looked at the smoke of her burning, saying, 'What is like the great city?'

And they cried out, seeing the place of her conflagration, saying: 'What city resembles this great city?'

and seeing the smoke from the burning city, cried – "What city can compare with the Great city?"

And cried - That is, as they had a deep interest in it, they would, on their own account, as well as hers, lift up the voice of lamentation.What city is like unto this great city? - In her destruction. What calamity has ever come upon a city like this?

What city is like unto this great city! - Viz. in magnitude, power, and luxury.

And cried when they saw the smoke of her burning,.... See Gill on Revelation 18:9.
saying, what city is like unto this great city? as before for magnificence and grandeur, so now for sorrow, desolation, and ruin; nor was any city like it for power and authority, for pride and luxury, for idolatry and superstition, blasphemy and impenitence; the like the sailors say of Tyre, Ezekiel 27:30 from whence this and other expressions are borrowed in this lamentation.

when they saw--Greek, "horontes." But A, B, C, and ANDREAS read, Greek, "blepontes," "looking at." Greek, "blepo," is to use the eyes, to look: the act of seeing without thought of the object seen. Greek, "horao," refers to the thing seen or presented to the eyes [TITTMANN].
smoke--so B, C. But A reads "place."
What city is like--Compare the similar beast as to the beast, Revelation 13:4 : so closely do the harlot and beast approximate one another. Contrast the attribution of this praise to God, to whom alone it is due, by His servants (Exodus 15:11). MARTIAL says of Rome, "Nothing is equal to her;" and ATHENÆUS, "She is the epitome of the world."