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15. Prophecy Against Moab

1 A prophecy against Moab:

   Ar in Moab is ruined,
   destroyed in a night!
Kir in Moab is ruined,
   destroyed in a night!

2 Dibon goes up to its temple,
   to its high places to weep;
   Moab wails over Nebo and Medeba.
Every head is shaved
   and every beard cut off.

3 In the streets they wear sackcloth;
   on the roofs and in the public squares
they all wail,
   prostrate with weeping.

4 Heshbon and Elealeh cry out,
   their voices are heard all the way to Jahaz.
Therefore the armed men of Moab cry out,
   and their hearts are faint.

    5 My heart cries out over Moab;
   her fugitives flee as far as Zoar,
   as far as Eglath Shelishiyah.
They go up the hill to Luhith,
   weeping as they go;
on the road to Horonaim
   they lament their destruction.

6 The waters of Nimrim are dried up
   and the grass is withered;
the vegetation is gone
   and nothing green is left.

7 So the wealth they have acquired and stored up
   they carry away over the Ravine of the Poplars.

8 Their outcry echoes along the border of Moab;
   their wailing reaches as far as Eglaim,
   their lamentation as far as Beer Elim.

9 The waters of Dimon Dimon, a wordplay on Dibon (see verse 2), sounds like the Hebrew for blood. are full of blood,
   but I will bring still more upon Dimon Dimon, a wordplay on Dibon (see verse 2), sounds like the Hebrew for blood.—
a lion upon the fugitives of Moab
   and upon those who remain in the land.


7. Therefore what every one hath left. 244244    {Bogus footnote} This corresponds to the ordinary expression, (Ce qu’il aura espargne,) Whatever he shall have spared. He means the riches that are laid up, and describes what usually happens in countries which are invaded by an enemy. All the inhabitants are wont to convey their riches elsewhere, and to lay them up in some safe place, that they may afterwards bring them back when peace has been restored.

To the brook of the willows. He means that they will have no storehouse, no fortress in which they can lay them up with safety; so that they will be compelled to hide them among the willows. This certainly is the lowest wretchedness, when the enemy is attacking us, and we can find no storehouse for laying up those things which we have collected with great industry. These willows were probably situated in some remote and sequestered place. Others explain it as referring to enemies, that they will bring the fruits of their robbery to the brook, to divide among themselves the general plunder.


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