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48. Message About Moab

¹ Concerning Moab:

This is what the LORD Almighty, the God of Israel, says:

   “Woe to Nebo, for it will be ruined.
   Kiriathaim will be disgraced and captured;
   the stronghold Or captured; / Misgab will be disgraced and shattered.
² Moab will be praised no more;
   in Heshbon The Hebrew for Heshbon sounds like the Hebrew for plot. people will plot her downfall:
   ‘Come, let us put an end to that nation.’
You, the people of Madmen, The name of the Moabite town Madmen sounds like the Hebrew for be silenced. will also be silenced;
   the sword will pursue you.
³ Cries of anguish arise from Horonaim,
   cries of great havoc and destruction.
⁴ Moab will be broken;
   her little ones will cry out. Hebrew; Septuagint / proclaim it to Zoar
⁵ They go up the hill to Luhith,
   weeping bitterly as they go;
on the road down to Horonaim
   anguished cries over the destruction are heard.
⁶ Flee! Run for your lives;
   become like a bush Or like Aroer in the desert.
⁷ Since you trust in your deeds and riches,
   you too will be taken captive,
and Chemosh will go into exile,
   together with his priests and officials.
⁸ The destroyer will come against every town,
   and not a town will escape.
The valley will be ruined
   and the plateau destroyed,
   because the LORD has spoken.
⁹ Put salt on Moab,
   for she will be laid waste Or Give wings to Moab, / for she will fly away;
her towns will become desolate,
   with no one to live in them.

¹⁰ “A curse on anyone who is lax in doing the LORD’s work!
A curse on anyone who keeps their sword from bloodshed!

    ¹¹ “Moab has been at rest from youth,
   like wine left on its dregs,
not poured from one jar to another—
   she has not gone into exile.
So she tastes as she did,
   and her aroma is unchanged.
¹² But days are coming,”
   declares the LORD,
“when I will send men who pour from pitchers,
   and they will pour her out;
they will empty her pitchers
   and smash her jars.
¹³ Then Moab will be ashamed of Chemosh,
   as Israel was ashamed
   when they trusted in Bethel.

    ¹⁴ “How can you say, ‘We are warriors,
   men valiant in battle’?
¹⁵ Moab will be destroyed and her towns invaded;
   her finest young men will go down in the slaughter,”
   declares the King, whose name is the LORD Almighty.
¹⁶ “The fall of Moab is at hand;
   her calamity will come quickly.
¹⁷ Mourn for her, all who live around her,
   all who know her fame;
say, ‘How broken is the mighty scepter,
   how broken the glorious staff!’

    ¹⁸ “Come down from your glory
   and sit on the parched ground,
   you inhabitants of Daughter Dibon,
for the one who destroys Moab
   will come up against you
   and ruin your fortified cities.
¹⁹ Stand by the road and watch,
   you who live in Aroer.
Ask the man fleeing and the woman escaping,
   ask them, ‘What has happened?’
²⁰ Moab is disgraced, for she is shattered.
   Wail and cry out!
Announce by the Arnon
   that Moab is destroyed.
²¹ Judgment has come to the plateau—
   to Holon, Jahzah and Mephaath,
    ²² to Dibon, Nebo and Beth Diblathaim,
    ²³ to Kiriathaim, Beth Gamul and Beth Meon,
    ²⁴ to Kerioth and Bozrah—
   to all the towns of Moab, far and near.
²⁵ Moab’s horn Horn here symbolizes strength. is cut off;
   her arm is broken,” declares the LORD.

    ²⁶ “Make her drunk,
   for she has defied the LORD.
Let Moab wallow in her vomit;
   let her be an object of ridicule.
²⁷ Was not Israel the object of your ridicule?
   Was she caught among thieves,
that you shake your head in scorn
   whenever you speak of her?
²⁸ Abandon your towns and dwell among the rocks,
   you who live in Moab.
Be like a dove that makes its nest
   at the mouth of a cave.

    ²⁹ “We have heard of Moab’s pride—
   how great is her arrogance!—
of her insolence, her pride, her conceit
   and the haughtiness of her heart.
³⁰ I know her insolence but it is futile,” declares the LORD,
   “and her boasts accomplish nothing.
³¹ Therefore I wail over Moab,
   for all Moab I cry out,
   I moan for the people of Kir Hareseth.
³² I weep for you, as Jazer weeps,
   you vines of Sibmah.
Your branches spread as far as the sea Probably the Dead Sea;
   they reached as far as Two Hebrew manuscripts and Septuagint; most Hebrew manuscripts as far as the Sea of Jazer.
The destroyer has fallen
   on your ripened fruit and grapes.
³³ Joy and gladness are gone
   from the orchards and fields of Moab.
I have stopped the flow of wine from the presses;
   no one treads them with shouts of joy.
Although there are shouts,
   they are not shouts of joy.

    ³⁴ “The sound of their cry rises
   from Heshbon to Elealeh and Jahaz,
from Zoar as far as Horonaim and Eglath Shelishiyah,
   for even the waters of Nimrim are dried up.
³⁵ In Moab I will put an end
   to those who make offerings on the high places
   and burn incense to their gods,” declares the LORD.
³⁶ “So my heart laments for Moab like the music of a pipe;
   it laments like a pipe for the people of Kir Hareseth.
   The wealth they acquired is gone.
³⁷ Every head is shaved
   and every beard cut off;
every hand is slashed
   and every waist is covered with sackcloth.
³⁸ On all the roofs in Moab
   and in the public squares
there is nothing but mourning,
   for I have broken Moab
   like a jar that no one wants,” declares the LORD.
³⁹ “How shattered she is! How they wail!
   How Moab turns her back in shame!
Moab has become an object of ridicule,
   an object of horror to all those around her.”

⁴⁰ This is what the LORD says:

   “Look! An eagle is swooping down,
   spreading its wings over Moab.
⁴¹ Kerioth Or The cities will be captured
   and the strongholds taken.
In that day the hearts of Moab’s warriors
   will be like the heart of a woman in labor.
⁴² Moab will be destroyed as a nation
   because she defied the LORD.
⁴³ Terror and pit and snare await you,
   you people of Moab,” declares the LORD.
⁴⁴ “Whoever flees from the terror
   will fall into a pit,
whoever climbs out of the pit
   will be caught in a snare;
for I will bring on Moab
   the year of her punishment,” declares the LORD.

    ⁴⁵ “In the shadow of Heshbon
   the fugitives stand helpless,
for a fire has gone out from Heshbon,
   a blaze from the midst of Sihon;
it burns the foreheads of Moab,
   the skulls of the noisy boasters.
⁴⁶ Woe to you, Moab!
   The people of Chemosh are destroyed;
your sons are taken into exile
   and your daughters into captivity.

⁴⁷ “Yet I will restore the fortunes of Moab
in days to come,” declares the LORD.

Here ends the judgment on Moab.

We may see more clearly from this verse, that the Prophet does not so much address the Moabites as his own people; for he was not a teacher to the Moabites to promote their safety; on the contrary, he intended his doctrine for the benefit of the Jews, as in the present instance.

Ashamed, he says, shall Moab be of his idol: for we have said that Chemosh was the god of the Moabites, as every nation had its own peculiar god, even its own invention. Now, the comparison made here shews that the Prophet wished to exhort the people, to whom he was appointed a teacher, to repentance; for he set before them the example of the ten tribes. And we know that at the time Jeremiah announced this prophecy, the kingdom of Israel was destroyed. All the Israelites, then, had been driven into exile except the tribe of Judah and the half tribe of Benjamin. Now, the ten tribes, as it is well known, had, under Jeroboam, departed from the pure worship of God, and had built for themselves an altar in Bethel. Hence, then, the Prophet now says, As ashamed were the Israelites of their superstitions, which they had devised for themselves, so a similar vengeance of God awaited the people of Moab; and thus he shews to the Jews what it is to trust in the only true God. The Jews were not, indeed, involved in so gross a superstition as to worship idols, at least publicly; but Ezekiel shews that they also were contaminated with this kind of pollution, and that the very sanctuary was defiled with idols; and at the same time the worship of God, according to the Law, continued to be celebrated. But the Jews had nothing but the external form: they had, indeed, the temple and the altar, they professed to worship the true God, but in the meantime impiety and contempt of true religion prevailed among them, and they had begun to involve themselves in many ungodly superstitions, as we have before seen.

What, then, does Jeremiah now do? He sets before their eyes the ten tribes whom God had destroyed, though the Israelites, as well as the Jews, had descended from the same father, even Abraham. As, then, God had inflicted so heavy a punishment on the kingdom of Israel, he now shews to the Jews, that the punishment of the Moabites was not less probable; and why? because they have, he says, their idol. God shews that this was a most atrocious wickedness, by which the Moabites had provoked his anger; for there is nothing less intolerable than for men to transfer the glory of God to their own inventions, to statues, to logs of wood, to stones, or to idols of gold and silver. We now, then, understand the object of the Prophet. It follows —