1Concerning the Ammonites, thus said the LORD:
does he have no heir?
Why has Milcom dispossessed Gad,
and his people has dwelled in Gad’s towns?
2Therefore days are coming, said the LORD,
when I will make Rabbah of the Ammonites hear
the trumpet blast of war,
and she shall become a desolate heap,
and her villages shall be burned in fire,
and Israel shall dispossess those who dispossessed her
—said the LORD.
3Wail, O Heshbon, for Ai has been ravaged,
scream, O daughters of Rabbah,
gird sackcloth and lament,
and run about among the sheep pens,
for Milcom shall go into exile,
his priests and his nobles together.
4Why should you boast of the valleys?
—Your valley oozes sickly, wayward daughter
who trusts in her treasures:
“Who can come against me?”
5I am about to bring upon you terror
—said the Master, LORD of Armies—
from all sides round you,
and you shall be dispossessed, each before him,
with none taking in the wanderer.
6And afterward I will restore the fortunes of the Ammonites, said the LORD.
7Concerning Edom. Thus said the LORD of Armies:
Is there no longer wisdom in Teman?
Counsel is lost to the discerning,
their wisdom is brought down.
8Flee, turn round, sit low,
O dwellers of Dedan!
For Esau’s disaster have I brought upon him,
the time when I reckon with him.
9If grape harvesters came to you,
would they not leave gleanings?
If thieves in the night,
they would despoil just what they need.
10For I have stripped Esau,
have laid bare his hidden places,
and he cannot be concealed,
his seed and brothers are ravaged
and his neighbors—he is no more.
11Leave your orphans with me, I will sustain them,
and your widows, rely on me!
12For thus said the LORD, “Look, those who are not wont to drink the cup will surely drink, and as for you, you shall not go scot free, you shall not go scot-free, for you surely shall drink. 13For by Myself do I vow, said the LORD, that a desolation, a disgrace, a ruin, and a curse shall be Bosra, and all its towns shall be everlasting ruins.”
14A report I have heard from the LORD,
and an envoy among the nations is sent:
Gather and come against her
and rise up for battle.
15For, look, I have made you least among the nations,
spurned by humankind
16The horror you imposed deceived you,
the arrogance of your heart.
Dweller in crevices of the rock,
who seizes the height of the hill,
though you raise high your nest like the eagle,
from there I will bring you down, said the LORD.
17And Edom shall become a desolation. All who pass by her shall be shocked and hiss at her blows. 18Like the overturning of Sodom and Gomorrah and its neighbors, said the LORD, no man shall dwell there and no human being sojourn within her.
19Look, as a lion comes up
from the Jordan’s thicket to a secure pasture,
so in a flash I will rush him off from her,
and who is the young man I could appoint over her,
for who is like Me, who can fix a time for Me,
who the shepherd that can stand against Me?
20Therefore hear the counsel of the LORD
that He conceived against Edom
and the plans that He devised
against the dwellers of Teman—
they shall surely drag them off, the young of the flock,
they shall surely desolate their pastures.
21From the sound of their falling the earth shook
the sound of a scream at the Reed Sea was heard.
22Look, as the eagle goes up and soars and spreads its wings over Bosra, the heart of the warriors of Edom on that day shall be like the heart of a woman in travail.
23Concerning Damascus.
Be shamed, Hamath and Arpad,
for an evil report they have heard.
They quailed in a sea of unease,
they cannot be quiet.
24Damascus has gone slack,
turned back to flee,
and trembling has seized her,
distress and pangs gripped her like a woman in labor.
25“How is the city of praise forsaken,
the town of my joy!”
26Therefore shall her young men fall in her streets and all the men of war shall be silent on that day, said the LORD of Armies.
27And I will light a fire in the wall of Damascus,
and it shall consume the citadels of Ben-Hadad.
28Concerning Kedar and the kingdom of Hazor that Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylonia struck down, thus said the LORD:
Arise, go up to Kedar,
and ravage the Easterners.
29Their tents and their flocks shall be taken,
their curtains and all their gear.
And their camels they shall bear off for themselves,
and they shall call them: Terror All Round.
30Flee, wander far, sit low,
O dwellers of Hazor, said the LORD.
For Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylonia has conceived counsel against you,
and devised plans against you.
31Arise, go up against a tranquil nation
dwelling safely, said the LORD.
No double doors nor bolt he has,
Alone do they dwell.
32And their camels shall become spoil,
and their crowd of cattle become booty.
And I will scatter them to every wind,
the men of cropped hair,
and from all sides I will bring their disaster
—said the LORD.
33And Hazor shall become a jackals’ den,
an everlasting desolation.
No man shall dwell there,
and no human being sojourn within her.
34Which was the word of the LORD to Jeremiah the prophet at the beginning of the kingship of Zedekiah king of Judah, saying,
35“Thus said the LORD of Armies: I am about to break the bow of Elam, the prime of their valor. 36And I will bring against Elam four winds from the four corners of the heavens and I will scatter them to all these winds, and there shall be no nation where the dispersed of Elam will not go.
37And I will shatter Elam before their enemies
and before those who seek their life,
and I will bring harm upon them,
My smoldering wrath, said the LORD.
And I will send the sword after them
until I make an end of them.
38And I will set My throne in Elam
and destroy from there king and nobles, said the LORD.
39And it will happen in the days after
that I will restore the fortunes of Elam.”
CHAPTER 49 NOTES
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1. Does Israel have no sons, / does he have no heir? The line is clearly framed on the legal assumption of the patriarchal society that it is the sons who inherit from the father. But it also plays on the other meaning of the verb yarash, which is “to take hold of,” as in conquest.
Milcom. He is the patron god of Ammon. The Masoretic Text reads malkam, “their king,” but three ancient versions show “Milcom,” and most modern scholars concur that this is the correct reading.
2. Rabbah of the Ammonites. This capital city stood on the site of present-day Amman, and all of the foreign nations mentioned in this chapter are trans-Jordanian kingdoms, with the exception of Elam, which is in Persia.
her villages. Though the literal sense of the Hebrew is “her daughters,” this is a term regularly used for the small outlying towns or hamlets in the vicinity of a city, and the city itself is sometimes given the epithet of “mother.”
3. daughters of Rabbah. In this instance, “daughters” must refer to the young women of the city, who take up the role of keening women, wailing and lamenting.
for Milcom shall go into exile. As in verse 1, the Masoretic Text has malkam, “their king.”
4. Your valley oozes sickly. The claim of some scholars that ʿemeq, “valley,” either here or in the preceding verset, means “strength,” is far-fetched. The Ammonites took pride in their fertile valleys (first verset). Now, however, the valley “flows” or “oozes,” zav. While this verb is the one that is used in the recurrent phrase “a land flowing with milk and honey,” it is also used for suppurations of the body, and that is the more likely sense here, because what the context suggests is a contrast between the valley about which the Ammonites once boasted and its present woeful state.
5. the wanderer. Here and below, this term is used as a loose synonym for an “exile” or “fugitive.”
6. I will restore the fortunes of the Ammonites. See the comment on 48:47.
7. Teman. This place-name also means “south.” A tradition going back to Late Antiquity locates it near Petra in present-day Jordan, but the precise identification remains uncertain.
8. sit low. The odd phrasing of the Hebrew is, literally, “deepen sitting.” The likely reference is sitting or living (the verb means both) in a lowly, humble condition.
Esau’s disaster. Esau is the purported founding father of the people of Edom.
9. would they not leave gleanings? / . . . they would despoil just what they need. In the normal order of things, grape harvesters leave some small grapes, and even thieves (the second verset is a kind of a fortiori) leave behind what they cannot use. Edom’s condition, on the other hand, will be grimmer, for the ravaging invader will take everything. In point of historical fact, Edom allied itself with the Babylonian invaders (see Psalm 137), and only two decades later would it become the target of a Babylonian assault.
11. I will sustain them. Literally, “I will make them live.”
12. those who are not wont to drink the cup. The cup in question is the cup of poison or destruction, so the reference is to a people that had been accustomed to live in security.
14. an envoy among the nations is sent. The most likely identity of the envoy is the prophet himself, here bringing this message of doom to the sundry nations east of Judah.
15. I have made you least among the nations. “You” is Edom.
16. The horror you imposed deceived you. The Hebrew simply says “your horror deceived you.” Though other interpretations have been proposed, this translation assumes that the reference is to the fear that a once powerful Edom inspired in its neighbors and hence “you imposed” has been added by way of clarification.
Dweller in crevices of the rock, / who seizes the height of the hill. The Edomites were prone to take strategic advantage of the rocky mountainous terrain around their towns. These elevated military positions, however, will not avail against the devastating force of the invaders: “though you raise high your nest like the eagle, / from there I will bring you down.”
18. no man shall dwell there and no human being sojourn within her. Jeremiah’s prophecies of doom make abundant use of stereotypical phrases such as this one.
19. I will rush him off from her. The received text here is puzzling because what is envisaged is someone attacking Edom. It is possible that the “him” refers to the fleeing inhabitant of Edom, but it may be more likely that the initial mem of the preposition here is a scribal error and that one should read ʾaleyha, “against her.”
who is the young man I could appoint over her. This somewhat obscure formulation, in light of what is said in the next line, may mean: what able-bodied man could I appoint to take charge of the conquest of Edom when I Myself will do it?
the shepherd. As repeatedly elsewhere, this is an epithet for the king.
23. Concerning Damascus. The prophecies against the nations now move northward to Syria and its capital, Damascus.
a sea of unease. The Masoretic Text shows a syntactically problematic reading: bayam deʾagah, “in the sea unease.” This translation revocalizes the first word as beyam, yielding a construct state between the two nouns, “a sea of unease.”
25. How is the city of praise forsaken, / the town of my joy! This is best construed as the quotation of a lament (the initial “how is” is the formula for beginning a lament) spoken by an inhabitant of Damascus. It is such a person who would call it “the city of praise,” “the town of my joy.” It should be noted that the verb “forsaken” in the Hebrew is preceded by lo’, which usually means “no” or “not” but here functions as a marker of emphasis, as it does in rhetorical questions (is it not . . .?).
27. Ben-Hadad. This is a hereditary name for the kings of Syria.
28. Kedar. This is an umbrella term for nomadic tribes to the southeast of ancient Israel, perhaps extending as far as the Arabian peninsula. The nomadic character of this population is signaled in the next verse in the reference to “tents,” “flocks,” and “curtains” (that is, tent curtains).
29. And their camels they shall bear off for themselves. This verset and the next exhibit the fluidity of pronominal reference that often characterizes biblical Hebrew. The antecedent of the initial “their” has to be the peoples of Kedar, whereas “they shall bear off for themselves” must refer to the Babylonian troops who seize the camels of Kedar as booty.
31. Arise, go up against a tranquil nation. The preceding imperative to flee was addressed to the inhabitants of Hazor. The present command, however, must be to the Babylonian forces, urging them to attack this people that had before been secure and had not felt the necessity to protect itself with bolted doors in its city walls.
35. I am about to break the bow of Elam. Some ancient sources indicate that the Elamites were renowned archers.
38. I will set My throne in Elam. The formulation is unusual. God will depose the king and nobles of Elam (second verset) and reign there instead. The theological idea behind this line is that God is the ruler of all nations, determining their fate, so that if He decides to destroy faraway Elam, He Himself will be king there, as He is king of all the earth.
39. And it will happen in the days after / that I will restore the fortunes of Elam. As with the other prophecies concerning the sundry nations, the prediction of doom concludes with this stereotypical pronouncement about a future restoration. History is a continual cycle of conquests and devastations, but in the course of events, most nations are not obliterated, only ravaged and then eventually restored.