Jeremiah 49:1-39
49 For the Bene-ʽAmmon Jehovah says, Has Israel no sons? or is there nobody of his to take possession? how comes it that Milcom has taken the possession of Gad and his people have settled in its cities?
2 So here are days coming, quoth Jehovah, when I will have a war-cry heard at Rabbah of the Bene-ʽAmmon, and she shall become a desolate ruin, and her dependencies shall be set on fire; and Israel shall take the possessions of those who dispossessed him, says Jehovah.
3 * Howl, Heshbon, because Ghai is ravaged; cry out, daughters of Rabbah, belt yourselves with sackcloths, wail and rove about the sheepfolds, because Milcom has gone into deportation, his priests and his captains together.
4 * Why are you boasting of the vales, rash lady, you that are confident in your reserve supplies—“who will come where I am?”
5 Here I am bringing dread over you, quoth the Lord Jehovah of Armies, from everybody around you, and you will make off, each one whatever way he is facing, and there will be nobody to give the runaway a home.
6 But after that I will bring the Bene-ʽAmmon back from slavery, quoth Jehovah.
7 * For Edom Jehovah says, There is no longer any wisdom in Teman; good ideas have stopped coming to shrewd men, their wisdom has spoiled.
8 * Take flight, turn about, live deep down, inhabitants of Dedan, because I have brought ʽEsau’s calamity upon him at his time of punishment.
9 If grape-gatherers come to you, they will leave after-pickings; if thieves in the night, they will do as much damage as they have occasion for.
10 For I have stripped ʽEsau bare, I have unscreened his places of concealment and he cannot hide; his descendants are made havoc of, and his brothers and his neighbors, and he is gone.
11 Leave your orphans, I will maintain them; and let your widows have confidence in me.
12 For Jehovah says, Those to whom it was not due to drink the cup shall drink, and is it to be you that go scot-free? you shall not, but drink you shall.
13 For I swear by myself, quoth Jehovah, that Bosrah shall become an object of horror and of taunting, a waste and a curse, and all its cities shall become perpetual wastes.
14 I have heard a report from Jehovah, and a courier is sent out among the nations, “Gather and come on against her and stand up for war”;
15 for here I have made you little among the nations, despised among mankind.
16 Your reign of terror has deluded you, your self-confidence, perched in the crannies of the cliffs, hilltop-holder! Though you build your nest as high as the vulture, from there I will bring you down, quoth Jehovah.
17 And Edom shall become an object of horror; everyone who goes past her shall be appalled and whistle at all the blows she has received.
18 As at the overthrow of Sodom and Ghomorrah and their neighbors, says Jehovah, not a man shall live there nor any human being spend time in her.
19 *** Here, like a lion coming up from the Jordan jungle to a permanent pasture, so on a sudden I will set him running from it; and what young man is there to set over it? for who is like me, and who will challenge me, and what shepherd is there that will stand his ground before me?
20 So listen to Jehovah’s policy that he has planned toward Edom and his ideas that he has thought of toward the inhabitants of Teman: the shepherd boys will drag them off, their pasture shall be aghast at them.
21 ** At the sound of their fall the earth quakes, cries out, its voice is heard at the Red Sea.
22 There is the like of a vulture soaring up and swooping down and spreading its wings over Bosrah; and the hearts of Edom’s champions will on that day become like the heart of a woman in birth-pains.
23 * For Damascus. Hamath is put to shame, and Arpad; because they have heard bad news they are swaying back and forth; there is anxiety in the sea, it cannot be quiet.
24 Damascus falters, turns to run, is seized with throes; distress and pangs have taken hold of it as they do of a childbearing woman.
25 * How deserted is it not, city of praise, town of my joy!
26 so its young men shall fall in its squares and all the men of war shall be silenced on that day, quoth Jehovah of Armies;
27 and I will light a fire in the wall of Damascus which shall consume Ben-Hadad’s palaces.
28 For Kedar and the kingdoms of Hasor which King Nebucadressar of Babylon cut down. Says Jehovah, Up with you to Kedar and make havoc of the Eastern Bedouins!
29 Their tents and their sheep and goats they shall take, their curtains and all their furnishings and their camels they shall carry off, and call up against them terror from all sides.
30 * Take to flight, rove far and wide, live deep in the desert, inhabitants of Hasor, quoth Jehovah; for King Nebucadressar of Babylon has adopted a policy against you and formed a project.
31 ** Up with you to a tranquil nation living a fearless life, one that has no doors nor bar but dwells in isolation,
32 * and their camels shall be taken for plunder and their hosts of livestock for booty; and I will scatter them to every wind, those that are clipped at the side, and will bring their calamity in from every quarter, quoth Jehovah.
33 And Hasor shall be a retreat of jackals, a desolation forever; no man shall settle there nor any human being seek a home in it.
34 What word of Jehovah came to the prophet Jeremiah to ʽElam in the beginning of the reign of King Sidkijah of Judah:
35 Says Jehovah of Armies, Here I am going to break ʽElam’s bow, the starting-point of his might;
36 and I will bring into ʽElam four winds from the four edges of the sky, and I will strew them on all these winds and there shall not be a nation where the exiles of ʽElam do not come.
37 * And I will dismay ʽElam before their enemies and before those who are looking for their lives, and I will bring upon them a calamity, my anger, quoth Jehovah, and will turn the sword loose behind them till I have finished them;
38 and I will plant my chair in ʽElam and destroy out of it king and general, quoth Jehovah.
39 But in a future time I will bring ʽElam back from slavery, quoth Jehovah.
Footnotes
^ 49:3 Conj. wail and flog yourselves full of gashes, because
^ 49:4 Var. vales? your vale is flowing, renegade daughter, you that are
^ 49:7 Lit. advice (or policy) has perished from shrewd men
^ 49:8 Codd. at the time when I attend to him
^ 49:19 Codd. because on a sudden
^ 49:19 Codd.* what chosen man
^ 49:19 (challenge) Or come into court against Lit. make an appointment with
^ 49:21 Or the country quakes
^ 49:21 Codd.* quakes, a cry whose sound is heard at Or quakes, its voice is heard as the outcry at
^ 49:23 Var. anxiety in their hearts, they cannot
^ 49:25 (first words) Unc.; susp.
^ 49:30 Lit. without in the desert
^ 49:31 Var. life, quoth Jehovah, one
^ 49:31 Var. no doors, no bolts, no bars
^ 49:32 Lit. become a plunder . . . a booty
^ 49:37 Or break ʽElam down before
