Yahweh will destroy Moab

15 I received this message from Yahweh about the Moab people-group:

In one night two of your important cities, Ar and Kir, will be destroyed.

2 The people of Dibon, your capital city, will go to their temple to mourn/weep;

they will go to their shrines on the hilltops to weep.

They will wail because of what happened to Nebo and Medeba towns in the south;

they will all shave the hair of their heads, and the men will cut off their beards to show that they are grieving.

3 In the streets people will wear rough sackcloth,

and on their flat rooftops and in the city plazas everyone will wail,

with tears streaming down their faces.

4 The people of Heshbon city and Elealeh towns in the north of Moab will cry out;

people as far away as Jahaz town in the south will hear them wailing.

Therefore the soldiers of Moab will tremble and cry out

and they will be very afraid [IDM].

5 I feel very sorry for the people of Moab;

they will flee to Zoar and Eglath-Shelishiyah towns in the far south.

They will cry as they walk up to Luhith town.

All along the road to Horonaim town people will mourn

because their country has been destroyed.

6 The water in Nimrim Valley will have dried up.

The grass there will be withered;

the green plants will all be gone,

and there will be nothing left that is green.

7 The people will pick up their possessions

and carry them across Willows Brook.

8 Throughout the country of Moab, people will be crying;

people as far away as Eglaim in the south and Beer-Elim in the north will hear them wailing.

9 The stream near Dimon will become red from the blood of people who have been killed,

but I will cause the people of Moab to experience even more trouble:

Lions will attack those who are trying to escape from Moab

and will also attack the people who remain in that country.

16 The rulers of Moab will say to each other,

“We must send some lambs from Sela city as a gift to the ruler of Judah to persuade him to not allow his army to attack us any more.

We should send them through the desert to the king.

2 The women of Moab will be left alone at the ◄fords of/places where people can walk across► the Arnon River;

they will be like [SIM] birds that have been pushed out of their nests.

3 They will cry out, ‘Help us!

Tell us what we should do!

Protect us completely [MET],

we who are running away from our enemies,

and do not ◄betray us/tell our enemies where we are►.

4 Allow those of us who are fleeing from Moab to stay with you;

hide/protect us from our enemies who want to destroy us!’

Some day there will be no one to oppress us,

and our enemies will stop destroying our land.

5 Then Yahweh will appoint someone to be king

who will be a descendant of King David.

As he rules [MTY], he will be merciful and truthful.

He will always do what is fair/just

and quickly do what is righteous.”

6 We people of Judah have heard about the people of Moab;

we have heard that they are very proud and conceited [DOU];

they are insolent,

but what they proudly say about themselves is not true.

7 Some day all the people in Moab will weep.

They will all mourn,

because there will be no more raisin cakes in Kir-Hareseth city.

8 The crops in the fields at Heshbon city will wither,

and the vineyards at Sibmah town will wither also.

The armies of other nations will destroy Moab,

which is like [MET] a beautiful grapevine

whose branches spread north to Jazer town

and east to the desert.

Its branches spread very far west,

to the west side of the Dead Sea.

9 So I will weep for Jazer

and for the grapevines of Sibmah.

I will shed tears for all of you.

I will cry because people will no longer shout joyfully, like they usually do

when they gather the fruit that ripens in the ◄summer/hot season► and the other crops that they harvest.

10 People will no longer be glad at harvest time.

No one will sing in the vineyards,

no one will shout joyfully.

No one will tread on grapes to get grape juice for wine;

there will be nothing to shout about joyfully.

11 I cry inwardly for Moab;

my groaning is like [SIM] a sad song played on a harp.

I am sad about Kir-Hareseth.

12 The people of Moab will go and pray at their sacred shrines,

but that will not help them.

They will cry out to their gods in their temples,

but none of them will be able to rescue the people.

13 Yahweh has already spoken those things about Moab. 14 But now he says that exactly three years from now, he will destroy all the things that the people of Moab have been proud of. Even though they have a huge number of people in Moab now, only a few people will remain alive, and they will be weak/helpless.