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An Oracle concerning Damascus

An oracle concerning Damascus.

See, Damascus will cease to be a city,

and will become a heap of ruins.

Her towns will be deserted forever;

they will be places for flocks,

which will lie down, and no one will make them afraid.

The fortress will disappear from Ephraim,

and the kingdom from Damascus;

and the remnant of Aram will be

like the glory of the children of Israel,

says the L ord of hosts.

On that day

the glory of Jacob will be brought low,

and the fat of his flesh will grow lean.

And it shall be as when reapers gather standing grain

and their arms harvest the ears,

and as when one gleans the ears of grain

in the Valley of Rephaim.

Gleanings will be left in it,

as when an olive tree is beaten—

two or three berries

in the top of the highest bough,

four or five

on the branches of a fruit tree,

says the L ord God of Israel.

⁷ On that day people will regard their Maker, and their eyes will look to the Holy One of Israel; ⁸they will not have regard for the altars, the work of their hands, and they will not look to what their own fingers have made, either the sacred poles or the altars of incense.

⁹ On that day their strong cities will be like the deserted places of the Hivites and the Amorites, which they deserted because of the children of Israel, and there will be desolation.

For you have forgotten the God of your salvation,

and have not remembered the Rock of your refuge;

therefore, though you plant pleasant plants

and set out slips of an alien god,

though you make them grow on the day that you plant them,

and make them blossom in the morning that you sow;

yet the harvest will flee away

in a day of grief and incurable pain.

Ah, the thunder of many peoples,

they thunder like the thundering of the sea!

Ah, the roar of nations,

they roar like the roaring of mighty waters!

The nations roar like the roaring of many waters,

but he will rebuke them, and they will flee far away,

chased like chaff on the mountains before the wind

and whirling dust before the storm.

At evening time, lo, terror!

Before morning, they are no more.

This is the fate of those who despoil us,

and the lot of those who plunder us.

New Revised Standard Version Bible, copyright 1989, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

13. The nations shall rush. Although he appears to follow out that threatening, which he formerly uttered, yet he begins to comfort believers by repeating the same statement, as if we should say, “They who were unmindful of God must be punished for their wicked revolt, and must be, as it were, overwhelmed by a deluge; but the Lord will restrain this savage disposition of the enemies, for, when they have exercised their cruelty, he shall find a method of casting them out and driving them away.” This is a remarkable consolation, by which he intended to support the remnant of the godly. Nor does he speak of the Jews only, as is commonly supposed, for hitherto he has addressed his discourse to the ten tribes, and it is certain that there were still left in Israel some who actually feared God, and who would have despaired if they had not been upheld by some promise.

By these metaphors he describes dreadful storms and tempests. When the Holy Spirit intends to bring comfort to the godly, he holds out those objects which are wont to terrify and discourage the minds of men, that we may learn that God will easily allay all tempests, however violent and dreadful. As the winds and seas and storms are at his command, so it is easy for him to restrain enemies and their violence; and therefore immediately afterwards he compares the Assyrians to chaff.

As the chaff of the mountains before the wind. Although with regard to the Israelites their attack was terrible, yet he shews that before God they will be like chaff, for without any effort he will scatter all their forces. Hence it follows that we ought not to judge of their resources and strength by our senses. Whenever therefore we see the restraints laid on the wicked withdrawn, ¹⁰¹⁰ {Bogus footnote} that they may rush forward for our destruction, let us indeed consider that, so far as lies in ourselves, we are ruined, but that God can easily frustrate their attacks. גלגל (galgal) means a rolling thing, ¹¹¹¹ {Bogus footnote} which is easily driven by the wind.

¹⁰ {Bogus footnote}

¹¹ {Bogus footnote}