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Judgment on Israel’s Enemies

Gather together, gather,

O shameless nation,

before you are driven away

like the drifting chaff,

before there comes upon you

the fierce anger of the L ord,

before there comes upon you

the day of the L ord’s wrath.

Seek the L ord, all you humble of the land,

who do his commands;

seek righteousness, seek humility;

perhaps you may be hidden

on the day of the L ord’s wrath.

For Gaza shall be deserted,

and Ashkelon shall become a desolation;

Ashdod’s people shall be driven out at noon,

and Ekron shall be uprooted.

Ah, inhabitants of the seacoast,

you nation of the Cherethites!

The word of the L ord is against you,

O Canaan, land of the Philistines;

and I will destroy you until no inhabitant is left.

And you, O seacoast, shall be pastures,

meadows for shepherds

and folds for flocks.

The seacoast shall become the possession

of the remnant of the house of Judah,

on which they shall pasture,

and in the houses of Ashkelon

they shall lie down at evening.

For the L ord their God will be mindful of them

and restore their fortunes.

I have heard the taunts of Moab

and the revilings of the Ammonites,

how they have taunted my people

and made boasts against their territory.

Therefore, as I live, says the L ord of hosts,

the God of Israel,

Moab shall become like Sodom

and the Ammonites like Gomorrah,

a land possessed by nettles and salt pits,

and a waste forever.

The remnant of my people shall plunder them,

and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.

This shall be their lot in return for their pride,

because they scoffed and boasted

against the people of the L ord of hosts.

The L ord will be terrible against them;

he will shrivel all the gods of the earth,

and to him shall bow down,

each in its place,

all the coasts and islands of the nations.

You also, O Ethiopians,

shall be killed by my sword.

And he will stretch out his hand against the north,

and destroy Assyria;

and he will make Nineveh a desolation,

a dry waste like the desert.

Herds shall lie down in it,

every wild animal;

the desert owl and the screech owl

shall lodge on its capitals;

the owl shall hoot at the window,

the raven croak on the threshold;

for its cedar work will be laid bare.

Is this the exultant city

that lived secure,

that said to itself,

“I am, and there is no one else”?

What a desolation it has become,

a lair for wild animals!

Everyone who passes by it

hisses and shakes the fist.

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.

The Prophet extends farther the threatened vengeance, and says, that God would also render to the Ethiopians the reward which they deserved; for they had also harassed the chosen people. But if God punished that nation, how could Ammon and Moab hope to escape? For how could God spare so great a cruelty, since he would visit with punishment the remotest nations? For the hatred of the Moabites and of the Ammonites, as we have said, was less excusable, because they were related to the children of Abraham. They ought, on this account, to have mitigated their fierceness: besides, vicinity ought to have rendered them more humane. But as they exceeded other nations in cruelty, a heavier punishment awaited them. Now this comparison was intended for this end—that the Jews might know that God would be inexorable towards the Moabites, by whom they had been so unjustly harassed, since even the Ethiopians would be punished, who yet were more excusable on account of their distance.

As to the words, some regard the demonstrative pronoun המה, eme, they, as referring to the Babylonians, and others, to the Moabites. I prefer to understand it of the Moabites, if we read, like them, or with them, as these interpreters consider it: for they regard the particle את, at, with, or כ, caph, like, to be understood, Ye Ethiopians shall be slain by my sword like them, or with them. It would in this case doubtless apply to the Moabites. But it seems to me that the sentence is irregular, even ye Ethiopians, and then, they shall be slain by any sword. The Prophet begins the verse in the second person, summoning the Ethiopians to appear before God’s tribunal; he afterwards adds in the third person, they shall be slain by my sword. ¹⁰³¹⁰³     Newcome cuts the knot, here by an emendation, by [אתם], ye, for [המה], they; and Houbigant, by [תהיו], ye shall be,—“the wounded of my sword shall ye be.” This is according to the Septuagint; but the former is more in accordance with the Hebrew idiom; for the pronoun is often used without the auxiliary verb. Some take [המה] as ipsi in Latin, connected with vos, ye yourselves. Then the rendering would be—
   Also ye Cushites,
The slain of my sword shall ye yourselves be.
   But what Calvin says is not uncommon in the Prophet, the abrupt change of persons.—Ed.

God calls whatever evils were impending over the Ethiopians his sword; for though they were destroyed by the Chaldeans yet it was done under the guidance of God himself. The Chaldeans made war under his authority, as the Assyrians did, who had been previously employed by him to execute his vengeance. It follows—

¹⁰³ Newcome cuts the knot, here by an emendation, by [אתם], ye, for [המה], they; and Houbigant, by [תהיו], ye shall be,—“the wounded of my sword shall ye be.” This is according to the Septuagint; but the former is more in accordance with the Hebrew idiom; for the pronoun is often used without the auxiliary verb. Some take [המה] as ipsi in Latin, connected with vos, ye yourselves. Then the rendering would be— Also ye Cushites, The slain of my sword shall ye yourselves be. But what Calvin says is not uncommon in the Prophet, the abrupt change of persons.—Ed.