| Chapter 16 |
1 | Send you the lambs for the ruler of the land from Selah to the wilderness, to the mountain of the daughter of Zion. |
2 | For it shall be that, as wandering birds, as a scattered nest, so shall the daughters of Moab be at the fords of the Arnon. |
3 | Give counsel, execute justice; make your shade as the night in the midst of the noonday; hide the outcasts; don't betray the fugitive. |
4 | Let my outcasts dwell with you; as for Moab, be you a covert to him from the face of the destroyer. For the extortioner is brought to nothing, destruction ceases, the oppressors are consumed out of the land. |
5 | A throne shall be established in lovingkindness; and one shall sit thereon in truth, in the tent of David, judging, and seeking justice, and swift to do righteousness. |
6 | We have heard of the pride of Moab, [that] he is very proud; even of his arrogance, and his pride, and his wrath; his boastings are nothing. |
7 | Therefore shall Moab wail for Moab, everyone shall wail: for the raisin-cakes of Kir-hareseth shall you mourn, utterly stricken. |
8 | For the fields of Heshbon languish, [and] the vine of Sibmah; the lords of the nations have broken down the choice branches of it, which reached even to Jazer, which wandered into the wilderness; its shoots were spread abroad, they passed over the sea. |
9 | Therefore I will weep with the weeping of Jazer for the vine of Sibmah; I will water you with my tears, Heshbon, and Elealeh: for on your summer fruits and on your harvest the [battle] shout is fallen. |
10 | Gladness is taken away, and joy out of the fruitful field; and in the vineyards there shall be no singing, neither joyful noise: nobody shall tread out wine in the presses; I have made the [vintage] shout to cease. |
11 | Why my heart sounds like a harp for Moab, and my inward parts for Kir-heres. |
12 | It shall happen, when Moab presents himself, when he wearies himself on the high place, and shall come to his sanctuary to pray, that he shall not prevail. |
13 | This is the word that Yahweh spoke concerning Moab in time past. |
14 | But now Yahweh has spoken, saying, Within three years, as the years of a hireling, the glory of Moab shall be brought into contempt, with all his great multitude; and the remnant shall be very small and of no account. |