A Plea for Mercy

¹Send a flock of lambs from the rock of the desert[#16:1 Or possibly a place in Edom called Sela (see 2 Kings 14:7). Sela means “rock” or “cliff.”]

as a gift to the leaders in Jerusalem,

to the mountain of the Daughter of Zion.

²At the banks of the River Arnon, the women of Moab

are like newly hatched, fluttering birds.

³They say, “Make a decision!

Give us shelter. Hide the fugitives. Don’t betray them!

⁴Allow the Moabite fugitives to stay with you.

Be a shelter for them from the destroyer!”

One day the oppressor will be no more.

The destroyer will come to an end,

and the tyrant will vanish from the land.

⁵Then a government of unfailing love will be established,[#16:5 Or “a throne,” a metonymy for a king or government being established.]

with a faithful king in the tabernacle of David,

passionate for justice and swift to do what is right.

Moab’s Demise

⁶We have heard about Moab’s pride.

How haughty she is—filled with arrogance and insolence,

with nothing more than empty boasts!

⁷So now Moab will wail;

everyone will wail over the ruin of their country.

Lament and grieve for the foundations of Kir-Hareseth.

⁸All the lush fields of Heshbon are dried up.

The vineyards of Sibmah have struck down the lords of nations,

whose vines reached northward to Jazer

and spread to the desert.

Their shoots spread out and extend across the Dead Sea.

⁹So I weep along with Jazer over the vines of Sibmah.

I drench you with my tears, O Heshbon and Elealeh,

for the shouts of joy over the harvest

of fruit and grain have ceased.

¹⁰Joyful celebrations are stilled in the orchards;

in the vineyards, no one sings or shouts,

and no one treads out wine in the presses.

I have silenced your gleeful shouts.

¹¹Like harp strings, my heartstrings throb for Moab,[#16:11 Even for pride-filled Moab, God’s heart was moved with compassion.]

and my inner being sighs for your broken walls, Kir-Hareseth.

¹²When Moab comes to their high places

to plead with all their might

and enter their temples to pray, it will have no effect.

¹³This was the word the Lord Yahweh spoke in the past about Moab,

¹⁴but now the Lord Yahweh says, “In exactly three years, the splendor of Moab and her huge population will shrink to nothing; only a small and feeble remnant will remain.”[#16:14 Or “in three years as the years of [or “counted by”] a hireling.”]